Pentagon to Give Trump Options to Reduce Troops in Germany

Defense Secretary Mark Esper will present President Donald Trump with a series of options on Monday to remove thousands of US troops from Germany, with others going to Eastern Europe, the Pentagon said on Saturday.

“Secretary Esper met with President Trump on Wednesday to discuss our presence in Europe,” said Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman.

“On Monday the Secretary will brief the President at the White House on options for our force posture in Germany.”

According to two top Pentagon sources, the proposal aims for a decrease of the total deployment of US forces in Germany to 25.000, as Trump declared on 15 June, with a decrease of 9.500 soldiers. Most of the 9,500 will move to the US, while some will be relocated to former Soviet bloc nations, the two officials said, reaching out for anonymity.

That shift, they added, would be meant as a clear warning to President Vladimir Putin of Russia, whose military ambitions were underscored by the 2014 annexation of the Crimea.

The two officials did not say to which European country the troops could be transferred, as this is one of the options to be presented to the President of the United States. But Trump, meeting in the White House on Wednesday with Polish President Andrzej Duda, said Wednesday that Poland would be one of the European countries receiving US troops.

The two men said that some of the troops would be permanently stationed there, but most of them would be rotating around the world.

In 1997, NATO promised Russia that it would not establish permanent bases in the former East bloc. So far, despite strains increasing, the Atlantic Alliance has only moved forces across the countries that are strategically nearest to Russia.

But the United States sees the annexation of Crimea and the continuing conflict on the Ukrainian-Russian border as freeing itself from the earlier commitment.

However, one of the two Pentagon officials stated that such exercises would be focused on reciprocal arrangements between the US and the countries involved and will not be carried out under the aegis of NATO.

The rotating method provides more stability and a higher degree of unpredictability — makes it more destabilizing for Russia, the official said.

But the calendar for the troop movements remains vague, with the US presidential election just over four months away.

Trump's declaration of a troop move came not long after German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that she would not attend the G-7 meeting that the US President planned to host this month. They've had a tense friendship for a long time.

Source: AFP