US May Move Troops From Germany To Poland Over Berlin's Failure To Meet NATO Spending Goal

US May Move Troops From Germany to Poland Over Berlin's Failure to Meet NATO Spending Goal

The United States is again considering relocating some of its troops stationed in Germany to Poland since Berlin is not meeting its defense spending commitments within NATO, US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell said

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th August, 2019) The United States is again considering relocating some of its troops stationed in Germany to Poland since Berlin is not meeting its defense spending commitments within NATO, US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell said.

US President Donald Trump said in June that Washington and Warsaw in talks to increase the number of US troops in Poland by 2,000. These troops would not be deployed from the United States but rather transferred from Germany, as the latter had not increased its defense spending to 2 percent of its GDP.

"It is really insulting to expect that the US taxpayer pays for more than 50,000 Americans in Germany, but the Germans use their trade surplus for domestic purposes," Grenell told the DPA news agency.

Germany currently spends only about 1 percent of its GDP on defense.

On Thursday, US Ambassador to Poland Georgette Mosbacher reiterated the United States' concern that Germany was failing to meet its NATO obligations, saying that Poland met the 2 percent spending goal and that Washington would happily make the troop transfer.