President Trump Reduces NATO Involvement

The Pentagon is preparing to eliminate roughly 200 American military positions embedded within NATO command and advisory bodies. These personnel cuts will affect several of the alliance’s most influential planning centers, including intelligence, special operations, and maritime command structures.

The report comes via The Washington Post, whose reporters spoke with multiple anonymous officials.

This has been in the works for months and conforms with President Trump’s view that we need to refocus away from Europe and toward our own hemisphere. The President wants the EU nations to have their own militaries, as per the American National Security Strategy (NSS). The strategy is a revival of the Monroe Doctrine.

While not directly tied to the Greenland issue that has greatly upset Europe, it will add to the angst. However, the timing is interesting. President Trump will speak to the Davos crowd today, and he has brought a contingent. Secretaries Bessent and Lutnick are in Davos now.

The Reductions

The impending move will affect about 200 military personnel and diminish U.S. involvement in nearly 30 NATO organizations, including its Centers of Excellence, which seek to train NATO forces on various areas of warfare, these people said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail the U.S. administration’s plans.

Among the entities impacted are the NATO Intelligence Fusion Centre in the United Kingdom, the Allied Special Operations Forces Command in Brussels, and STRIKFORNATO in Portugal, which coordinates maritime operations. In total, roughly half of the American personnel assigned to these bodies will be removed.

It won’t happen all at once. It will take place by attrition over the years.

Among the advisory groups facing cuts are those dedicated to the alliance’s energy security and naval warfare, according to three officials

The Pentagon will also reduce its involvement in official NATO organizations dedicated to special operations and intelligence. Some of those U.S. functions will be shifted elsewhere within the alliance, limiting the move’s impact.

In a statement, a spokesperson for NATO said that “adjustments to US force posture and staffing are not unusual” and that the alliance was in “close contact” with Washington about its overall distribution of forces. However, it hasn’t happened for decades.

US forces are reduced to the lowest number of nearly 80,000, which is still enough during peacetime. Any more reductions must go through Congress.