{"id":8931,"date":"2026-04-30T12:44:19","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T12:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/8931\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T12:44:19","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T12:44:19","slug":"merz-touts-continued-us-military-ties-despite-trump-threats-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/8931\/","title":{"rendered":"Merz touts continued US military ties despite Trump threats \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cThis work is carried out shoulder-to-shoulder, for our mutual benefit and in deep transatlantic partnership,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Trump late Wednesday lashed out at Germany, a sign of his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/04\/28\/trump-merz-german-chancellor-iran-00896561\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">rising anger <\/a>over allied reluctance to help with the war he launched against Iran and his pique at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.eu\/article\/germany-friedrich-merz-donald-trump-eu-economy\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Merz criticizing the conduct<\/a> of the campaign. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe United States is studying and reviewing the possible reduction of Troops in Germany, with a determination to be made over the next short period of time,\u201d Trump wrote on <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/116490196510215628\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Truth Social.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Germany <a href=\"https:\/\/dwp.dmdc.osd.mil\/dwp\/app\/dod-data-reports\/workforce-reports\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">hosts about 36,000 U.S. troops <\/a>at key bases like Ramstein that both help defend Europe and also serve as crucial hubs for American military operations, including logistics, command and deployments beyond Europe. Those bases are also being used in the ongoing campaign against Iran.<\/p>\n<p>In Munster, Merz avoided direct reference to Trump\u2019s comments, instead emphasizing continuity and alignment with Washington across a range of security issues. \u201cOn all these questions, we are in close and trusting contact with our partners \u2014 including, and especially, in Washington,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>The chancellor framed Germany\u2019s ongoing military buildup, including increased defense spending and modernization of the Bundeswehr, as part of a broader effort to strengthen both European security and ties with the United States.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThis work is carried out shoulder-to-shoulder, for our mutual benefit and in deep transatlantic partnership,\u201d he added. Trump&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8932,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[613,420,479,3423,393,5,617,619,478,481,2379],"class_list":{"0":"post-8931","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-cooperation","9":"tag-defense","10":"tag-donald-trump","11":"tag-eu-us-military-ties","12":"tag-friedrich-merz","13":"tag-germany","14":"tag-logistics","15":"tag-military","16":"tag-nato","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-war-in-iran"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}