In recent months, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has been praying for higher defense spending for the Bundeswehr but is now once again not receiving enough money to make the armed forces quickly capable of defense.
The unpopular “traffic light government” of SPD, Greens and FDP has often been predicted to come to an end, but as in Austria, they have now also come together in Berlin (Chancellor Olaf Scholz: “Sleep is overrated”) to continue together until the regular end of the government’s term. However, the mood among the coalition partners is still anything but good, as the recent federal press conference once again made clear: FDP Finance Minister Christian Lindner announced that the budget compromise The “debt press” would not be opened, meaning that Germany would not take on any new debt, as demanded by the red and green parties. This decision has consequences – despite the volatile world situation and talk of defense or even war readiness (-> current reports from the Ukraine war) – above all for the Bundeswehr. The budget for the coming year has only been increased slightly. According to Lindner, the situation for the German armed forces with regard to the NATOtarget of annual defense spending of two percent of gross domestic product (GDP), the situation for the German armed forces will improve again from 2028, but he did not want to give any details. https://militaeraktuell.at/bundesheer-black-hawk-sikorsky-kauf-offiziell/
“Disaster for the Bundeswehr”
In the German media, criticism of the criticism of the only moderate increase in defense spending is high. The tenor is that the SPD-led government is leaving its own minister Boris Pistorius out in the cold and risking the turnaround proclaimed by Olaf Scholz in 2022. In any case, the fact is that, as in the previous year, Pistorius will once again not receive the funds to make the armed forces “quickly” capable of defense. Whereby “quickly” describes a long-term process anyway; there is currently no question of the country being ready for war. And it probably won’t be for some time yet: The defense budget is only set to increase by 1.2 billion euros to around 53 billion next year. No further increases are planned for the following years – mind you, this concerns the current budget for the most part and not the credit-financed procurement “special assets”, which will probably be used up by 2027.
A few weeks ago, German defense experts extrapolated (statement) that significantly more money would be needed next year to prevent the “turnaround” from failing. There was talk of 25 billion euros more per year until 2028 – otherwise Germany would not be able to defend itself in the medium term. After all, Minister Boris Pistorius had called for 6.5 billion euros more, after he had announced a good ten billion euros the previous year – but his party comrade and Chancellor Olaf Scholz let him “run aground”, so to speak. This is because the current government compromise does not even cover the inflation costs in the defense budget and the hundreds of procurements from the “special fund” are – according to the opposition CDU according to the opposition CDU can hardly be financed.
The two percent of GDP – already committed to at the NATO summit in Wales in 2014 – was achieved by the “traffic light” this year with some cheating (@NZZ) for the first time. Just about. But at the 2023 summit in Vilnius, the NATO states agreed that the 2 percent figure would only apply as a lower limit in view of the growing threat from Russia. Without a further so-called “special fund”, the defense budget would have to suddenly increase by around 30 billion euros in 2028 if it remained at its current level. Germany’s military expenditure would then have to increase even more in the near future. Experts have therefore been calling for a good two years for the regular defense budget to be gradually increased in parallel to the special fund to such an extent that the jump in 2028 is no longer so sharp. However, based on the information now provided, it seems clear that this will not happen for the time being. The consequences are considerable – and will probably be serious for Germany’s defense capability and for Germany’s credibility in NATO. And from a global perspective, the often cited autocratic and anti-democratic powers and opponents of the West will of course also register this and make their harsh and hybrid deductions.
Here for further reports on the Bundeswehr.
