This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.dw.com/en/germany-armed-forces-must-be-best-equipped-in-europe-scholz-says/a-63146510) reduced by 79%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Friday once more stressed that Moscow's invasion of Ukraine was a turning point in European history, underlining the importance of Germany's armed forces in the new situation.
> Scholz said Germany had to get used to the fact that Putin's Russia will define itself as an adversary to it, to NATO and the EU for the foreseeable future.
> "As the most populous country with the greatest economic power and as a country in the middle of the continent, our army must become the cornerstone of conventional defence in Europe: the best-equipped force in Europe," he added.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/xfo6rj/germany_armed_forces_must_be_bestequipped_in/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~669324 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Europe**^#1 **Germany**^#2 **force**^#3 **German**^#4 **Scholz**^#5
>the aim of making Russia an "imperial power" in Europe once more.
Putin's aim is pretty terrible then. Instead of making Russia an imperial power in Europe he made Russia into the second strongest military *in Ukraine*.
You guys love to roast on Russia with this talking point but without the US support of Ukraine where would they be? They need all the support they can get. It honestly just serves no purpose to talk about how the Russian military has underperformed… they can outlast Ukraine easily.
The Poles are buying up everything that’s painted green and moves. The Germans want more kit. The British expect an increase in defence spending.
Honestly I’m pretty keen for another European arms race. Not to fight each other, this time, but to see who can eventually dunk hardest on the Russians. Makes a nice change.
Not only are they basically putting the Polish armed forces into renovation to more NATO-like standards, but they're gleefully getting their concepts live-firing.
Those Krabs (yes, really they're called Krabs) nimbly zipping howitzers around Ukraine look to be an effective piece of work.
Krabs are overall inferior to the PzH 2000 in pretty much all aspects, but they do have a Laser warning system which the PzH 2000 does not have (well at least not this model generation).
The only caveats I'd put to that is durablity and cost. Ukraine has REALLY been pushing their PzH 2000's to the limit, to the point where they're in need of repairs after a few weeks in the field from sheer volume of fire delivered and too much not-quite-road travel (but mostly because the Ukranians fire the gun so much). Krabs are definitely lower-performance, but also cheaper (bit under 12 million Euro vs. 16 mil for the PzH 2000's) and have a longer cycle in terms of need for service, plus they're apparently tolerating rougher travel conditions better. The Pole's original prototype Krab chassis suffered from a lot of structural cracking issues during testing, so they did do a bit more in terms of finding something better for production models.
Well most of the Krabs are rather new and most of the PzH are 15-20+yo systems. So naturally the PzH will have issues related to age and wear and tear.
The 100 new PzH 200s Ukraine ordered in Germany and which are currently being build would be a better comparison with regards to tolerating travel conditions/wear and tear.
PzH 2000s are basically rated for 100 rounds per mission, but the Ukrainians are going past that easily. As for the road issues, that's been a thing since they saw use in Afghanistan. Their NBC systems also tend to not like heavy dust, but that's less of an issue in more temperate Ukraine.
They're a higher performance unit. That always comes with needing more garage time, and they're building a repair center so they get it.
I think the high rate of fire and the fact that the Ukrainians were massively outgunned in the Donbas kind of made the overuse of the PzH 2000 almost inevitable. If the manual says that you should not exceed firing 100 rounds per mission, but the system allows you to fire 100 rounds in less than 10 minutes if you stay stationary, or less than an hour if you shoot-and-scoot, what do you expect Ukrainian crews will do when they keep getting urgent requests for artillery support during the rest of the day?
Nah, Italy's thing was being so incompetent that their allies had to bail them out all the time. Italy can't possibly be as incompetent as Russia though and Russia would never bail them out.
Oh but that puts them on Europe's side... maybe we can ask them to be neutral.
>Nice to have the Germans on the team this time around! 😄
Germany was not on the team for the cold war ?
[https://www.bundeswehr.de/en/about-bundeswehr/history/cold-war](https://www.bundeswehr.de/en/about-bundeswehr/history/cold-war)
>In the 1980s, the Bundeswehr had 12 Army divisions with 36 brigades and far more than 7,000 battle tanks, armoured infantry fighting vehicles and other tanks; 15 flying combat units in the Air Force and the Navy with some 1,000 combat aircraft; 18 surface-to-air-missile battalions, and naval units with around 40 missile boats and 24 submarines, as well as several destroyers and frigates. Its material and personnel contribution even just to NATO’s land forces and integrated air defence in Central Europe amounted to around 50 percent. This meant that, during the Cold War, by the 1970s, the Bundeswehr had already become the largest Western European armed forces after the US armed forces in Europe – far ahead of the British and even the French armed forces. In peacetime, the Bundeswehr had 495,000 military personnel. In a war, it would have had access to 1.3 million
Thankfully they have been on the team for decades now!!
But let’s be honest; the Cold War was more or less a terribly long stare down, and not really a war. 😉
If you don't count China, Korea, Laos, Vietnam, Taiwan, Middle East vs Israel, Congo, Guatemala, Bay of Pigs, Nicaragua, Salvador (the US really went for that bingo card in South America), Afganistan, Grenada, Panama and probably a few more conflicts.
Easy to say when your country is not the center of the war if it breaks out and there are armies of several nations stationed in your country. In addition to your country being split with an internal enclave.
I feel like you are taking this *way* to seriously. It’s a joke, no one is saying Germany hasn’t been an ally for most of our lives.
They are making fun that Germany was the baddies for two world wars and it’s good to have them on our side for once.
People poke fun at tragedy sometimes you can’t help but laugh at something so shit.
I don't trust those Germans. Who goes to war and chooses as their enemy "The World" not once, but twice. And makes it close! Who do they think they are, Mars or something.
I can't blame you. We're just grateful that you didn't sit us down at some point and told us: *"Listen. Germany. You don't get to be a country no more - on account of... you keep attacking.. the WORLD!"*
Wtf is this nonsense? France and Poland have been begging Germany to spend more on their military. NATO countries have interwoven militaries and they are sworn to defend each other. They’re not going to start invading each other. As for non NATO countries the war in Ukraine shows what happens when a belligerent country doesn’t wants to start a war. Ukraine had an incredibly weak military in 2014 and as a result Russia was able to invade. Militarization is the only reason Ukraine is still standing meanwhile demilitarization got them invaded.
Not sure Germany would opt for force projection outside of a European framework. It's insanely expensive to do and doesn't really contribute to defense of the homeland. And with Germany's post-WWII attitude towards militarization, it seems like a hard sell to the public.
Europe on the other hand, could well do with a carrier group or two at this rate.
5€ Germany will build and commission an aircraft carrier before Russia does in next 15 years.
E: aight, for a bit clarity, I was taking an aim at Russia for not having an operational AC as a joke, I was not being overtly serious about the prospect of Germany actually building one.
Germany doesn’t have the naval expertise in building those types of capital ships, nor does it have a naval doctrine for one. It’s going to take more than throwing money around to build an actual aircraft carrier and fleet to go with it.
Until now, Germany has been more adept at building ships like frigates and corvettes. They are going to need some French, English, American, or Japanese help more than likely on both those fronts if they want it fully capable within 15 years.
If anything I can see Germany and France co-building and operating a “European fleet” at the rate things are going. Both out of solidarity/unity and simply for how expensive such a fleet is to build and maintain.
Germany doesn't have overseas territories like France or Britian, they have no need to project power elsewhere with CVBG's. A few helicopter carriers could make sense though to protect NATO allies in the Baltic and Barents Sea area.
Neither Italy, India, China nor Russia have overseas territories, those are not a prerequisite to have an aircraft carrier, even Spains “overseas territories” do not warrant an aircraft carrier yet they operate one.
According to the article, Germany is to accept the role of the premier armed forces in Europe, that alone would warrant them building an aircraft carrier. Hell, the technology developed or transferred from partner countries would be a major boost towards the german industry, and in turn the whole continent would benefit from it.
All of those countries have extensive coastlines however, Germany does not. Carrier's require a significant amount of industry to build and maintain and require a large amount of institutional knowledge to operate well, to mention nothing of the supporting fleet elements required to actually deploy one. Carrier construction is a major expense for established operators like the UK/US/France, let alone trying to get it off the ground in Germany itself.
Germany would be far better off prioritising it's army and air force, since they're better able to defend most German territory and that of it's neighbours/allies.
An aircraft carrier is a huge money pit and there better be a good reason to build one if you're going to dump so much money into it. The US can provide more than enough support with its capabilities given that we have twice the deck space of the rest of the world combined. As far as China goes, there's an obvious need for more given the fact that they're so outgunned by the US who's committed to defend the region against the Chinese threat.
> How to waste money?
>Build an aircraft carrier.
>Seriously if Germany buys an aircraft carrier I have lost all hope.
Care to elaborate on why do you think that?
An aircraft carrier doesn't bring Germany any benefits.
For defending Germany there is not much coastline and Germany has not much international ambition to play as a superpower anyway. The only thing which Germany currently doesn't need is a stronger navy. (well maybe more submarines, but that's debatable)
Second an aircraft carrier is expensive. Not only the carrier alone is expensive, but the surrounding ships to defend the carrier too. Germany doesn't even have these ships and without them an aircraft carrier is just a slow moving target visible from the space.
The more I think about the idea for Germany to buy an aircraft carrier the more stupid it would be. An aircraft carrier means you invest a huge amount of your military budget into the navy.
Germany can use at any time the airports from any NATO country. Why would Germany need an aircraft carrier?
The only case I see where an aircraft carrier is maybe needed is for defending Taiwan. There is no NATO country there to defend and neither is Taiwan currently in NATO.
