Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-25

[Iormlund]

Holy Warhammer 40k wet dreams made real.

Or Diablo. Needs gigantic shoulder pads for either, though.

[Razgovory]

Meanwhile in the Netherlands

It's like a Homer Simpson fantasy. 

[The Larch]

The German defence minister has resigned, apparently in part because of failing to put the German army into shape in the context of the war in Ukraine. Zanza, can you give us some enlightement?

[Duque de Bragança]

A long string of gaffes, including botched New Year greetings, and a general failure to organise and implement the 100 bn € promised to the Bundeswehr.

[The Larch]

How can anyone botch new year's greetings?

[Sheilbh]

How can anyone botch new year's greetings?

Little bit tone deaf. There's a thread here (and I read something interesting by this writer on the zeitenwende more broadly) - but this has the relevant sections with English subs:
https://twitter.com/RikeFranke/status/1609646613118717952?s=20&t=CBCKsOvpwmo-l0V_tTa9CA

[celedhring]

It seems tone deaf, yeah, but hardly a resignable offence.

[Zanza]

She is incompetent and was publicly criticized a lot. In her view that of course unfair criticism made her job impossible. So she resigned. It's a relief as any replacement should be an improvement. 

Her failings were particularly egregious in context of the war, but even without it she would probably have been a failure.

She is not the right person to lead a re-armament of the Bundeswehr.

[Sheilbh]

It seems tone deaf, yeah, but hardly a resignable offence.

I think it's a straw that broke the camel's back situation - or perhaps was just a visible, obvious and more comprehensible example of wider issues.

I think there's been a sense that she's not quite up to the job of responding to Russia's invasion or the Zeitenwende. Eg from Franke on what's happened with that €100 billion boost to spending:

The Bad

Many of the big Zeitenwende achievements just ensure the status quo or overcome self-imposed restrictions

As a long-term observer of the German military, one could almost get whiplash from Scholz's Zeitenwende speech. In one fell swoop, he announced a 100bn Euro special fund for the Bundeswehr leading to Germany spending "beyond 2% of GDP" on defence, the purchase of US F35 planes to ensure Germany's role in NATO's nuclear sharing task, and noted that Germany was getting armed drones. The discussion of some of these topics had been going on for decades, and Scholz then just solved them in a half-hour speech. On the one hand, this felt like a decisive moment of change. On the other hand, on close examination, the majority of these decisions were about keeping the status quo, or doing what had already been promised and was expected by allies.

Germany agreed back in 2014 to spend 2% on its defence, it just never did so. Thus, Scholz should expect little backslapping for this. Also, looking at the list of the acquisitions to be made with the 100 billion fund, it becomes clear that many things on that list Germany had already planned to buy before the war. In fact, one is left wondering where that money would have come from without the special fund. These acquisitions and investments are important – but largely they just ensure the continuous working of the Bundeswehr. For example, buying 35 F-35s is a huge investment – but it just ensures that Germany isn't stumbling out of NATO's nuclear sharing for lack of an aircraft (which was a real concern before the election).

Finally, it has been noted that the arms deliveries to Ukraine were an important change to German foreign policy. The chancellor often repeats that this is something Germany had never done before and which breaks a rule of German foreign policy to not deliver weapons into active war zones. But this was a self-imposed rule, meaning that abandoning it was not as big of a feat as it was made out to be. The rule also has a caveat. Namely, it only forbids weapons deliveries to war zones, unless there is a case under article 51 of the UN Charter - which refers to a country's right to self-defence in case of an armed attack. As this is the case in Ukraine, arguably the German government did not break but rather just applied its own rule.

Still in peacetime mode

It took chancellor Scholz only three days after the invasion to make his landmark speech, announcing the 100 billion special fund. But following this burst of rhetoric, Germany appears to have sunk back into its beauty sleep: it took until June to get the parliament's sign off . In October, the list was changed after criticism from the court of audit. It then took another month for the parliamentary committee's approval. Finally, in December, 10 months after the Zeitenwende announcement, the first money was approved to be spent. This is a procedure appropriate to peacetime, not to times of war.

Similarly, it became known in December that despite well-known gaps in the Bundeswehr's ammunition arsenals, the MoD had still not begun discussions with industry to build up ammunition stocks. Decisive and fast, this is not.

[...]

No big reform by an unambitious defence minister

No one would claim that reforming the Bundeswehr, or its procurement process, is an easy task. Several defence ministers have tried to do it in the past, with limited success. But never have the circumstances been so favourable to begin important reforms. And rarely has Germany had a defence minister who seemed so uninterested in seizing the occasion. When Christine Lambrecht (SPD) was named German defence minister, she was considered a compromise candidate, the person chosen for a little-coveted job for reasons that had little to do with interest or qualification, and more with quotas and internal coalition deals. But people can rise to the task, especially in difficult circumstances – after all, few would have predicted that former actor and comedian Zelensky would become a heroic wartime leader. Unfortunately, this does not appear to be the case for Christine Lambrecht.

Lambrecht provided the German government with its first scandal of 2023 before the clock even struck midnight. On New Year's Eve, she published a video on her personal Instagram account. Standing in the streets in Berlin, one can hear fireworks going off in the background – a rather insensitive backdrop as she speaks of the war raging in Europe. Lambrecht notes how the war had allowed her to meet "interesting, amazing people", and make "interesting impressions" for which she would like to say "a hearty thank you". The backlash should not have come as a surprise to the government, which maintains that this video was done in a personal capacity, and thus not a topic for discussion.

German newspapers reported on Friday night that Lambrecht was likely to soon resign from her post. Earlier that day Spiegel published a title story on the state of the Bundeswehr, which also included strong criticism of her.

She'd also had to admit that she didn't understand the army's ranks, there was the 5,000 helmet embarrassment and there's been nepotism allegations after her son posted photos of himself going on holiday with her on a government helicopter on social media. He apparently paid for it, but not a great look.

From what I read - like that Franke piece - she's never actually been interested in defence - she was justice minister previously. I could be wrong but I suspect the fact she was appointed to defence without having much of an interest or background in it possibly indicated how low a priority it was for Germany when the cabinet was assembled. Now there's an actual war and Germany is meant to be shifting its policy, it's not really enough.

In terms of the Zeitenwende - compare the success (so far - this year is still a big challenge) of Germany's energy ministry and Habeck v her time at defence.

[The Brain]

She's no Roon.

[Zanza]

She's no Roon.

We have quite a history of mediocre or poor defence ministers in the last decades. Not really sure,but the last competent ones were probably Struck 2002-5 and Wörner in the 1980s...

[Sheilbh]

We have quite a history of mediocre or poor defence ministers in the last decades. Not really sure,but the last competent ones were probably Struck 2002-5 and Wörner in the 1980s...

And yet irony is that I think VDL underwhelmed but has, in my view, been an excellent President of the Commission. It feels like one of those examples of people needing to be in the right jobs. Especially, from what I've read, because it seems like many of the flaws of her time at defence seem to be the things that are enabling her to be very effective at the Commission - which I always think is often the case and, politically, we're a bit too keen to write people off.

[Zanza]

Being corrupt? I can see how that helps. 

[Legbiter]

She is incompetent and was publicly criticized a lot. In her view that of course unfair criticism made her job impossible. So she resigned. It's a relief as any replacement should be an improvement. 

Her failings were particularly egregious in context of the war, but even without it she would probably have been a failure.

She is not the right person to lead a re-armament of the Bundeswehr.

Interesting. Who replaces her and from which party? 

[Zanza]

Her replacement is Boris Pistorius (of the Social Democrats), who served as interior minister in Lower Saxony so far. He is a law and order type.