We withdrew our last tank unit from Europe about a year ago. We decided we didn't need that insurance policy for deterrence in post-Cold War peaceful Europe.
But we stored some heavy equipment in Germany for training purposes. We will use some of this for training:
Notably, the Army is putting to use its new European Activity Set for the first time. The EAS is a stockpile of M-1A2SEPv2 Abrams tanks and M2A3 Bradley fighting vehicles, stored in warehouses at the Joint Multinational Training Command in Grafenwoehr, Germany.
This isn't a prepositioned set, however, since it only supports a task force element (reinforced battalion) and a brigade headquarters element rather than a full brigade set.
I will repeat what I called for after Russia invaded Georgia in 2008--put unit sets of heavy equipment in southern Poland:
The return of a belligerent Russia means that the age of peace is over in Europe. Which means that the logic of reducing our Army in Europe is blown away, killed in Gori, Georgia under the weight of Russian armor.
I noted my wish that we'd keep the leading elements of a full corps in Europe capable of reacting to threats from West Africa to Central Asia--and in light of Russia's invasion of Georgia--an arc of crisis that went through eastern Europe, too:
It is apparent that the arc of crisis also takes a hard left and extends through the Caucasus, Ukraine, eastern Europe, and the Baltic states. We now need a robust United States Army Europe to cope with the Russians pining for past glory days.
While not proposing we move our Army into eastern Europe, I wanted NATO prepared to mass in Poland for operations north, east, or south:
[We] should establish American, British, and German equipment depots for additional heavy brigades in southern Poland. If we can fly in troops to man these forces, in a return of forces to Poland (REFORPOL) concept, we'd enhance deterrence without forward deploying powerful NATO offensive units that would scare the Russians in reality instead of their faux fear of Georgians and Latvians. Those units could swing north or south or stay put once manned and fielded.
So far, counting on a benign Russia that is a strategic partner, we've extended NATO membership east without extending NATO military strength east in any significant fashion. It is time to correct that mistake. Russia has shown they'll strike at gaps in our defenses. Fill those gaps.
REFORPOL is patterned on our REFORGER (Return of Forces to Germany) program in the Cold War, which put unit sets in Germany so troops could quickly fly in to draw the equipment and take the field faster than shipping a unit with its equipment from the continental United States could achieve.
Strictly speaking, the Ukraine crisis is not a gap in our defense. Ukraine is not a NATO member. But the Baltic states feel the gap right now. And the distance of NATO's defense center of gravity in western NATO from eastern Ukraine where the crisis is gives Russia confidence that whatever problems they might face in subduing a resisting Ukrainian population, they do not need to worry about direct NATO ground intervention on the side of Ukraine.
Fill the gaps with American heavy armor. Gori did not kill our delusions of peace that encompassed ill-deserved mockery of Mitt Romney in 2012 for worrying about Russian aggression. Can we sleep through Crimea, too?
And at this point, I'd like to see a single American heavy brigade added to our European Command and located with the unit sets in Poland.
