Withdrawing Troops From Europe Is a Policy in Search of a Problem

(Photo illustration by Bill Kuchman/The Bulwark | Photos: Getty, Shutterstock)

THIS WEEK, AS NATO LEADERS gather in Ankara, Turkey for their annual summit, the Department of Defense is continuing a comprehensive review of America’s force posture in Europe—i.e., what forces the United States maintains there, what their capabilities are, and where exactly they’re stationed or deployed. The goal, according to a DOD publication, is “that the alliance will pull its own weight in terms of defense funds spent and that Europe will take the lead in maintaining its defense.”

The debate over force posture risks becoming an exercise in counting brigades and troop numbers rather than evaluating strategy—especially when it’s connected, as it inevitably will be, to the administration’s poorly explained and apparently vindictive decisions to withdraw troops from Europe or rebase them around the continent. Military posture is about far more than the number of soldiers stationed on the continent. It is principally about preserving America’s ability to act—militarily, diplomatically, economically, and politically—when the next crisis arrives.

It seems entirely likely that the result of this review—which Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said could take less than six months—will be further reductions of American forces in Europe. That may be appropriate, though having participated in the last two meticulous reductions of forces in Europe, I have my doubts. The bigger issue is that Secretary Hegseth and his aides seem to have arrived at a “solution” before they’ve taken the time to study the problem. Reducing American forces in Europe for its own sake doesn’t seem to be a strategic goal; rather, it’s a policy in search of a rationale.

Simply put, force posture should be where strategy connects resources and geography. The process of deciding force posture should translate national objectives into airfields, ports, headquarters, logistics hubs, transportation networks, training areas, pre-positioned equipment, alliances, and military formations around the world. The positioning of America’s military should be the ways and means to preserve American freedom of action. A force posture review should never begin with a map covered in unit symbols, but with a strategy—a goal and a plan for achieving it. Before we ask where American forces should be stationed, and in what numbers and strengths, we first should ask what options will be necessary and useful to future presidents in an emergency.

Strategists rarely ask, “Where can we move forces?” They ask, “What capabilities must we preserve, and from where can they best influence events?” One approach measures success by counting troops. The other measures success by preserving national options.

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SERVING FOR MORE THAN A DECADE in Europe—as a planner, a division commander, and ultimately as the commander of U.S. Army Europe—I participated in two of the most significant force posture transformations in modern American military history. The first followed the end of the Cold War, when America’s permanent Army presence in Europe declined from nearly 300,000 soldiers to roughly 90,000 as the Soviet threat disappeared and a democratic Europe emerged. The second occurred about a decade later when the Army force on the continent was reduced from approximately 90,000 soldiers to about 34,000.

The shortest, simplest way to describe those strategic changes is in numbers—as I’ve just done. But simply counting heads does more to obscure than to explain those force posture decisions and their effects.

We replaced large, permanent formations with units specifically designed to ensure mission accomplishment, with new facilities, rotational armored brigades, expanded pre-positioned stocks so equipment remained in theater, modernized and world-class multinational training centers, strengthened strategic mobility, and stronger military relationships with new allies and partners that had once stood behind the Iron Curtain.

The objective was never simply to reduce numbers. In fact, the reduction in personnel stationed in Europe can best be described as a simple consequence of the real goal, which was to reduce spending while preserving—and in many respects expanding—America’s strategic flexibility in a changing new security environment.

That experience reinforced one lesson above all others: Successful force posture reviews are measured not by how many units disappear from a chart but by whether the nation gains or loses strategic options. Every decision was aimed at expanding America’s freedom of action during the next crisis. (As I’ve written before, I thought at the time that some of the decisions we made were misaligned with the security environment and the national interest. Even a good process can’t prevent mistakes and errors.)

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BECAUSE FORCE POSTURE IS ABOUT the country’s overall national security goals and our government’s response to potential crises, the review process should not belong to the Defense Department alone.

Military leaders understandably focus on readiness, capabilities, and operational requirements. But force posture influences every element of national power. The Department of State understands how military presence affects diplomacy and alliance management. Treasury and Commerce appreciate how security commitments shape investment, trade, industrial cooperation, and economic resilience. The intelligence community will evaluate how allies and adversaries interpret and respond to American force placement decisions. Congress authorizes resources, exercises oversight, and represents the American people in determining long-term national commitments. Our allies themselves will also have legitimate perspectives because the infrastructure, access agreements, and relationships that underpin American power have been built together over generations, and those governments will also place their security forces to complement U.S. basing locations.

