February 2022 marked one of Germany’s most significant post-Cold War policy shifts.
Catalyzed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, former Chancellor Olaf Scholz declared that Moscow’s actions marked a Zeitenwende, a turning point and a new era in which Germany would cut through its deeply embedded bureaucracy and red tape to rebuild its long-ignored military.
A Military Revived
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Berlin injected a once-unbelievable sum into its ailing military.
A once-off €100 billion cash injection into the military was, to paraphrase the chancellor, part of a broader effort to revive a military that had been virtually on life support.
Though the continent’s largest economy, the German military had long been neglected in the years following the end of the Cold War, nominally obligated to meet the NATO alliance’s two percent of GDP toward defense spending target, that must was seen as optional in Berlin.
In fact, Germany had not spent more than 1.5 percent of GDP on defense since 1996.
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