The agreement on the special fund for the Bundeswehr is of historic importance. Three months after it was proclaimed by Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the turning point is taking concrete shape. The Bundeswehr is finally getting the equipment that it urgently needed before Russia attacked Ukraine.
The Bundeswehr is an example of the fatal consequences that wrong priorities can have when it comes to saving. submarines that don’t dive; tanks that don’t roll; Planes that don’t fly – the list of the most abstruse examples of the “Bundeswehr shortage economy” has become a journalistic genre of its own, like the Berlin bashing.
The soldiers who risk their heads on missions abroad never deserved it. The underfunding and the associated disrespectful treatment of the troops were a disgrace.
Politicians must learn lessons from these omissions. A one-off special fund is not enough. A fundamentally new way of dealing with the Bundeswehr is necessary. Politicians must ensure that the troops are no longer ostracized in parts of society, but respected again.
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To do this, the Bundeswehr must become more attractive as an employer, the Bundeswehr universities must become cadre schools, and the armed forces must become leaders in IT. Adequate equipment is absolutely essential for this and for the ability to defend and form alliances.
Financing the Bundeswehr from a secondary budget and labeling it as “assets” in the peculiar language of budgetary policy, even though it consists 100 percent of debt, must therefore remain a one-off action.
Special assets: The financing trick is an embarrassment
The fact that the Federal Republic has to resort to such tricks at all is an embarrassment that is due to the pacifist errors in the left camp, the consistently poor performance of the Union defense ministers and a cross-party budgetary policy with the wrong priorities: First, the Bundeswehr is so badly equipped that it can hardly meet its alliance obligations. And then Berlin, which acts internationally as a schoolmaster in financial policy, uses tricks to circumvent its own debt regulations.
Agreement on special assets for the Bundeswehr
But the 100 billion euros from the special fund will also be used up quickly. 20 billion euros are needed for ammunition, as much money for the renovation of rickety barracks. Almost half of the money is already gone and not a single combat aircraft has been bought. And because politicians are suddenly putting the 100 billion in the shop window, they are driving up prices. Rheinmetall shareholders are happy.
The ability to defend and form alliances is one of the core tasks of a state, so the armed forces must be financed from the core budget and the necessary funds made available. Also because nobody knows what geopolitical shock is imminent next: If Donald Trump or one of his vassals wins the election in the USA in 2024, the reinvigorated NATO could quickly be history. Europe would be naked.
The special fund can therefore only be a start. The Federal Republic must clarify the question of how much its own security is worth in the future. Debt is the wrong answer to this question.
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