<<Print>>

WASHINGTON: American troops are heading out for foreign shores yet again only months after a humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan in a fiasco that shook Washington. US President Joe Biden on Wednesday approved deployment of about 3,000 additional American troops to Eastern Europe amid ceaseless wrangling with Russia over Ukraine, on whose borders Pentagon says Moscow has amassed 1,00,000 troops ready to invade the former Soviet territory.

US officials emphasised that American troops are not being deployed in Ukraine but instead will go to Poland and Romania to protect Nato's eastern flank. Roughly 1,000 personnel based in Germany will move to Romania, and another 2,000 will depart shortly from Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina. Of these 1,700 members from 82nd Airborne Division will go to Poland and 300 members from 18th Airborne Corps will go to Germany.