Just over a week ago, we already reported that the German imperialists want to allocate significantly more money to the defence budget in the future. According to what has been decided in the coalition agreement of the traffic light government, the so-called 2 per cent target of NATO is to be fulfilled, which states that 2 per cent of the gross domestic product is to be invested in the armed forces. That would be at least 73 billion euros a year, while last year's budget was still 46 billion. With the situation in Ukraine, where Russian imperialism launched a bloody war of aggression on 24 February, the situation has changed again. Even if the German imperialists did not wish for this war at this moment, they are now trying to get the maximum profit out of it. Above all, this war offers an opportunity to justify the increase in military expenditure and thus to meet the 2 per cent target.
The propaganda push of the German warmongers already began with the statement of the Bundeswehr Army Inspector Alfons Mais, who described the Bundeswehr as "bare" on 24 February shortly after the outbreak of the war. The Bundeswehr was not up to a war, was not strong enough to act as a deterrent. The old tune was replayed and so the course of propaganda was steered towards rearmament.
The 2 per cent target was not enough for the imperialist gang of murderers, however, so yesterday, 27 February, the federal government arranged for a 100 billion euro so-called special fund for the Bundeswehr to be launched. Mafioso Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that Germany would: "from now on - year after year - invest more than two percent of the gross domestic product in our defence". There was general agreement in the Bundestag that such a special fund was the right thing to do, and the representatives of the various factions of the bourgeoisie spoke in favour of it. The said special fund is even to be anchored in the Basic Law.
These are crocodile tears that the German imperialists are now shedding because of the war in Ukraine. Even though they did not want this war, they know how to use it for their own ends. The build-up of German imperialism, whose history is marked by war and genocide, is always a build-up against the international proletariat and the peoples of the world.
