German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/159,
pp. 20331-20332.
Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable Herr Chancellor.
Right honorable ladies and gentlemen.
The omens under which you set out for this European Council
are dark. The Ukraine war is already in a third year. Serious efforts to end
the fateful bloodletting in the midst of Europe are not in sight. Warmongering and war rhetoric determine
the tone in Brussels as well as in Berlin.
Friedrich Merz
(CDU/CSU): Not in Moscow?
Michel, the President of the European Council, demands:
Europe needs to prepare itself for war and change over to a war economy.
Friedrich Merz
(CDU/CSU): In which world do you live, actually?
The French state President Macron speaks of the mission of
NATO troops in the Ukraine theater of war,
and boasts that France would be in the position for that.
Friedrich Merz
(CDU/CSU): What you say, Putin could not say better!
In the ranks of the Union, in a remarkable historical
amnesia, – Herr Merz, because you the
entire time interrupt –
Till
Steffen (Greens): That’s in your manuscript, but he didn’t do that!
one dreams of carrying the war to Russia. The Union stands
for that. In lock-step with the FDP armaments lobbyist Strack-Zimmermann forms
a black-green coalition of warmongers which flatters itself with martial
rhetoric – even you, Herr Chancellor; a shame that you are not here – and accuses
others of defeatism.
Till
Steffen (Greens): I believe that was a failure of translation from the Russian.
The bellicose over-bidding competition rings the more absurd
against the background of the desolate state of our own armed forces. The
Bundeswehr has at its disposal, as before, not one, single mission-ready army
brigade. Nevertheless, the debate revolves steadfastly around new weapons
deliveries and financial aid in the billions to Kiev, while the reconstruction
of our own army and the recovery of capability for our own national defense is
here obviously of no priority. It was right, Herr Chancellor, that you spoke
against the delivery of the Taurus cruise missile to the Ukraine.
Dorothee Bär (CDU/CSU): Yes, praise
from the AfD! That is super for the SPD! Madness!
It would not be in the German security interest to strip our
armed forces of an additional important weapons system. In that regard, the
Bundeswehr does not even have at its disposal a sufficient number of these
cruise missiles so as to fulfill its obligations vis-à-vis NATO. The delivery
of this system, which as an offensive weapon may have effect far into Russia
and can even reach the Kremlin, would be a quite clear participation in the
war. The commitment of German soldiers for servicing would necessarily follow
after it and thereby dramatically increase the potential of escalation.
And even you, Herr Scholz, have ever again fallen down and
have let yourself be forced into escalation. First should German armored
howitzers bring the war’s turning point, then German defensive panzers and
finally German combat panzers. None of that fulfilled the ratcheted-up
expectations. Now the escalationists extol the Taurus as a game-changer or
wonder weapon. Even with the Taurus, the Ukraine has not the faintest breath of
a chance to achieve its war aims. The truth is needed for that.
Even if this time you remain steadfast, the Nein to Taurus does not suffice. Germany
is acting de facto as a war party. Germany participates by means of the
sanctions in an economic war against Russia. Germany delivers weapons to the
Ukraine. Germany gives to considerable extent financial assistance,
Christoph
Meyer (FDP): Has the Kremlin written down all of that for you?
and Europe expropriates capital income on Russian reserve
deposits – from my viewpoint, that is forbidden.
Friedrich Merz (CDU/CSU): Russia
Today speaks! Here is the latest news from Russia Today!
Instead of driving forward the escalation with warmongering
and weapons deliveries, the German policy needs to call to mind its strengths. That
means: It needs to venture all to step forward as a mediator and get
negotiations underway. To that, we are besides also obligated by the peace
precept in the German Basic Law.
Without question is Russia’s war in the Ukraine an attack
contrary to international law.
Friedrich Merz
(CDU/CSU): Ach ja?
Christian
Dürr (FDP): Ah!
Just so without question has the Ukraine the right to self
defense.
Friedrich Merz
(CDU/CSU): Aha!
The decision in that regard to support it does not however
release us from the obligation to rational policy in the well understood
interests of our own country and our own people.
German interests are represented and defined in Berlin, not
by chance in Kiev or in Washington. Even in the U.S.A. are there long since
signs of an exit [Ausstieg]. To believe
the Europeans could alone continue to conduct the U.S.A.’s proxy war against
Russia would be folly and hubris in one.
Kordula
Schulz-Asche (Greens): Proxy war?
The Ukraine war has long since run aground. It devours month
by month billions in money and material and countless soldiers’ lives. The talk
of victory and endurance from Kiev is unrealistic. This war must not be frozen
in, it must be ended.
Katja Mast
(SPD): Putin can pull out!
A Ukraine as a theater of war, de-populated and devastated
for years, helplessly dependent on foreign payments and under the continual
danger of the escalation to a Third World War, is neither in the German nor
European interest. It can also ultimately not be in the interest of the
Ukrainian nation.
Germany’s interest is peace in Europe, the normalization of
economic relations with all countries, Russia also, and the ending of the
sanctions war which most harms us alone. The way there leads through negotiations.
You cannot execute this charge, in that you glorify one of the war’s opponents
and demonize the other. Realistic foreign policy has the duty, in the propaganda
thunder of the war parties which we here everyday hear,
Patrick Schnieder
(CDU/CSU): Just from you!
to find the contact points for a durable exchange of interests.
Certainly, when the weapons speak, diplomacy is not allowed to be silent.
Vice-president
Katrin Göring-Eckardt: Your time is expired, Frau Weidel.
Act for the best of one’s own people and the peoples of
Europe. Seek the way to peace
Vice-president Katrin
Göring-Eckardt: Frau Weidel.
so as to prevent a major European war.
[trans: tem]