With the votes of the three government parties plus two opposition parties, Die Linke and AfD, the Bundestag yesterday rejected, 485-176, a motion by the Christian Democrats for delivery of Taurus missiles to Ukraine. The vote may reflect that a majority of Germans oppose weapons deliveries. The government already is faced with plenty of unrest in the country these days, with farmers and truckers protesting against budget cuts—from which the defense budget is exempted.
The Chairwoman of the Bundestag’s Defense Committee Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmerman discounted the vote. She argued that the opposition Christian Democrats attempted to “pull off a clumsy PR stunt” by linking the missile proposal to a debate on the state of Germany’s military. This resulted in some lawmakers who support sending the Taurus missiles, to vote against the proposal to send them. But, regardless of the vote, she assured that “a request that includes the missiles, as well as other Ukraine aid, will be sent to Scholz by sometime in February at the latest,” as RT described it.
Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Ivan Hawryliuk told Tagesspiegel of his hope that that allied pressure on Germany will change the view there on the missiles. He pointed to the Jan. 23 Ukraine Contact Group meeting of NATO partners as an occasion for this.
