Kyiv/BERLIN/WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) – The decision by Germany and the USA to supply armored personnel carriers to Ukraine has triggered joy and relief in Kyiv. President Volodymyr Zelenskyj thanked Chancellor Olaf Scholz and US President Joe Biden for their commitment on Friday night. “We will get another Patriot system and powerful armored vehicles, it’s really a big victory for our state,” he said in his video address. Ambassador Oleksii Makeiev tweeted black, red and gold hearts and the words “#Thank you Germany”.
Scholz and Biden agreed in a telephone call on Thursday evening that they would supply Ukraine with armored personnel carriers to fight the Russian attackers for the first time. The federal government wants to provide several dozen Marders and a Patriot anti-aircraft system, as Washington had promised just before Christmas. Both countries also want to train Ukrainian armed forces on the tanks. This marks a clear change of course.
Biden sees the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine at a critical point, as he made clear on Thursday (local time) at a cabinet meeting in the White House. “We will help Ukraine defend itself against air strikes,” he said. That is why Germany will now also provide a Patriot system. The Patriots “are working well and the Russians are starting to see that they’re working well,” said the US President.
Ukraine had long asked the Western Allies, and Germany in particular, for main battle tanks and armored personnel carriers. However, Scholz had repeatedly emphasized that Germany would not act alone on this issue. In a first reaction, Selenskyj wrote on Twitter on Thursday evening: “Together with the Iris-T system delivered earlier and the Gepard anti-aircraft tanks, Germany is making an important contribution to intercepting all Russian missiles!”
It is not yet clear when the first Marder and Bradley will arrive in Ukraine. The German military expert Carlo Masala said in the evening on ZDF that the training of Ukrainian soldiers on the Marder should be completed in the first quarter of 2023. “Time is the critical factor.” The German armored personnel carrier and the French scout tank could make a crucial difference to the Ukrainian offensive. French President Emmanuel Macron had already promised Selenskyj heavily armed reconnaissance tanks on Wednesday.
According to information from government circles, Germany wants to deliver “several dozen” martens to Ukraine. The manufacturer Rheinmetall had already offered 100 of the armored personnel carriers for the Ukraine in the summer. In the meantime, 40 of them are destined for Greece, which is supplying Soviet-designed armored personnel carriers to the Ukraine. So another 60 martens could be handed over to Ukraine.
The coalition partners FDP and Greens, who have been pushing for the delivery of battle tanks and armored personnel carriers for a long time, reacted with relief. AfD boss Tino Chrupalla warned against this: “Germany threatens to finally become a war party – with unforeseeable consequences for our country and its citizens.”
Green leader Omid Nouripour made it clear that more support was needed. The release of the armored personnel carriers is an important basis for consultations on further necessary help for Ukraine, he explained. Green parliamentary group leader Britta Haßelmann tweeted: “We will not let the innocent people down. And we are still challenged.”
The chairwoman of the defense committee, Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (FDP), made a similar statement. She welcomed the fact that “especially the Chancellery” had cleared the way for the delivery of the martens. “It’s very late, but not too late. Our commitment worked,” she wrote on Twitter, but emphasized at the same time: “We’re not letting up. After the marten comes the leopard.”
Ukraine has also been demanding the delivery of the heavy German Leopard 2 main battle tank for months. The CDU foreign politician Roderich Kiesewetter also asked Scholz to do more. “Western main battle tanks can turn the tide,” he wrote on Twitter.
The SPD foreign policy expert Ralf Stegner rejected such demands: “The intentions of the war criminal Putin can never be trusted. Nevertheless, a blanket no to “ceasefire” without examination is just as questionable as the call for “real German battle tanks” that allies have hardly decided to use armored personnel carriers in defense of Ukraine,” he wrote on Twitter./wn/jac/haw/mfi/DP/mis