By Sabine Siebold
BERLIN (Reuters) – The German army’s battle-readiness is less than when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, military officials, lawmakers and defence experts told Reuters.
Even if a new government boosts defence spending, it will remain hamstrung for years, particularly by a lack of air defence, artillery and soldiers, they said.
“Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, we had eight brigades at around 65% readiness,” Colonel Andre Wuestner, head of the German Armed Forces Association, told Reuters in an interview. Sending weapons, ammunition and equipment to Ukraine, as well as accelerating Germany’s own drills, took a toll on the available equipment, he said.
“Together, this means the German land forces are down to a readiness of around 50%,” he said.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised after Russia’s invasion to overhaul Germany’s decrepit military, but three years later a pledge to provide the NATO alliance with two divisions – typically around 40,000 troops – by 2025 and 2027 faces major setbacks, more than a dozen military officials, lawmakers and defence experts said.
The details revealed by the sources, some of whom spoke on condition of anonymity as they discussed classified military information, underscore Berlin’s precarious position as Europe faces a new geopolitical era under U.S. President Donald Trump.
Germany, alongside Poland, is tasked by NATO with providing the bulk of ground forces that would act as first responders to any Russian attack on the alliance’s eastern flank.
Scholz’s historic pledge to bring about a Zeitenwende, or turning point, in Germany’s approach to its military has not worked, the sources said, blaming a lack of a sense of urgency, a dysfunctional procurement system and strained finances.
Berlin has failed to fully equip troops for a division for NATO by the start of this year, and in any case has no air defences to support them, the sources said.
Its pledge for a NATO division by 2027 is “long out of our reach,” said a military source.
That second division is only about 20% equipped, according to opposition lawmaker Ingo Gaedechens, a defence expert on parliament’s budget committee.
“Even if we were to order everything now, we would not get it equipped in time,” said Gaedechens. Polls suggest his Christian Democrats (CDU) party, headed by candidate chancellor Friedrich Merz, will lead a new government after Germany’s February 23 election.
TRUMP’S DEMANDS
The extent of Germany’s weakness comes to light as President Trump is pushing Europe to shoulder more of its own defence burden and Washington talks of a deal to end the war in Ukraine, which would put even more demands on Germany’s military if they have to police a truce.
Trump said on Wednesday that he had spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin about starting negotiations immediately to end the war in Ukraine.
All Germany’s mainstream parties have pledged to keep military spending at NATO’s required minimum of 2% of GDP. Trump wants NATO members to more than double their spending targets to 5% of GDP from 2%, and NATO is considering raising its military spending target to around 3%.
Germany’s current Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said last month military expenditures of around 3% of GDP will be necessary to make the Bundeswehr ready for war, but has said Trump’s 5% target would amount to more than 40% of Germany’s total government spending.
Whoever wins the election will in any case face severe challenges after 2027 when the 100 billion euro ($104 billion) special fund will be exhausted. Germany will need around 30 billion euros per year from then on to reach the 2% target.
“Now there are only problems everywhere and no solutions,” Gaedechens said.
The most glaring example is air defence, which “needs to be solved most urgently,” Johann Wadephul, deputy leader of the CDU/CSU conservative faction in parliament responsible for defence topics, told Reuters.
Defence experts say the war in Ukraine has demonstrated the importance of drones and artillery – large guns operated by crews. The Bundeswehr is lagging on both.
On drones, “the Bundeswehr has nothing at all,” said Wadephul. “So we are practically empty-handed.”
He called for easier procurement standards and a rise in defence spending to 3% of GDP. He and the CDU also want Germany to reintroduce conscription, which the country suspended in 2011.
A spokesperson for Scholz did not respond directly to a request for comment on the assertion the Zeitenwende had failed, but pointed to remarks Scholz made in February. Then he said a national debate on how to fund more defence spending was “somewhat irritating,” and called for a deal to ease Germany’s tight restrictions on debt to cover the cost.