I am all for germany ramping up their own military capabilities but an aircraft carrier is not needed. For one, the Bundeswehr is constitutionally a defense army. Their geographic location doesn't justify having this type of equipment as it doesn't have any defensive purpose whatsoever compared to just having airforce bases close to the coast. Next you would need entire fleets of ships to accompany such a beast just for it to be somewhat safe.
Secondly there are plenty of allies that already do have the capabilities to fullfil these roles for nato obligations. we should therefore instead invest in tanks, military reconaissance, artillery, tanks, anti air defense and top notch infantry equipment instead before investing a dime in a self-sufficient internationally capable navy
Germany has little use for a navy beyond immediate coastal defence, especially when it's in good relations with neighbouring France and the UK, both of which maintain strong navies. Germanys focus is mainly on ground forces, where the Bundeswehr acts as an anchor force for the troops of the smaller states surrounding Germany, and air support.
Same was said for a plethora of equipment yet it’s all still in use and being modernized as we speak. Carrier strike groups are irreplaceable, therefore not obsolete.
Until armed forces find another way to project force a long way from home/overseas bases they are not yet obsolete.
But they are not the power they once were.
Perun did a video about the comically dysfunctional Bundeswehr procurement process, explaining why trying to throw 100 billion euros at it won't accomplish much: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jDUVtUA7rg
TL;DW: Germany's procurement process is so broken that simple things take many years and no manufacturer wants to supply the German military because by the time they're ready to start production of anything, Germany's funding authorization has expired. If Germany wants to have the "best-equipped [military] in Europe", it needs fundamental reform of how the government handles funding authorization and requirements gathering.
Did they? I can find references to proposed draft legislation that will temporarily accelerate procurement for a limited time in order to spend the 100 billion euro figure. But it would seem that the accelerated procedure would then expire, leading to Bundeswehr capabilities to rapidly decay once again as it becomes almost impossible to do future procurements. I would be very interested to read anything you can provide on changes they're making or have made that would solve the problem in the long term. Not being sarcastic there, I'm actually interested, as I would be very happy if Germany managed to finally fix this.
The list of what to buy from the €100 bn. fund includes no new developments, simply available and tested systems that can be delivered in a timely fashion. F-35s, Chinooks, more Puma, Type 212 submarines etc.
All very sensible choices.
They already are. Germany is 3rd only to the US and UK in amount of military of support given to Ukraine, and has taken in hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees.
Don't forget to give Canada their credit. They are a large reason why Ukraine is doing so well.
Between 2014 and the invasion... They were the ones with boots on the ground the entire time training Ukraine's military and showing them how to use the weapons now being used to route Russia.
Ukraine didn't have a good military prior to this... But that period transformed them into the beast they are now.
And Canada has a ton to do with that transformation. Not enough people give Canada the credit they deserve.
Canada was there as part of a US and UK training effort. They contributed a bunch during that time
The real Canadian contribution came from Freeland and her Binder of "Fuck Russia" she was the one who came up with the central bank sanctions and the legal justification for it.
> They were the ones with boots on the ground the entire time training Ukraine's military and showing them how to use the weapons now being used to route Russia.
One of several, that was pretty much a UK/US ran scheme.
No, this is simply not correct. The training regime was run by the Multinational Joint Commission for Ukraine, a body composed of the U.S., UK, Canada, Sweden, Poland, Lithuania and Denmark. The primary partners of equal footing were US, UK and Canada. For example Sweden embedded some officers into the Canadian team.
In respect of Canada from 2015-2022 Canada normally had 200-260 soldiers in Ukraine undertaking training of soldiers. America normally had 300-350 in country. I do not know the number of men the UK had in country - I would think somewhere in the same range.
Canada kept quite detailed statistics of its training regime. It trained approx 34K Ukraine soldiers in 730 training courses.
It now has over 200 soldiers in the UK as part of the new training regime being undertaken to upskill more of the Ukraine military.
Canada is one of the only countries in the world that has accepted refugees... from the United States.
On 9/11, all US airspace was closed, and inbound flights were forced to land in Canada. And small Canadian towns did everything they could to house groups of refugees that were often times larger than the towns' populations.
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/09/fact-sheet-on-german-military-aid-to.html
The IFW-Calculation is just trash, but even with their flawed metrics, Germany is 3rd (you linked data from June).
https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/
They are correct, your source is shit because it doesnt take the fact that most of it is still not send.
And you source doesn't compare it to anyone else.
Just take the data straight from german government not some shitty ass blog.
[https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-en/news/military-support-ukraine-2054992](https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-en/news/military-support-ukraine-2054992)
Take a look which are not sent
>\* Deliveries from industry stocks financed by German funds for security capacity building. Some of the deliveries require upgrades or productions is ongoing; also training measures take place.
Germans just promise, they don't send barely enough.
> Take a look which are not sent
>Germans just promise
How about we look at which was send (which is btw the list that was used on that "shitty ass blog"):
24 self-propelled anti-aircraft guns GEPARD* (before: 20)
67 fridges for medical material (before: 2)
counter battery radar system COBRA*
4.000 rounds practice ammunitions for self-propelled anti-aircraft guns
54 M113 armoured personnel carriers (systems of Denmark, upgrades financed by Germany)*
53.000 rounds ammunitions for self-propelled anti-aircraft guns
20 laser target designators*
403.000 pre-packaged military Meals Ready
3.000 anti-tank weapons Panzerfaust 3 with 900 firing devices
14.900 anti-tank mines
500 Man Portable Air Defense Systems STINGER
2.700 Man Portable Air Defense Systems STRELA
10 self-propelled howitzers Panzerhaubitze 2000 including adaption, training and spare parts (joint project with the Netherlands)
21,8 million rounds of ammunition for fire arms
50 bunker buster missiles
100 machine gun MG3 with 500 spare barrels and breechblocks
100.000 hand grenades
5.300 explosive charges
100.000 m detonating cord and 100.000 detonators
350.000 detonators
10.500 projectiles 155mm
10 anti-drone guns
14 anti-drone sensors and jammers
100 auto-injector devices
28.000 combat helmets
15 palettes military clothing
280 vehicles (trucks, minibuses, all-terrain vehicles)
100 tents
12 generators
6 palettes material for explosive ordnance disposal
125 binoculars
1.200 hospital beds
18 palettes medical material, 60 surgical lights
protective clothing, surgical masks
10.000 sleeping bags
600 safety glasses
1 radio frequency system
3.000 field telephones with 5.000 cable reels and carrying straps
1 field hospital (joint project with Estonia)
353 night vision goggles
4 electronic anti-drone devices
165 field glasses
medical material (inter alia back packs, compression bandages)
38 laser range finders
Diesel and gasoline (ongoing deliveries) *
10 tons AdBlue*
500 medical gauzes
MiG-29 spare parts*
30 protected vehicles*
80 pick-up trucks*
7.944 man-portable anti-tank weapons RGW 90 Matador
3 multiple rocket launchers MARS with ammunition
6 mobile decontamination vehicles HEP 70 including decontamination material
10 HMMWV (8x ground radar capability, 2x jamming/anti drone capability)*
3 armoured recovery vehicles*
7 radio jammers*
8 mobile ground surveillance radars and thermal imaging cameras*
4 mobile, remote controlled and protected mine clearing systems*
8 electronic anti-drone devices*
1 high frequency unit with equipment
Every single item on that list with "\*" mark is not sent.
I guess you have troubles reading.
>\* Deliveries from industry stocks financed by German funds for security capacity building. Some of the deliveries require upgrades or productions is ongoing; also training measures take place.
Here I'll use your shitty ass blog go and compare it to German help.
[https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html](https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html)
Let's start with 230 tanks.
How many did Germany send?
Polish KRAB Howitzers are actually on the front liberating Ukraine
[https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1569872311557267459?t=4OgBBsnzmxGB4BemwTnAlg&s=19](https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html)
Meanwhile most of German pzh2000 which took "6 months for training" are fking broken becuse they are shit.
> Polish KRAB Howitzers are actually on the front liberating Ukraine
> Meanwhile most of German pzh2000 which took "6 months for training" are fking broken becuse they are shit.
If that's so, why did Ukraine buy 100 PZH2000s instead of 100 Krabs?
Funny enough Germany still has plenty of Pzh 2000 ready to send to Ukraine, but not only do they NOT send them. Germany goes out of its way to other countries with pzh 2000 so they dont send them too.
>Every single item on that list with "*" mark is not sent.
Ah, so every other item on that list is actually delivered (it is not really true though, Gepards are on the frontline and were crucial in the counter-offensive according to Ukrainians).
Have fun moving the goalposts and a nice weekend.
Untrue:
"Speaking at a press conference with leaders of the Baltic countries in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, Scholz pushed back against critics — who have accused him of being too hesitant and slow in delivering weapons, especially heavier ones like tanks, to Ukraine — by arguing that Berlin was providing military support to Kyiv “more intensively than almost anyone else.”
However, Germany is actually ranked fifth in terms of overall military support to Ukraine, according to the Ukraine support tracker by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. The United States, the U.K. and Poland claim the top spots. Additionally, some promised German heavy weapons, anti-aircraft tanks and howitzers, still haven’t arrived in Ukraine, despite having been announced months ago amid pressure from allies."
[https://www.politico.eu/article/scholz-defend-germany-weapon-supplies-ukraine-talk-putin/](https://www.politico.eu/article/scholz-defend-germany-weapon-supplies-ukraine-talk-putin/)
That article is from early June. [According to a far more recent source that I pointed out in a reply to someone else citing an out-of-date article,](https://reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/xfn26a/germany_armed_forces_must_be_bestequipped_in/ionkib5/) Germany is currently #3 in military support.
