U.S. to Withdraw 5k Troops from Germany, Pentagon Says

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/01/us/politics/us-troops-germany.html

by mikhael • 3 months ago

62 46 3 months ago

nytimes.com

doctaj• 3 months ago

https://archive.ph/TvRui

thaumasiotes• 3 months ago

That's just an empty pane saying "please disable your ad blocker".

kogus• 3 months ago

If this is the Trump Administration's "punishment" for "disloyalty", then we are in for a treat. Hopefully US forces can also be withdrawn from Japan, Iraq, Italy, Guam, and the other 180 locations where they are currently unnecessarily stationed.

arvid-lind2• 3 months ago

I'm thinking it's meant to appear as a punishment for disloyalty, but withdrawing troops like this only hurts the US and NATO. As we've seen in the Middle East recently, the hosts don't get any kind of security guarantees.

Overall it meets the primary directive of this administration, which is to weaken the United States as a superpower and make way for Russia.

pohuing• 3 months ago

It does remove money from local economies. The drawdown of the British hurt my regional economy quite a bit.

tharkun__2• 3 months ago

Withdrawing 5k troops that are probably just rotational troops that ... go home without replenishment is different from actually shutting down bases.

Unless Germany denies the US Ramstein airbase and spying operations, you can safely bet they'll stay. Even if they withdraw everything that isn't required to just keep operating the airbase and listening posts, they'll at least keep those around for as long as they are able to actually use them.

curmudgeon22• 3 months ago

The Pentagon said the withdrawal was expected to be completed over the next six to 12 months. Germany is home to around 35,000 active-duty U.S. military personnel, more than anywhere else in Europe.[1]

[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/us-troops-germany-withdraw-nat...

icegreentea22• 3 months ago

The articles mention withdrawing a BCT (which is ~4000 people) form Germany.

The US currently has 2 BCTs "fully" in Germany. The 2nd Cav Regiment (a Stryker unit.. so infantry mounted on 8x8 APCs) and an Armoured BCT on 9 month rotation (so tanks and IFVs).

There have been a bunch of studies indicating that the rotational ABCT costs more than even a truly forward deployed ABCT. My bet is that it's the ABCT that is going to get withdrawn. It's both the flashier unit, and likely has the highest impact on freeing up money. This also lines up with the withdrawal timelines... since the unit is rotational, they just need to wait for the end of rotation, and just... not send another. Much less disruption.

While the timing was obviously conjunction with current events, this draw down was likely to happen at some point in this term, even in absence of Iran things. Trump literally tried to do this at the end of his last term.

rayiner7• 3 months ago

Good. It’s not 1945 anymore, we don’t need to keep occupying Germany.

trhway2• 3 months ago

now Germany has a choice - to spend hundreds of billions for conventionally armed military to defend itself and still face risks of war or just a few billions to develop and produce nukes (using already existing Pu from the power plants) and have everlasting peace. Germans are rational people as i heard.

Ksv28• 3 months ago

They can learn a lot from the Swiss who spend a whole lot of less time and energy reacting daily to what the US thinks, says and does.

rayiner7• 3 months ago

Do you think Germany doesn’t have nukes? I’ve always assumed it’s like Japan. They don’t “have nukes.” Just all the parts to make a nuke in five minutes.

cthe• 3 months ago

The nuke is a tricky thing: deterring many scenarios like a full scale invasion, but a risk of mutual suicide when the enemy also has it. As a matter of fact it does not stop from "hybrid war", there are so many possibilities to harm a country (disorganize society, promote a friendly leader, attack critical infrastructures,...). So having nukes certainly increases security in many cases but is not sufficient to have everlasting peace !

jacquesm8• 3 months ago

Every time you comment on here you show a little bit more of how little you understand of how the world works.

