Berlin Welcomes Washington's Move to Freeze US Troops Withdrawal From Germany

The pull-out was originally announced by the Trump administration in 2020 in response to Berlin's reluctance to boost defence spending. A fraction of the withdrawn servicemen were set to be redeployed to Poland, with the fate of the move remaining unclear for now.

Berlin hails the US administration's decision to halt the withdrawal of its troops from Germany, the country's government spokesman Steffen Seibert has said.

"The German government welcomes this announcement […] The US military presence in Germany serves the European and Transatlantic security. It is in our mutual interest", Seibert added.

The freeze of the order was announced by President Joe Biden on 4 February as part of a comprehensive US global force posture review conducted by the Pentagon. The review will determine how many troops the new administration intends to keep in certain regions of the world, meaning that some bases hosting American forces might see an increase or decrease in personnel.

It is unclear so far how long the suspension of the US troop withdrawal from Germany will last and if Biden's administration will decide to return it to the 34,500 servicemen level, which existed prior to an order issued by Donald Trump in 2020. The former US president condemned Germany for being reluctant in meeting the voluntary NATO goal of spending 2% of its GDP on defence.

Under Trump's order, nearly 10,000 US servicemen were to abandon US bases in Germany with most of them returning home. Part of the withdrawn contingency, between 1,000 and 2,000 troops, were to redeploy to Poland at the request of Warsaw. It remains unclear if the Biden-ordered halt to the withdrawal has affected the additional deployments to Poland.