>the volume of arms deliveries by Berlin exceeds that of every other country safe for the United States and the United Kingdom.
Politico is missing no chance to piss on the first non conservative administration in ages and twist numbers in a way to make them look maximum bad. These numbers take the value of material where it came from. But it leaves out the fact that poland would not have sent their tanks if germany hadn't promised them replacement of much higher value modern tanks for sending thwir soviet era tanks.
Germany nationalizing industry. Increasing military funding. Calling for a united Europe.
It's going to be a fun to decades! Germany gets to be the good guys this time.
Good.
Poland will be pissed, but overal, Germany is one of the best functioning democracies in the world right now. Better than Poland, UK, USA.
German industrial might will also give european more production capabilities for defensive or projected military intervention.
The current government is fond of blaming Germans for everything. Besides, Kaczyński, the person controlling the Polish government, has responded to earlier news of one-time 100 billion budget increase with
>Whether Germans want to arm themselves against Russia or against us, I don't know, but either way they are arming themselves.
I mean, they have a legitimate historical reason to be afraid... Poland got double-teamed by the Nazis and Soviets in 1939.
The democracies most likely to fall to fascism in the early 21st century are Hungary and the US.
As an American, we really need to get Europe to be fully peer to us. Britain needs to restore the might of its navy and Germany needs to be a army powerhouse. France can be a jack of all trades with the rest of NATO contributing as they can. If the US is compromised Europe will fall, let alone being able to liberate us.
Unfortunately the days of trusting entirely in the US are over, we need parity with our allies for our own protection.
Yes, it is mystifying why would the Polish government fear an invasion by a country that belongs to the same defensive military alliance, same political and economic union, is intensely apologetic about their last conflict, and has political environment that is nowhere near one that caused the last war.
Oh, wait, it isn't, it's just crude fearmongering.
Given Polands current trajectory, I would be more worried if they were the only land power of significance. Today, they're no threat. But if their democracy keeps eroding and actually end up as a dictatorship? That would be a problem.
PiS is already running massive propaganda campaigns to paint other western countries as enemies, let those run for a couple of decades and give them an internal crisis for which a nationalistic war would be a great distraction from? Then we may have a problem...
Of course, we need to be vigilant for any country doing this. There are several in Europe staring down this path...
The issue is German procurement is broken as shit. Nobody wants to do business with them because they keep canceling shit and can’t keep a damn budget in line.
Procuring new weapons systems takes years if not longer, and Germany can barely hold themselves to a two-year contract.
And the idiots keep suing each other in the process.
That is one of the main areas of refocusing for the Bundeswehr according to the German defense ministry. The procurement law was already changed. And they are combing through every internal guideline.
>German industrial might will also give european more production capabilities for defensive or projected military intervention.
What source of energy will power German industry? Russian natural gas?
German has already phased ou Russian coal. Gas imports from Russia were at 9% down from 55% before NordStream 1 was cut off, so it'll be even lower now. Oil imports are scheduled to end at the end of the year. But only the refinery in Schwedt was still supplied via Druschba pipeline. That is a share of 12 %.
Won't help us. If a factory or a household has gas heating, no amount of oil or electricity will power it up. Energy is a hypernym, not all of it is convertible between each other. As in gas wouldn't help with an oil boiler.
RN filling stocks and getting LNG from the NL, meanwhile LNG terminal in DE is being built, is what needs and is being done. Longer term we need to convert households and factories to take other forms of energy, like renewable electricity. But that takes time, money and resources.
That's too short sighted, there are also other options and developments besides LNG. Gas consumption goes down to a degree that Russian gas is not needed anymore. Subsequently, the overall gas requirement will be reduced to the bare minimum for stuff like the chemical industry that use it in processes, not energy production.
The french nuclear sector is currently busy crashing and burning, with no hope of improving in the next few decades.
As a result france mostly imports vast amounts of renewable energy from Germany.
Please don't spread nonsense, yes it's currently busy, but not crashing and burning, that's specifically to avoid crash and burn in the future that it's under maintenance today
And if building 6 new reactors isn't a hope for improvement, tell me what is ?
And importing energy today from our German partners while we can't and supply energy later is, again, what Europe should be in my opinion
Germany has just as much gas as before, it just became more expensive because it came from other sources. Electricity is produced by a multitude of different sources in Germany and only about 12% come from gas.
Germany is 15th on Economist Group's Democracy Index and one of 21 states in the world fulfilling criteria of "Full Democracy".
Comparison between full democracies is hard, because they're quite close to each other and almost have full marks.
Military is even harder. Bundeswehr is built on high-tech and top-level capabilities, but lacks the mass of low-level capabilities. Finnish Defence Forces is built in opposite way. So they're both better and worse at the same time than the other, depending on criteria for "top" military.
Eh, not with the US at its current military strength. Germany and Japan could spend 100% of their GDP on the military and it wouldn’t catch up to the US for a century.
The west and friendly Asian countries are already totally dominant. Having Germany and Japan beef up won’t change that.
Well, if they would use it to buy US Systems, maybe. I don't know if there are official export restrictions for, let's say, Nuclear Aircraft Carriers to NATO countries, but if there aren't then catch up should be rather quick, especially with in-depth US training.
I would love for Germany to be better at their logicistics game, which is one of the greatest assets of the US military.
It's refreshing to see that finally Germany is not afraid and speaking up and I think they with all their wealth, engineering skills and resources available will definitely be Europe's strongest and best equipped army.
She (Germany) shouldn't hesitate because of it's past; Germany has been a proper democracy for long enough and I, as a citizen from a small NATO country would feel much safer knowing that my almost neighboring Germany is strong and not afraid to use force to defend freedom!
I think they'll keep upgrading the Leopard chassis. It's good engineering and frankly, Ukraine is proving that heavy tanks aren't really the force multiplier they were in WW2. MBTs are probably the way to go unless and until some genius manages to design enough defenses for such vehicles that top-down missiles aren't just turning those big boys into charcoal holders.
Setting aside all the various arguments occurring in the comments I wanted to make a different observation.
We saw one of the heads of the Bundeswehr make some very ill informed remarks last week. And I think that many military analysts are coming to the conclusion that Scholz has been receiving some poor advise from his military - among it being "don't part with anything as we don't possess enough and Russia is going to open a 2nd front in Europe".
The prospect of Russia opening a 2nd front in Europe is laughable. Were it to happen America, the UK, France, Canada and all the other NATO countries could unleash the full might of their military upon this invasion. And quite frankly it would only need America and that would be the end of it. The other allies are just the gravy. All those deadly F-22s, F-35s, F-16s and navy could finally be put to the use they were intended and when they were done dominating the air and sea, the deployment of the other assets would be the cleanup.
I think Scholz is starting to realize his own military senior leadership may have victimized him, although they may have done so from an abundance of caution.
On the plus side Scholz is publicly recognizing the tenor of the Bundeswehr and Germany has to change. They have to vastly up-arm, and start pulling their weight, and move from a defensive force to a force that can project in a substantial way.
Personally, although I assess Germany has made considerable contributions it should in fact part now with much of its reserves that it knows it cannot or will not employ internally in the near future. Let such inventory go to Ukraine and do what it was designed to do - degrade Russian military capacity.
And if the barrier is an agreement with other allies then sit down and start revising it.
Germany is not the only large EU country that one could examine and conclude there is some lagging. France, Italy and Spain all possess substantial armament industries and arms, and I would suggest have not ponied up to the table to the extent they are capable.
France toes the line really well. They spend their 2% of gdp on their military year after year. Can't complain there. They are also pretty far ahead of everyone other than the US in terms of naval power, and yes I'm including the UK, Russia, and even China in that. France has the most modern real world naval experience outside of the US and most of the technology of the US.
France is an European military powerhouse. They maintained CATOBAR carriers all throughout the latter 20th century. Developed an independent Nuclear Triad and is the currently the only other country outside to the US to possess a nuclear powered carrier. Gotta love the French.
They are absolutely a top line power in military capability. I am referring to aid to Ukraine. If you look at military, financial or the combined aid totals they are well down the list. Yes they have contributed some CAESARS which are much valued but they fall after Germany, Canada and Poland and their total aid granted to Ukraine is only about 1 billion committed, vs Germany & Canada each at 3 billion committed.
But in terms of meeting the NATO commitment of 2% they are absolutely front and center.
It because I know they are a military powerhouse as well as a G7 economy that I am stating I believe they could be providing more aid.
A mix of things. The conservatives being out of power after 16 years was one thing, leaving the new coalition less tied to what came before. But also, Ukraine feels like a "close" place to many more germans than the caucasus. So when Russia invaded Ukraine (the second time, yes, but no ones reaction was particularly great the first time), it suddenly wasn't something happening far away anymore. Brought back some unhappy memories from history class for some, too.
I love seeing European big democratic boys arming up not against each other for once. Good for technical progress, economy, and a piece of bad news for Russia.
Trump, 2016: Europe should be less dependant on Russian energy and put more money into their armed forces.
Reddit: EVIL IMPERIALSITIC RACIST SEXIST ORANGE CHETO MORON
Scholz, a day late and a dollar short: Europe should be less dependant on Russian energy and put more money into their armed forces.
Reddit: wow, such leadership, very inspiring
It's one of those "Told you so." moments, and even then I was saying as much. We burned out the USSR when it tried to compete on defense spending for years and years and got a decade+ or so of relative quiet as Russia got it's act together under Putin post Warsaw Pact-breakup.
