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Germany plans to Halve military aid for Ukraine amid speculation of Trump’s potential return

Germany plans to Halve military aid for Ukraine amid speculation of Trump’s potential return

Germany plans to Halve military aid for Ukraine amid speculation of Trump’s potential return

Germany plans to Halve military aid for Ukraine amid speculation of Trump’s potential return

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  • Germany plans to halve military aid for Ukraine from 8 billion euros in 2024 to 4 billion euros ($4.35 billion) in 2025.
  • The funds earmarked for armaments are not expected to be fully used, but Washington pushed to “front load” the loans.
  • EU leaders agreed to the idea to reduce the risk of Ukraine facing a funding shortfall if Trump returns to the White House.
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Germany plans to halve military aid for Ukraine next year, despite the possibility of Republican candidate Donald Trump returning to the White House and curbing support for Kyiv. According to a draft of the 2025 budget, German aid to Ukraine will decrease from around 8 billion euros in 2024 to 4 billion euros ($4.35 billion) in 2025.

Germany hopes Ukraine can meet most of its military needs with the $50 billion in loans from frozen Russian assets, as agreed by the Group of Seven. The funds earmarked for armaments are not expected to be fully used. Washington pushed to “front load” the loans, providing Ukraine with a substantial lump sum now.

Officials say EU leaders agreed to the idea partly to reduce the risk of Ukraine facing a funding shortfall if Trump returns to the White House. Alarm spread across Europe this week after Trump chose Senator J.D. Vance, who opposes military aid for Ukraine and warned that Europe would need to rely less on the United States for defense, as his vice-presidential candidate.

Western officials fiercely criticized Trump for suggesting he would not protect countries that failed to meet the transatlantic military alliance’s defense spending targets and would even encourage Russia to attack them. Germany has repeatedly missed NATO’s target of spending 2 percent of its economic output on defense, facing significant criticism for it.

DEPLETED MILITARY STOCKS:

Decades of underinvestment have already depleted Germany’s armed forces stocks, and arms supplies to Kyiv have further reduced them. So far, Berlin has donated three Patriot air defense units to Kyiv, more than any other country, reducing the number of Patriot systems in Germany to nine.

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Germany’s fractious coalition of left-leaning Social Democrats, pro-business liberals, and ecologist Greens has struggled to comply with NATO’s spending target due to self-imposed rules limiting state borrowing.

Although Germany will cut military aid to Ukraine, it will meet NATO’s target of spending 2 percent of GDP on defense in 2025, totaling 75.3 billion euros. Days after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a “Zeitenwende”—a historic turning point—with a 100 billion euro special fund to modernize the military.

The special fund will allocate an additional 22.0 billion euros for defense, alongside 53.3 billion euros in the regular budget, which is still less than what Defense Minister Boris Pistorius requested. The 2025 budget includes mid-term financial planning until 2028, when the armed forces’ special fund aimed at meeting NATO’s minimum spending goals is expected to expire, necessitating 80 billion euros for defense, as outlined in the financial plan.

Sources from the finance ministry reported a 39 billion euro gap in the regular budget for 2028, with 28 billion euros required to meet the NATO target without relying on the special fund. Decisions on how to address this shortfall are unlikely to be made until after the 2025 election.

“The 80 billion euros that have been put on display for 2028 simply do not exist,” said Ingo Gaedechens, a member of the parliament’s budget committee from the conservative opposition party CDU.

“The coalition is not even trying to cover this up but is openly admitting it.”

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