Germany announced on Monday (14) that it will buy 35 state-of-the-art American F-35 fighter jets, in the first step of rearmament of the largest European economy due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
According to the German Defense Ministry, in a statement to Parliament, the acquisition aims to replace the fleet of Tornado fighter-bombers, the only planes in the country capable of carrying American nuclear bombs. The F-35s are certified for this.
A member of NATO, the western military alliance, Berlin has 68 Tornadoes, a fighter manufactured from 1979 to 1998, for attack and 20 more equipped for electronic warfare. In addition, it operates 140 advanced Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets. Both aircraft are from European consortia with German participation.
The F-35 Lightning 2 is a so-called fifth generation aircraft, with radar stealth capabilities and long-term supersonic flight capabilities, among other features. As for it, there is only the American F-22 Raptor, the Russian Sukhoi Su-35 and the Chinese Chengdu J-20. In addition to this purchase, it is speculated in the German press that the country will also acquire at least 15 more Eurofighters.
Renewed German militarism is one of the effects of Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine, which began on February 24. Three days later, Chancellor (prime minister in German and Austrian designation) Olaf Scholz announced that he would spend €100 billion on defense in 2022.
The extraordinary credit, through a specific fund, will triple German military spending, compared to what was spent in 2021. The country will jump from a constant expenditure of 1.5% of Gross Domestic Product to 2.8 %, above the 2% established as a reference by NATO.
Berlin has always been reticent about military spending. First, because of his past. Prussian militarism, a reference to the most important kingdom in the formation of the German state in 1871, was feared as Putin is today. The central role in the First World War (1914-18) and, mainly, as the homeland of the Nazi monstrosity in the Second World War (1939-45), generated a trauma.
In German military academies, innovative Nazi-era tactics are not studied, for example, and the principle of moral objection to participating in an action is valid in their Armed Forces.
During the 16 years of government by Angela Merkel, Scholz’s predecessor until last December, Berlin sought a balance in its relationship with Russia, especially given its dependence on Putin’s natural gas. The biggest symbol of this, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, is now frozen.
In addition, there is the question of the continental balance of power. The European Union is a project that originally aimed to prevent the French and Germans from going to war. In its design, Paris maintained a more developed military force, while Berlin would be the economic heart of Europe.
The breakdown of Putin’s war could have long-term effects on this as-yet-unfathomable arrangement.
One thing he has achieved: more animosity on the part of France towards the most powerful country in NATO, the United States, because the purchase of the F-35 is expected to bury the joint program of the Franco-German fifth-generation fighter that has been dragging on for years.
It will be the second blow taken by Paris from Washington. Last year, by forging a military pact with Australia and the United Kingdom without telling anyone, the Joe Biden government made Canberra cancel a billion-dollar purchase of French submarines — in favor of receiving nuclear-powered models of American and British design.
After the Second World War, German military action always took place within the NATO doctrine, as a spearhead in an eventual conflict with the communist forces of the Warsaw Pact. To this day, the largest American base in Europe is there, in Ramstein.
But its troops only saw action in 1999, in support of NATO’s intervention in then-Yugoslavia, which spawned independent Kosovo, and later in the alliance’s mission in the US war in Afghanistan (2001-2021).