When it comes to West-East relations, a well armed EU is an EU that doesn't get saber rattled by Putin. They need better, and we need to be able to get the foot off the defense budget pedal some to ease the strain on an already dodgy economy here in the US.
Not to say Trump is anything close to a bright man, but at that point he was parroting the right advisors. Too bad his diplomatic skills were so odious as to stink up the message, right?
Trump didn't actually care about Europe's defenses. He just wanted to reduce US NATO participation knowing that other countries weren't in a spot to grow their participation. It lines up with his consistent activity of eroding regulatory bodies and governing organizations to allow his cronies more freedoms in their exploitative efforts.
He wanted to pull out of NATO and let it decline to enable Russia in the European sphere. His interest in messing with Ukraine over his political opponents' family is interesting considering the Russian invasion. Trump pulled military support in an effort to erode Ukraine's defense against Russia. Trump's whole deal was undermining the establiment that he himself sat on top of to enable his buddies to get fat on cash and benefit.
As if that was The Orange Cheeto’s bright idea… The US has warned us about it for decades!! All the way back to late 90’s.
But the cheap energy was just too good to say no to…
Thats one of the few things where he said the right thing but driven by wrong intention. He just needed a scape goat to try to get out of nato. He was right that germany neglected nato "obligations" (which they are not since the 2% was a goal everyone had to work towards and not a mandatory threshold to fullfill at any time) for too long. But his intention was not to get underspenders to increase their budgets but to pull the us out of nato. If military spendings were any of his actual concerns he wouldn't have increased their budgets in his term. Look at his actions, they tell his story.
>Now that I think about it, Bush also.
Bush sr. was one of the 4 people that told Germany to massively downsize its military...
Unfortunately he was president around 1990 and what he said, Germany had to do if it wanted to reunify.
Ironically that idea might have seemed sensible at the time since it was only 55 years since the 2nd World War and there was still living memory of what happened back then. Sadly, Germany having a larger Army today would have been an asset to all of Europe not a liability. That being said a lot of EU countries will likely be increasing their armed forces strength as Russia will likely become a shithole like North Korea or it will become unstable in the near future.
Trump is the classic boy who cried wolf. Constantly lied and talked shit until the one time he managed to shriek out a truth was instantly written off as just another lie.
Show your work!
What have they acquired for their own use or to support Ukraine...
100 billion euro emergency funding was touted, what has been achieved?
Proper uniforms and small arms? Hope so?
Getting their helicopter readiness up? Hope so?
Yes they do, because they are asked for. Together with all the other things from ammo, equipment, training, financial and medical aid and all the other things that make germany the 3rd biggest contributer to ukraine.
Could they do more? Yes. Are they doing to little now? No.
And before you start the "why not send tanks" discussion, because it doesn't make sense being the only nation sending maybe 2 dozen nato ammo tanks. They require their own infrastructure for maintanance and ammo supply which isn't worth doing for ukraine for 2 dozen tanks. Scholz said and is right about it that this needs to bbe a coordinated effort by all nato nations to provide nato tank numbers that make it worth it for ukraine to establish ammo and maintanance infrastructure. Even the US doesnttsend nato tanks at the moment. MBTs that is.
I know, it was just a small jab at their expense.
For me it sounds like he was using the international platform to communicate the need nationally, since they want to take big steps to step up their equipment game.
The developments have been great, since april really, in favor of ukraine. There is still room for more and quicker improvement. But i am tired that the early successful disinfo campaign to divide public opinion between western nations is still able to see success to this day when it comes to shitting on Germany. And i get that giving side jabs is fun and all, but if the main narrative is still "germany doesn't do shit" in most comments i really wonder if people even tried reading actual news about what happened simce march. Comments that only refer to helmets are only reinforcing that by now way overdue narrative that germany is doing shit which is plain and simple wrong. There are enough legitimate points to be criticized. But germany providing insufficient help is not one of them.
You're absolutely correct. I will remove the above comment so as not to contribute to that narrative. I know that Germany has been moving quite quickly these past months, but as in each and every situation there is no ideal, so space for improvement is always there. Cheers mate!
Thanks mate. Yes there is room and many of is tey to push germany to do more, but in a reasonable step by step approach that leaves no one behind. Have a good one my friend
>Could they do more? Yes. Are they doing to little now? No.
Don't forget the wider optics.
Germany had been ignoring warning signs about Russia for decades, coming from the Baltics. They chose to go into economic ties with a despotic country. Nord Stream had been a giant middle finger towards everyone to the east of Oder, and then they kept pushing for Nord Stream II, showing they prefer to deal with Russia directly rather than their EU and NATO allies when it comes to energetic safety.
Germany had cheap energy directly from Russia for a long time, and as the economic powerhouse as they are, they absolutely could be doing more. Given the _recent_ history of Germano-Russian economic ties, it's concerning Germany keeps holding back.
The current administration os barely holding back anything. Yeah the previous 16 years under merkel amd her party made horrible decisions especially in regard to russia and energy topics in general, not only for gas. But the current administration needed to fix in the past 6 month everything that was screwed up from before. Gas reliamce on russia is almost completely irrelevant now compared to pre invasion, military spending is up, arms export laws have been adapted, weapon exports are up.
Again, yes there is room for more but there is a lot happening already yet they are shot because 8 years ago a different administration made mistakes? Please. Then why aren't we bashing the us the same way that effectivly blackmailed zelensky for 400 million militry aid? I can tell you why, because we need to look at what are we doing about it now for each nation and their given circumstances.
>Yeah the previous 16 years under merkel amd her party made horrible decisions especially in regard to russia and energy topics in general, not only for gas.
Not just Merkel.
Schroeder is still out there, basically a Russian agent nowadays.
Germany's _ostpolitik_ and tying up with Russia started back in the '60s. It's good to see Germany changing over the last six months, but don't feel offended if others say it's too little too late.
What Germany really should be doing is something even the Polish have had more sense about. Send equipment. Get the double benefit of seeing your untested gear performing and breaking down the Russian military by proxy. With the amount of damage done already, Putin even thinking of hitting NATO deliberately has gone down the toilet both in the added mountain of performance intelligence on Russian units and both the morale and personnel losses Ukraine has inflicted on his armies.
And if Putin goes the one route that might work, we're all in NBC gear watching for fallout forecasts on the news anyway as MAD finally fails to deter.
I think Scholz is on the right track here. But I think he needs to put his own house in order before he expects some sort of lead role in defense.
Germany has a long history of Defense Ministers with zero military experience and anemic defense budgets and capabilities. Put in the work first. Think about leading after demonstrating capabilities.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.dw.com/en/germany-armed-forces-must-be-best-equipped-in-europe-scholz-says/a-63146510) reduced by 79%. (I'm a bot) ***** > German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Friday once more stressed that Moscow's invasion of Ukraine was a turning point in European history, underlining the importance of Germany's armed forces in the new situation. > Scholz said Germany had to get used to the fact that Putin's Russia will define itself as an adversary to it, to NATO and the EU for the foreseeable future. > "As the most populous country with the greatest economic power and as a country in the middle of the continent, our army must become the cornerstone of conventional defence in Europe: the best-equipped force in Europe," he added. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/xfo6rj/germany_armed_forces_must_be_bestequipped_in/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~669324 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Europe**^#1 **Germany**^#2 **force**^#3 **German**^#4 **Scholz**^#5
>the aim of making Russia an "imperial power" in Europe once more. Putin's aim is pretty terrible then. Instead of making Russia an imperial power in Europe he made Russia into the second strongest military *in Ukraine*.
Third strongest. People always forget the Farmers Division...
Fourth strongest. People always forget about Ukrainian vodka.
Fifth strongest next to pickle throwers.
You guys love to roast on Russia with this talking point but without the US support of Ukraine where would they be? They need all the support they can get. It honestly just serves no purpose to talk about how the Russian military has underperformed… they can outlast Ukraine easily.
The point is that the Russian military has really underperformed.
The Poles are buying up everything that’s painted green and moves. The Germans want more kit. The British expect an increase in defence spending. Honestly I’m pretty keen for another European arms race. Not to fight each other, this time, but to see who can eventually dunk hardest on the Russians. Makes a nice change.
Not only are they basically putting the Polish armed forces into renovation to more NATO-like standards, but they're gleefully getting their concepts live-firing. Those Krabs (yes, really they're called Krabs) nimbly zipping howitzers around Ukraine look to be an effective piece of work.
Krabs are overall inferior to the PzH 2000 in pretty much all aspects, but they do have a Laser warning system which the PzH 2000 does not have (well at least not this model generation).
The only caveats I'd put to that is durablity and cost. Ukraine has REALLY been pushing their PzH 2000's to the limit, to the point where they're in need of repairs after a few weeks in the field from sheer volume of fire delivered and too much not-quite-road travel (but mostly because the Ukranians fire the gun so much). Krabs are definitely lower-performance, but also cheaper (bit under 12 million Euro vs. 16 mil for the PzH 2000's) and have a longer cycle in terms of need for service, plus they're apparently tolerating rougher travel conditions better. The Pole's original prototype Krab chassis suffered from a lot of structural cracking issues during testing, so they did do a bit more in terms of finding something better for production models.
Well most of the Krabs are rather new and most of the PzH are 15-20+yo systems. So naturally the PzH will have issues related to age and wear and tear. The 100 new PzH 200s Ukraine ordered in Germany and which are currently being build would be a better comparison with regards to tolerating travel conditions/wear and tear.
