Germany Issues Ominous Warning About War in Europe

Germany's defense minister has warned that "there could be a threat of war in Europe" as he defended his administration's response to emerging threats, including Russian and Iranian aggression.

Speaking to German broadcaster ZDF on Sunday, Boris Pistorius, a member of Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democratic Party , said nations like Germany would have to increase their armed forces capability to maintain peace in the region, and needed to change their mentality to one in which war was possible.

"Thirty years of peace dividends, 30 years without the Warsaw Pact as a threat have meant that the Bundeswehr, like other armed forces, is not in the condition it would otherwise have been," he said in German, according to a translation produced by Newsweek .

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022, shocked many in Europe who had not seen a full-scale war between nations on the continent since World War II, and had not faced the threat of attack since the end of the Cold War in the 1990s with the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Since the war in Ukraine, some European nations have increased their defense budgets, while NATO has strengthened the forces deployed along Europe's eastern flank bordering Russia. Shortly after Moscow's invasion, Scholz announced a €100 billion ($106 billion) boost to Germany's military spending.

Noting the change in defense spending introduced following the invasion of Ukraine, he added: "You can't make up for that in 19 months, neither through production, nor through procurement, nor through anything else. Our standard [for improving defense] must be as quickly as possible and as energetically as possible."

"We have to get used to the idea that there could be a threat of war in Europe," Pistorius said. "And that means we have to become fit for war, we have to be defensive and prepare the Bundeswehr and society for this."

It is unclear if he was referring to a threat from Russia, or elsewhere. Newsweek approached the German Ministry of Defense via email for comment on Monday.

In July, the German cabinet approved a draft budget which would have raised defense spending to the 2 percent of GDP target set by NATO for member nations. The following month, Reuters reported, citing government sources, this had since been dropped in favor of a five-year 2 percent average.

Asked about concerns that Germany—which has suffered from high inflation following the pandemic—was not acclimatizing to the threat of war rapidly enough, Pistorius said: "Everything that has been messed up in 30 years cannot be made up for in 19 months."

But he added that by the end of the year, the government would have already committed over two thirds of the €100 billion "special fund" to military contracts. Pistorius cautioned, though, that "the problem is that the contracts do not yet directly ensure production and delivery. This takes time again."

Germany has faced criticism for its sluggish response to the Russian invasion and for refusing to lend Ukraine some of its Leopard tanks while Kyiv was waiting on an order of refurbished ones. After other allies offered their own, it agreed to send 18 newer Leopard tanks .