President Donald Trump plans to pull about 20,000 U.S. troops from Europe, according to a leading Italian news agency.
A European diplomatic source told ANSA that Trump, who entered office on Monday for a second term, wants to reduce the American contingent in Europe by about 20 percent and plans to ask for a “financial contribution” for the maintenance of the remaining troops.
The US doesn’t have troops in Europe to benefit Europe though. They have troops in Europe to benefit the US.
Europe should be totally fine with them leaving. Get off their territory, give up all that power projection and hamstring yourself.
What a weird thing to threaten.
Trump is as dumb as a bucket of shit. That’s why he’s threatening to shoot himself in the foot.
He’d cut off his own hand if you could convince him that it voted for Biden.
That will depend on whether Trump knows Putin has something planned for Europe now that his lapdog is in the White House
What could Putin have that could threaten Europe when he has been unable to make inroads in Ukraine for years?
It’s depressing, but the US is the largest supporter of the Ukraine war effort. Europe has been able to rely on a US-backed NATO for a long time, and boy oh boy is trump making it clear what a bad idea that was. If the US stops supporting Ukraine, even just materially (i.e. we keep supplying intelligence and similar), the war will turn depressingly quickly. Hopefully they’ve been able to inflict enough damage on the russian economy that they’ll agree to a cease fire, but no european nations are equipped to fight the war of attrition Ukraine has turned into. Even with the US + Europe together, we’re barely able keep up with the ammunition demanded by the war.
If NATO and the US are no longer as much if a factor? He can project westward with less fear.
Well i argue that it’s more complicated than that … Europe really did profit tremendously from the relationship with the USA after WW2, but now … not so much anymore, i guess. If one looks at recent developments.