A force posture review worthy of its name should reflect all those perspectives. If it doesn’t, it risks becoming a manpower exercise rather than a strategy review.

Some will argue that Europe has become wealthy enough to defend itself. Others will contend that China—not Russia—is America’s defining strategic challenge, and there should be a visible “pivot” to locations in the east. Still others will correctly observe that many European governments underinvested in defense for years while relying heavily upon American capabilities. Each of these arguments contains elements of truth. But they also overlook important history.

The effort to encourage greater European defense spending did not begin with President Trump. Debates about burden sharing in European defense can be traced back as far as NATO’s 1952 meeting in Lisbon, when allied leaders realized that the European NATO members wouldn’t be able to raise the regular forces necessary for their defense, and would rely instead on America’s nuclear arsenal. More recently, in June 2011, then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates delivered a remarkably candid speech in Brussels warning NATO leaders of a “dim if not dismal future” if alliance members failed to reverse declining defense investment. Such prodding from the United States continued throughout the Obama administration and became significantly more urgent after Russia’s illegal seizure of Crimea in 2014. President Trump intensified that pressure through much sharper rhetoric, but the strategic objective remained consistent across administrations: Encourage European allies to assume greater responsibility for their own defense while preserving the alliance that magnifies American power.

By many measures, that strategy and the related pressure has worked over the last decade, over four administrations.

Because of this, and the increased Russian threat, European defense spending has increased dramatically. Allies have expanded military production, rebuilt ammunition stockpiles, modernized command structures, strengthened air and missile defenses, and invested in capabilities that had atrophied following the end of the Cold War. Those developments represent one of NATO’s most significant strategic successes of the past decade.

Some now argue that these improvements justify reducing America’s own presence in Europe. But that suggestion misunderstands why American forces are stationed there in the first place. They are not there simply to defend Europe, but to enable America, provide us global flexibility, while meeting our strategic objectives.

Military power rarely operates within neatly defined political boundaries. Logistics certainly do not. Europe’s mature network of ports, airfields, headquarters, maintenance facilities, transportation infrastructure, intelligence architecture, and allied relationships has become one of America’s greatest strategic advantages. During operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, nearly every major deployment, sustainment mission, casualty evacuation, and redeployment flowed through that network. More recently, the conflict with Iran once again demonstrated how indispensable those command relationships, logistics hubs, intelligence capabilities, and transportation systems remain.

The same logic applies to the Indo-Pacific. Any future confrontation with China would demand simultaneous operations across multiple theaters while protecting the homeland, reinforcing allies, sustaining global supply chains, and maintaining commitments elsewhere around the world. A quick perusal of the histories of the world’s great powers, from Rome to the British Empire, shows that great powers do not have the luxury of focusing on a single region. They compete through global networks of alliances, infrastructure, logistics, economic capacity, and strategic geography. Europe remains one of America’s strongest nodes in that worldwide network. Weakening it would not strengthen America’s position in Asia; it would diminish America’s ability to respond everywhere.

Force posture, therefore, should never be viewed as an accounting exercise. It should be seen as an exercise to provide strategic flexibility.

Every headquarters retained, every training area modernized, every logistics hub protected, every pre-positioned equipment site maintained, every access agreement renewed, and every alliance strengthened expands the choices available to future presidents. Every unnecessary and haphazard reduction narrows those choices. Once abandoned, headquarters, training areas, logistics hubs, repair facilities, equipment stocks, access agreements, and alliances cannot be recreated during a crisis. They require years—often decades—of diplomacy, investment, trust, and cooperation to rebuild.

Over Independence Day, Americans gathered with family and friends, watched parades and fireworks, reflected on our nation’s founding, and honored generations of men and women who have defended the freedoms secured nearly 250 years ago. Yet our independence itself was never achieved in isolation. Throughout our history—from the Revolution to World War II, the Cold War, and into the twenty-first century—America’s greatest strategic successes have depended not only on military strength, but on geography, partnerships, and alliances patiently cultivated over generations.

For nearly 250 years, America’s security has depended not only on the courage of those in uniform, but on the wisdom of the civilian and military leaders who decide where those forces should stand, whom they should stand beside, and what strategic options they would preserve for those who followed.

That is the responsibility facing today’s leaders. And the decisions deserve to be guided by strategy, informed by history, and measured not by the next budget cycle or the desires of a few, but by the needs of the next generation.