Ukraine conflict: rethinking in the SPD - Unusual calls for deterrence are loud
Created: 02/26/2022, 08:59
By: Marcus Mäckler
Federal Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) visiting a tank training brigade in February.
© dpaPhilipp Schulze
For a long time, the SPD relied on disarmament and military skepticism.
Now there is a rethink - Defense Minister Lambrecht calls for an increase in the defense budget.
Munich – If you listen carefully, you will find something amazing: Many in the SPD suddenly have a long, embellished word on their lips.
Party leader Lars Klingbeil recently called for "more military deterrence" against authoritarian regimes, similar to the military commissioner Eva Högl and the SPD foreign policy officer Nils Schmid.
An ex-party leader put it particularly pointedly: "We are back in the time of deterrence," Sigmar Gabriel told
Der Spiegel
.
"A truly frightening reality."
For a long time, the SPD did not believe in the worst when it came to the conflict between Ukraine and Russia
In the case of the Social Democrats, one can probably speak of a reality shock.
He hit the party particularly hard after Russia's attack on Ukraine.
Because until the very end, large sections of the Social Democrats believed that regimes like the one in Moscow could be appeased through forbearance, dialogue and cooperation – deterrence, however, was counterproductive.
After the annexation of Crimea, then Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier warned against too much “saber rattling” towards Russia.
He was just one of many.
The goodwill was also reflected in the demand to disarm militarily.
The SPD election program for 2021 is still talking about a “new European Ostpolitik” that includes “real disarmament steps”.
The aim is to "finally withdraw and destroy the nuclear weapons stationed in Europe and Germany".
In addition to the political competition, experts also criticized this as naive.
The head of the Munich Security Conference at the time, Wolfgang Ischinger, warned against unilateral disarmament – with reference to Russia, of course.
SPD-Left: This is how parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich reacted
But that did not irritate the party left.
She continued to cultivate the mixture of too great an understanding of the Kremlin and military skepticism.
One is particularly associated with this attitude: parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich.
Shortly before the Russian attack, he preferred to point out mistakes by the US government rather than Kremlin aggression.
It was he who – still in the GroKo – and others in the parliamentary group opposed the arming of the Bundeswehr with combat drones.
During the election campaign, he called for the withdrawal of nuclear weapons from Europe more aggressively than almost anyone else.
Even Mützenich has caught up with reality, a little bit.
He labeled Russian President Vladimir Putin a “war criminal” after his order to attack him, but remains skeptical in other areas.
On
Deutschlandfunk
, Mützenich says he "continues to have fundamental doubts about nuclear deterrence capacities".
They obviously wouldn't have stopped Putin from attacking Ukraine.
CDU foreign affairs expert Norbert Röttgen reacted sharply: "The tanks are rolling in Ukraine, Putin is threatening nuclear war and Mützenich is questioning nuclear participation," he tweeted.
That is "fire hazard".
SPD change of course with Christine Lambrecht
For a long time, the Mützenichs in the SPD dictated the party's security course, but it seems as if a rethink is beginning.
Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht recently called for an increase in the defense budget.
In the parliamentary group, too, many now have doubts about the gentle Russia course that relies solely on diplomacy.
At the Munich Security Conference, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said an important sentence with regard to Russia: "We must not be naive." That could be the standard for the future.
- mma
