Germany rearms to face the challenge of Putin’s Russia: announces more than US $ 100,000 million in defense

Germanywith a chronically under-resourced armed forces, will spend an additional €100 billion to rearm the Bundeswehr and will spend more than 2% per year of its gross domestic product on defense to meet the challenge of a Russia leadered by Vladimir Putin.

“We have to ask ourselves the question of what capabilities the Russia from Putin and what capabilities do we need to face this threat, today and in the future”said the German chancellor, Olaf Scholzthis Sunday in a government statement before the Bundestag (Lower House).

The goal, he stressed, is have an “efficient, state-of-the-art and advanced” Bundeswehrwhich implies “better equipment, modern equipment, more staff”.

“That costs a lot of money”, granted, but it should be possible for a country of the size and importance in Europe as Germanyhe added.

Faced with this “change of era” that the Russian invasion of Ukraine, “whatever is necessary will be done to guarantee peace in Europe”, and Germany it will be supportive in its contribution, for which, however, the Bundeswehr needs “new and great capabilities,” he acknowledged.

In this sense, Scholz addressed all the parliamentary groups to ask for the Basic Law to shield this additional item aimed at modernizing the armed forces.

“From now on, every year, we will invest more than 2% of our GDP in our defense”, not only because of the commitment made to the Atlantic Alliance, but “for our own security,” he also announced.

Scholz warned the Kremlin chief against underestimating Germany’s determination to defend alongside its allies “every square meter of Alliance territory.”

Among the great challenges is that of “preventing the war of Putin move to other countries Europe”, he pointed out and added that with the invasion of Ukraine, the Russian president “does not just want to erase an independent country from the map”, but rather “destroys the European security order” founded for almost half a century in the Helsinki Final Act.

Scholz accused Putin of wanting to “build a Russian empire”radically reorganize Europe according to his ideas and divide the continent with the violence of arms into “well-known zones of influence”.

SCHOLZ DEFENDS DIPLOMCY, BUT “WITHOUT SINNING INNOCENTS”

On the other hand, the chancellor underlined that “Putin’s war marks a turning point”also for the foreign policy of Germany.

The aspiration will continue to be that of “as much diplomacy as possible, without being innocent”, which also implies “no talk for talk”.

He added that “for a real dialogue it is necessary that there be willingness on both sides”, and on that of Putin there isn’t, “and not just in the last few days and weeks,” he said.

“We have tried until the last minute with diplomacy. The Kremlin has made us wait, has lied to us and has denied everything that we Europeans have defended until now. Putin wanted this war, whatever it took.”said the Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, during her turn to speak.

On the other hand, Scholz underlined the need to support Ukraine “in this desperate situation”.

With the invasion of Ukrainethe Russian president has created a “new reality” that demands “a clear answer”.

He referred to the decision of the German Government to supply defensive weapons to Ukrainesomething he had resisted until the last minute, and conceded that “there was no other possible response to Putin’s aggression.”

Another task is to “dissuade Putin of its warmongering course”, for which, he recalled, the heads of State and Government of the EU approved a package of sanctions “of unprecedented dimensions”.

“The war is a catastrophe for Ukraine. The war will end up being a catastrophe for Russia too.”he said, referring to the agreed package, which translates into a cut in the flow of money to Russian state companies, the disconnection of important Russian banks from the SWIFT international payment system and personal sanctions against Putin and other people in their immediate environment, among other measures.

don’t be fooled, “Putin will not change his course from night to day”but “very soon the Russian leadership will realize the high price it pays,” he added, adding that the EU reserves the right to impose more sanctions.

Another pending task is to work to guarantee the security of energy supply in Germany and reduce energy dependence on third parties.

In this sense, he assured that a responsible energy policy with a vision of the future is decisive not only for the economy and the climate, but also for the country’s security.

For this, in addition to speeding up the development of renewable energies, it will be essential to increase coal and gas reserves – in the latter case by 2,000 million cubic meters -, he said, while announcing the construction of two liquefied natural gas terminals .

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