NATO is developing numerous "land corridors", including through Bulgaria, along which US troops and armored vehicles can move to the front line in the event of a major European land war with Russia, writes the newspaper " ;Daily Telegraph", quoted by BTA.
US troops will arrive at one of five ports and be routed along pre-planned logistics routes to counter a possible attack by Moscow, officials said, quoted by the British daily.
This comes amid warnings from senior NATO leaders that Western governments must prepare for conflict with Russia in the next two decades.
Logistics routes have become a key priority after NATO leaders agreed at a summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, last year to prepare 300,000 troops to be kept on high alert to defend the alliance.< /p>
Existing plans call for US troops to arrive at Dutch ports, then board trains to transport them through Germany and on to Poland.
In the event of a Russian invasion of the territory of a NATO country or countries, US troops would be sent to the port of Rotterdam before being transported east.
But arrangements are being made behind the scenes to extend the routes to other ports to ensure that the land line of communication cannot be cut by Moscow's forces, the Daily Telegraph reports.
Lieutenant General Alexander Solfrank, head of NATO's Jsec logistics command (Joint Support and Enabling Command), told the Daily Telegraph: "Ukraine is suffering a lot from Russian missile attacks long range against logistics systems.“
If NATO forces entering the Netherlands are hit by Russian bombing or northern European ports are destroyed, the alliance will shift its focus to ports in Italy, Greece and Turkey.
From Italian ports, US troops could be transported overland through Slovenia, Croatia to Hungary, which shares a border with Ukraine.
Similar plans exist to transport forces from Turkish and Greek ports through Bulgaria and Romania to reach the alliance's eastern flank.
Plans are also being drawn up to transport the troops through ports in the Balkans, as well as through Norway, Sweden and Finland.
For the past five years, Jsec has been conducting assessments to identify different routes that could be used to transport troops to deal with a Russian invasion.
Ports in northern Europe - in the Netherlands, Germany and the Baltic states - are considered particularly vulnerable to Russian missile attacks.
Lieutenant General Solfrank stated: "Everything is designed so that there is the necessary resilience - strength, reserves, and even redundancy.“
But after warnings that NATO only has 5% of the air defenses it needs to cover its eastern flank, the Jsec commander is concerned about the air defense capability to protect key logistics hubs.
"In monitoring and assessing the Russian war in Ukraine, we noticed that Russia is attacking Ukraine's logistics bases,” he said.
"This should lead to the conclusion that it is clear that huge logistics bases as we know them from Afghanistan and Iraq are no longer possible because they will be attacked and destroyed very early in a conflict situation.“< /p>
"As for air defenses... They are always scarce. I can't imagine a situation where you would have sufficient air defenses. This is a good example that illustrates the military principle: "If you want to be strong everywhere, you are not strong anywhere.“