Bundestag
Fierce exchange of blows during Scholz’s survey on Taurus
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) during the federal government questioning in the German Bundestag. photo
© Michael Kappeler/dpa
In the Bundestag, the Chancellor is fending off accusations from the Union about Taurus with a counteroffensive. He accuses her of spreading “half-truths,” but also leaves questions unanswered.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz has once again clearly rejected the delivery of long-range German Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine. “Prudence is not something that can be qualified as weakness, as some do, but prudence is what the citizens of this country are entitled to,” said the SPD politician on Wednesday in his first survey this year in the Bundestag in Berlin.
Scholz: “Half-truths” – Union: “Deception”
Scholz accused the Union of spreading “half-truths” in the debate. “The citizens are afraid of you,” he said. On behalf of the CDU/CSU, CDU politician Norbert Röttgen rejected this accusation with sharp words. “You are not playing with clear cards. And you are aiming to deceive the public on this issue – on an issue of European and national security.”
Ukraine applied for the Taurus cruise missile with a range of 500 kilometers to the federal government in May last year. She wants to hit supply lines of the Russian armed forces far behind the front. In October, Scholz rejected a delivery for the first time – without providing a detailed explanation. This only followed on February 26th in a conversation with journalists and in the days afterwards at other public events.
In the 70-minute government survey, Scholz commented on this for the first time in the Bundestag. He did not take part in the big Ukraine debate in the Bundestag on February 22nd.
“Taking the bull by the horns”
Scholz opened the survey about Taurus with the words: “I would also like to take the bull by the horns” – Taurus means bull in Latin. He wanted to expressly say again that from his point of view it is “urgently necessary that in all decisions, especially when we are doing so much and when we are getting so many things underway, it remains central that we make every single decision carefully weigh up”.
Scholz reiterated his argument in the Bundestag as to why he does not want to deliver Taurus. Because the Taurus can be used to reach Russian territory as far as Moscow, he does not want to hand over control of this weapon to the Ukrainians. In order to maintain control themselves, German soldiers would have to take part in targeting – from Germany or in Ukraine. Both are out of the question for Scholz because, in his view, that could mean involvement in the war. The Bundestag would also have to agree to such a deployment of German soldiers if one wanted to be legally on the safe side. This is not the case in other countries such as Great Britain and France.
Scholz doesn’t trust Ukraine?
For him, it was impossible “to deliver long-range weapon systems that can only be meaningfully delivered if they were also associated with the deployment of German soldiers outside of Ukraine,” said Scholz. “That is a limit that I do not want to cross as Chancellor.”
The question of why Scholz does not want to leave the target control to Ukraine alone remains open. The Union then asked him whether this was not a sign of no confidence in Ukraine. Scholz rejected that. “We trust Ukraine.” But he failed to provide a clear explanation.