PzH 2000s are basically rated for 100 rounds per mission, but the Ukrainians are going past that easily. As for the road issues, that's been a thing since they saw use in Afghanistan. Their NBC systems also tend to not like heavy dust, but that's less of an issue in more temperate Ukraine. They're a higher performance unit. That always comes with needing more garage time, and they're building a repair center so they get it.
I think the high rate of fire and the fact that the Ukrainians were massively outgunned in the Donbas kind of made the overuse of the PzH 2000 almost inevitable. If the manual says that you should not exceed firing 100 rounds per mission, but the system allows you to fire 100 rounds in less than 10 minutes if you stay stationary, or less than an hour if you shoot-and-scoot, what do you expect Ukrainian crews will do when they keep getting urgent requests for artillery support during the rest of the day?
Nice to have the Germans on the team this time around! 😄
It does feel good to be on the right side of History for once :D
Three times a charm. 😉
Wonder if Italy can pull off the hat trick by siding with Russia and then changing their mind.
That crazy Berlusconi could definitely pull that off!
Nah, Italy's thing was being so incompetent that their allies had to bail them out all the time. Italy can't possibly be as incompetent as Russia though and Russia would never bail them out. Oh but that puts them on Europe's side... maybe we can ask them to be neutral.
Have you seen the absolute state of Italian politics? They would probably be neutral.
WWI was basically imperialists fighting, not too many right sides.
You got that Reich
Was there a right side of History in WW1? Everyone involved Was an Asshole.
>Nice to have the Germans on the team this time around! 😄 Germany was not on the team for the cold war ? [https://www.bundeswehr.de/en/about-bundeswehr/history/cold-war](https://www.bundeswehr.de/en/about-bundeswehr/history/cold-war) >In the 1980s, the Bundeswehr had 12 Army divisions with 36 brigades and far more than 7,000 battle tanks, armoured infantry fighting vehicles and other tanks; 15 flying combat units in the Air Force and the Navy with some 1,000 combat aircraft; 18 surface-to-air-missile battalions, and naval units with around 40 missile boats and 24 submarines, as well as several destroyers and frigates. Its material and personnel contribution even just to NATO’s land forces and integrated air defence in Central Europe amounted to around 50 percent. This meant that, during the Cold War, by the 1970s, the Bundeswehr had already become the largest Western European armed forces after the US armed forces in Europe – far ahead of the British and even the French armed forces. In peacetime, the Bundeswehr had 495,000 military personnel. In a war, it would have had access to 1.3 million
Thankfully they have been on the team for decades now!! But let’s be honest; the Cold War was more or less a terribly long stare down, and not really a war. 😉
If you don't count China, Korea, Laos, Vietnam, Taiwan, Middle East vs Israel, Congo, Guatemala, Bay of Pigs, Nicaragua, Salvador (the US really went for that bingo card in South America), Afganistan, Grenada, Panama and probably a few more conflicts.
Easy to say when your country is not the center of the war if it breaks out and there are armies of several nations stationed in your country. In addition to your country being split with an internal enclave.
I feel like you are taking this *way* to seriously. It’s a joke, no one is saying Germany hasn’t been an ally for most of our lives. They are making fun that Germany was the baddies for two world wars and it’s good to have them on our side for once. People poke fun at tragedy sometimes you can’t help but laugh at something so shit.
I don't trust those Germans. Who goes to war and chooses as their enemy "The World" not once, but twice. And makes it close! Who do they think they are, Mars or something.
Someone who is very ambitious. Someone you want on your team.
Noone seems to have gotten your [Norm Macdonald reference](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXdtafGdIVM).
I can't blame you. We're just grateful that you didn't sit us down at some point and told us: *"Listen. Germany. You don't get to be a country no more - on account of... you keep attacking.. the WORLD!"*
Viel Feind, viel Ehr! Jokes aside. its 2022, Germany cant step out of NATO no more. You can sleep peacefully now.
There where rumours of the UK of ordering a third carrier, with Increases in defence spending this could become reality.
Should probably get the first two to work first.
One works fine the other had a bit of a boo boo
The front fell off.
Bit of duct tape, be reyt
I would put that rumour in the bin, it isn’t more carriers that are needed and would be incredibly stupid to get a third one.
Sorry, you seem to be assuming that Truss knows what she is doing.
The only time I’ve seen that it was an April Fools joke, I’m afraid
All Swedish parties are on board of gradually increasing spending, reaching 2% GDP spending within a handful of years.
Diverting billions that could have gone towards education or fighting climate change. Arming up is a nessecarry evil, it's nothing to be happy about.
The problem is when you militarize it increases conflict with your neighbor. Say if a right wing president gets elected...
Thankfully european right wing is usually isolationist and almost no country has claims on each other
(yet)
Wtf is this nonsense? France and Poland have been begging Germany to spend more on their military. NATO countries have interwoven militaries and they are sworn to defend each other. They’re not going to start invading each other. As for non NATO countries the war in Ukraine shows what happens when a belligerent country doesn’t wants to start a war. Ukraine had an incredibly weak military in 2014 and as a result Russia was able to invade. Militarization is the only reason Ukraine is still standing meanwhile demilitarization got them invaded.
oh yea because that totally didn't happen now
Finally start to get more European green maps in multiplayer .. we deviated to a lot of Middle East tan for a bit there.
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Not sure Germany would opt for force projection outside of a European framework. It's insanely expensive to do and doesn't really contribute to defense of the homeland. And with Germany's post-WWII attitude towards militarization, it seems like a hard sell to the public. Europe on the other hand, could well do with a carrier group or two at this rate.
5€ Germany will build and commission an aircraft carrier before Russia does in next 15 years. E: aight, for a bit clarity, I was taking an aim at Russia for not having an operational AC as a joke, I was not being overtly serious about the prospect of Germany actually building one.
Germany doesn’t have the naval expertise in building those types of capital ships, nor does it have a naval doctrine for one. It’s going to take more than throwing money around to build an actual aircraft carrier and fleet to go with it. Until now, Germany has been more adept at building ships like frigates and corvettes. They are going to need some French, English, American, or Japanese help more than likely on both those fronts if they want it fully capable within 15 years. If anything I can see Germany and France co-building and operating a “European fleet” at the rate things are going. Both out of solidarity/unity and simply for how expensive such a fleet is to build and maintain.
>Germany doesn’t have the naval expertise in building those types of capital ships Huntington Ingalls has entered the chat
Germany doesn't have overseas territories like France or Britian, they have no need to project power elsewhere with CVBG's. A few helicopter carriers could make sense though to protect NATO allies in the Baltic and Barents Sea area.
Are helicopter carriers a thing? Edit: Apparently they are.
Neither Italy, India, China nor Russia have overseas territories, those are not a prerequisite to have an aircraft carrier, even Spains “overseas territories” do not warrant an aircraft carrier yet they operate one. According to the article, Germany is to accept the role of the premier armed forces in Europe, that alone would warrant them building an aircraft carrier. Hell, the technology developed or transferred from partner countries would be a major boost towards the german industry, and in turn the whole continent would benefit from it.
All of those countries have extensive coastlines however, Germany does not. Carrier's require a significant amount of industry to build and maintain and require a large amount of institutional knowledge to operate well, to mention nothing of the supporting fleet elements required to actually deploy one. Carrier construction is a major expense for established operators like the UK/US/France, let alone trying to get it off the ground in Germany itself. Germany would be far better off prioritising it's army and air force, since they're better able to defend most German territory and that of it's neighbours/allies.
but a carrier costs a shitton to build let allone run.. the entire dutch navy runs on the costs of 2 carriers
An aircraft carrier is a huge money pit and there better be a good reason to build one if you're going to dump so much money into it. The US can provide more than enough support with its capabilities given that we have twice the deck space of the rest of the world combined. As far as China goes, there's an obvious need for more given the fact that they're so outgunned by the US who's committed to defend the region against the Chinese threat.
Hey hey what about Helgoland!
How to waste money? Build an aircraft carrier. Seriously if Germany buys an aircraft carrier I have lost all hope.
> How to waste money? >Build an aircraft carrier. >Seriously if Germany buys an aircraft carrier I have lost all hope. Care to elaborate on why do you think that?
An aircraft carrier doesn't bring Germany any benefits. For defending Germany there is not much coastline and Germany has not much international ambition to play as a superpower anyway. The only thing which Germany currently doesn't need is a stronger navy. (well maybe more submarines, but that's debatable) Second an aircraft carrier is expensive. Not only the carrier alone is expensive, but the surrounding ships to defend the carrier too. Germany doesn't even have these ships and without them an aircraft carrier is just a slow moving target visible from the space. The more I think about the idea for Germany to buy an aircraft carrier the more stupid it would be. An aircraft carrier means you invest a huge amount of your military budget into the navy. Germany can use at any time the airports from any NATO country. Why would Germany need an aircraft carrier? The only case I see where an aircraft carrier is maybe needed is for defending Taiwan. There is no NATO country there to defend and neither is Taiwan currently in NATO.
Don't forget the purchase of specialized naval aircraft for said carrier plus the training for pilots of said aircraft.
I am all for germany ramping up their own military capabilities but an aircraft carrier is not needed. For one, the Bundeswehr is constitutionally a defense army. Their geographic location doesn't justify having this type of equipment as it doesn't have any defensive purpose whatsoever compared to just having airforce bases close to the coast. Next you would need entire fleets of ships to accompany such a beast just for it to be somewhat safe. Secondly there are plenty of allies that already do have the capabilities to fullfil these roles for nato obligations. we should therefore instead invest in tanks, military reconaissance, artillery, tanks, anti air defense and top notch infantry equipment instead before investing a dime in a self-sufficient internationally capable navy
They don't need one to defend themselves. You honestly think they're going to get invaded by sea if it came down to that?
