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Training of Ukrainian soldiers (archive image)
Photo: Andrew Kravchenko / dpa
The EU training mission to support Ukraine against the Russian invaders is taking shape.
According to SPIEGEL information, the member states of the EU agreed at the working level in recent weeks that up to 15,000 Ukrainian soldiers should be trained outside the country as quickly as possible.
According to diplomats involved in the negotiations, 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers are to receive special training, such as tactical combat training for commanders or courses for engineers.
The plans for the mission, which the EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell only proposed at the end of August, are to be decided as early as mid-October.
According to EU diplomats, things could then go very quickly.
So far, individual EU nations have been training Ukrainians in bilateral projects.
The Bundeswehr in Germany trained teams for the weapon systems supplied by Berlin, such as the »Panzerhaubitze2000« or the »Gepard« anti-aircraft tank.
Additional staff is currently being trained at various locations for these and other German systems.
If the EU is to receive the mission, which is to be given the somewhat unwieldy name "European Union Military Assistance Mission" or EUMAM for short, the activities of the individual states will be bundled so that better coordination should also be possible.
There had been some controversy behind the scenes over the details of the mission planning.
Poland had suggested installing a kind of central training camp for the Ukrainians near the border with Ukraine.
According to the military, the Poles wanted to practically train entire battle groups up to a battalion there.
Germany, meanwhile, doesn't think much of a central training facility.
In the Bundeswehr, it is said that setting up a large training camp in Poland alone would take a lot of time, and that such a camp would also have to be extensively protected against possible spying by the Russian secret services and also against possible attacks or sabotage actions.
As evidence, it is cited that there is concrete evidence that the courses for Ukrainian soldiers in Wildflecken or Idar-Oberstein were observed by Russia with drones.
The Bundeswehr is planning its own courses in Germany
In the end, a compromise was found at the working level.
The Poles are supposed to set up a kind of small headquarters, called "Forces Headquarters" in military slang, and will receive EU funds for it.
Instead of a central training camp, there should be individual courses in the EU countries.
Germany is already planning its own training courses for the Bundeswehr.
For example, the army could train Ukrainian commanders in tactics in a combat simulation center, and engineers, deminers, medics and other specialists are also to be trained in Germany.
The pace of planning illustrates that even within the EU there is little doubt that Ukraine needed more military support than before.
Before the summer, the German government had blocked initial ideas for training missions because it feared that direct training of Ukrainian combat units would turn the EU into a war party.
So far, the EU had only provided a financial pot from which the member states can pay for their arms deliveries to Ukraine, and Kyiv can also use the funds to buy arms directly.
The final details for the EUMAM mission are to be negotiated in Brussels next week.
The project should then be decided at the next formal EU external council on October 17th.