Stars and Stripes
March 28, 2023

Army’s new Poland garrison went from Warsaw’s wish list to high US priority

A U.S. Army map shows shows current and projected sites for the service in Poland, including the new headquarters in the west central city of Poznan. U.S.-based units are also on rotations to the southeastern part of the country at temporary or Polish-run sites. The Navy and Air Force also have personnel in the country.

Six years after…U.S. soldiers arrived, this military post in the west-central city of Poznan has emerged as the nerve center for Army leaders overseeing troops from the Baltics to Bulgaria.

The evolution of Camp Kosciuszko, which last week formally became the first U.S. permanent base in Poland, showcases how events in Ukraine over the past nine years have overhauled the United States’ military mission in Europe.

…now the Army is talking about what not long ago was little more than a Polish pipe dream: American military families calling Poznan home.

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…Big plans are in the works for further transformation of the site into a modern Army garrison.

Six years ago, a contingent of 100 troops assigned to Mission Command Element arrived from Baumholder, Germany with the job of overseeing soldier maneuvers on NATO’s eastern flank.

…as U.S. Army Europe and Africa’s mission continued to expand, it became clear that more command-and-control capabilities were needed.

Enter V Corps, which was reestablished in 2021 to give the Army a new three-star headquarters to manage day-to-day activities from the Baltic Sea in the north down to the Black Sea region.

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In addition to coordinating troop movement, V Corps also is involved in ongoing training with U.S. and allied forces. Soldiers at Camp Kosciuszko are there to improve battlefield information sharing among allies.

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Other new V Corps initiatives include an apprenticeship program in which foreign soldiers will embed with U.S. units to develop expertise on using high-mobility rocket systems, known as HIMARS, which have been put to effective use in Ukraine.

[G]arrison officials in Poznan oversee about a dozen Army sites in Poland to facilitate the V Corps mission. The sites include an aviation and logistics hub 90 minutes east of Poznan in Powidz, and a cluster of camps near Zagan, a town where an Army brigade operates not far from the southwestern border with Germany.

More than 100 infrastructure projects to support the U.S. military in Poland are in the works….

 U.S. Army map shows shows current and projected sites for the service in Poland, including the new headquarters in the west central city of Poznan. U.S.-based units are also on rotations to the southeastern part of the country at temporary or Polish-run sites. The Navy and Air Force also have personnel in the country.