8500 US and 40,000 NATO Troops Placed on Standby

The Pentagon has put 8500 troops on alert for possible deployment to Eastern Europe in case Russia invades the Ukraine.

I think there is no chance of any direct US or NATO engagement of Russian troops inside Ukraine. Troops would be doing to other nearby countries.

The UK and USA are drawing down embassy staff and embassy families from Ukraine.

There is also a 40,000 troop NATO Response Force. There is rumors of considerations to activate those troops. The NATO website reports:

NATO Allies are putting forces on standby and sending additional ships and fighter jets to NATO deployments in eastern Europe, reinforcing Allied deterrence and defence as Russia continues its military build-up in and around Ukraine.

France took the lead of NATO’s highest-readiness military force on Saturday, 1 January 2022, for a period of one year. The formation, formally known as NATO’s Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF), was created in 2014 in response to crises in the Middle East and Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, and is permanently available to move within days to defend any Ally. The VJTF is the highest-readiness element of NATO’s 40,000-strong Response Force.

In 2022, the VJTF will comprise a multinational force of several thousand troops. The Franco-German brigade of 3,500 troops will serve as the core of the force, drawing on the 1st Infantry Regiment and the 3rd Hussar Regiment. Led by France’s Rapid Reaction Corps in Lille, the Franco-German brigade is a bi-national unit, underlining the strong bond between NATO Allies Germany and France. Other NATO countries, including Spain, Portugal, and Poland will also provide forces. The majority of the force is comprised of units from the lead brigade.

NATO deployed a few thousand troops to some of the Baltic state NATO member countries in 2014 after Russia invaded Crimea. NATO did not stop Russia from taking Crimea but they sent troops to the neighboring allied countries to draw a line against Russia expanding its aggression.

This is the US and NATO telling Russia and Putin take half or the entire Ukraine but go no further. We will actually fight to protect NATO countries like Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.

NATO original members were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Joining later were Greece and Turkey (1952), West Germany (1955 and as whole Germany in 1990, Spain (1982), the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland (1999), Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia (2004), Albania and Croatia (2009), Montenegro (2017), and North Macedonia (2020).

SOURCES- NATO, White House, NBC News
Written by Brian Wang, Nextbigfuture.com

51 thoughts on “8500 US and 40,000 NATO Troops Placed on Standby”

  1. If NATO will offer instant membership if Russia invades Ukraine this would deter Russia since they would have to fight NATO. A second thing to do is give Ukraine short range missiles they could use to destroy the Russian bases if they invade. Bullies like Putin understand force.

  2. No it's not obvious at all. What military did you serve in? I served in the Marine Corps for 25 years and deployed many times, both in the US and overseas. I know what it takes to train, equip, and deploy a military unit. What have you done?

  3. You sound like the folks after World War One who said it was the war to end all wars. Twenty one years later WW2 started. One generation, three generations, ten generations – it doesn't matter. The public always eventually forgets the mistakes of the past and sooner or later history repeats itself. Conflict and disaster are inseparable parts of human existence, nuclear weapons don't change that. What makes wars and disasters more likely to happen is folks who refuse to believe it can't happen again – because thinking this way causes them to ignore all the warning signs and not prepare or take action to prevent it. It's kind of like the Titanic. No one thought it could sink. It did and 1500 people died because the crew wasn't really prepared to evacuate the ship and there weren't enough life boats for all the passengers. No one thought WW2 was going to happen. It did happen because France and Britain let their military forces wither away to the point they were unprepared to fight. Then in a blind panic they appeased Nazi Germany at the 1938 Munich Crisis. That was their last chance to force Germany to back down without a war. Instead they sacrificed Czechoslovakia in one the most cowardly acts of history. A year later the war started anyway and 70 million people died. You think NATO and Russia are not going to fight. It can happen. The more people think like you, the more likely it becomes.

  4. The EU has a population 5 times that of Russia and an economy 8 times larger.
    Why can't they defend themselves?

  5. 'Every generation makes the same mistake.' It's three generations since the end of WW2, during which there's been no direct war between major powers. You could probably define 'major powers' as 'nuclear-armed powers' – the three Arab-Israeli wars, and the three India-Pakistan wars, stopped when either side tooled up with nooks. Ukraine maybe regrets handing over the warheads they held when the Soviet Union collapsed, but in any case, Nato and Russia are not going to have a shooting war.

