Commander: NATO Must Consider ‘Permanent’ Troops in Eastern Europe

Says Russia-Ukraine Situation Justifies Buildup on Frontier

The US has been sending some small deployments to Eastern Europe in recent days, but NATO Supreme Allied Commander and US Gen. Philip Breedlove is now talking up the idea of making alliance troop deployments in those regions larger, and permanent.

Gen. Breedlove insists NATO’s leadership needs to consider the possibility on the grounds of tension between Russia and Ukraine, and that it was time for leaders to answer “tough questions” about how much of a footprint they need in Eastern Europe.

Breedlove has been making the rounds in both the US and Europe, talking up the “threat” Russia poses along their eastern frontier, and drumming up support for sending troops to the area to placate Poland and the Baltic States.

But while those nominal numbers of troops were sent on the pretext of calming those nations down about the non-existent threat of Russian invasion, Gen. Breedlove’s own interest in building up his theater of operations as European Command leader seems to be taking over, with calls to make those deployments as big as possible and as long-term as possible.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.