Pentagon Tells NATO to Prepare for Deep US Troop Cuts

Elbridge Colby stood next to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in Brussels Thursday and delivered a message European officials have spent months bracing for: Washington wants the alliance’s current structure gone, replaced by one where Europe, not America, carries its own conventional defense — and the Pentagon’s six-month review of exactly how many US troops that leaves behind is now entering its final stretch.

The Under Secretary of War for Policy told NATO ambassadors the alliance’s current approach is “no longer fit for purpose,” calling for “partnerships not dependencies” and “clear-eyed realism and fundamental adaptation by all.” He specifically praised Poland, Germany and the Netherlands — Rutte’s own former post as Dutch prime minister making the mention pointed — for raising defense spending, calling the progress across several allies “extraordinary.” Colby framed the review, which he’s dubbed “NATO 3.0,” as designed to move the alliance “fast and irreversibly toward Europe taking primary responsibility for its conventional defense.”

The review Colby briefed allies on Thursday isn’t abstract planning — it has a hard deadline and real numbers attached. Launched July 27 and expected to conclude by year’s end, the assessment covers roughly 80,000 US troops currently stationed across Europe, nearly half of them in Germany, with additional forces in the UK, Spain, Italy, Poland, Romania, Greece and Estonia. The Pentagon has already sent NATO members a detailed questionnaire covering defense spending, strategy, procurement and — notably — support for broader US foreign policy priorities, a scope that goes well beyond traditional troop-and-basing calculations into something closer to a loyalty audit of the alliance itself.

Congress has already moved to blunt how far the cuts can go. Lawmakers inserted language into the 2026 defense funding bill setting a floor of 76,000 US military personnel in Europe — a legislative check that, per Foreign Policy’s reporting, means competing priorities inside Washington could stop the Pentagon from delivering the scale of drawdown some officials are pushing for, regardless of what Colby’s review ultimately recommends.

European governments aren’t waiting passively for the verdict. Diplomats told Reuters they planned to use Thursday’s meeting specifically to reassure Colby that member states are already increasing their own defense contributions, with one European diplomat stressing it was important NATO’s top military commander stay involved so “the review doesn’t become a beauty contest” — a pointed warning against a process driven purely by Washington’s internal politics rather than genuine alliance planning. That defensive posture reflects a broader anxiety: this review follows Washington’s announcement of troop withdrawals and reduced force commitments to NATO defense plans even before Thursday’s briefing, leaving allies with reason to worry the consultation process is more formality than genuine input.

The stakes go beyond troop numbers to the credibility question already surfacing elsewhere this week. Trump’s own comments Thursday dismissing concern about a Russian move against NATO territory — made the same day Colby was in Brussels warning allies to prepare for reduced US presence — sit awkwardly next to reporting that CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s Moscow trip this week specifically raised the possibility of a Russian NATO operation. A posture review premised on Europe absorbing more of its own defense burden lands very differently if the underlying Russian threat is being downplayed by the same administration ordering the drawdown.

With the review due to conclude by year’s end, the coming months will determine whether “NATO 3.0” produces a genuinely rebalanced alliance or simply a smaller American presence layered onto unresolved questions about Washington’s actual commitment to the continent’s defense.