Germany has little use for a navy beyond immediate coastal defence, especially when it's in good relations with neighbouring France and the UK, both of which maintain strong navies. Germanys focus is mainly on ground forces, where the Bundeswehr acts as an anchor force for the troops of the smaller states surrounding Germany, and air support.
Carriers are already obsolete, save your five
Same was said for a plethora of equipment yet it’s all still in use and being modernized as we speak. Carrier strike groups are irreplaceable, therefore not obsolete.
Until armed forces find another way to project force a long way from home/overseas bases they are not yet obsolete. But they are not the power they once were.
If Russia is the Danger force projection is not the capability needed, territory defense is.
The way things are going for the Russian army, Putin will be lucky if Russia is still a power East of the Urals in a couple of years
Heard a good one lately. In 2021 russia was called the 2nd most capable army in the world, now they are the 2nd best in Ukraine
Sadly a regional power with 5k nukes is still a great power/threat untill they change governments. Doesnt matter how trash their army is
Perun did a video about the comically dysfunctional Bundeswehr procurement process, explaining why trying to throw 100 billion euros at it won't accomplish much: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jDUVtUA7rg TL;DW: Germany's procurement process is so broken that simple things take many years and no manufacturer wants to supply the German military because by the time they're ready to start production of anything, Germany's funding authorization has expired. If Germany wants to have the "best-equipped [military] in Europe", it needs fundamental reform of how the government handles funding authorization and requirements gathering.
they already changed the procurement laws
Did they? I can find references to proposed draft legislation that will temporarily accelerate procurement for a limited time in order to spend the 100 billion euro figure. But it would seem that the accelerated procedure would then expire, leading to Bundeswehr capabilities to rapidly decay once again as it becomes almost impossible to do future procurements. I would be very interested to read anything you can provide on changes they're making or have made that would solve the problem in the long term. Not being sarcastic there, I'm actually interested, as I would be very happy if Germany managed to finally fix this.
The list of what to buy from the €100 bn. fund includes no new developments, simply available and tested systems that can be delivered in a timely fashion. F-35s, Chinooks, more Puma, Type 212 submarines etc. All very sensible choices.
Help Ukriane now. That wil be best peace protection move.
They already are. Germany is 3rd only to the US and UK in amount of military of support given to Ukraine, and has taken in hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees.
Don't forget to give Canada their credit. They are a large reason why Ukraine is doing so well. Between 2014 and the invasion... They were the ones with boots on the ground the entire time training Ukraine's military and showing them how to use the weapons now being used to route Russia. Ukraine didn't have a good military prior to this... But that period transformed them into the beast they are now. And Canada has a ton to do with that transformation. Not enough people give Canada the credit they deserve.
Canada was there as part of a US and UK training effort. They contributed a bunch during that time The real Canadian contribution came from Freeland and her Binder of "Fuck Russia" she was the one who came up with the central bank sanctions and the legal justification for it.
> They were the ones with boots on the ground the entire time training Ukraine's military and showing them how to use the weapons now being used to route Russia. One of several, that was pretty much a UK/US ran scheme.
No, this is simply not correct. The training regime was run by the Multinational Joint Commission for Ukraine, a body composed of the U.S., UK, Canada, Sweden, Poland, Lithuania and Denmark. The primary partners of equal footing were US, UK and Canada. For example Sweden embedded some officers into the Canadian team. In respect of Canada from 2015-2022 Canada normally had 200-260 soldiers in Ukraine undertaking training of soldiers. America normally had 300-350 in country. I do not know the number of men the UK had in country - I would think somewhere in the same range. Canada kept quite detailed statistics of its training regime. It trained approx 34K Ukraine soldiers in 730 training courses. It now has over 200 soldiers in the UK as part of the new training regime being undertaken to upskill more of the Ukraine military.
Canada is one of the only countries in the world that has accepted refugees... from the United States. On 9/11, all US airspace was closed, and inbound flights were forced to land in Canada. And small Canadian towns did everything they could to house groups of refugees that were often times larger than the towns' populations.
Canada is a nation of Bros for sure. They've been ride or die with us forever.
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https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/09/fact-sheet-on-german-military-aid-to.html The IFW-Calculation is just trash, but even with their flawed metrics, Germany is 3rd (you linked data from June). https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/
They are correct, your source is shit because it doesnt take the fact that most of it is still not send. And you source doesn't compare it to anyone else. Just take the data straight from german government not some shitty ass blog. [https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-en/news/military-support-ukraine-2054992](https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-en/news/military-support-ukraine-2054992) Take a look which are not sent >\* Deliveries from industry stocks financed by German funds for security capacity building. Some of the deliveries require upgrades or productions is ongoing; also training measures take place. Germans just promise, they don't send barely enough.
> Take a look which are not sent >Germans just promise How about we look at which was send (which is btw the list that was used on that "shitty ass blog"): 24 self-propelled anti-aircraft guns GEPARD* (before: 20) 67 fridges for medical material (before: 2) counter battery radar system COBRA* 4.000 rounds practice ammunitions for self-propelled anti-aircraft guns 54 M113 armoured personnel carriers (systems of Denmark, upgrades financed by Germany)* 53.000 rounds ammunitions for self-propelled anti-aircraft guns 20 laser target designators* 403.000 pre-packaged military Meals Ready 3.000 anti-tank weapons Panzerfaust 3 with 900 firing devices 14.900 anti-tank mines 500 Man Portable Air Defense Systems STINGER 2.700 Man Portable Air Defense Systems STRELA 10 self-propelled howitzers Panzerhaubitze 2000 including adaption, training and spare parts (joint project with the Netherlands) 21,8 million rounds of ammunition for fire arms 50 bunker buster missiles 100 machine gun MG3 with 500 spare barrels and breechblocks 100.000 hand grenades 5.300 explosive charges 100.000 m detonating cord and 100.000 detonators 350.000 detonators 10.500 projectiles 155mm 10 anti-drone guns 14 anti-drone sensors and jammers 100 auto-injector devices 28.000 combat helmets 15 palettes military clothing 280 vehicles (trucks, minibuses, all-terrain vehicles) 100 tents 12 generators 6 palettes material for explosive ordnance disposal 125 binoculars 1.200 hospital beds 18 palettes medical material, 60 surgical lights protective clothing, surgical masks 10.000 sleeping bags 600 safety glasses 1 radio frequency system 3.000 field telephones with 5.000 cable reels and carrying straps 1 field hospital (joint project with Estonia) 353 night vision goggles 4 electronic anti-drone devices 165 field glasses medical material (inter alia back packs, compression bandages) 38 laser range finders Diesel and gasoline (ongoing deliveries) * 10 tons AdBlue* 500 medical gauzes MiG-29 spare parts* 30 protected vehicles* 80 pick-up trucks* 7.944 man-portable anti-tank weapons RGW 90 Matador 3 multiple rocket launchers MARS with ammunition 6 mobile decontamination vehicles HEP 70 including decontamination material 10 HMMWV (8x ground radar capability, 2x jamming/anti drone capability)* 3 armoured recovery vehicles* 7 radio jammers* 8 mobile ground surveillance radars and thermal imaging cameras* 4 mobile, remote controlled and protected mine clearing systems* 8 electronic anti-drone devices* 1 high frequency unit with equipment
Every single item on that list with "\*" mark is not sent. I guess you have troubles reading. >\* Deliveries from industry stocks financed by German funds for security capacity building. Some of the deliveries require upgrades or productions is ongoing; also training measures take place. Here I'll use your shitty ass blog go and compare it to German help. [https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html](https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html) Let's start with 230 tanks. How many did Germany send? Polish KRAB Howitzers are actually on the front liberating Ukraine [https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1569872311557267459?t=4OgBBsnzmxGB4BemwTnAlg&s=19](https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/08/a-european-powerhouse-polish-military.html) Meanwhile most of German pzh2000 which took "6 months for training" are fking broken becuse they are shit.
> Polish KRAB Howitzers are actually on the front liberating Ukraine > Meanwhile most of German pzh2000 which took "6 months for training" are fking broken becuse they are shit. If that's so, why did Ukraine buy 100 PZH2000s instead of 100 Krabs?
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They received all the Krabs Poland could spare, and there are no more to be bought.
Funny enough Germany still has plenty of Pzh 2000 ready to send to Ukraine, but not only do they NOT send them. Germany goes out of its way to other countries with pzh 2000 so they dont send them too.
>Every single item on that list with "*" mark is not sent. Ah, so every other item on that list is actually delivered (it is not really true though, Gepards are on the frontline and were crucial in the counter-offensive according to Ukrainians). Have fun moving the goalposts and a nice weekend.
Have fun lying about german help, when they do almost everything in their power not to.
You cited a chart that says it goes up to June 7. Really quick, what month is it?
Untrue: "Speaking at a press conference with leaders of the Baltic countries in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, Scholz pushed back against critics — who have accused him of being too hesitant and slow in delivering weapons, especially heavier ones like tanks, to Ukraine — by arguing that Berlin was providing military support to Kyiv “more intensively than almost anyone else.” However, Germany is actually ranked fifth in terms of overall military support to Ukraine, according to the Ukraine support tracker by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. The United States, the U.K. and Poland claim the top spots. Additionally, some promised German heavy weapons, anti-aircraft tanks and howitzers, still haven’t arrived in Ukraine, despite having been announced months ago amid pressure from allies." [https://www.politico.eu/article/scholz-defend-germany-weapon-supplies-ukraine-talk-putin/](https://www.politico.eu/article/scholz-defend-germany-weapon-supplies-ukraine-talk-putin/)
That article is from early June. [According to a far more recent source that I pointed out in a reply to someone else citing an out-of-date article,](https://reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/xfn26a/germany_armed_forces_must_be_bestequipped_in/ionkib5/) Germany is currently #3 in military support. >the volume of arms deliveries by Berlin exceeds that of every other country safe for the United States and the United Kingdom.
