By Gistflash News
Aug 9, 2021
The U.S. Army on Monday planned to retain several locations that were scheduled to be returned to Germany due to the country’s growing need for facilities in Europe.
The Amelia Earhart Centre in Wiesbaden, the Pulaski Barracks in Kaiserslautern, the Barton Barracks in Ansbach in Bavaria, the Coleman Barracks in Mannheim and Weilimdorf Warehouse in Stuttgart were included in the military’s revised plans, the army said.
In addition, Husterhohe Barracks in Pirmasens is scheduled to transfer from the U.S. Army to the U.S. Air Force, the army announced at its European headquarters in the western German city of Wiesbaden.
The expected closure of Coleman Barracks was reported in 2010.
Plans for the other sites became public in 2015 as part of the Defense Department’s consolidation of European infrastructure.
But in April, it was announced that the U.S. planned to increase the number of soldiers in Germany by 500, with the additional personnel to be stationed in the Wiesbaden area in the coming months.
U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin described the new deployment as a sign of the U.S.’s commitment to Germany, a key European ally of Washington.
About six months before his November election defeat, former U.S. President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of 12,000 of the roughly 35,000 U.S. troops stationed in Germany.
The withdrawal was a punitive measure for what he saw as Berlin’s failure to help share the cost burden of the NATO military alliance.
However, Trump’s successor Joe Biden halted the withdrawal of the troops shortly after becoming president earlier this year.
dpa/NAN
