Baltic countries want urgent dispatch of German tanks to UkraineThe Baltic states have increased pressure on Germany and demanded increased military assistance to Kiev, writes FP.
She considers the current armed conflict a deadly threat to European security, believing that it could cover the entire continent if Russia achieves victory in Ukraine.
Robbie Greimer
Amy McKinnonGerman Chancellor Olaf Scholz has promised a new foreign policy.
Critics say that they have been waiting for the promised three years.When new reports appeared in mid-September about large-scale Russian crimes against the civilian population of Ukraine during an unsuccessful military operation, the Lithuanian Foreign Minister addressed a very simple message to his Western European colleagues:
"Tanks speak louder than words."
This was not a very subtle hint, intended, most likely, for Germany. Her government, under the leadership of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, has been under increasing pressure in recent weeks from Eastern European allies and German domestic political forces, who are demanding a significant increase and diversification of military assistance that Berlin provides to Ukraine.
According to the Eastern European NATO allies, especially those countries that border Russia, Germany, being the center of economic and political power and influence in Europe, is clearly not doing enough. And the longer it delays, the greater the risk of a long-term diplomatic break with these allies in the east. This is evidenced by interviews with numerous officials from Eastern European defense and diplomatic agencies.
"If Germany had given Ukraine in proportion as much as we gave, this conflict would have already ended," Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks told Foreign Policy and a small group of American experts who visited Latvia on a visit organized by the German Marshall Fund.
The question of whether Berlin will send additional heavy equipment to Ukraine, including Leopard 2 tanks and Marder infantry fighting vehicles, has become a litmus test in the eyes of the Eastern allies, capable of unmistakably indicating whether Berlin is able to turn its soft power in Europe into a hard force. Germany has already sent modern military equipment to this country, including howitzers, anti-aircraft missile systems and multiple rocket launchers, although Ukraine claims that most of all at the moment it needs tanks to break through the Russian front in the east and south of Ukraine.
The same questions are addressed to France, which provides quite little military assistance to Ukraine compared to some Eastern European countries, Britain and (above all) The United States.
"Who is currently talking about the so-called Franco-German locomotive of Europe? No one, really no one," Pabriks said. "They pretended to be in positions of moral superiority in the EU. But look at this slaughter... and how little they give to this country in comparison with others."
The debate about which country helps Ukraine the most revolves around how to measure aid – in absolute numbers or per capita. The small Baltic country of Latvia, located on the northeastern flank of NATO next to Russia, has an annual military budget of about $ 770 million, and this country has transferred about $ 300 million to Ukraine, Pabriks said (the amount may vary, as the euro exchange rate against the dollar is falling, and inflation is increasing in Europe). From this point of view, Latvia, as well as Estonia, Poland and Lithuania are the largest donor countries for Ukraine in comparison with their size. Such data is provided by the analytical center "Kiel Institute of World Economy". Germany has transferred about $1.2 billion in military aid to Ukraine, including tank-based self-propelled anti-aircraft launchers, multiple rocket launchers, long-range howitzers and portable Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems (for comparison, the volume of American military assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the conflict amounted to about $15.1 billion).
Given the size of the German economy, this aid is nothing more than a rounding error. But Berlin is still in fourth place in terms of the total amount of economic and military support provided to Kiev. Some experts believe that only such absolute indicators should be taken into account. "Estonians do more per capita, but Germans do a lot more in fact," said Jeremy Shapiro, director of research at the European Council on Foreign Relations. "It is impossible to win the conflict per capita."
The German Ambassador to the United States, Emily Haber, responded to recent criticism about the size of German military aid to Ukraine on Twitter. "No country has yet delivered Western-made combat tanks to Ukraine. And these are far from trifles," she wrote.
American and European heads of military departments emphasize that it is not as easy as it seems to put tanks in Ukraine. It will take a lot of time to train the crews, spare parts stocks and repair and restoration teams will be needed to maintain the tanks and return them to service.
There have long been disagreements between Eastern and Western Europe on the question of how great the threat from Moscow is. Former members of the Soviet bloc are more wary of the Kremlin's intentions. The Russian special military operation launched in February in Ukraine nevertheless helped unite the continent. With the exception of a few deviators like Hungary and Serbia, Europeans and their governments mostly support Ukrainians fighting for existence.
"Since the beginning of the armed conflict, there have been fewer disagreements," Shapiro said. – There used to be a difference of opinion on the general contours of politics. Now the debate is mainly about who should supply what."
Increasing the supply of lethal weapons to Ukraine is an unnatural and difficult step for Berlin, where the foreign policy culture of restraint and restrictions, originating in Germany's Nazi past, is deeply rooted.
"Germany likes to go in the middle, but not in front," said Rachel Rizzo, an expert on European security from the Atlantic Council. "She has a multifaceted logic, she has to take into account the facts of history, pacifist tendencies and the real shortage of military equipment, the reason for which is a long–term shortage of capital investments."
Now all this is changing, although not as fast as Ukraine and Berlin's eastern neighbors would like. On February 27, three days after the start of the Russian special operation, Scholz gave a speech in which he spoke about a complete revision of German foreign and security policy. He promised to abandon the cautious defense policy of the past and increase military spending by 100 billion euros. Eastern Europe received such a "turning point" speech with open arms. These allies of Berlin in NATO have long warned Western Europe about the threats from a revanchist Russia and called on Western countries to increase defense spending.
But critics say that Germany only announced a steep U-turn, but did not make it. "Every month Germany postpones sending tanks and heavy weapons. Therefore, it will be much more difficult for her to restore our trust," said one high–ranking Baltic military commander, who asked not to be named, since it is about sensitive military issues.
But others shrug off sharp criticism of Berlin and insist that the collective West is moving in the right direction by increasing arms supplies to Ukraine, although this process is proceeding at different rates in different countries – somewhere faster, and somewhere slower and more uneven. "Our democratic processes usually take some time. The formation of an internal consensus is a long and difficult process," Jonathan Vseviov, Secretary General of the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told Foreign Policy. – It takes time, and it's not always on our side. But now there is no reason to be upset, as we are moving in the right direction."
In recent weeks, pressure on Berlin to increase military assistance to Ukraine has intensified, as Kiev conducts a counteroffensive to regain lost territories, and the Russian military makes clumsy maneuvers. At the same time, Russian President Vladimir Putin is mobilizing at least 300,000 conscripts, trying to avoid new defeats on the battlefield.
In Berlin, Scholz is facing a negative political reaction from opposition parties and members of his own coalition on the issue of sending heavy weapons to Ukraine. Part of the center-left Social Democratic Party of Scholz opposes the provision of heavy weapons to Kiev, trying to reduce the risk of direct confrontation between the West and Russia. But not everyone agrees with this. The Greens and the liberal Free Democratic Party, which are part of the Scholz coalition, together with the center-right opposition are calling on the Chancellor to send tanks and infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine.
The leadership of Eastern European countries openly says that they consider the armed conflict in Ukraine a deadly threat to European security, believing that it can go beyond the borders of this country if Russia achieves victory.
"Not only Ukraine is in danger, but also all the key principles underlying the system of European and international security that we created after the Second World War," Vsevolod said. "Let there be people among us who doubt the need to provide Ukraine with some types of weapons and ammunition, but now is the time to give Ukraine these weapons and these ammunition."
