Two years after Putin’s escalation of the war against Ukraine, the West is still not delivering enough ammunition and weapons to Ukraine. Many Western countries, including European heavyweights such as Germany and France, are not even producing enough ammunition and weapons for themselves.
The German Chancellor Olaf Scholz refuses to send Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine. His ever changing “arguments” are not convincing, some are outright lies. The social-democrat Scholz claims for instance that Ukraine would need German soldiers on the ground in Ukraine to handle the Taurus cruise missiles, which would make Germany a belligerent country (Kriegspartei). The Green Party member Anton Hofreiter unmasked this as a fairy-tale. According to Hofreiter’s account, Germany has delivered some 260 Taurus cruise missiles to South Korea, a country which does not need Bundeswehr soldiers on the ground to handle those weapons.
Incidentally, the Greens are governing in Germany together with the Social-Democrats and the Free Democrats (FDP) in the so-called traffic light coalition (Ampelkoalition), named after the three traffic light colors red (SPD), green (Greens) and yellow (FDP), which are used to represent the three parties. The Greens and the FDP are ready to send more weapons, including Taurus. But Scholz is blocking them. The Greens and the FDP are commanding a majority in the very unpopular Ampel and could force the hand of Scholz or force him to resign, e.g. in favor of Germany’s most popular politician: Defense Minister Boris Pistorius. But the Greens and the FDP shy away from this option because this could mean the end of the Ampel and early elections. According to current polls, the FDP would not make it back into parliament, and the Greens would lose many seats.
This is not the first time Olaf Scholz is blocking the delivery of certain weapon systems to Ukraine. At the end of February 2024, at the Paris conference uniting 20 countries supporting Ukraine’s war effort, the French President Macron rightly reminded people that, initially in 2022, “many of those who say ‘never, never’ today are the same people who said ‘never, never tanks, never, never aircraft, never, never long-range missiles’ two years ago. Let me recall that two years ago some around this table said ‘We’ll send sleeping bags and helmets.’”
Emmanuel Macron did not mention Olaf Scholz, but he was of course aiming at the hesitant and incompetent German chancellor. Macron could have been more precise regarding the weapons Scholz initially refused to send and then often ended up delivering; mostly too little, too late, some weapon systems have still not been sent: howitzers (later 14 Panzerhaubitze 2000 delivered), helicopters (only six 50-year old Sea King anti-submarine helicopters to be sent), Marder infantry fighting vehicles (later delivered), MARS multiple rocket launchers (later delivered), Leopard 2 battle tanks (later delivered), and the Taurus cruise missiles (still refused) mentioned above. In 2023, Scholz ruled out to send figher jets to Ukraine. He has not changed his position yet. According to recent reports, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway have pledged to send over sixty F-16 to Ukraine in 2024. Ukrainian pilots have already been trained in Western countries.
Kyiv and Paris are still in talks about the delivery of Mirage fighter jets (or other military planes). In short: Macron himself has not been the most helpful when it comes to help Ukraine. On the contrary. For many months, the French president thought his mission was to talk to Putin, to help negociate a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine, instead of standing firmly on the side of Ukraine, as a strong pillar of the West. By his self-delusional moves, Macron encouraged Putin, who read these signals as signs of weakness; anyway, the Russian dictator had made clear that, for him, Ukraine was part of Russia. Full stop. Macron’s attempts were all the more astonishing because Putin, via his Wagner mercenaries, repeatedly targeted French interests and allies in Africa, including the democratically elected President Bazoum in Niger.
Scholz and Macron did not want to “provoke” Putin and “escalate” the war although, in reality, only one person has been escalating for many years: Putin.
So far, the French aid to Ukraine (GDP per capita) is far behind the one by Germany and many other countries. President Macron’s remark at the Paris conference at the end of February 2024 in which he said one should not rule out French (and, in general: Western) ground troops for Ukraine was not a mistake in the sense that the West should not rule out anything in the fight against the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But is was also a move to make people forget that, so far, France has largely failed Ukraine, also regarding the number of Ukrainian refugees the country has welcomed.
Back to Olaf Scholz (*1958), the main obstacle in Germany to efficient aid to Ukraine. In 1975, as a teenager, he joined the youth organization (Jusos) of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD). From 1982 until 1987, he was Deputy Federal Chairman of the Jusos and, from 1987 until 1989 Vice President of the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY).
In the 1980s, Olaf Scholz represented the far-left wing of the Social Democrats. He was spreading the marxist and soviet theory of “state monopoly capitalism” ruling in the West (Staatsmonopolkapitalismus, Stamokap). He wanted to “overcome capitalism”, opposed the NATO Double Track Decision of 1979 (NATO-Nachrüstung) and, still when he was around 30 (!), wanted Germany to exit NATO. Olaf Scholz went as far as to call NATO an “aggressive, imperialistic association”, and he maintained good relations with the Communist Youth Organization in East Germany (FDJ) and the Communist Party ruling East Germany (SED), pretty much until the fall of the Berlin wall.
