Where Are U.S. Forces Deployed in Europe?

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Where are U.S. bases and forces situated in Europe? 

U.S. forces have been stationed in and deployed to Europe since the end of World War II. Numbers have fluctuated since that time, reaching a high of roughly 475,000 active-duty personnel in the late 1950s when the U.S. military served as a bulwark against Soviet and Warsaw Pact forces at the height of the Cold War. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, those numbers dropped to the tens of thousands. 

In early 2025, the United States had nearly eighty-four thousand U.S. servicemembers in Europe, according to the United States European Command (EUCOM). The total amount varies due to planned exercises and regular rotations of troops in and out of the continent. For example, following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, some twenty thousand additional U.S. soldiers were deployed to states neighboring Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine to support Ukraine and contain the conflict. Over the course of the war, the total number of troops has ranged between approximately 75,000 and 105,000 military personnel, primarily from the Air Force, Army, and Navy.

More than forty U.S. military bases span the continent, from northwestern Greenland to Turkey’s border with Russia. The bulk of bases are concentrated in central Europe—primarily in Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom. The headquarters of EUCOM is in Stuttgart, Germany, alongside the United States’ Africa Command. Many of these bases are also NATO interoperable, meaning U.S. troops work alongside the alliance’s member states to ensure cohesion across the alliance’s processes, technologies, information networks, and workforce.

What roles do these forces serve?

U.S. soldiers serve a variety of functions, from forward defense to providing logistics and training to allied forces.  Troops at Büchel Air Base in Germany, for example, manage the ten to twenty B-61 nuclear bombs housed there, while members of the Pennsylvania National Guard conduct joint drills with the Lithuanian military as part of the National Guard State Partnership Program. Members of the 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) train Ukrainian troops in special operations, primarily in Germany. The United States has also provided more military aid to Ukraine since 2022 than any other country, including significant amounts of weapons and equipment to boost its defensive capabilities. U.S. forces help to facilitate the transfer of weapons systems and ammunition, as well as train Ukrainian soldiers in how to operate the new machinery.

Generally, the following types of troops are based in Europe:

• Permanently assigned forces. These are military personnel who are permanently or semi-permanently based in a European country for an extended period. Referred to as stationed troops, these forces are part of a long-term U.S. military presence in Europe, occupy established military bases and facilities, and engage in regular training exercises with host nation forces.
• Long-term rotational forces. U.S. forces also undertake shorter-term deployments for specific missions or in response to events. In Europe, there are two primary operations involving rotational forces: NATO’s Enhanced Forward Presence (EFP) and Operation Atlantic Resolve. EFP was established in 2017 to unify NATO soldiers from multiple member states under a single command. The four so-called multinational battlegroups are located in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland and are led by the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, and the United States, respectively. In 2022, EFPs doubled in size in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Department of Defense launched Operation Atlantic Resolve [PDF] in April 2014 to send U.S.-based troops to eastern European NATO member states for nine months at a time. Atlantic Resolve hosts multinational training events in Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania.
• National Guard State Partnership Program. This security partnership program was established in 1993 after the collapse of the Soviet Union to help former Soviet states interested in joining NATO, primarily the Baltic states, reform their militaries. The United States now has twenty-nine partnerships with European countries.
• Temporary forces on training exercises in region. This entails large-scale training exercises involving multiple branches of the U.S. military as well as fellow NATO member militaries. U.S. troops that take part remain only for the duration of the exercise. 

U.S. forces also manage the country’s nuclear arsenal in Europe. During the early days of the Cold War, the United States deployed American troops to Europe and created a nuclear-sharing program through NATO. These programs served to deter Soviet aggression as well as prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons among NATO allies. Under these agreements, the United States once kept nearly seven thousand nuclear weapons in Europe. Currently, it is believed to house roughly one hundred B16 gravity bombs, which are smaller, tactical nuclear weapons, in Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, and Turkey. No country may use these weapons without the permission of the United States.

What could change in the aftermath of a Ukraine peace deal?

The outcome of the Trump administration’s efforts to negotiate a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine remains uncertain. Prominent members of the Trump administration have repeatedly expressed interest in downsizing the United States’ military footprint in Europe to focus on China in the Indo-Pacific. At a joint press conference with Polish Deputy Prime Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz this month, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth warned that American military presence would not last “forever,” prompting panic among European allies about the future of the transatlantic alliance.

In the event of a peace deal, analysts and European officials have voiced concern that Trump will withdraw the twenty thousand U.S. troops that have been deployed to Eastern Europe since 2022. Trump has also repeatedly said he would consider withdrawing the United States from NATO entirely.

However, on February 18, Trump said removing all U.S. troops from Europe was not a condition of a peace agreement in Ukraine but that the topic had not been discussed.

If the Trump administration decides to sharply alter the United States’ security presence in Europe, decades of military integration would need to be disentangled. Although the United States might not abandon the bases entirely, the Trump administration could demand Europe pay more for U.S. protection; they currently pay about 34 percent of operating costs for U.S. bases. European countries have already significantly increased their military spending over fears of a possible U.S. withdrawal from the continent. In a recent interview, incoming German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he aimed to strengthen Europe and achieve independence from the United States as quicky as possible.

Some experts say removing U.S. troops would also weaken the credibility of NATO’s Article 5, which commits member states to collectively defend each other in the event of an armed attack on one of them. An open question remains as to how a U.S. drawdown would impact the status of its nuclear weapons in Europe. The removal of the United States’ so-called “nuclear umbrella” would leave a significant gap in Europe’s collective nuclear arsenal, which Russia could readily exploit.

Will Merrow created the graphics for this article.