“I’ll be moving troops to Eastern Europe in the NATO countries in the near term,” Biden told reporters at Joint Base Andrews upon returning from a trip to Pittsburgh., adding, “Not too many.”
This comes as the Pentagon has put 8,500 troops on heightened alert for potential deployment to NATO countries in Eastern Europe, The Hill reported.
Biden’s comments seemed to signal definitively that at least some of those forces would deploy soon. Most of the troops are expected to join a NATO rapid response force in Eastern Europe.
Russia has staged more than 100,000 troops at the Ukrainian border and recently conducted military drills in Belarus.
The American source has recently claimed that Russia may use a military option against Ukraine.
Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov repeatedly dismissed such rumors as groundless fanning of tensions.
He stressed that Russia was no threat to anyone. At the same time, Peskov pointed to a certain risk of provocations that might be staged to back up such claims and warned that any attempts at handling the crisis in southeastern Ukraine would entail dire consequences.
Referring to the US constructing role, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the United States and NATO had not addressed Moscow’s main security demands in their standoff over Ukraine, as US President Joe Biden announced an additional troop deployment in Eastern Europe.
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