'Velez-Green, who now serves as the senior adviser to the undersecretary of defense for policy, told Stars and Stripes last year that requirements in the Pacific mean European allies will need to shoulder a much larger share of the security burden on the Continent.''President Donald Trump’s team of defense advisers is taking shape, this week adding two high-level officials who have called for slashing the American armed presence in Europe and broadly restructuring the military to deal with China.
Austin Dahmer and Alexander Velez-Green, known for their hawkish views on China, will serve in senior posts focused on developing military strategy, the Defense Department said Tuesday.
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Overall, Dahmer’s report recommends about $70 billion less annually for the Army, which along with other cuts would give about $40 billion more apiece to the Navy and Air Force.
The realignment he calls for in the report would also exact a heavy toll on the security structures that Europe has been relying on for over a decade. For one thing, the U.S. European Command mission would be slashed.
The European Deterrence Initiative, a multibillion-dollar annual effort aimed at deterring Russian aggression, would be dramatically scaled back if not eliminated outright, according to the report.
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Velez-Green, who now serves as the senior adviser to the undersecretary of defense for policy, told Stars and Stripes last year that requirements in the Pacific mean European allies will need to shoulder a much larger share of the security burden on the Continent.
“These (EUCOM troops) are the forces that cannot be in two places at once. They’ll have to be backfilled by our NATO allies,” Velez-Green said in May.
He and Colby argued that the Pentagon has stretched itself too thin and that stakes in the Pacific are too high to overinvest elsewhere.'
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Deep cuts in Army, EUCOM downsizing among plans pushed by 2 Trump defense strategists, January 22, 2025
Context'The Biden policy on Ukraine has been a global disaster.'