Germany has three years to overhaul military: official

Germany has three years to overhaul military: official
by AFP Staff Writers
Berlin June 7, 2025

Germany's armed forces have three years to acquire the equipment to tackle a possible Russian attack on NATO territory, the head of military procurement said Saturday. Defence spending has risen up the political agenda since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and more recently with the United States pushing NATO members to increase their commitments. "Everything necessary to be fully prepared to defend the country must be acquired by 2028," Annette Lehnigk-Emden, head of the Federal Office for Military Procurement, told the Tagesspiegel newspaper. Germany's chief of defence, General Carsten Breuer, recently warned that Russia could be in a position to "launch a large-scale attack against NATO territory" as early as 2029. He said there was a Russian build-up of ammunition and tanks for a possible attack on NATO's Baltic members. Lehnigk-Emden said that Chancellor Friedrich Merz's new government was enabling the upgrade by allocating hundreds of billions of euros for defence. She said the priority would be for heavy equipment such as Skyranger anti-aircraft tanks. Merz has made rearmament a priority of his coalition government to make German forces "the most powerful conventional army in Europe". Rearmament had already begun under the previous government of Olaf Scholz after Russia launched its war in Ukraine. And US President Donald Trump has raised the stakes further this year by pushing NATO members to increase their defence spending to five percent of GDP from the current level of two percent. Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said Thursday that 50,000 to 60,000 new soldiers would be needed in the coming years to meet the increased NATO defence needs. Last year, the army had more than 180,000 soldiers and set a goal of exceeding 203,000 by 2031. Germany is meanwhile looking to speed up the establishment of shelters where the population could find refuge in the event of conflict, according to the president of the German Federal Office for Civil Protection, Ralph Tiesler. At the end of last year, the authorities began to catalogue tunnels, subway stations, underground carparks and cellars of public buildings that could be converted into bunkers. "We are going to create one million shelter places as quickly as possible," Tiesler told the Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, indicating that a plan to this effect would be presented this summer. NATO closes in on agreement to meet Trump's spending demand
Brussels, Belgium (AFP) June 5, 2025 - US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said Thursday that NATO allies were close to a deal on spending ahead of a summit later this month, in a bid to satisfy US President Donald Trump's demand that it reach five percent of GDP.

Trump is pressuring alliance members to announce a massive boost in the target for their military budgets at the June 24-25 summit in the Netherlands.

"Countries in there are well exceeding two percent and we think very close, almost near consensus, on a five percent commitment for NATO in The Hague later this month," Hegseth said after meeting his NATO counterparts in Brussels.

NATO chief Mark Rutte has put forward a compromise agreement of 3.5 percent of GDP on core military spending by 2032, and 1.5 percent on broader security-related areas such as infrastructure.

"This alliance, we believe, in a matter of weeks, will be committing to five percent -- 3.5 percent in hard military and 1.5 percent in infrastructure and defence-related activities," Hegseth said.

"That combination constitutes a real commitment, and we think every country can step up."

The threat from Russia after more than three years of war in Ukraine and worries about US commitment to Europe's security under Trump are driving up military budgets in Europe.

Multiple diplomats say Rutte appears on track to secure the deal for the summit in The Hague, though a few allies are still hesitant about committing to such levels of spending.

"I have total confidence we will get there," Rutte said after the meeting. "Look at the Russian threat. The Chinese build-up. We live in a different world. We live in a more dangerous world."

Most vocal in its reluctance has been Spain, which is only set to reach NATO's current target of two percent of GDP by the end of this year.

But Defence Minister Margarita Robles said Madrid would not veto a deal, even if it did not agree with setting a "fixed percentage" figure.

Diplomats say other countries are also haggling over making the timeline longer and dropping a demand for core defence spending to increase by 0.2 percentage points each year.

The deal appears an acceptable compromise to most, which will allow Trump to claim that he has achieved his headline demand, while in reality setting the bar lower for struggling European allies.

Currently only a handful of NATO countries most worried about Russia, such as Poland and the Baltics, are on target to spend five percent on defence.

- 'America can't be everywhere' -

In a connected move, NATO ministers signed off at their meeting on new capability targets for the weaponry needed to deter Russia.

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius estimated the new requirements meant Berlin would need to add "around 50,000 to 60,000" more soldiers to its army.

His Dutch counterpart Ruben Brekelmans said reaching the level requested would cost the Netherlands at least 3.5 percent of GDP.

"The new defence investment plan, of course, is rooted in what we need in terms of the hard capabilities," Rutte said.

Hegseth, a former TV presenter, rocked NATO on his last visit in February with a fiery warning that Washington could look to scale back its forces in Europe to focus on the threat from China.

This time around Hegseth said he did not want to "get ahead" of any decisions from Trump as the United States conducts a review of its force deployments worldwide.

"We're going to make sure we shift properly to the Indo-Pacific and re-establish deterrence there, and then we're going to increase burden-sharing across the world," he said.

"America can't be everywhere all the time, nor should we be."

- Ukraine question -

While US officials are focused on getting Trump a win on defence spending in The Hague, they have sidestepped talks on supporting Ukraine in its fight with Russia.

Hegseth underscored the United States' disengagement with Kyiv by skipping a meeting of Ukraine's backers in Brussels on Wednesday, and is set to miss a second sit-down with Ukraine officials Thursday.

Kyiv's European allies are pressing to overcome US reluctance and invited Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky to the Hague summit as a sign of support.

So far, NATO has said only that Ukraine will be represented at the gathering, without confirming that Zelensky will be in attendance.