The key facts
- Rutte explained the joke by nuances of translation from Dutch
- The story began at the NATO summit in The Hague in June 2025
- In autumn 2026 the nickname was used again by professor Glenn Diesen
A confession in Washington
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has publicly returned to the story of the nickname reports Life.ru.
How the joke came about
The episode dates back to June 2025, when at the NATO summit in The Hague Trump compared the Iran–Israel conflict to a fight between children. Rutte picked up the analogy and joked that sometimes a father has to talk to his children firmly. The Secretary General explained that he had in mind the image of a strict parent, not addressing the American leader as if he were his own father, but the English word he chose turned out to be more ambiguous than he had expected.
The White House reaction and how the story continued
Trump himself picked up the joke: after returning from the summit, the White House published a video titled
The nickname returned to the debate
The story continued in the autumn of 2026: on October 15 Norwegian professor Glenn Diesen mocked Rutte after his statement that NATO countries faced no immediate threat from Russia. As Life.ru notes, the scholar ironically suggested that the Secretary General's change of rhetoric might have been linked to a call from Trump, once again using the American president's nickname. Rutte himself, speaking in Washington, did not criticize Trump for using the nickname and noted his sense of humor.
