Delivery of German “Marder” tanks to Ukraine is correct. But it also shows how little Germany can escape the military logic of war – including the Chancellor.
And the chancellor is on the move: Germany is supplying several dozen “Marder” armored personnel carriers to Ukraine, which will use them to start recapturing other Russian-occupied territories in the spring. Olaf Scholz explains that he has remained true to his line and only delivers what others, such as the USA or France, also deliver. But that’s a facade. Something strikingly new is happening, if not to say something unheard of.
Whether the “Marder” armored personnel carriers are “offensive weapons” is an idle argument: practically any weapon can be part of an offensive within your own national borders or beyond. What is qualitatively new is that the Chancellor no longer follows a domestic, perhaps even intra-European, logic and consideration. Instead, Olaf Scholz is now finally obeying the military logic of the war that is being waged for the security of all of Europe: From now on, what is needed to let Ukraine win within its territorial borders will be supplied. That’s good news.
All previous arguments against the delivery of certain weapons from Germany are secondary. It should be remembered that heavy weapons, including the “Marder” tanks, were considered a dangerous fuel for an escalation which, in the Chancellor’s words, could go as far as “nuclear war”. That is no longer the case, and that too is good news.
The delivery of the “Marder” tanks does not make Germany any more a party to the war than it already is. The federal government is now in second place among donor nations, but Berlin never wanted to make such a big deal out of it – for whatever reason. Incidentally, in all his madness, Vladimir Putin alone decides who is a party to the war and who isn’t.
Nevertheless, the chancellor’s warnings and hesitation about heavy weapons always had the majority of the citizens behind him. It was one of the very few points where approval has remained stable since he took office a good year ago. Olaf Scholz is also getting rid of this with the decision for the “Marder”. Apparently, public opinion is no longer an argument for or against the supply of specific weapons.
That is risky, especially in a coalition where this very chancellor seemed to be the relatively calm pole. But that might be the essence of a chancellorship in times of war. Olaf Scholz has now arrived at this point, and that removes the last doubt as to whether heavy German battle tanks of the “Leopard” type will also be delivered in the end. The answer is yes, if the Americans think it makes military sense.
