Polish President Karol Nawrocki discussed plans for a new permanent US military base in Poland directly with US President Donald Trump during his visit to New York, according to the Polish Presidential Chancellery.
Marcin Przydacz, Nawrocki’s foreign-policy chief, said the two presidents had an opportunity for a “direct conversation” while attending a reception hosted by Trump during the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.
Asked what they discussed, Przydacz said the conversation covered the permanent presence of US troops in Poland as well as potential American investment in the Polish economy.
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The disclosure adds presidential-level talks to negotiations that have already been taking place between the Polish government and the Pentagon over a new permanent American base.
It does not, however, amount to a final basing agreement.
No White House or Pentagon account located by Poland-24 has disclosed details of the Nawrocki-Trump conversation or announced a new US commitment arising from it.
Trump says ‘major progress’ is being made
Trump had already publicly signalled support for the project before the New York encounter.
On 17 September, the US president said “major progress” was being made towards establishing a US Army base in Poland and said its location could be announced soon if the plan went ahead.
“This will be a historic step for our Great U.S./Polish Alliance,” Trump wrote, according to Reuters.
Nawrocki subsequently told Bloomberg Television that, following Trump’s declaration, he regarded creation of the base as “only a question of time”.
He said infrastructure was being prepared and an appropriate location was being selected, although administrative and financial matters still had to be resolved. Nawrocki also said he hoped Trump could personally attend the eventual opening of the base.
The Polish president has suggested that the facility could be called “Fort Trump”, reviving a name first associated with former president Andrzej Duda’s campaign for a permanent American base during Trump’s first presidency.
There is no indication that “Fort Trump” is an agreed official name.
Polish presidency says political direction is settled
Officials in Nawrocki’s office have portrayed Trump’s public declaration as a political green light for the project.
Before the UN visit, Przydacz said the decision on the US side had “in principle already been made”, while stressing that questions over the location and accompanying military and civilian infrastructure still needed to be settled.
Presidential spokesman Rafał Leśkiewicz said this week that detailed negotiations over specific locations were being conducted by the Polish government rather than the Presidential Chancellery.
That distinction is significant.
While the president can promote the project in his contacts with Trump, negotiations covering military infrastructure, financing and implementation are being handled through the Polish government and defence ministries of the two countries.
Government authorised base preparations in June
Poland’s Council of Ministers formally authorised Defence Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz in June to pursue creation of a permanent US base.
The resolution authorised consultations with Washington and preparations covering a proposed location, necessary infrastructure, costs and financing.
Two days later, Kosiniak-Kamysz said he had received an official response from US defence chief Pete Hegseth indicating that the American side viewed Poland’s proposal positively.
At that stage, however, discussions were continuing and no final site or detailed basing arrangement had been announced.
The talks have since become more concrete.
A Pentagon delegation led by William Cappelletti, the official assigned by the US side to negotiations on strengthening the American military presence in Poland, met Polish defence officials on 10 September.
The two sides agreed on a structure and general timetable for further consultations and the creation of working groups for more detailed talks.
During the visit, the US delegation was also due to inspect facilities in Powidz and Poznań, including accommodation, infrastructure and Polish host-nation support.
Neither of those locations has been officially announced as the site of the proposed new base.
US already has permanent personnel in Poland
References to a “permanent US base” can obscure the fact that the American military already maintains some permanently stationed personnel and infrastructure in Poland.
In 2022, Washington permanently forward-stationed the US Army’s V Corps Forward Command Post, an Army garrison headquarters and a field support battalion in Poland — described by the Pentagon at the time as the first permanent US forces on NATO’s eastern flank.
V Corps’ forward headquarters is based at Camp Kościuszko in Poznań.
The United States also maintains a larger rotational military presence in Poland, including units using facilities around the country.
The current negotiations therefore concern an expansion of permanent American basing arrangements, rather than the establishment of the first permanently stationed US military personnel on Polish territory.
Poland and the United States are using the 2020 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement as the framework for the latest negotiations.
Long-running Polish objective
Warsaw has sought a larger and more permanent American military footprint for years.
Duda publicly proposed the idea of “Fort Trump” during Trump’s first term, and successive Polish governments have argued that permanently based US forces would strengthen deterrence on NATO’s eastern flank.
The issue has gained additional importance since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and as the United States conducts a wider review of its military posture in Europe.
For Nawrocki, the latest development allows him to point to direct presidential diplomacy alongside the technical negotiations being conducted by Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government.
But the central unanswered questions remain the same: where a new base would be located, which US units would be permanently stationed there, how large the presence would be, how the costs would be divided and when a final agreement would be signed.
Trump has suggested that an announcement on location could come soon.
For now, the New York conversation confirms that the project remains on the agenda at presidential level, but neither side has announced a final basing deal.
