Ukrainian Ambassador: Germany could give us more
It was not for nothing that the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, Andriy Melnyk, commented on the chancellor’s speech: New armament funds are arriving in Kyiv, other weapons are not. According to Melnyk, the Bundeswehr could deliver Kyiv an unused portion of its 400 Marder infantry fighting vehicles, 800 Fuchs troop carriers and around 120 PzH 2000 howitzers to ensure NATO.
Berlin: nothing available for fast shipping
Berlin, clarified German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, has chosen not to publish the list of all the weapons it is sending to Kyiv, adding that it will also help Ukraine by charging soldiers for using the skillful weapons training. “We sent antitank missiles, the Stingers and other things that we have not spoken about publicly,” the minister said. He then added that the supply of armored vehicles “is not taboo, even if it sometimes sounds like it in the German debate, but it’s true that we don’t have anything available in the short term that we can deliver really quickly”.
The conditions of the German Wehrmacht
On the other hand, the German armed forces are in a very bad state: military spending at a minimum (1.2% of GDP) has severely penalized the air force, navy and army: for a NATO exercise in Norway in September the soldiers they didn’t have enough guns and guns, so much so that they were forced to use broomsticks. The Navy has only 65 ships compared to 180 in France and Italy and 100 in Spain and Greece, while the fighter jets face serious maintenancerelated problems. Gone are the days when the Bundeswehr was a role model for the whole world.
Russian gas and addiction
But Germany is not only slowing down on the weapons issue, but is also taking a step back on the sanctions front. “We cannot get out of this relative dependence on Russian gas overnight,” German ambassador to Italy Viktor Elbling said in an Ansa forum, “both for Germany and for Italy: it would be very damaging, but I am certain that we will be able to do this this year is an important step towards significantly reducing this dependency, and in the coming years we want to reduce this dependency to zero. Italy is well positioned in terms of energy diversification, it has already installed regasifiers. We are working on it, a lot will happen in the coming years”.
The talks to end the conflict are fully supported. “We are facing an invasion by a sovereign country, the victim of an invasion stressed Elbling and therefore Ukraine must decide under what conditions to say that this war is over, we cannot be. Ukraine has the right to defend itself and we support it.”