NATO exercises not involving US troops have begun across Greece, Bulgaria and Romania as European members of the Washington-led alliance reel from Wednesday evening’s address by US Defence Secretary Peter Hegseth.

The Steadfast Dart manoeuvres are led by the British military and involve nine countries, including another nuclear power, France. Commanders billed them as a bid to show Nato is able to effectively deploy force in eastern Europe without the United States, which has signalled under President Donald Trump that it is no longer prepared to contribute financially or militarily to the Ukraine war.

Greek and Spanish marines led an amphibious assault near the Greek city of Volos today in the first deployment of Nato’s new Allied Reaction Force. The Communist Party of Greece (KKE) staged protests at the deployments.

Addressing a meeting of serving and retired armed forces personnel, KKE general secretary Dimitris Koutsoumpas said Greece should not be dragged into imperialist wars. He listed facilities used to supply wars in Ukraine and Palestine and warned that they make Greece “a potential target of a generalised war that is increasingly visible,” urging that attempts to raise military spending to make up for a reduced US presence should be resisted.

European leaders appeared to contradict Mr Hegseth’s address today, with British and German defence ministers insisting that “there can be no talks over Ukraine without Ukraine,” though Mr Trump suggested negotiations with Russia on ending the war would “start immediately” and that he would “work together, very closely” with Russian President Vladimir Putin to that end. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned against any peace being “imposed” on Ukraine.

Mr Hegseth told Nato countries that the US would not pay more towards the Ukraine war, would not contribute any troops to police a ceasefire and would not consider any forces sent on such a mission to be covered by Nato guarantees of mutual defence if they were attacked. He said Nato membership is off the table for Ukraine.

He also said that Ukraine could not hope to regain the borders it had before 2014 (when Russia annexed Crimea and separatist conflicts erupted in the Donbass following the Maidan coup in Kiev). Prior to the meeting, President Trump said that Ukraine “may be Russian some day,” hinting Washington could even endorse Russian territorial annexations beyond its current claims to four Ukrainian regions.