When Olaf Schultz left the conference room at Paul-Löbe-Haus shortly after nine in the morning and was asked how it was, the chancellor shouted with a mischievous smile: “Great.” Go back to the chancellery. But it clearly wasn’t that “super” after all. In the end, there is still a suboptimal picture of his Traffic Signal Alliance. An FDP politician is so intertwined that he draws personal conclusions.
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scholz He didn’t really understand at first why some FDP politicians had left the meeting earlier. But what is supposed to be a fatal blow to the SPD chancellor, a soothing explanation of his cautious course in arms delivery, ends in a petty scandal in the Defense Committee and later in the farce of the FDP. In the end, the incident above all shows how fragile his traffic light alliance is currently.
But first things first. A private session is scheduled for 8 a.m. for the counselor’s first appearance. President Marie Agnes Strack Zimmermann (FDP), which had recently been his fiercest critic within the coalition, greeted him with a handshake. “We do it every Friday the 13th now,” she says. “Exactly,” Schulz smiles. “Both sides are trying to show unity — but that doesn’t last long, at least not with the other FDP committee members.”
It’s nine in the morning and the meeting is about to end. However, when Schulze did not respond repeatedly and avoided inquiries about the status of arms shipments to Ukraine and when the Marder tanks could also be given the green light, members of the Defense Committee of the FDP left the conference room.
An employee of the site told The Tagesspiegel that they were outraged by Scholz’s behaviour. The trigger is a question from FDP politician Marcus Faber. When answering, Schulze goes on to talk about China, the Global South and the looming food crisis.
How the FDP initially justified the protest
“He had the opportunity today to explain how the federal government would like to continue supporting Ukraine,” Faber says afterwards. Unfortunately, he gave “barely any answers” to the questions. Faber emphasizes that the work was not planned and happened spontaneously. “Unfortunately, many questions have not been answered. That is why we, as Liberal Democrats, decided shortly after nine o’clock that we would leave the session now,” Faber said to microphones and cameras.
Strack-Zimmermann remains in the hall and ends the session. She has repeatedly criticized Schulz and accused him of behaving too reluctantly. However, she does not join the protest in any way, and then commends Schulz for his visit: “Not all questions can be answered in an hour, but it was a constructive exchange, and more will follow.”
After news of the scandal spread, it is clear that some politicians in the FDP have been called to mind. Faber is trying to smooth things over: no one felt “cheated”, as was reported in the Bild newspaper, and no one issued a protest note.
FDP man Faber tries to sort things out
Almost three hours after leaving the meeting, the parliamentary group of the Free Democratic Party sent a message: “I am grateful to the chancellor for the constructive exchange. Today it became clear again that the traffic light is strong behind the decision to deliver heavy weapons to Ukraine.
I’m sorry I gave the wrong impression. There were “follow-up appointments” unrelated to the protest. But the media duck’s line of defense is collapsing, since the previous “video evidence” of Faber’s statements appeared in front of the committee hall after leaving the meeting early.
The question arises, if there are follow-up appointments, why did he continue explaining his protest behavior to the media so long after the meeting at the site. FDP spokesman for military technology, Alexander Muller, also said he left earlier because he had to go to a follow-up appointment.
Employee Consequences – For Faber
but that is not all. The leadership of the parliamentary group is calling for a special meeting, because it is the process of shooting in a coalition in the best way the opposition against the chancellor, who was also elected by the Free Democratic Party. At around 4 p.m., Marcus Faber announced on Twitter that he was resigning from his position as defense policy spokesperson. “Today’s defense committee comment was inappropriate and downplays the gravity of the situation. I apologize for this and will offer my parliamentary group to step down as speaker at their next meeting on Tuesday,” the Stendhal man tweeted.
There is a lot of tension in the FDP at the moment, as there is impending disaster in Sunday’s state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia. Opinion polls put the Liberals at six percent, which would halve the 2017 result and could lead to a loss of government involvement in the home of FDP leader Christian Lindner.
It was said at the FDP that one should distinguish oneself more – and so a defeat at NRW could have a major climate impact on the traffic light coalition. It would have given Friday and the committee a foregone conclusion.
Strack-Zimmermann’s request for Scholz to appoint a coordinator for the difficult subject in the Chancellery went unheeded at the meeting. Instead, the chancellor is referring to the coordination being carried out by the Inspector General of the German Armed Forces – who, however, does not conduct negotiations with industry, for example, about possible arms deliveries. And the German army itself, as is known, no longer had any weapons to give up.
Schulz avoids the spotlight when asked about the trip to Kyiv
Schulz explained his principles internally, but also referred to difficult negotiations with other countries, for example on the exchange of rings, so that these countries could abandon their Soviet-designed tanks and receive Marder tanks from Germany in return. He asserts that he never said that he did not want to provide heavy weapons. Scholz avoids showing up on a possible trip to Kyiv.
[lLesen Sie hier: Direkte Panzerlieferungen an Kiew – wie die SPD-Fraktion von der Gepard-Entscheidung überrollt wurde]
His environment confirms that he once again made clear the points that matter to him: support Ukraine as much as possible. NATO and Germany will not become parties to a war. There is no German who walks alone and does not rush to hand over weapons. Germany works in close coordination with its closest allies.
Cheetah problems No green light for marten
However, it is becoming increasingly clear that the approval given to Krauss-Maffei-Wegmann to deliver up to 50 Gepard tanks to Ukraine may not help at all. Switzerland forbids firing only ammunition produced there. And the training of Ukrainian soldiers in Germany, which has already begun, is long, because the cheetah is a very complex device from a technical point of view.
It will be easier with the Marder infantry fighting vehicle, but an order from Rheinmetall to deliver up to 100 tanks has not yet been decided by the Federal Security Council. This reluctance is justified by the fact that the Marder may still need to conduct a circular exchange with Eastern European countries, which in return could provide Ukraine with immediately deployable tanks of Russian or Soviet design. The Freedom, Democracy Party and the Greens insist on more rapid decision-making.
SPD chief: There are no Leopard tanks for Ukraine
After the meeting with the aim of submitting another order to Rheinmetall for the delivery of 88 Leopard battle tanks, the head of the SPD in the commission, Wolfgang Helmich, said: A joint NATO decision was made not to deliver heavy battle tanks like the Leopard.
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But these details don’t play a major role in the one-hour session, and Scholz remains ambiguous in the non-public session. Then Anisska Bruger, a defense politician in the Green Party, stressed that, in light of criticism from union politicians, too, they know well that arms exports are subject to strict confidentiality guidelines. This is also indicated in the Chancellery, and they do not want to jeopardize any transportation with very accurate information.
On Twitter, Brueger asserts in view of the behavior of his coalition colleagues from the FDP: “Not every storm in a cup of tea equals a scandal.” There was amazement and smiles in the room when some of the deputies left earlier.
“Unfortunately, this visit did not contribute to gaining knowledge,” criticized CDU defense politician Serap Guler in an interview with Tagesspiegel about the chancellor’s appearance. Our questions about the exact state of affairs in (Already approved by the government, editor) Gibbard’s delivery of tanks, whether you can tell, was not answered with a word.”