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The US Congress has passed a defence policy bill that mandates the Pentagon retain at least 76,000 troops in Europe, in a rebuke of President Donald Trump’s threats to scale back commitments to the continent.
The National Defense Authorization Act, a sweeping 3,000-page bill that authorises how the Pentagon can spend $900bn, passed the Senate by 77-20 on Wednesday. Trump is expected to sign the bill into law, although Congress has not yet passed the defence department’s funding bill.
The NDAA contrasts sharply on policy towards Europe from Trump’s new national security strategy, which called for “cultivating resistance” on the continent, blasted it for blocking peace in Ukraine and warned it faces “civilisational erasure”.
The act also comes as the Republican-controlled Congress is trying to flex more of its oversight muscles, especially on matters of national security, after nearly a year of passive support for Trump’s agenda.
The administration’s hostile rhetoric towards its allies across the Atlantic and sceptical attitude towards Nato has sparked fears that it will withdraw a significant number of US troops from Europe. The Pentagon has yet to release its highly anticipated global force posture review.
There are almost 80,000 American troops in Europe, according to a spokesperson for US European Command (Eucom), which oversees military operations in the region.
Troop numbers fluctuate regularly based on planned rotations and exercises. Since 2022, levels in Europe have ranged from 75,000 to 105,000. Prior to that there was an average of 65,000 troops.
The NDAA says that troop levels in Europe cannot fall below 76,000 for more than 45 days unless defence secretary Pete Hegseth and the Eucom commander certify to Congress that doing so would be in the US’s national security interests and that Nato allies were consulted. The Pentagon must also keep major weapons systems on the continent.
The bill calls on Washington to fund the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative with $400mn annually for the next two years for the manufacturing of weapons to be sent to Kyiv. It also tells the administration to maintain the Baltic Security Initiative to deepen security co-operation with the Baltic states.
Separately, the act mandates Washington to keep at least 28,500 troops in South Korea.
It also contains a provision to pressure Hegseth over US military operations in the Latin American region, stating that he would lose up to a quarter of his travel budget unless he provides the unedited footage of the controversial double-tap strike against alleged drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean Sea and Eastern Pacific to Congress’s two armed services committees.
He must also provide the orders for the strikes to Congress.
Hegseth on Tuesday delivered classified briefings on the boat strikes to senators. He declined to show them the unedited footage but said the armed services committees would see it on Wednesday.
He added that the Pentagon would not release the raw footage publicly. “Of course, we’re not going to release a top secret, full, unedited video of that to the general public.”
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