Europe's military personnel shortfalls exposed as Trump warns US security priorities lie elsewhere

BRUSSELS (AP) — In the year after Russia launched outright war on Ukraine, NATO leaders approved a set of military plans designed to repel an invasion of Europe. It was the biggest shake-up of the alliance’s defense readiness preparations since the Cold War.

The secret plans set out how Western allies would defend NATO territory from the Atlantic to the Arctic, through the Baltic region and Central Europe, down to the Mediterranean Sea. Up to 300,000 troops would move to its eastern flank within 30 days, many of them American. That would climb to 800,000 within six months.

But the Trump administration warned last month that U.S. priorities lie elsewhere. Europe must take care of its own security, and those goals now seem questionable. Mustering just 30,000 European troops to police any future peace in Ukraine is proving a challenge.

Billions of euros are being shifted to military budgets, but only slowly, and the Europeans are struggling to fire up production in their defense industries.

Beyond funding, tens of thousands more European citizens might have to complete military service, and time is of the essence. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has warned that Russian forces could be capable of launching an attack on European territory in 2030.

Concerned about Russia's intentions, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk wants to introduce large-scale military training for every adult male, and double the size of Poland's army to around 500,000 soldiers.

“If Ukraine loses the war or if it accepts the terms of peace, armistice or capitulation … then, without a doubt — and we can all agree on that — Poland will find itself in a much more difficult geopolitical situation,” Tusk warned lawmakers last week.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that Europe, including the U.K., has almost 1.5 million active duty personnel. But many can't be deployed on a battlefield, and those who can are hard to use effectively without a centralized command system.

The number of Russian troops in Ukraine at the end of 2024 was estimated to be around 700,000.

NATO troops are controlled by a U.S. general, using American air transport and logistics.

Analysts say that in the event of a Russian attack, NATO’s top military officer would probably dispatch around 200,000 U.S. troops to Europe to build on the 100,000 U.S. military personnel already based there.

With the Americans out of the picture, “a realistic estimate may therefore be that an increase in European capacities equivalent to the fighting capacity of 300,000 U.S. troops is needed,” the Brussels-based Bruegel think tank estimates.

“Europe faces a choice: either increase troop numbers significantly by more than 300,000 to make up for the fragmented nature of national militaries, or find ways to rapidly enhance military coordination,” Bruegel said.

The question is how.

NATO is encouraging countries to build up personnel numbers, but the trans-Atlantic alliance isn't telling them how to do it. Maintaining public support for the armed forces and for Ukraine is too important to risk by dictating choices.

“The way they go about it is intensely political, so we wouldn’t prescribe any way of changing this — whether to go for conscription, elective conscription, bigger reserves,” a senior NATO official said on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to brief journalists unless he remained unnamed.

“We do stress the point that fighting with those regional plans means that we are in collective defense and likely in an attrition war that requires way more manpower than we currently have, or we designed our force models to deliver,” he added.

Eleven European countries have compulsory military service: Austria, Cyprus, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, and non-European Union nation Norway. The length of service ranges from as little as two months in Croatia to 19 months in Norway.

Poland isn't considering a return to universal military service, but rather a reserve system based on the model in Switzerland, where every man is obliged to serve in the armed forces or an alternative civilian service. Women can volunteer.

Belgium’s new defense minister plans to write a letter in November to around 120,000 citizens who are age 18 to try to persuade at least 500 of them to sign up for voluntary military service. Debate about the issue goes on in the U.K. and Germany.

Germany’s professional armed forces had 181,174 active service personnel at the end of last year — slightly lower than in 2023, according to a parliamentary report released Tuesday. That means it’s no closer to reaching a Defense Ministry target of 203,000 by 2031.

Last year, 20,290 people started serving in the German military, or Bundeswehr, an 8% increase, the report said. But of the 18,810 who joined in 2023, more than a quarter — 5,100 or 27% of the total — left again, most at their own request during the six-month trial period.

The German parliament’s commissioner for the armed forces, Eva Högl, said that army life is a hard sell.

“The biggest problem is boredom,” Högl said. “If young people have nothing to do, if there isn’t enough equipment and there aren’t enough trainers, if the rooms aren’t reasonably clean and orderly, that deters people and it makes the Bundeswehr unattractive.”

At the other end of the scale, tiny Luxembourg has unique demographic challenges. Of its roughly 630,000 passport holders, only 315,000 are Luxembourgers. The number of people of military service age — 18 to 40 — is smaller still.

Around 1,000 people are enlisted. That’s small compared to some European powers, but bigger per capita than the U.K. armed forces. Recently, Luxembourg — where unemployment is low and salaries are high — has struggled to find just 200-300 military personnel.

Military service comes with many challenges too, not least convincing someone to sign up when they might be sent to the front, and hastily trained conscripts can't replace a professional army. The draft also costs money. Extra staff, accommodation and trainers are needed throughout a conscript's term.