Afterwards, together with today’s President of Germany, Steinmeier, Olaf Scholz was a key figure in support of Chancellor Schröder, who pushed through some economically liberal reforms (not marxist ones), which helped Germany reduce the unemployment problem, but at the price of the creation of Europe’s largest low-wage sector. When it comes to foreign policy, Scholz and Steinmeier were in support of Schröder’s (and later Merkel’s) doubtful policies towards Putin’s Russia and Russian gas. Today, Olaf Scholz is trying to sell himself as a thoughtful, prudent, wise man whereas, in reality, he’s just a incompetent, old, white man.
As early as at the end of February 2022, Olaf Scholz made his famous Zeitenwende-speech. For one moment, one could be under the illusion that the German chancellor had finally understood what should happen. But then he made speeches regarding the danger of a possible nuclear war, playing into Putin’s hands. And, until today, he started obstructing and delaying military aid to Ukraine. In his Zeitenwende policy speech, he had talked about German leadership in Europe. But, subsequently, he offered little to none.
In 2023, Ukraine had no chance to win back territory. An attacker needs roughly a 3:1 superiority to overcome a defender. Russia was and is defending the territory it conquered in Ukraine. The West must offer President Zelensky substantially more ammunition and weapons. Putin has moved to a war economy. He cannot afford to lose this war. All of this is unsustainable. He will need another and another war to stir up nationalist sentiments in Russia to remain in power. The quicker he will be stopped, the better.
Regime change is needed in Russia. Russian oligarchs, Silowiki and other people of power must be told: Russians will not enjoy another glass of champagne on the Côte d’Azur as long as Putin and his regime are in power.
As written in April 2022, the West can and must outspend Russia in Ukraine. The Russian GDP is tiny in comparison with the one by the combined West. Russia’s outdated military material cannot compete with Western high-tech. Ukrainians are fighting for democracy, for their independence. They do not want to live under dictator Putin. The massacres and war crimes in Mariupol, Bucha and elsewhere have shown how Ukrainian life under Putin’s rule would look like.
The situation is not as desperate as it looks like to some. The Ukrainians know what they are fighting for. And the West has the material. Furthermore, the Prigozhin mutinery has shown that the Tsar is naked. Putin is presiding over a house of cards. He could fall at any moment. Nawalny’s funeral today has shown that, despite the incredible repression, thousands were ready to defy Putin and pay tribute to Nawalny, the last major opposition figure eliminated by the Kremlin.
Germany, France, Italy, the UK and the USA must and can do much more to help Ukraine. In addition, many European countries, notably including the continent’s number one economy, Germany, must do much more to defend themselves. Germany’s defense is a joke (German article) and could not withstand a high-intensity war for more than a few hours, maybe a few days.
Olaf Scholz offers not much more than his permanent grin. The Greens and the FDP cannot hide behind this incompetent man for any longer. He must be replaced one way or another. One option is the social democratic Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, another option would be a coalition with the oppositional Union of CDU and CSU.
2024 is not the year for a hesitant leader. Dictators such as Putin only understand the language of brutal force. Behind Putin are hiding other dangers, including Iran and, above all, Xi Xinping’s China, which showed in Hong Kong that the future will look grim under this corrupt, pseudo-communist regime.
In the Budapest Memorandum signed in 1994, the United States and the United Kingdom together with Russia guaranteed Ukraine’s territorial integrity in return for Ukraine giving up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons. From 2014 until now, they have failed to deliver on that promise. Joe Biden and the secret services of the United States rightly predicted what Putin would do in early 2022. But instead of sending troops, material and other assistance when there was time, they went into appeasement mode and, whe Putin attacked, retreated to Lviv. The rest of the old continent nations must get their act together too because Europe will only find peace if Putin and his regime fall.
The West has not done nothing, but not enough. Billions of financial aid have flown from Germany into Ukraine. But this is palliative care. Money can only fight the symptoms. Only substantially more weapons and ammunition and pressure on Russia and its economic and financial system and leaders will bring change.
Roughly one fifth of Ukraine is occupied by Russia. Many Ukrainian cities and villages have partly or almost entirely been destroyed. Millions of Ukrainians have been internally displaced or forced into exile. According to estimations, probably over 100,000 Ukrainians have been killed or injured. The democrats of this world have to stand together and show the dicators of our planet that wars of aggression do not pay.
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The incompetent German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in 2021, holding up the Ampel coalition treaty. Photograph by Sandro Halank via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Article added on March 1, 2024 at 22:10 German time.
