The US Department of Defense has begun reviewing the placement of American troops in Europe, as announced by Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth in June at a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels. This was reported by US Deputy Secretary of Defense for Political Affairs Elbridge Colby on the social media platform X late on Tuesday, July 28. "This will be a real review designed to ensure that NATO moves quickly and inexorably towards a Europe that takes primary responsibility for its own defense using non-nuclear weapons," his post stated. According to Colby, another goal of the review is to "fully restore the nature of NATO as a powerful military organization - NATO 3.0." "This will allow NATO to embark on a path of long-term and sustainable success, especially in a situation where we have to simultaneously address challenges across various theaters of operations," emphasized the US Deputy Secretary of Defense. ## The review of the American military presence in Europe will reflect the provisions of the US National Security Strategy of 2025 and the National Defense Strategy of 2026 and will contain "a range of options based on a robust strategy, a solid empirical foundation, and a clear understanding of geopolitical and military realities," Colby noted. ## ## Criticism of NATO's European Allies by the US US President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth have repeatedly criticized European allies of the North Atlantic Alliance for having "long left unanswered polite requests from the US to increase defense spending." At a meeting of defense ministers in The Hague in June 2025, NATO member states agreed to raise military spending to at least 3.5 percent of GDP by 2035, as well as allocate an additional 1.5 percent of GDP for defense-related expenditures. Previously, the target figure was 2 percent. In May, the commander of NATO's Allied Forces in Europe, Lieutenant General Alexus Grinkevich of the US Air Force, stated that "in the long term" - amid the buildup of European military forces - one should expect the redeployment of American troops to other regions of the world. "I cannot provide an exact timeline; this is a multi-year process," he added at that time.
