{"id":2741,"date":"2025-02-16T02:32:45","date_gmt":"2025-02-16T03:32:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/?p=2741"},"modified":"2025-02-16T05:29:30","modified_gmt":"2025-02-16T05:29:30","slug":"us-asks-european-nato-members-to-count-their-troops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/16\/us-asks-european-nato-members-to-count-their-troops\/","title":{"rendered":"US asks European NATO members to count their troops"},"content":{"rendered":"

Washington seeks clarity on the scale of potential EU \u201cpeacekeeping\u201d deployment to Ukraine<\/strong><\/p>\n

The United States has asked its NATO allies in Europe to assess their available troops and weaponry and determine the size of the force they could deploy as a \u201csecurity guarantee\u201d<\/em> to Kiev, if Washington and Moscow reach an agreement\u00a0on ending the Ukraine conflict.<\/p>\n

US President Donald Trump surprised European allies on Wednesday with a lengthy call to Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss possible steps toward resolving the crisis. Since then, the US State Department has reportedly circulated a \u201cquestionnaire\u201d<\/em> to gauge EU allies\u2019 willingness to commit to a long-term security arrangement for Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Americans are approaching European capitals and asking how many soldiers they are ready to deploy,\u201d<\/em> one diplomat told Reuters on Saturday. The US questionnaire, first reported by the Financial Times, posed six key questions, including one specifically for European Union member states.<\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"NATO
NATO boss tells Europe to \u2018stop complaining\u2019<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThe Americans have provided Europeans with the questionnaire on what would be possible,\u201d<\/em> Finnish President Alexander Stubb confirmed when asked about the document on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference on Saturday. \u201cThis will force Europeans to think. Then it\u2019s up to the Europeans to decide whether they actually answer the questionnaire, or whether they answer it together.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky claimed in January that Kiev needs \u201cat least\u201d<\/em> 200,000 European soldiers as peacekeepers to enforce any potential agreement with Russia. However, analysts cited recently by the New York Times consider this figure unattainable<\/a>, noting that deploying even 40,000 troops would be challenging.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the Munich Security Conference on Friday, Zelensky issued a new demand to Ukraine\u2019s Western backers after the US said Kiev\u2019s goal of NATO membership was \u201cunrealistic.\u201d<\/em> He stated that without security guarantees from the US-led alliance, Ukraine would need to expand its army to 1.5 million troops \u2013 maintaining which would require a 50% increase in funding.<\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"Vladimir
Zelensky demands 1.5 million-strong army<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The Trump administration has repeatedly signaled its intent to minimize US involvement once a potential truce is reached, instead seeking to shift the financial and logistical burden of supporting Kiev onto regional allies.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be clear, as part of any security guarantee, there will not be US troops deployed to Ukraine,\u201d<\/em> US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told the Ukraine Defense Contact Group this week. \u201cSafeguarding European security must be an imperative for European members of NATO. As part of this, Europe must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and nonlethal aid to Ukraine.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\n READ MORE: <\/span>European NATO \u2018fears cost\u2019 of Trump\u2019s Ukraine burden shift \u2013 FT
\n <\/a>\n <\/p>\n

High-level delegations from Washington and Moscow will reportedly meet in Saudi Arabia next week to discuss the next steps and potentially lay the groundwork for a meeting between the countries\u2019 leaders. Kiev did not receive an invitation to participate, according to Zelensky. European NATO members have also voiced concerns that they could be sidelined in potential peace negotiations to resolve the nearly three-year-long conflict.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Washington seeks clarity on the scale of potential EU \u201cpeacekeeping\u201d deployment to Ukraine The United States has asked its NATO allies in Europe to assess their available troops and weaponry and determine the size of the force they could deploy as a \u201csecurity guarantee\u201d to Kiev, if Washington and Moscow reach an agreement\u00a0on ending the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2743,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2741"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2744,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741\/revisions\/2744"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}