Poland Says US to Deploy Troops on Eastern Border

The US announcement of 12,000 troops leaving Germany now sees another scramble to secure US presences. Poland is reportedly keen to have a “permanent” US presence, complete with a command. They say at least 1,000 US troops will be involved.

Polish officials say the troops will be on the eastern border, and the command will manage all NATO troops on the Russian frontier. Poland has been courting a US presence for years, suggesting at times they’d joined NATO specifically for the opportunity to host US troops.

The opportunity to bring thousands of US troops back home, disappointingly, seems to have been short-lived hope. Worse still, the shaky suggestions from pullout critics that leaving Germany was a favor to Russia may well have played a role in a hasty scheme to dump some of the troops even closer to Russia, worsening the tensions in Eastern Europe.

Poland is also reporting they will soon sign a military deal with the US for substantial further cooperation. In recent years, the US has put troops in the Baltic states with an eye toward challenging Russia, and this Poland move seems a continuation of that.

Source: Antiwar.com