WASHINGTON - US military officials have proposed sending more troops to Europe in a bid to counter Russia in the event of a crisis, a new report says.
The Wall Street Journal reports that proposals for the deployment of multiple US brigades in Europe were made over the weekend at the Reagan National Defence Forum at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California.
The US Army currently has two infantry brigades based in Eastern Europe, totaling approximately 7,000 soldiers. One other brigade rotates in and out of Europe on a regular basis. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley told the Journal that he would like to send attack helicopter units and artillery brigades to Europe as well as more rotating brigades.
Gen Philip Breedlove, the supreme allied commander of NATO, was quoted as saying that decisions on the proposals would be made "in the next couple of months." Any plans for a troop increase must be developed by the Pentagon, approved by President Barack Obama and funded by Congress. The paper reported that funding for the troop increase would be included in a budget request sent to Congress early next year.
The defence leaders slammed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “military aggression and threats” and warned that Washington must not allow Moscow to cooperate with the West in Syria. They said Putin’s military support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against ISIS terrorists is in fact a distraction designed to take away attention from the conflict in Ukraine.
Breedlove warned that cooperating with Russia on Syria means the West has accepted Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and support for pro-Russia forces in Ukraine’s Donbas region.
Ties between Moscow and Washington hit a new low after US-backed forces ousted Ukraine’s former president Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014.
US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter issued a warning against what he called the Russian “aggression” at the same forum, saying Saturday that Moscow seems “intent to play spoiler” by “throwing gasoline” on the fire of Syria. He then went on to criticize Russia’s “nuclear saber-rattling.”Carter said NATO is in need of a “new playbook” to deter Russia.
The US has vowed to develop military training bases in six countries on or near Russian borders, including Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, as well as Poland, Bulgaria and Romania.