For more than two decades Poland has been exposed to Russia. Being in the middle is an improvement for Warsaw, no?
For more than a year, the United States and Poland have been in talks over such an agreement, which Polish officials have indicated could be finalized by as soon as Sept. 1. However, such a fixed U.S. presence near Russia will undoubtedly spur Moscow to ramp up its own military presence near Poland's borders — placing Warsaw squarely in the middle of Moscow and Washington's increasingly heated great power competition.
As for causing Russia to threaten NATO, Russia has been doing that even as NATO has lacked the forces, logistics, or even plans to defend new eastern NATO members.
The main reason we are looking at permanent forces is to counter Russia’s ability to attack NATO reinforcements to Poland by using air defense and surface-to-surface missiles located in Kaliningrad.
Further, are you seriously going to argue that the Russians see our post-2014 constant rotation of an armored brigade into Poland as less than “fixed?”
The great power competition is purely the result of Russian hostility even when NATO was content to demilitarize and ignore Russia.
So don’t even talk to me about provoking Russia.
