U.S. service members stand in formation during the German Armed Forces Proficiency Badge competition at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, in February 2026. (Kirk Frady/U.S. Army)
STUTTGART, Germany — The United States will pull up to 5,000 troops from Germany in the coming months, a move that comes amid a Pentagon review of the American military mission in Europe and tensions over the conflict in Iran.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the withdrawal, which is expected to be completed within six to 12 months, the Pentagon said Friday.
“This decision follows a thorough review of the Department’s force posture in Europe and is in recognition of theater requirements and conditions on the ground. We expect the withdrawal to be completed over the next six to 12 months,” chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.
Trump, when asked about the plan on Saturday, said, “We’re going to cut way down. And we’re cutting a lot further than 5,000.”
The move comes after German Chancellor Friedrich Merz earlier in the week said the United States was being “humiliated” by Iran during the course of the prolonged war in the Middle East. Merz’s comments prompted a strong reaction from U.S. President Donald Trump, who has complained that European allies have not done more to support the U.S. conflict.
The U.S. has roughly 34,000 troops in Germany, the highest number of any country in Europe.
If the U.S. aims to reduce the force presence quickly, rotational forces that move in and out of Germany could be the first to go. If the plan involves moving permanently based units, such as the Vilseck, Germany-based 2nd Cavalry Regiment, the Pentagon will need to uproot troops and families and find a new base of operations for those forces.
According to CBS News and The Wall Street Journal, the move is expected to affect one brigade combat team in Germany and cancel a planned deployment of a long-range fires battalion later this year. The deployment, which involved long-range conventional missiles, had been announced by the United States and Germany at the 2024 NATO summit in Washington.
At the end of his first term, Trump sought to remove 12,000 troops from Germany in connection with complaints about Berlin’s laggard defense spending. At the time, the 2nd Cavalry Regiment was identified as a unit to be redeployed to the United States. The plan also called for moving U.S. European Command headquarters from Stuttgart to Belgium among other moves.
The plan never came to fruition and was later canceled by former President Joe Biden.
Given that the Vilseck unit is the only brigade-sized combat unit in Germany, 2nd Cavalry Regiment appears to have been targeted again.
Even after a 5,000-troop reduction, U.S. forces in Europe would remain at around 80,000 — above the 76,000 threshold set by Congress. However, uprooting an entire regiment could run afoul of other aspects of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, which prohibits the Defense Department from using funds to make drastic changes to U.S. European Command before meeting a long list of reporting and justification requirements.
Other moves restricted in the NDAA include transferring any U.S. military facility to a host nation or handing over any pieces of military hardware valued at more than $500,000.
The removal of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment would be a blow to the small garrison town of Vilseck, whose economy revolves around the Army’s presence there.
In 2020, Vilseck officials said pulling the regiment from Germany would result in a nearly $1 billion hit to the Bavarian economy — a hit that could require state and federal support.
Meanwhile, the long-range fires unit likely to be targeted is the 3rd Battalion, 12th Field Artillery Regiment, based out of Fort Drum, N.Y., which was expected to take on a mission in Germany later this year. While the unit was activated in October, the Army never announced a concrete timeline for its deployment.
Before taking up his post earlier this year, the Defense Department’s top policy chief, Elbridge Colby, voiced concerns about the idea of sending more long-range artillery to Europe.
Colby, a longtime China hawk, accused Washington of “unwisely prioritizing Europe over the Asia-Pacific” after the Biden administration announced the deployment of the long-range fires unit in 2024.
After Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. boosted its presence in Europe, mainly by adding more rotational units, with troop levels peaking at about 100,000. The Pentagon began scaling back in October, removing a brigade combat team from Romania and other deployments on NATO’s eastern flank. The U.S. still maintains rotational forces in Europe, mostly based in Poland.
Allies in Europe have been anticipating a reduction in U.S. troops in Europe since Trump’s return to office. Top Pentagon officials have repeatedly emphasized that Europe was expected to take on primary responsibility for the conventional defense of the continent so the U.S. could turn its attention to the Indo-Pacific region.
Germany’s defense minister, Boris Pistorius, said the latest move was not unexpected.
“It was foreseeable,” Pistorius said according to German media, adding that “we Europeans must take on more responsibility for our security.”
A NATO spokesperson said the alliance was seeking more details from Washington but framed the decision as part of a broader shift toward greater European responsibility.
“This adjustment underscores the need for Europe to continue to invest more in defence and take on a greater share of the responsibility for our shared security,” the spokesperson said in a statement on X, adding that allies remain confident in their ability to maintain deterrence.
The conflict in Iran has also increased pressure on European allies, as Trump has pushed them to do more to support U.S. military operations. Trump has said he is reconsidering the U.S. relationship with NATO over disagreements with allies over the Iran war.
But any reduction to the force posture in Germany will likely take aim at units and capabilities that don’t negatively affect the Pentagon’s ability to project global power. For example, facilities such as Ramstein Air Base play a key role in extending the reach of the U.S. military worldwide. The base also has factored into military operations against Iran.
On Thursday, Trump said he also was weighing a troop reduction in Italy and Spain in connection with complaints those countries have been uncooperative in the military campaign against Iran. Spain has been singled out for special criticism after it ruled that bases and airspace in the country could not be used for military operations related to the Iran mission.
“Italy has not been of any help. Spain has been horrible,” Trump said Thursday.
Stars and Stripes reporter Matthew Adams contributed to this report.
