BERLIN – On 27 February 2022, three days after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Olaf Scholz, the chancellor of Germany, delivered the now-famous “Zeitenwende” (turning point) speech to the Bundestag, the German parliament. Scholz announced a €100bn increase in military spending, a historic shift in a country traditionally averse to military spending and asserting hard power.
A little over a year later, though, not much has changed. “It was a lot of rhetoric – not lip service, but only a small amount has been brought to reality,” Roderich Kiesewetter, an MP for the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU), told me over video call from his home. Scholz’s coalition government, led by his Social Democratic Party, has been accused by international allies of being soft on Russia. It has stalled on weapons deliveries to Ukraine. In October it was reported that the Bundeswehr, the German armed forces, had enough ammunition for just two days of war.
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