Geir Moulson contributed to this report from Berlin.

FILE - Army Forces of Croatia walk during the rehearsal of the French Bastille Day parade at the Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris, July 9, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori, File)

FILE - Members of the Greek army take part in the military parade at the northern port city of Thessaloniki, Greece, Oct. 28, 2022. (AP Photo/Giannis Papanikos, File)

FILE - Members of La Legion, an elite unit of the Spanish Army, march to celebrate 'Dia de la Hispanidad' or Hispanic Day, in Madrid, Spain, Oct. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez, File)

FILE - Lithuanian Army soldiers take part in a Lithuanian-Polish Brave Griffin 24/II military exercise near the Suwalki Gap near the Polish border at the Dirmiskes village, in Lithuania on April 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mindaugas Kulbis, File)

FILE - Volunteers takes part in basic training with the Polish army in Nowogrod, Poland, on June 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski, File)

FILE - German soldiers take part in the Lithuanian-German division-level international military exercise 'Grand Quadriga 2024' at a training range in Pabrade, north of the capital Vilnius, Lithuania on May 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Mindaugas Kulbis, File)

FILE - Soldiers from the Belgian Special Forces perform a mock medical evacuation during an European Defense Agency joint military training exercise at Florennes airbase in Rosse, Belgium on Nov. 30, 2016. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo, File)

FILE - Italian Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon military fighter jets participate in NATO's Baltic Air Policing Mission operate in Lithuanian airspace, on Sept.12, 2023. (AP Photo/Mindaugas Kulbis, File)

FILE - Soldiers demonstrate operational technics for close combat in a training class at a military camp set up for the Paris Olympic games, July 19, 2024, Vincennes, just outside Paris, France. (AP Photo/David Goldman, File)

FILE - Soldiers from Belgium and Luxembourg line up as they prepare to board a military transport plane at Melsbroek Military Airport in Melsbroek, Belgium, July 4, 2023. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Helicopters will be permanently restricted from flying near Washington, D.C.'s airport on the same route where a passenger jet and an Army helicopter collided in midair, killing 67 people, the Federal Aviation Administration said Friday.

The move comes just days after federal investigators looking into the cause of the crash recommended a ban on some helicopter flights, saying a string of near misses in recent years showed that the current setup “poses an intolerable risk.”

The FAA, which manages the nation’s airspace and oversees aviation safety, has come under criticism after the National Transportation Safety Board said there had been an alarming number of near misses in recent year in the congested skies around Ronald Reagan National Airport.

The closure of the helicopter route near the airport makes permanent the restrictions put in place after Jan. 29 midair collision. The FAA order will allow a few exceptions for helicopter use, including presidential flights along with law enforcement and lifesaving missions.

The FAA also said it is studying cities with airports where there are a high number of different types of aircraft sharing the same space, including eight metro areas with busy helicopter routes: Boston, New York, Baltimore-Washington, Detroit, Chicago, Dallas, Houston and Los Angeles.

It also is looking at offshore helicopter operations along the Gulf Coast. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said this week that the FAA will use artificial intelligence to analyze data to look for similar danger areas.

But first Duffy vowed to adopt the NTSB’s recommendations for reducing airspace congestion near Reagan National and stop helicopters from “threading the needle” by flying under landing planes.

The Army supports the FAA’s efforts to improve aviation safety around the nation's capital and will use "alternative routes to mitigate impacts on training and readiness,” spokesman Matt Ahearn said Friday.

Before the collision, there were 28 government agencies authorized to fly helicopters near Reagan National, including the Department of Defense, military services, law enforcement, and emergency medical services.

The Army Black Hawk involved in the January crash belonged to the 12th Aviation Battalion based at Davison Army Air Field at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. That unit has a classified mission to ensure continuity of government by getting certain officials to safety in case of an attack.

It is also tasked with ferrying high-ranking government and military officials to bases throughout the region. Before the crash the now-closed route was a regular part of their mission routes and training.

The impact on the unit and flights around Reagan National is expected to come up at a March 27 hearing at the Senate Commerce Committee hearing where Brig. Gen. Matthew Braman, director of Army aviation, is expected to testify alongside the acting FAA administrator Chris Rocheleau and National Transportation Safety Board chairman Jennifer Homendy.

In a letter to Braman, Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz pressed for answers on whether the Army Black Hawks regularly operate without transmitting location data, and how many flights it regularly conducted to transport dignitaries and high-ranking officers.

Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio.

FILE - A piece of wreckage is lifted from the water onto a salvage vessel near the site in the Potomac River of a mid-air collision between an American Airlines jet and a Black Hawk helicopter, at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Feb. 4, 2025, in Arlington, Va. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, file)

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy speaks about the recent mid-air collision of an American Airlines flight and a Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, at a news conference in Washington, Tuesday, March 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy speaks during a news conference following up on the issuance of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) preliminary report on the mid-air collision near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Tuesday, March 11, 2025, at the Department of Transportation in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)