Poland’s foreign and security policy in 2025 reflects an increasingly deliberate and disciplined alignment with the United States, anchored in hard security cooperation, defense modernization, and energy resilience, while also navigating a controlled distancing from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) due to Beijing’s sustained support for Russia’s military aggression. […]
The post-2022 regional security environment—fundamentally altered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s rhetorical and material support for the Kremlin—has led Warsaw to re-anchor its strategic doctrine around a doctrine of “forward fortification.” This encompasses not only material investments in U.S.-sourced weapons systems and NATO infrastructure but also an energetic diplomatic campaign to consolidate American presence east of the Oder. Poland has operationalized this doctrine by hosting a rotating force of approximately 10,000 U.S. troops on its territory as of mid-2025, nearly double the number stationed in 2021. According to figures from the U.S. Department of Defense, 5,000 of these troops form part of the 82nd Airborne Division and an Armoured Brigade Combat Group tasked with deterring Russian advances near Poland’s eastern frontier. These troops, stationed in garrisons close to the Suwałki Gap and near Rzeszów—the logistics hub for aid to Ukraine—form the hard backbone of NATO’s Article 5 implementation in the region. Läs artikel