It is not 1945 anymore, indeed. But that's not why the US has bases in Germany. It has bases in Germany to serve as 'stationary aircraft carriers' on friendly foreign soil, which is a privilege and as part of NATO a mutual benefit and which were there on account of Russia and the Middle-East, not because Germany was still perceived as a threat or a country that needed occupation, that particular need ended well before the Unification and the withdrawal of Russians from Eastern Europe.

Tossing all of that into the grinder isn't 'making America great' it is making America smaller, much smaller. The EU has spent an absolute fortune on US military hardware in return in the past. That will end now, and this is being said out loud. EU military spending has been on the rise, but the US fraction of that spending is diminishing, and is expected to diminish further.

This will hurt the US much more than that it will help. So these are - like most MAGA inspired actions - at best own goals, at worse active aid to Putin.

You should be able to figure out the truth of this: if withdrawing 5K troops made sense outside of the context of being ostensibly as pay-back for Merz stating that the US has been humiliated by Iran - which they have, there is no doubt about it - then it would have been done so. But instead, the use of one particular word that your king is a bit sensitive to because it hits home is what set this off.

rayiner7• 3 months ago

You should be able to figure out the truth of this: if withdrawing 5K troops made sense … there is no doubt about it - then it would have been done so

If American foreign policy was rational, we wouldn’t have been involved in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and now Iran. Not to mention Somalia, Kosovo, and Libya, and countless minor skirmishes. We’ve been throwing kids into the meat grinder for 75 years, and lighting dollars on fire, for no good reason. There’s no reason for us to light money on fire having bases all over the world, when we have two huge oceans to protect us.

I’d also point out that “MAGA” is not united on this. A third of Republicans disapprove of Trump’s handling of the Iran war: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2026/05/01/americans.... Traditional republicans have long wanted to attack Iran so they’re pleased. But the America First people have been vocal in their opposition: https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/04/28/iran-war-trump-coalitio...

karim79• 3 months ago

Germany is silent on the Gaza genocide, and silent on the ethnic cleansing of Lebanon. Also Donald Trump doesn't have a fucking clue.

To get back to the point, I actually do not understand why there are any US soldiers here to begin with. Is it just posturing?

icegreentea22• 3 months ago

There are two broad reasons why the US has troops in Germany (and in Europe overall).

1. Because the Europeans wanted them there. NATO was a big security blanket, and certainly since the end of the cold war, up to say... 2014, America -wanted- a compliant Europe.

2. Because Europe is an amazing springboard into the middle east, and America just can't help but get itself involved in dropping bombs on the middle east.

1 ties into 2. A compliant Europe is less likely to raise objections to being used as a forward base for bombing Iraqis and Iranians. It's only in the last 10-15 years that the US realized that perhaps it was/had squandered it's lead to China, and dropped the ball (Europe at fault too) on properly containing (or addressing) Russia, and it would sure be nice if it could focus on the Pacific.

tharmas• 3 months ago

And number 3:

To ensure that Germany and Russia never team up to be a world super power that would rival the USA.

That's the main reason they are there.

nikeyshon• 3 months ago

https://archive.ph/hFHiE

CMay• 3 months ago

Not sure this really means anything, but we've been fairly transparent that we want to redirect attention and funding towards the pacific.

Jtsummers• 3 months ago

For the many commenters that can't be bothered to exercise their reading comprehension skills:

This is not reducing to pre-WWII levels, this is reducing down to 2022 levels (pre-Russia discovering their military can't win a war against Ukraine). It's mostly symbolic because Trump is a thin-skinned idiot and his staff wanted an easy way to appease him and make it look like something important was happening.

yongjik• 3 months ago

This may not be the end of the days of America the Superpower... but it may be the beginning of the end.

orwin• 3 months ago

Maybe Germany will stop being the Trojan horse of the US inside the EU, at least for the defence.

Trump honestly have been great for EU sovereignty. It's a shame that his decisions caused that much suffering, which prevents me to truly be happy that he controls the US, but I do believe he is a net positive for the EU.

U.S. to Withdraw 5k Troops from Germany, Pentagon Says

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