When Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a “Special Fund for the Federal Armed Forces” a good three weeks ago in his turning point government statement, the MPs of the CDU and CSU applauded the Social Democrats standing up. Opposition leader Friedrich Merz announced that the Union would support the necessary amendment to the Basic Law for the 100 billion euro package. “If you want our armed forces to be comprehensively upgraded – and we obviously want this with you from today – then we will go down this path with you, even against resistance,” Merz said to the Chancellor at the time. But now there is considerable trouble about the special fund.
This Tuesday evening, CSU regional group leader Alexander Dobrindt and Union faction leader Mathias Middelberg (CDU) are meeting with Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) and his State Secretary Werner Gatzer for a crisis talk; Lindner has submitted draft laws both for amending the Basic Law and for a subsequent implementation law.
Special assets or special debts?
The Union is still willing to amend the Basic Law, but is upset that the traffic light coalition does not, in its view, comply with what the Chancellor has announced. In the Bundestag, Scholz not only promised to set up a “Bundeswehr special fund” for “necessary investments and armaments projects”. He had also promised: “From now on, we will invest more than two percent of gross domestic product in our defense every year.” The Union now fears that the traffic light coalition will not only use the special fund for the Bundeswehr. And she complains that there is no repayment plan for the special fund.
“The 100 billion special assets are nothing more than 100 billion special debts,” said CSU regional group leader Alexander Dobrindt on Tuesday, referring to Lindner. “100 billion euros in new special debts without specifying how you want to pay them back, that will not have our approval.” The federal government has so far planned to regulate the modalities of the repayment at a later date through a separate federal law, as can be seen from a letter from Lindner to his cabinet colleagues.
Above all, however, the Union now complains that the government does not want to increase the actual defense budget and only wants to achieve the two percent target through the special fund. Government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit had made it clear several times that the traffic light wants to count the special assets in full.
The leaders of the CDU and Union faction argue that in order to achieve the two percent target, the defense budget would have to be 70 billion euros; but it is only 50 billion. With the special fund, the gap can only be closed for four to five years, depending on the development of gross domestic product. After that, however, there is again a huge underfunding. But the Union does not want to allow this. The CDU and CSU are therefore demanding that it be ensured now that the two percent target will be met even after the special fund has been exhausted.
Expenditure on cyber defense too?
CDU leader Friedrich Merz has therefore stated several times that he does not want to give the federal government carte blanche when it comes to amending the Basic Law. The votes of the Union for a constitutional change will only exist if the conditions of the Union are also addressed. This also applies to the use of funds.
The justification for the draft law to amend the Basic Law, which has already been passed by the cabinet, states, as in the justification for the implementation law, that the funds from the special fund “are tied to the purpose of strengthening alliance and defense capabilities and are intended exclusively to finance important equipment projects”. But then the addition follows: “This also includes measures to strengthen the cyber and information space as well as to equip and strengthen the security forces of partners.”
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) had repeatedly spoken out in favor of using the funds from the special fund for cyber defense and stabilization measures; the formulation should go back to them, among other things. There are also demands in the SPD not to spend the money exclusively on equipping the Bundeswehr.
According to the current responsibilities in Germany, a number of authorities could benefit from cyber defense: the Federal Office for Information Security, which is subordinate to the Ministry of the Interior, for example, but also secret services and police authorities. The phrase “upgrading the security forces of partners” suggests that this is about help for third countries, so the money does not benefit the Bundeswehr. No further stipulations can be found in the implementing law; the justification merely mentions as a criterion that all expenditure from the special fund must be offset against the NATO target for the defense expenditure of the member states.
And what happens now? Before the meeting between representatives of the Union with Finance Minister Lindner and his State Secretary on Tuesday evening, it was said that a compromise should not yet be expected. The meeting was “the first step on a path – and not the end”.