US President Donald Trump has announced that the US will send an additional 5,000 troops to Poland. He has attributed the decision to his personal relationship with Polish President Karol Nawrocki, CNN reported.
The step came one week after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth halted a scheduled combat-team rotation to Poland as part of a wider US drawdown in Europe. About 10,000 US troops are typically stationed in Poland. Approximately 4,000 service members were frozen out of their planned deployments by Hegseth's order last week.
5,000 US troops from Germany
The new 5,000 figure restores roughly the pre-freeze level, as Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski stated when welcoming the announcement: the US troop presence "will be maintained more or less at previous levels," according to Al Jazeera.
"I am pleased to announce that the US will be sending an additional 5,000 Troops to Poland," Trump said.
Earlier this month, Trump had announced the withdrawal of 5,000 US troops from Germany after Chancellor Friedrich Merz said the US was being "humiliated" in its war with Iran.
Polish responses, and what cohabitation says
Nawrocki, who won Poland's June 2025 presidential election against the candidate aligned with Prime Minister Donald Tusk's centrist coalition and took office in the summer of 2025, welcomed the announcement in alliance language on X, calling the US-Poland relationship "a vital pillar of security for every Polish home and for all of Europe."
Tusk's government and Nawrocki's presidency constitute Poland's current political cohabitation: a centrist, pro-European coalition controlling the parliament and cabinet, and a right-wing, PiS-aligned president whom Trump endorsed and hosted at the White House in September 2025.
Belarus threat
What gives the troop numbers their strategic weight is the threat picture along Poland's eastern border. Poland shares a 260-mile border with Belarus and a 130-mile border with Russia's Kaliningrad exclave.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week warned of Russian planning for an offensive on the Chernihiv–Kyiv axis or against a NATO state from Belarusian territory, Euromaidan Press reported. On 21 May, he spoke from Slavutych, which is roughly 50 kilometers from the Belarusian border, to announce reinforced fortifications and air defense for Ukraine's northern axis.
