Germany's rearmament, aiming to make it Europe's strongest conventional army by 2039, is reportedly causing concern among its European allies. This follows a period of three decades where Germany's armed forces had diminished, with the country priding itself on being a "civil power" and advocating military restraint.
The combination of a sudden increase in German military spending, growing doubts about the United States' commitment to European security through NATO, and the rise of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party, which is currently leading in opinion polls, has reignited anxieties, particularly in Poland and France.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz's government has ruled out issuing eurobonds to fund European defence and has cancelled two major arms cooperation projects with France, involving a next-generation fighter aircraft and a tank. Planned arms purchases valued at €123.3bn, notified to parliament last month, are predominantly from national and US industries, with only a small proportion allocated to European partners.
Liana Fix, a historian and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, has warned of the perils of Germany becoming "Europe's next hegemon." She advocates for Germany to anchor its future military power in closer European unification, suggesting joint defence bonds, Europeanisation of national arms industries, and deeper integration of the Bundeswehr into European armed forces.