When Russia Invaded Ukraine, Germany Promised to Rearm. One Year Later, It Is Having Second Thoughts.
Days after being elected chancellor, Olaf Scholz demanded to see his government’s contingency plans in case Russia, Germany’s main energy supplier, suddenly stopped supplies.
The response: There was no plan.
It was December 2021 and the U.S. was warning the world that Russian President Vladimir Putin was about to invade Ukraine. In a landmark speech days after the invasion, Mr. Scholz promised a “Zeitenwende”—a turning point—pledging to rebuild Germany’s military, secure alternative energy supplies and help Ukraine fight off Russia.
He has delivered on the latter two pledges, but a year on, Germany’s armed forces are in an even worse condition than when the war started, according to military commanders, and Mr. Scholz has struggled to invest any extra in the depleted military.
Berlin’s wobbling defense commitments are likely to hang in the air when Mr. Scholz visits Washington on Friday to meet with President Biden for talks that German officials said would focus on Ukraine and the security of Europe.
In a speech to parliament marking the anniversary of the Zeitenwende address, Mr. Scholz said on Thursday that Germany would stand with Ukraine, and that Kyiv wouldn’t be pressured into signing an unjust peace that would only mean submission to the Kremlin.
He added that Germany and its allies were working on providing security guarantees for Ukraine that could eventually help achieve a just peace, one that would leave Ukraine with the means to defend itself.
When Mr. Scholz picked up the reins of Europe’s largest economy after Angela Merkel’s 16-year rule, Germany depended on Russia for its energy, China for its trade and the U.S. for its security. Its military was creaking after decades of underinvestment and its energy infrastructure was heavily geared toward Russian pipeline oil and gas. When Russia invaded Ukraine, Mr. Scholz was left scrambling to reverse defense, energy and economic policies entrenched over decades.
On energy and assistance to Kyiv, Mr. Scholz more than delivered. Within a year, Germany became almost entirely independent of Russia for its oil and gas, avoiding blackouts and a winter gas shortage. Berlin committed over 7% of its gross domestic product in measures to shield households and companies from the impact of higher energy prices.
On Ukraine, Mr. Scholz discarded the longstanding pacifism underpinning German foreign policy to become the third-largest supplier of weapons to Kyiv after the U.S. and the U.K., according to the Kiel Institute for World the Economy. Two days after the invasion Mr. Scholz lifted a ban on exporting weapons to war zones. Berlin has purchased for Ukraine state-of-the-art weapons Germany’s own army was never able to afford. It welcomed more than one million Ukrainian refugees and granted the country more than 14 billion euros in aid, equivalent to around $15 billion.