In an incendiary letter, Baerbock and Pistorius demand more support for Ukraine from their German partners. The initiative could quickly be successful.
Berlin – Weapons aid was quickly promised because this time it did not require months of discussions in advance. Germany will “immediately hand over another Patriot fire unit to Ukraine to repel Russian air attacks,” the Federal Ministry of Defense wrote on the online platform X on Saturday (April 13) – just a few days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj said his country needed A good two dozen Patriot air defense systems are used to protect its own airspace against Russian missile and drone attacks.
Anyone who can do the math can immediately see that there is still a lot missing, even if it is assumed that the few systems that have so far been delivered to Ukraine by the USA, Germany and the Netherlands are still fully functional and have not already been partially destroyed by the Russian army. It is therefore not surprising that the federal government has now dared to make another move following its announcement on Saturday. The NATO partners should also provide more support to the heavily beleaguered Ukraine - Germany has approached its allies with this demand.
Fire letter from Baerbock and Pistorius: Better support for Ukraine with air defense systems
Several media outlets are reporting that Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) and Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD) have sent a kind of incendiary letter to their counterparts. In it they call for better and rapid support for Ukraine with air defense systems. “In view of the situation in which Ukraine finds itself, our help is extremely urgent,”
Spiegel
quotes from the letter. The magazine was the first to report. Spokespeople for the two ministries have now confirmed that the ministers have contacted their partners, writes Die
Zeit
. According to the Foreign Office, the addressees are the partners at NATO and the European Union as well as third countries.
The dpa
also
has the letter. Contributions to the defense against Russian aggression “must come quickly,” wrote Pistorius and Baerbock, calling on allies to take stock of all air defense systems in their arsenals. It is important to think about what could be given to Ukraine directly or in exchange with partners. Production capacities should also be checked and used. It is also possible to participate in the initiative with financial support.
Ukraine with a desperate cry for help – Scholz: “We have to do more than before”
This comes at a time when Ukraine is coming under increasing pressure, which is also due to the stagnant support from the USA. The Republicans in Congress have been blocking further aid for the country for months, and a corresponding package could finally be passed in the US House of Representatives this weekend - and provide the Ukrainian armed forces with urgently needed supplies.
“If Congress doesn’t help Ukraine, Ukraine will lose the war,” Zelensky warned at the beginning of April. In an interview recently he made a desperate appeal for help: “Today our artillery shell ratio is 1 to 10. Can we hold our own? No. In any case, with these numbers they will push us back every day,” Zelensky said.
The federal government also seems to see it that way. “The Russian war of aggression is being carried out with great brutality and we know that we have to do more than we are doing so far to support Ukraine,” said Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) on Wednesday (April 17) at an EU meeting. Summit. In addition to ammunition and artillery, the Ukrainian armed forces primarily needed air defense systems.
Baerbock and Pistorius want to immediately help Ukraine with air defense
“We must now act quickly together and stop the brutal and ruthless air strikes, especially on centers like Odessa or Kharkiv,” Pistorius told
Spiegel
. “More air defense is urgently needed to protect the Ukrainian population, cities and critical infrastructure,” the minister and Baerbock wrote in the letter. Any kind of help is welcome. “We all have something to contribute, perhaps more than we previously thought possible,” the paper quotes from the letter. “It is up to us to immediately help Ukraine to repel this murderous onslaught.”
According to Spiegel
, the background to the initiative, which was created together with France, is
President Zelensky's calls for help. He points out that the Ukrainian troops are in an almost hopeless situation and urgently need more air defense. Western intelligence services warned that Moscow was deliberately attacking Ukraine's energy infrastructure in order to paralyze the country. Russia is currently bombing Ukraine almost every day with missiles or attacking from the air with attack drones. Recent Russian attacks on vital energy infrastructure have caused at least as much destruction as in the winter of the first year of the war, the letter says. “Russia is exploiting current gaps in Ukraine’s air defense.”
As Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba is said to have said at a NATO foreign ministers meeting at the beginning of April, according to
Spiegel
, Ukraine urgently needs more weapons to defend against air attacks - ideally modern systems such as Patriot or Iris-T. At the meeting, Kuleba talked about how Russian drones and missiles were systematically destroying the energy infrastructure and that Ukraine would not be able to defend itself for much longer without rapid additional help. That apparently left an impression on Baerbock, writes Der
Spiegel
. She left Brussels frustrated because none of the partners announced concrete deliveries. This led to the plan to set a good example and spontaneously promise a Patriot system.
EU promises further military support for Ukraine
The plan could work. There is an urgent need to provide Ukraine with air defense systems and to accelerate and intensify the provision of necessary military support, said a joint statement by EU leaders after the EU summit on Wednesday (April 17). . According to his own words, EU Council President Charles Michel expects that the EU member states will soon make a decision on further deliveries of air defense systems to Ukraine, writes Die
Zeit
. “It’s not a matter of months. It’s a matter of days and weeks,” said Michel. Everyone involved is doing everything possible to speed up the process.
“If all the words that have been spoken here in Brussels in recent years about common defense could be converted into bullets and rocket launchers, Europe would be the strongest power in the world,” Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk called on the EU states on Thursday (18). . April) on the platform He recently announced that Poland would join the “European Sky Shield” project initiated by Germany. The plan is for some European states to jointly procure Iris-T air defense systems in order to close gaps in the NATO protective umbrella for Europe.
The EU should not rely solely on the United States to support Ukraine with air defense systems, warned EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Thursday (April 18) at the meeting of the G7 foreign ministers. “We have to take responsibility ourselves.” The Europeans have Patriots and anti-missile systems. “We have to take them out of our barracks, where they are, and send them to Ukraine, where the war is raging. I'm sure we will do that. But we have to act quickly.”
US lawmakers are expected to vote on the Ukraine aid package on Saturday
Of course, it is still important that the blockade situation in Washington ends. “In these stormy times, it is a hopeful sign that there are now signals from the US from the Republicans that support for Ukraine can continue to be intensive. We campaigned intensively for this,” said Baerbock at the foreign ministers’ meeting. At the NATO meeting two weeks ago, there was a lot of discussion about “how we can now show our strength by supporting Ukraine with everything we have,” said Baerbock. “Of course the USA plays an important role in this.”
The vote in the US House of Representatives on the Ukraine aid package planned for Saturday involves $61 billion in US aid, mostly military support. In Washington it was said that President Joe Biden should provide Ukraine with long-range ATACMS missile systems “as soon as practicable”.
(flon)