Robert C. O’Brien, President Trump’s National Security Advisor, asserts, in an op-ed published yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, that the plan to remove 9,500 US troops from Germany was forced by Russia and China.
“To counter China and Russia, two great-power competitors, U.S. forces must be deployed abroad in a more forward and expeditionary manner than they have been in recent years,” he writes at the outset. “This is the main reason the U.S. will reduce its permanently stationed force in Germany from 34,500 troops to 25,000.” O’Brien noted that while Trump confirmed the plan on June 15, details are still under development and no formal announcement has been made. “Several thousand troops currently assigned to Germany may be reassigned to other countries in Europe. Thousands may expect to redeploy to the Indo-Pacific,” he writes, while “the remainder will return to bases in the U.S.”