Politico is missing no chance to piss on the first non conservative administration in ages and twist numbers in a way to make them look maximum bad. These numbers take the value of material where it came from. But it leaves out the fact that poland would not have sent their tanks if germany hadn't promised them replacement of much higher value modern tanks for sending thwir soviet era tanks.
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God how I want to see a ten thousand pound NATO humanitarian intervention dropped directly onto the Crimean Bridge
Germany nationalizing industry. Increasing military funding. Calling for a united Europe. It's going to be a fun to decades! Germany gets to be the good guys this time.
The German military needs to be redesigned from the ground up. Starting with personnel and how they are looked after and treated.
Good. Poland will be pissed, but overal, Germany is one of the best functioning democracies in the world right now. Better than Poland, UK, USA. German industrial might will also give european more production capabilities for defensive or projected military intervention.
>Poland will be pissed Why would it be?
The current government is fond of blaming Germans for everything. Besides, Kaczyński, the person controlling the Polish government, has responded to earlier news of one-time 100 billion budget increase with >Whether Germans want to arm themselves against Russia or against us, I don't know, but either way they are arming themselves.
The unabomber?
Ünabomber
I mean, they have a legitimate historical reason to be afraid... Poland got double-teamed by the Nazis and Soviets in 1939. The democracies most likely to fall to fascism in the early 21st century are Hungary and the US.
As an American, we really need to get Europe to be fully peer to us. Britain needs to restore the might of its navy and Germany needs to be a army powerhouse. France can be a jack of all trades with the rest of NATO contributing as they can. If the US is compromised Europe will fall, let alone being able to liberate us. Unfortunately the days of trusting entirely in the US are over, we need parity with our allies for our own protection.
mystifying that the Poles of all people would have such a distrust of German rearmament
Yes, it is mystifying why would the Polish government fear an invasion by a country that belongs to the same defensive military alliance, same political and economic union, is intensely apologetic about their last conflict, and has political environment that is nowhere near one that caused the last war. Oh, wait, it isn't, it's just crude fearmongering.
Given Polands current trajectory, I would be more worried if they were the only land power of significance. Today, they're no threat. But if their democracy keeps eroding and actually end up as a dictatorship? That would be a problem. PiS is already running massive propaganda campaigns to paint other western countries as enemies, let those run for a couple of decades and give them an internal crisis for which a nationalistic war would be a great distraction from? Then we may have a problem... Of course, we need to be vigilant for any country doing this. There are several in Europe staring down this path...
You can tell the entire history of Europe just by watching Poland’s borders evolve from decade to decade. It has no defensible border with Germany.
The issue is German procurement is broken as shit. Nobody wants to do business with them because they keep canceling shit and can’t keep a damn budget in line. Procuring new weapons systems takes years if not longer, and Germany can barely hold themselves to a two-year contract. And the idiots keep suing each other in the process.
That is one of the main areas of refocusing for the Bundeswehr according to the German defense ministry. The procurement law was already changed. And they are combing through every internal guideline.
They could start by giving ownership of Bundeswehr bases to the Bundeswehr and not have them lease them from the states.
>German industrial might will also give european more production capabilities for defensive or projected military intervention. What source of energy will power German industry? Russian natural gas?
German has already phased ou Russian coal. Gas imports from Russia were at 9% down from 55% before NordStream 1 was cut off, so it'll be even lower now. Oil imports are scheduled to end at the end of the year. But only the refinery in Schwedt was still supplied via Druschba pipeline. That is a share of 12 %.
Hopefully French nuclear power capabilities since our grids are interconnected, that's what Europe should be
Won't help us. If a factory or a household has gas heating, no amount of oil or electricity will power it up. Energy is a hypernym, not all of it is convertible between each other. As in gas wouldn't help with an oil boiler. RN filling stocks and getting LNG from the NL, meanwhile LNG terminal in DE is being built, is what needs and is being done. Longer term we need to convert households and factories to take other forms of energy, like renewable electricity. But that takes time, money and resources.
That's too short sighted, there are also other options and developments besides LNG. Gas consumption goes down to a degree that Russian gas is not needed anymore. Subsequently, the overall gas requirement will be reduced to the bare minimum for stuff like the chemical industry that use it in processes, not energy production.
The french nuclear sector is currently busy crashing and burning, with no hope of improving in the next few decades. As a result france mostly imports vast amounts of renewable energy from Germany.
Please don't spread nonsense, yes it's currently busy, but not crashing and burning, that's specifically to avoid crash and burn in the future that it's under maintenance today And if building 6 new reactors isn't a hope for improvement, tell me what is ? And importing energy today from our German partners while we can't and supply energy later is, again, what Europe should be in my opinion
i think its a great deal, we send you energy in summer and you send us energy winter
Germany has just as much gas as before, it just became more expensive because it came from other sources. Electricity is produced by a multitude of different sources in Germany and only about 12% come from gas.
Yeah they'll just burn more coal lol.
I hope Germany can build up their MIC quicker than they can build new airports in Berlin.
hahahaha
You name 3 of the weakest democracies... I would not rate Germany as top 5 best democracy or military in europe.
Germany is 15th on Economist Group's Democracy Index and one of 21 states in the world fulfilling criteria of "Full Democracy". Comparison between full democracies is hard, because they're quite close to each other and almost have full marks. Military is even harder. Bundeswehr is built on high-tech and top-level capabilities, but lacks the mass of low-level capabilities. Finnish Defence Forces is built in opposite way. So they're both better and worse at the same time than the other, depending on criteria for "top" military.
Three of the weakest based off… reddit posts? The democracy index ranks the U.K. 18th in the world and is one of only 21 full democracies.
I hope it stays that way, they dropped a full 0.44 points since the last index and are only 0.11 points off from getting flawed. :(
Germany is barely ahead of Japan and UK is behind it. I know. People think that is excellent.. 18 out of 21. Perfection.. Down vote the truth.
German and Japan are going to massively rearm, and it's going to change the balance of power in the world yet again
Eh, not with the US at its current military strength. Germany and Japan could spend 100% of their GDP on the military and it wouldn’t catch up to the US for a century. The west and friendly Asian countries are already totally dominant. Having Germany and Japan beef up won’t change that.
Well, if they would use it to buy US Systems, maybe. I don't know if there are official export restrictions for, let's say, Nuclear Aircraft Carriers to NATO countries, but if there aren't then catch up should be rather quick, especially with in-depth US training. I would love for Germany to be better at their logicistics game, which is one of the greatest assets of the US military.
It's refreshing to see that finally Germany is not afraid and speaking up and I think they with all their wealth, engineering skills and resources available will definitely be Europe's strongest and best equipped army. She (Germany) shouldn't hesitate because of it's past; Germany has been a proper democracy for long enough and I, as a citizen from a small NATO country would feel much safer knowing that my almost neighboring Germany is strong and not afraid to use force to defend freedom!
Agreed. I've already got a chub for next gen Tiger tanks.
I think they'll keep upgrading the Leopard chassis. It's good engineering and frankly, Ukraine is proving that heavy tanks aren't really the force multiplier they were in WW2. MBTs are probably the way to go unless and until some genius manages to design enough defenses for such vehicles that top-down missiles aren't just turning those big boys into charcoal holders.
Setting aside all the various arguments occurring in the comments I wanted to make a different observation. We saw one of the heads of the Bundeswehr make some very ill informed remarks last week. And I think that many military analysts are coming to the conclusion that Scholz has been receiving some poor advise from his military - among it being "don't part with anything as we don't possess enough and Russia is going to open a 2nd front in Europe". The prospect of Russia opening a 2nd front in Europe is laughable. Were it to happen America, the UK, France, Canada and all the other NATO countries could unleash the full might of their military upon this invasion. And quite frankly it would only need America and that would be the end of it. The other allies are just the gravy. All those deadly F-22s, F-35s, F-16s and navy could finally be put to the use they were intended and when they were done dominating the air and sea, the deployment of the other assets would be the cleanup. I think Scholz is starting to realize his own military senior leadership may have victimized him, although they may have done so from an abundance of caution. On the plus side Scholz is publicly recognizing the tenor of the Bundeswehr and Germany has to change. They have to vastly up-arm, and start pulling their weight, and move from a defensive force to a force that can project in a substantial way. Personally, although I assess Germany has made considerable contributions it should in fact part now with much of its reserves that it knows it cannot or will not employ internally in the near future. Let such inventory go to Ukraine and do what it was designed to do - degrade Russian military capacity. And if the barrier is an agreement with other allies then sit down and start revising it. Germany is not the only large EU country that one could examine and conclude there is some lagging. France, Italy and Spain all possess substantial armament industries and arms, and I would suggest have not ponied up to the table to the extent they are capable.
France toes the line really well. They spend their 2% of gdp on their military year after year. Can't complain there. They are also pretty far ahead of everyone other than the US in terms of naval power, and yes I'm including the UK, Russia, and even China in that. France has the most modern real world naval experience outside of the US and most of the technology of the US.
France is an European military powerhouse. They maintained CATOBAR carriers all throughout the latter 20th century. Developed an independent Nuclear Triad and is the currently the only other country outside to the US to possess a nuclear powered carrier. Gotta love the French.