Germany was already facing a shortfall in funding its needs, he said then, adding that it was “almost spooky that there is no discussion about how we will pay for it.”
The defence ministry declined to comment on the state of the army’s readiness, saying it was classified information. But a spokesperson added that Germany’s land forces have been “providing a combat-ready division in high availability” to fulfil NATO missions at short notice on its eastern flank since January 1, 2025.
A NATO spokesperson said Scholz’s Zeitenwende had made a big difference to Germany’s security and the strength of the alliance. Increasing defence spending was one of its top priorities although there is more to do, they added.
“THE SNOOZE BUTTON”
Russian President Vladimir Putin is ramping up his forces to 1.5 million troops as he aims to be capable of fighting in two different theatres.
Wuestner, the colonel, said Germany is far from the only European state to be slow to respond to Russia’s military incursions into Ukraine since 2014, but “in particular we Germans hit the snooze button.”
Defence ranks third after immigration and the state of the economy in what Germans see as the most pressing problems for the new government, according to a survey by public broadcaster ARD published in January.
In 2021, Germany agreed to provide 10 brigades – units of some 5,000 troops – for NATO – by 2030. It now has eight and is building up a ninth in Lithuania to be ready from 2027.
In summer, NATO is set to agree more demanding targets to adapt to the deteriorating security situation; Germany is expected to the be asked to provide at least two more brigades, two experts told Reuters.
The German NATO division that was meant to be ready this year is not fully operational as – after donations to Ukraine – it lacks 155mm howitzers, its main weapons system, and had to cannibalize some artillery pieces for spare parts, a military and a parliamentary source told Reuters.
Around 80 advanced RCH 155 howitzers needed for the 2027 second division have not yet been ordered.
Both the divisions also need around 200 short-range air defences, such as Gepard anti-aircraft tanks, to protect them from drones and aircraft, according to two military sources and a parliamentary one.
To save money, Germany decommissioned the Gepard in 2012 and is only slowly starting to replace it, with deliveries of an initial order of 19 Rheinmetall Skyrangers expected in 2027 and 2028.
“We won’t have the air defences for the division 2025 up and running before 2029,” the military source warned.
“BLED OUT WITHIN MONTHS”
During the Cold War, Germany spent between 3% and 4.5% of GDP on defence and maintained 500,000 troops and 800,000 reserve forces. But the Bundeswehr has not met a target of 203,000 troops set in 2018, and it is currently short-staffed by some 20,000 regular troops, according to defence ministry data.
Since conscription was suspended in 2011, it also needs more reservists. Scholz’s government introduced a law in November obliging young men to fill in a questionnaire on their readiness to fight, and Berlin’s goal is to eventually reach 200,000 more reservists.
This would enable Germany to swiftly expand its troops to around 460,000 in the event of war – nearly double what it could muster today.
“Given the casualty rates we are calculating with, the Bundeswehr will be bled out within months,” said CDU lawmaker Roderich Kiesewetter, who was a colonel in the German forces before turning to politics. He declined to disclose what those rates are.
His CDU colleague Wadephul said Germany needs a combat-ready military with some 250,000 troops and 500,000 reserve forces.
According to the latest polls, a coalition of the CDU and the SPD is the most likely election outcome.
Smaller, radical parties AfD and BSW could potentially form a blocking minority of one third of the seats in parliament, and prevent agreement on new special funds to bankroll higher investment into the Bundeswehr.
And the military’s readiness would be tested if Trump strikes a deal on Ukraine that includes Europe providing troops to secure a ceasefire.
“If you take a look at the length of the frontline, how many brigades will we have to provide?” asked Joe Weingarten, a lawmaker with the SPD who specializes in defence topics.
“This would come on top of everything.”
($1 = 0.9604 euros)
(Reporting by Sabine Siebold in Berlin; Writing by Matthias Williams; edited by Sara Ledwith)
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