German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul complained that Ukraine isn’t buying enough German guns. He told Bild, “We are now Ukraine’s strongest supporter in terms of financial and military assistance. And naturally, the German defense industry should benefit from this. I told President Zelenskyy this during my last visit. We stand by you, we support you. But I also have to explain this to German taxpayers, and the very least you can do is involve the German defense industry in all procurement projects.”
Wadephul then said that “At the moment, we are not entirely satisfied with the number of orders we are receiving in Germany. Therefore, we have asked the Ukrainian government to review the situation and ensure that it improves.” For background, Germany and Ukraine agreed to jointly develop their deep-strike capabilities earlier this spring, which coincides with Germany’s rapid remilitarization to the tune of at least €800 billion. The regular large-scale sale of arms to Ukraine can accelerate this trend.
There are three primary reasons why Ukraine hasn’t met Germany’s expectations, the first of which is that the US remains Ukraine’s top security partner due to the indispensable role of its arms, intelligence, and Starlink in perpetuating the conflict. In connection with this role, Trump recently posted that “Hundreds of Billions of Dollars was given to Ukraine and NATO, free of charge, that Europe would have paid for — If they were only asked, but we will be asking for that money, though somewhat belatedly!”
A creative solution for recouping these costs could be for European NATO to continue purchasing American arms at full price for donation to Ukraine, with this arrangement continuing after the large-scale phase of the conflict is over indefinitely or at least till Trump is satisfied with the profits. In parallel with these sales, as well as after the scenario of them possibly being scaled back, Germany must compete with the UK and others like China (whose drone sales are indispensable to Ukraine’s war effort).
Germany doesn’t have the political sway over Ukraine that the UK does, nor is domestic drone production anything remotely close to China’s, so it’s expected to struggle in this arms competition. Finally, the last point is that drones occupy a grossly disproportionate share of the casualties that Ukraine inflicts on Russia and are widely regarded as one of the reasons why the frontline has barely shifted in recent years, so German arms companies’ traditional wares aren’t needed as much anymore.
Despite Germany’s disappointment at Ukraine’s unsatisfactory purchase of its defense products, they still remain close at the political level and are coordinating a regional power play against their shared Polish “frenemy”, which was elaborated on here over the summer. This joint effort advances the grand strategic goal of German domination over the post-war European security architecture west of the new “Iron Curtain”, which is more important for Berlin than arms sales to Kiev, so no rift is likely over this issue.
The takeaway from Wadephul’s complaint is therefore that German taxpayers are becoming increasingly upset with their country’s lack of tangible returns from the billions of euros that it’s given to Ukraine. It’s not just their arms industry that’s struggling to leverage aid for future profits but their reconstruction one too since it’s expected that American and Chinese companies will dominate this industry too. The more fed up that Germans become with Ukraine, the more that support for the AfD is expected to surge.