  6. The actual combat power of the NATO Response Force is not very large, only a few thousand troops.

    Ukraine's birth rate is 1.23. It takes 2.1 just to maintain a level population. I would like someone to explain why Americans should have children to defend Ukraine when Ukrainians don't do it.

    For that matter, I would raise the same objection about almost all NATO countries, whose birth rates are also very low, excepting France and the UK. For that matter, though, Russia's birth rates has been so low for so long that even the CPSU worried about it.

  7. I think that it is obvious that it takes way longer to build up a force in the other side of the world in another country then in your own country where you already have the infrastructure and you use Land Transportation.

  8. Specifically, Lennon wrote the song. More generally, when people succeed in Primal Therapy, they have a "live and let live" attitude, libertarian, which makes territorial power addiction a thing of the past, as does O'Neill.

  9. Every generation makes the same mistake. The public forgets the lessons of the past and then is shocked when they make all the same mistakes our ancestors made. Human civilization is simply a constant cycle of disaster, harsh lessons learned, recovery, slow fade of memory, blissful ignorance, and then the cycle renews.

  10. It all comes down to the ability of the Ukrainian military to fight. If the Russians invade and the Ukrainians put up stiff resistance, then Putin's goose is cooked. Even if the Russians advance deep into the Ukraine, NATO will simply keep up a steady flow of weapons, ammo, and supply deliveries to the Ukrainians which they will use to inflict severe casualties on the Russians. Eventually, as the number of Russian dead grow, and the West enacts ever harsher economic sanctions, the conflict will become unsustainable for them, both politically and militarily.

    OTOH, if the Ukrainians are wiped out or put up little resistance, then we're probably looking at a full Russian conquest of the Ukraine. But of course, all empires eventually collapse from their own internal corruption and loss of popular support. Even if Putin succeeds in the short term, it's unlikely he can extinguish Ukrainian nationalism. Stalin starved millions of Ukrainians to death, and still they clung to their desire for independence. Eventually Putin will die of old age, the Russian people will tire of dictatorship, and Ukraine will once again be free.

  11. Why does the location of the front line matter? Building up forces takes time. You have to move the forces from their bases to the build up area. You have to supply them. You have to make sure you the logistics are in place, including supply dumps, ammo dumps, etc. You may have to mobilize your reserve units which takes time to call up civilians and get them ready to deploy. For example, when I deployed to Iraq in 2006 I spent 4 months training for it. Travelling to Iraq took 19 hours. Making a force ready to fight takes much more time then actually getting it to the battlefield.

    But really none of this matters. It's obvious that Putin will invade if he thinks he can conquer Ukraine. His troop build up on the border is a way of testing the waters. Had the US and NATO responded meekly, he'd already be in Kiev. That he's held off doesn't mean he still doesn't intend to invade. He's measuring the Western response and looking to exploit political differences between the NATO members. Ultimately, if he comes to believe he can take the Ukraine at an acceptable cost, he will do so.

  12. www primaltherapy dot com. You may have heard of him as Lennon's therapist. Anything you see about childhood trauma, esp epigenetic changes, is along these lines, but Janov has the key experiment, the Primal.

  13. For now, it looks like NATO is attempting to deter Russia through a variety of methods. One of which is supplying Ukraine with more arms to defend itself.
    Should the Russians invade, a lot will depend on how well the Ukrainian military does at defending the country. If it does well, then it may be the case that NATO arms shipments will allow them to inflict enough casualties on Russian forces to cause them to withdrawal. If the conflict drags on, and should it become a humanitarian nightmare, then NATO will most likely step up its arm shipments, and provide other support. A NATO enforced no fly zone is possible. Improved air defenses and anti missile forces would be another option. Both will make it much harder for the Russian army to sustain the invasion. If worst comes to worse and the Russians attempt to occupy the whole country and extinguish all resistance, then the use of NATO military forces becomes much more likely.

