Taking into consideration the growing global instability as well as the changing tasks the country’s armed forces are facing in the area of external security – including national defence and international deployments - the German government decided to reverse the trend of recent years and to significantly raise its defence spending. It is indicative that the defence budget will be increased by 1.7 billion Euros in 2017, reaching 36.6 billion Euros, while an additional 10.2 billion Euros to that previously planned, will be allocated to defence, up to the year 2020. More on that, spending on internal security will rise by approximately 540 million Euros in the 2017 budget and by a total of over 2.2 billion Euros, up to 2020.
2017 German Federal Budget
|
|
Billion Euros |
As a % of Total Budget |
|
Labour and Social Affairs |
138.6 |
42.2% |
|
Defence |
36.6 |
11.1% |
|
Transport and Digital Infrastructure |
26.8 |
8.2% |
|
Federal Debt |
20.1 |
6.1% |
|
Education and Research |
17.6 |
5.3% |
|
Health |
15.1 |
4.6% |
|
Revenue Admin. |
14.7 |
4.5% |
|
Internal Affairs |
8.3 |
2.5% |
|
Others |
50.9 |
15.5% |
Source: http://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de
More specifically, the Defence Ministry stated that part of the money will be used to modernize equipment, as Germany aims to invest approximately 20% of its defence budget in the procurement of major equipment over the long term, in order to meet the target set by NATO. The reason is that currently the German army is underequipped and there is a need for procuring new equipment, as well as for the upgrading of existing ones.
According to an official report published by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Armed Forces in 2015, less than half of the country’s military planes were combat-ready. Specifically, in December of 2015, the German Air Force had access to only three A400Ms, while of the 114 Eurofighters in operation, 40% were being refitted by private companies, only 68 aircraft were actually assigned to air wings, and of them, just 38 were operational on average. Additionally, merely 21 out of 50 Transall C-160 aircraft were flight ready and a lack of spare parts had as a consequence that only 29 out of 93 Tornadoes were operational, five of the 40 NH90 transport helicopter and seven out of the 43 Tiger helicopters.
Further, the German Navy’s helicopter fleet demonstrated a poor operational readiness as far as the Sea King helicopters, of which only three to five out of the 21 currently in the Navy’s inventory were operationally ready, while of the 22 Sea Lynx helicopters, only four were available at any given time.
On the other hand, the German Land Forces also had major equipment deficiencies. For example, as far as the 345th Artillery Demonstration Battalion, only 60% of the materiel required for the NATO Response Force’s standby tasks could be supplied by the battalion itself. The rest of the materiel would have to be borrowed from other units.
In order to avert such ‘shortages’, in early 2016, the Minister of Defence, Mrs. Ursula von der Leyen, announced that Germany is planning to invest some 130 billion Euros within the next 15 years, in the Armed Forces’ infrastructure and equipment. The plan includes the procurement of new systems and platforms, as well as the overhaul and upgrading of existing ones. As far as land systems, the plan calls for the increase of the operationally available LEOPARD 2 Main Battle Tanks (MBT) from 225 to 320, of the FENNEK reconnaissance vehicles from 217 to 248, of the BOXER 8x8 Armoured Personnel Carriers (APC) from 272 to 402, of the PzH 2000 self-propelled howitzers from 89 to 101, as well as for the procurement of up to 192 Marder and 342 Puma Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFV).
Additionally, the Ministry of Defence of the country, released in the beginning of 2016, an Air Power Development Strategy, in which among other items, the equipment priorities of the German Air Force are indicated. The key programs indicated in the associated report are the successors of the Sea Lynx shipboard helicopter and the CH-53 heavy transport helicopter, the strategy for the creation of an integrated Future Combat Air System (FCAS), the development of a Medium-Altitude Long-Endurance (MALE) class unmanned aerial vehicle, in cooperation with France, Italy and Spain, the modernisation of the nation’s Airborne Early Warning & Control (NAEW&C) system, the procurement and use of the TRITON UAV, the successor system of the tactical Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) currently used by the land forces (KZO, LUNA), the P-3C ORION capability spectrum expansion (i.e. for wide-area reconnaissance, through the integration of additional reconnaissance resources), and finally the sustainment of the Tiger’s multirole support helicopter capabilities.
Lastly, it is worth mentioning that Germany is leaning towards the integration of its defence strategy, with those of the EU and NATO. Being the economic leader of its continent, Germany gradually assumes a greater role in regional and global security in the new environment under establishment, within both the NATO and EU governing bodies. In the White Paper published in 2016, Germany calls for a common build-up and expansion of defence capabilities in Europe, with the goal of achieving an interoperable, coherent and comprehensive set of European military assets. The initial priorities of such a policy would be the establishment of a common inventory of UAVs, air-to-air refuelling assets, satellite communication systems, cyber protection and cyber defence capabilities.