Lithuania has become the first NATO member to formally commit troops to the Strait of Hormuz, as the Trump administration steps up pressure on allies. The move coincides with a scramble among Eastern European nations to attract U.S. forces after Washington announced a drawdown of American troops stationed in Germany.
The Lithuanian presidential office said Wednesday it had approved a deployment plan to join the international maritime security operation in the Strait of Hormuz.
Up to 40 personnel, including military and civilian staff, will be dispatched, and Lithuania is also prepared to authorize the United States to use its rear-area support and military infrastructure, the office said. The plan requires final approval from Lithuania's parliament to take effect.
President Trump has voiced near-daily frustration over what he describes as insufficient allied cooperation since launching "Epic Fury," an operation targeting Iran, on February 28. He has signaled the resumption of "Project Freedom," a military escort operation for civilian vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz, and has pressed NATO allies to participate.
France has moved its Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier strike group toward the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, and the United Kingdom is set to dispatch the destroyer HMS Dragon to the Middle East. Most NATO members, however, maintain that they can only join the operation once hostilities between the United States and Iran have fully ended.
Against this backdrop, Lithuania's decision to step forward reflects a complex mix of security concerns and strategic interests.
Bordering Russia's exclave of Kaliningrad, Lithuania stands out among NATO members for its security vulnerabilities. The Suwalki Gap, a 65-kilometer land corridor between Poland and Lithuania, is widely regarded as NATO's weak point, as Russian control of the passage would directly connect Kaliningrad with Belarus.
With a population of about 2.8 million, Lithuania maintains an active-duty force of roughly 20,000, vastly outmatched by Russia's military, which is reported to number around 1 million. Its decision last year to permanently host the German Bundeswehr's "Lithuania Brigade" reflects the same calculus.
The announcement of the U.S. drawdown in Germany has further complicated that calculus. The U.S. Defense Department said on the 1st that it would cut and redeploy 5,000 of the approximately 36,000 American troops stationed in Germany. Despite the Trump administration's pressure on defense cost-sharing, Berlin has not met the conditions Washington set for keeping the forces in place, prompting the actual withdrawal to begin.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said more than 1,000 U.S. troops are currently stationed in the country and that Lithuania is ready to host more, formally requesting a rotational reinforcement of 5,000 troops by the end of next year. Defense Minister Robertas Kaunas said Lithuania could contribute mine-clearance capabilities to the Strait of Hormuz operation. The three Baltic states each operate multiple minesweepers to counter the Russian mine threat.
Poland has joined the same line. Polish President Karol Nawrocki spoke by phone with Trump shortly after the announcement of the U.S. drawdown in Germany to discuss the American military presence in Europe, and is pursuing an increase in the 10,000 U.S. troops currently stationed in his country as a strategic objective. Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz has also publicly declared that "expanding the U.S. military presence is a strategic goal."
Lithuania's decision to deploy to the Strait of Hormuz appears on the surface to be a response to Trump's demands for allied participation, but analysts say it also reflects an underlying security strategy to draw U.S. forces stationed in Germany into the country.