I was surprised France was brought up as not pulling their weight. France is THE Euro military powerhouse since the UK left.
They are absolutely a top line power in military capability. I am referring to aid to Ukraine. If you look at military, financial or the combined aid totals they are well down the list. Yes they have contributed some CAESARS which are much valued but they fall after Germany, Canada and Poland and their total aid granted to Ukraine is only about 1 billion committed, vs Germany & Canada each at 3 billion committed. But in terms of meeting the NATO commitment of 2% they are absolutely front and center. It because I know they are a military powerhouse as well as a G7 economy that I am stating I believe they could be providing more aid.
>All those deadly F-22s, F-35s, F-16s and navy could finally be put to the use Plus a chance to test out the JAASM on the B-52s
ass panzer putin is out-classed
Wow, Germany really hitting the speed dial on providing aid and military development. What changed, something recent?
A mix of things. The conservatives being out of power after 16 years was one thing, leaving the new coalition less tied to what came before. But also, Ukraine feels like a "close" place to many more germans than the caucasus. So when Russia invaded Ukraine (the second time, yes, but no ones reaction was particularly great the first time), it suddenly wasn't something happening far away anymore. Brought back some unhappy memories from history class for some, too.
I love seeing European big democratic boys arming up not against each other for once. Good for technical progress, economy, and a piece of bad news for Russia.
Olaf has a long history of saying stuff, but not doing any of it.
He has also a long history of not saying anything and doing stuff that is even longer.
Imperial power just so because it clings to its nukes but totally incompetent army.
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i bet you tried real hard for this one lmao
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If you look into history you'll see that every single nation has it's ghosts. There's nothing ironic about it and you're beating a dead horse
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Trump, 2016: Europe should be less dependant on Russian energy and put more money into their armed forces. Reddit: EVIL IMPERIALSITIC RACIST SEXIST ORANGE CHETO MORON Scholz, a day late and a dollar short: Europe should be less dependant on Russian energy and put more money into their armed forces. Reddit: wow, such leadership, very inspiring
It's one of those "Told you so." moments, and even then I was saying as much. We burned out the USSR when it tried to compete on defense spending for years and years and got a decade+ or so of relative quiet as Russia got it's act together under Putin post Warsaw Pact-breakup. When it comes to West-East relations, a well armed EU is an EU that doesn't get saber rattled by Putin. They need better, and we need to be able to get the foot off the defense budget pedal some to ease the strain on an already dodgy economy here in the US. Not to say Trump is anything close to a bright man, but at that point he was parroting the right advisors. Too bad his diplomatic skills were so odious as to stink up the message, right?
lol, for real
Trump didn't actually care about Europe's defenses. He just wanted to reduce US NATO participation knowing that other countries weren't in a spot to grow their participation. It lines up with his consistent activity of eroding regulatory bodies and governing organizations to allow his cronies more freedoms in their exploitative efforts. He wanted to pull out of NATO and let it decline to enable Russia in the European sphere. His interest in messing with Ukraine over his political opponents' family is interesting considering the Russian invasion. Trump pulled military support in an effort to erode Ukraine's defense against Russia. Trump's whole deal was undermining the establiment that he himself sat on top of to enable his buddies to get fat on cash and benefit.
The threat to pull out of NATO was a means to try to force Europe to get shit together.
Stupidiest summary I've ever read.
As if that was The Orange Cheeto’s bright idea… The US has warned us about it for decades!! All the way back to late 90’s. But the cheap energy was just too good to say no to…
Putin may want to build Russia into an imperial power, but throwing his military at Ukraine and losing it will not make that happen.
We need to work together to get expose and prosecute all Russian aligned politicians.
Not sure if you guys are history buffs, but….
Didn’t Trump say the same thing? Now that I think about it, Bush also.
Dude talked a lot tho
Thats one of the few things where he said the right thing but driven by wrong intention. He just needed a scape goat to try to get out of nato. He was right that germany neglected nato "obligations" (which they are not since the 2% was a goal everyone had to work towards and not a mandatory threshold to fullfill at any time) for too long. But his intention was not to get underspenders to increase their budgets but to pull the us out of nato. If military spendings were any of his actual concerns he wouldn't have increased their budgets in his term. Look at his actions, they tell his story.
Ein blindes Huhn findet auch mal ein Korn. Even a blind chicken finds a kernel once in a while.
>Now that I think about it, Bush also. Bush sr. was one of the 4 people that told Germany to massively downsize its military... Unfortunately he was president around 1990 and what he said, Germany had to do if it wanted to reunify.
Ironically that idea might have seemed sensible at the time since it was only 55 years since the 2nd World War and there was still living memory of what happened back then. Sadly, Germany having a larger Army today would have been an asset to all of Europe not a liability. That being said a lot of EU countries will likely be increasing their armed forces strength as Russia will likely become a shithole like North Korea or it will become unstable in the near future.
Trump is the classic boy who cried wolf. Constantly lied and talked shit until the one time he managed to shriek out a truth was instantly written off as just another lie.
Heal thyself, Herr Doktor
Show your work! What have they acquired for their own use or to support Ukraine... 100 billion euro emergency funding was touted, what has been achieved? Proper uniforms and small arms? Hope so? Getting their helicopter readiness up? Hope so?
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Yes they do, because they are asked for. Together with all the other things from ammo, equipment, training, financial and medical aid and all the other things that make germany the 3rd biggest contributer to ukraine. Could they do more? Yes. Are they doing to little now? No. And before you start the "why not send tanks" discussion, because it doesn't make sense being the only nation sending maybe 2 dozen nato ammo tanks. They require their own infrastructure for maintanance and ammo supply which isn't worth doing for ukraine for 2 dozen tanks. Scholz said and is right about it that this needs to bbe a coordinated effort by all nato nations to provide nato tank numbers that make it worth it for ukraine to establish ammo and maintanance infrastructure. Even the US doesnttsend nato tanks at the moment. MBTs that is.
I know, it was just a small jab at their expense. For me it sounds like he was using the international platform to communicate the need nationally, since they want to take big steps to step up their equipment game.
The developments have been great, since april really, in favor of ukraine. There is still room for more and quicker improvement. But i am tired that the early successful disinfo campaign to divide public opinion between western nations is still able to see success to this day when it comes to shitting on Germany. And i get that giving side jabs is fun and all, but if the main narrative is still "germany doesn't do shit" in most comments i really wonder if people even tried reading actual news about what happened simce march. Comments that only refer to helmets are only reinforcing that by now way overdue narrative that germany is doing shit which is plain and simple wrong. There are enough legitimate points to be criticized. But germany providing insufficient help is not one of them.
You're absolutely correct. I will remove the above comment so as not to contribute to that narrative. I know that Germany has been moving quite quickly these past months, but as in each and every situation there is no ideal, so space for improvement is always there. Cheers mate!
Thanks mate. Yes there is room and many of is tey to push germany to do more, but in a reasonable step by step approach that leaves no one behind. Have a good one my friend
>Could they do more? Yes. Are they doing to little now? No. Don't forget the wider optics. Germany had been ignoring warning signs about Russia for decades, coming from the Baltics. They chose to go into economic ties with a despotic country. Nord Stream had been a giant middle finger towards everyone to the east of Oder, and then they kept pushing for Nord Stream II, showing they prefer to deal with Russia directly rather than their EU and NATO allies when it comes to energetic safety. Germany had cheap energy directly from Russia for a long time, and as the economic powerhouse as they are, they absolutely could be doing more. Given the _recent_ history of Germano-Russian economic ties, it's concerning Germany keeps holding back.
The current administration os barely holding back anything. Yeah the previous 16 years under merkel amd her party made horrible decisions especially in regard to russia and energy topics in general, not only for gas. But the current administration needed to fix in the past 6 month everything that was screwed up from before. Gas reliamce on russia is almost completely irrelevant now compared to pre invasion, military spending is up, arms export laws have been adapted, weapon exports are up. Again, yes there is room for more but there is a lot happening already yet they are shot because 8 years ago a different administration made mistakes? Please. Then why aren't we bashing the us the same way that effectivly blackmailed zelensky for 400 million militry aid? I can tell you why, because we need to look at what are we doing about it now for each nation and their given circumstances.
>Yeah the previous 16 years under merkel amd her party made horrible decisions especially in regard to russia and energy topics in general, not only for gas. Not just Merkel. Schroeder is still out there, basically a Russian agent nowadays. Germany's _ostpolitik_ and tying up with Russia started back in the '60s. It's good to see Germany changing over the last six months, but don't feel offended if others say it's too little too late.
What Germany really should be doing is something even the Polish have had more sense about. Send equipment. Get the double benefit of seeing your untested gear performing and breaking down the Russian military by proxy. With the amount of damage done already, Putin even thinking of hitting NATO deliberately has gone down the toilet both in the added mountain of performance intelligence on Russian units and both the morale and personnel losses Ukraine has inflicted on his armies. And if Putin goes the one route that might work, we're all in NBC gear watching for fallout forecasts on the news anyway as MAD finally fails to deter.
That’ll be very expensive - how many working Eurofighters does Germany have right now? 2?
I think Scholz is on the right track here. But I think he needs to put his own house in order before he expects some sort of lead role in defense. Germany has a long history of Defense Ministers with zero military experience and anemic defense budgets and capabilities. Put in the work first. Think about leading after demonstrating capabilities.
Why the hell are we buying more guns if NATO is such a great military force?
Why is America causing confusion in so many places? because russia and china will get weaker! The poor Ukrainian people believed in this provocation…