This is how it all starts. The US had 25,000 "advisors" on the ground in Vietnam before the official 8 March 1965 US Marine landings at Da Nang. I don't blame the Germans for being transparent, so the people know what we might be getting into here.

You will see posts about the aggregate number of French, UK, and German forces, which seems like it is enough without the US to have a shot at fighting Russia, but these are mainly troops with little experience in recent history of taking on a willing enemy. Given we have depleted our conventional weapons by supplying Israel and Ukraine, and that Russia is putting nuclear missiles on display on their streets, it should be time to go to the table before the battlefield. Ukraine released a 31,000 people killed figure that the West agrees is conservatively twice that, but reports from Ukraine and Ukrainian soldiers hint it is well above 150,000. This is why they are recruiting everyone they can by pulling them off the streets and out of buses and trains as long as they are under 65 at this point and can walk.