Germany’s reluctance to embrace such thinking, and the costs that come with resourcing the policies it demands, ignores the direct security threat Russia poses. A NATO-Russia war would spread westward across Europe’s strategic depth, just as Russian cruise missiles have rained down on western Ukraine while ground combat rages in the east. The country and its government are more than capable of breaking from “business as usual” when the political will is there, as German vice-chancellor Robert Habeck’s hard work to replace its energy supply while divesting from Russian oil, natural gas, and coal demonstrates. Unfortunately, the same sense of urgency has not been there for the Bundeswehr, resulting in the underwhelming Zeitenwende.

A Productive Way Forward

To address this urgent issue, American policymakers and interlocuters need to make it abundantly clear to their German counterparts that an enduring U.S. military presence in Europe will not come at the cost of a military defeat in the Indo-Pacific. The United States doesn’t need to performatively criticize Germany—as doing so would be counterproductive—but Americans need to have frank, realistic, and open conversations with Germans about America’s military commitments in the current strategic environment. This discourse should emphasize the immediate dangers that a gap in NATO’s capacity to defend its frontiers poses for Germany itself, and the steps Germany can take right now to adequately resource its contribution to this capacity. 

Old arguments that the German defense ministry and Bundeswehr would just waste increased funding, making institutional reform more important than spending increases, ignore the fact that all countries accept degrees of waste in their security apparatus. They continue to accept this because the existential costs of failure are far greater than those of inefficiency. If Germany was able to maintain Western Europe’s most powerful military just twenty years after World War II, then neither a supposed pacifist legacy nor disquiet over conflict with Russians is a meaningful justification for continued failure to meet its alliance defense commitments. Germans need to recognize the reality of a potential war with Russia, and how it would unfold in Germany itself even if most of the fighting was confined to the most vulnerable eastern NATO member states. Given the trajectories of Russia’s military power and the American military presence in Europe over the coming years, Germany can’t afford to lose any more time making the Zeitenwende happen, or the country itself will risk the consequences of inaction.

George Pavlakis is a U.S. Army officer currently earning an M.Sc. in Politics & Technology at the Technical University of Munich in Germany, where he focuses on European security and emerging military technologies. He is a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. 

The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.

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