U.S. media reports that Donald Trump has approved a plan to withdraw 9,500 of US soldiers from German bases until September 2020.

Trump has long said that European NATO members must increase the cost of their defense. At the moment, he wants to limit the number of US troops to 25,000.

According to the media, the troops are likely to be relocated to another location or returned back home.

The US President said that European members of NATO should no longer rely on the United States in material terms.

The German Foreign Ministry did not comment on the news, but two senior members of the ruling Christian Democratic Union party expressed concern about it.

According to Andreas Nick, since the Pentagon did not make any public comments but instead sent a request to the White House, the decision is "purely politically motivated."

Johann Wadephul, meanwhile, said that Trump's plan once again showed that the US administration is ignoring the elementary task of leadership, involving allies in the decision-making process.

Prime Minister of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki, on the other hand, expressed his hope that part of the troops withdrawn from Germany will be transferred to his country.

On Friday, the Pentagon received instructions from Trump to withdraw 27.5% of the US troops that are based in Germany. According to him, the Ministry of Defense will have to approve the plan before its implementation.

Trump has long been giving attention to the sharing costs at NATO summits.

Discussions say that defense spending should correspond to 2% of GDP by 2024.

In 2019, both NATO's military and civilian budget amounted to approximately 1.67 billion euros (1.43 billion pounds sterling; 1.84 billion US dollars).

The presence of US troops in Germany is nothing more than the legacy of the occupation of the country after World War II. Germany currently has the largest number of US troops in Europe, followed by Italy, Britain and Spain.