Where will the Bundeswehr be heading soon?
Photo: Imago/Wedel
Rough times provoke nightmares. How long will it be before there is a war cabinet in Germany? Camouflage suit instead of suit material? Absurd? Some cabinet members already have both in their closet.
Since Tsarevich Putin had his troops invade Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has noticeably often cuddled with the generals. Reserve Major and Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) is freeing up billions for new military equipment despite negative growth. Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir (Greens) “earned” his first lieutenant position in just four days, and State Minister Tobias Lindner is not only keeping pace with his boss Annalena Baerbock. Bettina Stark-Watzinger (FDP), responsible for education, recently posted a photo with camouflage paint on her face and her party colleague Marco Buschmann, who manages the justice department, was in uniform years ago. Who forgot? Oh yes: Boris Pistorius. Although he was once only in the last echelon of army air defense, he has been in charge of supreme command as Minister of Defense since the beginning of the year. In peace, which is supposedly the emergency here. For how much longer? SPD man Pistorius propagates a necessary change in mentality towards “war-fighting” so eloquently that even FDP sign bearer Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann sometimes remains silent. Against the background of the Russian attack on Ukraine and the Hamas attacks on Israel, we must learn again that there are threat scenarios that we Germans have to prepare for.
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The nightmare plus: What happens if Russia doesn’t “settle” for Ukraine but also attacks Germany? An absurd question? Not for Carlo Masala. He is a professor of international politics at the University of the Bundeswehr. At least since Russia’s invasion of a neighboring state in violation of international law, it has become popular, is featured in news programs, has regular slots on talk shows and even on X – formerly Twitter – Masala cannot be overlooked.
His latest book follows the question-answer methodology. This makes writing (like reading) easy and so the explanatory book was able to come onto the market quickly at the turn of the times. The historian Sebastian Ullrich and the political scientist Matthias Hansl, editor and program manager at CH Beck-Verlag, act as keywords. The title of the volume of discussions: “Conditionally ready to defend ourselves – Germany’s weakness at the turn of the century.” Intentionally reminiscent of the legendary “Spiegel” affair from 1962.
The professor says that the Federal Republic would not be able to withstand a Russian attack. “In my opinion, the Bundeswehr’s endurance in this case would have been between three days and two and a half weeks, not longer.” However, the other European NATO countries are not doing particularly well either. According to the Bundeswehr expert, the German armed forces are in a deplorable condition despite lots of words and rich windfalls from the special fund cloud.
No doubt, the author, who wrote an interesting book about global crises (“The World Disorder”) after Putin’s annexation of Crimea in 2016 and will soon publish his thoughts “Why the World Doesn’t Find Peace” in the Vienna Brandstätter Verlag, argues in “Conditional “ready to defend” as knowledgeable as it is direct. Thanks for that, because – as intended – it makes it easier for readers to identify the places that provoke contradiction. Especially when Masala is not inclined to allow contradiction.
A fundamental mistake of past decades is that the Germans have benefited from the peace dividend of the past decades for too long. Instead of the necessary defensive readiness, NATO – like NATO as a whole – relied almost exclusively on foreign missions. The West, EU, NATO, especially the Americans – they all made many mistakes. The professor calls the interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Libya highly problematic and warns against continuing to confuse values and interests. Even those who do not follow Masala’s ideas certainly support this statement: In the interests of a more self-confident foreign policy, Germany would first have to make it clear to itself: What are its own goals that it is pursuing? And how realistic is the pursuit of these goals?
Many of the arguments put forward have been heard often enough by now. No blame, but reality is currently overtaking every printing press. This also applies to passages in which Masala tries to explain Ukraine and its defenses. Things get more interesting when the Bundeswehr professor analyzes longer-term power politics and asks the question of NATO’s eastward expansion. Was this a provocation that led to the unexpected? The expected answer: “Russia is not a passive victim.” NATO’s eastern expansion was an argument put forward by Moscow until the start of the war; there were a variety of offers to Putin, formats, concessions, compromises, invitations, good will. Without success. And what next?
The author has only disturbing news for his readers. No matter how this brutal war ends, in which the attacked Ukraine is still receiving too little and too hesitant support – the fact is that Moscow will not give up its ambitions for imperial power. So the West must rely on deterrence and reduce all relationships to a minimum. Welcome to the Cold War of the 50s and 60s of the 20th century. The Germans, now expanded to include the East, must once again develop a national defense concept and arm themselves as much as possible.
There are weak points in the book: Peace as an emergency – that was the slogan even at the worst times of the last Cold War – does not appear in Masala in the sense of sensible realpolitik that transcends divisions. Not even in the somewhat brief visions about the still “widespread strategic naivety towards China.” And: The author – like all too many Western analysts – can hardly imagine the position of the other side. However, Masala’s rejection of Europe as the third pole of world politics, alongside the USA and China, is all the clearer. This would require Europe to develop global military power. A cloud cuckoo land: “Realistically speaking, there is no way to get there in the foreseeable future.”
The bottom line is that “Conditionally Defense Ready” is a quick read volume that stimulates debate and reinforces nightmares.
Carlo Masala: Conditionally ready to defend – Germany’s weakness at the turn of the century. A conversation with Sebastian Ullrich and Matthias Hansl. CH Beck, 207 pages, hardcover, €18.
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