Defense Minister Pistorius is pushing: a German-Polish repair shop for tanks is to be built near the Ukrainian border in Poland. Leopard tanks damaged in the war could be repaired there – and the German-Polish relationship to a certain extent.
The way to more safety leads over a dusty gravel road, through corn fields, up to a slight hill. Up here are the German Patriot systems protecting the skies over Poland. They are four-canister trucks loaded with rockets, facing east. The radar systems are parked a few hundred meters away, and next to them two radio masts soar into the sky like oversized skewers. The noise of the transformers drowns out any normal conversation. Only the storks stalk through the meadow, unimpressed by the German anti-aircraft defenses.