United States Secretary of the Army, Mark Esper said on Wednesday in an interview for AFP that Poland is not yet ready for "Fort Trump", that is a permanent U.S. military base on its soil. The proposed territory isn't vast enough, he argued.
Polish President Andrzej Duda asked Trump for a permanent U.S. base during a White House meeting, offering to name it "Fort Trump," and explaining it would be a bulwark against what he considers a threat from Russia.
As he added, from Polish perspective, U.S. military presence guarantees security of our part of Europe. He reminded of Poland's purchase of American Patriot missile systems.
US Army Secretary Mark Esper told AFP that when he visited Poland in January, it appeared there was not enough space on offer to fulfill the training requirements for US soldiers.
It was not sufficient in terms of size and what we could do in the manoeuver space and certainly on the ranges," Esper said. "You need a lot of range space to do tank gunnery, for example."
He added that, in many cases, the terrain was "maybe not robust enough to really allow us to maintain the level of readiness we would like to maintain."
In order to present the idea of establishing Fort Trump in Poland, the French agency cited the Polish president who said in Washington: "I deeply believe this is possible and I'm certain that such decision would be beneficial for both Poland and the USA".
Esper is set to visit Europe next weekend, traveling to Germany, Bulgaria and France, where he will attend the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery for a commemoration 100 years after World War I.
AFP reminded that Donald Trump found the idea setting up an American base in Poland interesting, and he was enthusiastic about Poland's readiness to pay for it.
President Donald Trump said the United States is considering a request from Poland for a permanent U.S. military presence in the fellow NATO country, acknowledging that he shares Poland's concerns about possible Russian aggression.
According to Trump, setting up permanent U.S. military bases in Poland would cost about 2 billion dollars. "The President offered us much more than 2 billion dollars to do this and so we're looking at it. We're loking at it from the standpoint, number one, military protection for both countries, and also cost. A term you don't hear to often," said the American president.
Autor: gf / Źródło: TVN24 International, PAP, AFP