“Germany has clearly failed NATO’s 2% target and this in the year of the Zeitenwende”, i.e. the turning point in German defense policy, says the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in its current version. According to a NATO statement presented on Tuesday, defense spending in 2022 was just 1.49% of the Gross Domestic Product after 1.46% (2021) and 1.51% (2020). “Of the thirty member states, seventeen members spent more money on defense than Berlin could afford. Seven countries were above the 2% threshold set by the alliance as a benchmark after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. Greece, the United States, Lithuania, Poland, the United Kingdom, Estonia and Latvia (in that order).” , reports the Frankfurt paper.

Federal Defense Minister Boris Pistorius had pushed for 2% as the new floor at the alliance’s last cabinet meeting. Chancellor Olaf Solz, also a Social Democrat, announced a special fund of 100 billion euros in his speech after the Russian attack on Ukraine and said: “From now on we will invest more than 2% of the Gross Domestic Product in our defense every year.” . At the Munich Security Conference, however, he scaled back this again in February and merely promised to “permanently raise this spending to 2% of GDP,” FAZ notes.

FAZ: Debate on lockdowns

“When Germany entered its first coronavirus lockdown three years ago it was not clear whether shutting down large parts of public life, closing schools, restaurants or theaters and strict bans on contact would stop the spread of the virus,” the report said. FAZ.

Still: “Three years on, it’s time for a critical inventory of all the measures taken by politicians on the coronavirus. Errors must be clearly identified as errors. These include closing schools nationwide or dealing with vaccine damage. A committee of inquiry in the federal parliament would be the appropriate place for this,” the newspaper comments.