  14. "I think there is no chance of any direct US or NATO engagement of Russian troops inside Ukraine."
    Grossly optimistic statement. Once armies are set in motion, it doesn't take much for a violent, escalating mistake to be made. For example Russian WWI mobilization plans – which didn't provide any options to stop, delay or slow the mobilization. 'Neutrality Patrols' that led to the loss of the USS Reuben James, etc.

    I personally have significant reservations about the current political/military leadership on both sides having any contingency plans for de-escalating if an incident happens. I'm sure there's a couple of Lt Colonels in the bowels of the Pentagon and Kremlin who would have good suggestions, but generals are political creatures and their political masters have not demonstrated mental flexibility in the past.

  15. Blowing up Putin's palace is just wishful thinking.

    But a scorched-earth counter-invasion targeting productive infrastructure isn't the worst idea, if you expect to lose anyhow. Make Russians feel the cost of Putin's aggression, see if they remain so supportive of their 'strong man' leader.

    Of course, the 'best' idea (least lives lost, least damage to Ukraine) is probably to just surrender to Russia and become a vassal state again. Do you think Ukraine is likely to do that?

  16. Biden will have no problem deciding as he is owned by the Chinese. He is bought and paid for by the Chicoms.

  17. If Xi Jinping makes a simultaneous move on Taiwan, Biden will be faced with a tough choice.
    And he may only have minutes to decide

  18. The build-up in these cases was much slower for obvious logistic reasons. Here the front line is close to the Russian Heartland.

  19. And, instead of the entire army, just send a small band of misfit soldiers who've been released from prison where they were put for a variety of "loveable rogue" type crimes.

  20. Attack against Iraq control of Kuwait in 1991: Armed forces build up in Saudi arabia from August 1990, don't attack until Jan 1991.

    Attack against Iraq in 2003. Armed forces build up from January, don't attack until March.

    D-day in 1944. Armed forces build up across the English channel for a year before attacking.

  21. I'm pretty sure the Leave vote was engineered by the English not wanting to live under the rule of Germans.

  22. That sounds super fun! Do the Ukrainians get their legs blown off on the way to Putin's house, or on the way back to the ruins of their homes?

  23. Ukraine should accept that defending Kiev is impossible. They should take their entire force, push through Crimea, and keep going into Russia. Putin's palace is only 100 miles from the Kerch strait. Rush it, sack it, get out. Ukraine will fall either way, but Putin will lose his home. Make the cost of war personal to him.

  24. "We" the broad collective mind know nothing of the topic. primaltherapy dot com How many news stories about popliticians start with the descriptor "neurotic"? How many popliticians have any faint clue they are neurotic?

  25. Lukashenko in Belarus is already a pro-Russian dictator who is dependent on Putin to stay in power. If Putin wants to annex Belarus all he has to do is tell them when to plan the parades in Minsk. No ruse needed.

  26. With reason, Russia doesn't want the Nato at the front door, so why do they intent to invade Ukraine? With that, they are placing the frontdoor step next to the Nato

  27. I never heard of an army that is on a standby for an attack for months in the front and then attacking. This is some part of very complex political maneuvering.

  28. Biden has agreed with Putin on some power consolidation agreement in Eastern Europe… Probably worse than his decision on Afghanistan and just as bad as the coming agreement with Iran.

  29. This is the US and NATO telling Russia and Putin take half or the entire Ukraine but go no further.

    Basically, "dont do what you have no plans of doing"?
    This what the effete do to pretend that they're not useless.

  30. I heard one pundit speculate that the build up against the Ukraine is a ruse to trick Belarus into complacency before Russia takes them. Western nations would issue protestations but secretly support ending the dictatorship there—even if it gave Putin his first major step towards restarting a pseudo Soviet sphere of influence.

    He could only take the Russian friendly bits of the Ukraine without engaging in a long guerrilla war. Belarus might be less hostile after there dictator is removed.

    It’s not a likely theory though.

  31. Sending troops to prevent Russia from taking more territory after conquering Ukraine. Does the Ukraine know that's the plan? Ukraine should surrender and work out a amicable arrangement. I think NATO protecting Ukraine's neighbors border should send a clear message they are a pawn in a game of peril.

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