Lawmakers added a provision to key defense legislation that, if included in the final version, would prevent the Pentagon from reducing the military‘s presence in Europe below a specific threshold.
The inclusion of this provision in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026, the language of which was released on Sunday, stands in contrast with the Trump administration’s stance on what its European presence should entail.
Section 1249 prohibits the Pentagon from reducing “the total number of members of the Armed Forces permanently stationed in or deployed to the area of responsibility of the United States European Command below 76,000 for longer than a 45-day period.”
It also bars the department from divesting, redeploying, or permanently moving equipment or physical property with an “initial purchase value of more than $500,000,” that was still in the area as of June, in addition to blocking the Pentagon from relinquishing the U.S.-held role of NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander.
NSS EMPHASIZES TRUMP’S ‘AMERICA FIRST’ PRIORITIZATION OF US’S BACKYARD
The Trump administration has publicly rebuked Europe in many instances for relying too heavily on the United States for defense and urged it in the National Security Strategy released last week to do more for its own security.
The document outlines the core principles of Trump’s “America First” foreign policy, and it focuses heavily on Europe.
“The days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over. We count among our many allies and partners dozens of wealthy, sophisticated nations that must assume primary responsibility for their regions and contribute far more to our collective defense,” the NSS said.
The NSS also underscored the “prospect of civilizational erasure” it sees posed by unregulated mass migration.
“The larger issues facing Europe include activities of the European Union and other transnational bodies that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering
birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence,” the NSS read.
The U.S. Army announced in late October that the 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the 101st Airborne Division would be coming home from its deployment in Romania without a replacement.
The Republican chairman of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) released a joint statement at the time stating that they “strongly oppose the decision not to maintain the rotational U.S. brigade in Romania and the Pentagon’s process for its ongoing force posture review that may result in further drawdowns of U.S. forces from Eastern Europe.”
As a part of the Trump administration’s efforts to reshape the U.S.-European relationship, the U.S. pushed for NATO members to increase their defense spending, while also reducing the burden put on America for providing military aid to Ukraine.
The Trump administration now sells military support destined for Ukraine to European intermediaries, who then give it to Kyiv without charging them. In this system, European countries are now taking on the cost of the equipment instead of the U.S.
It’s in a “core” U.S. interest to “negotiate an expeditious cessation of hostilities in Ukraine,” the NSS continued, adding that doing so would “stabilize European economies, prevent unintended escalation or expansion of the war, and reestablish strategic stability with Russia, as well as to enable the post-hostilities reconstruction of Ukraine to enable its survival as a viable state.”