Calm Down, Ladies and Gentlemen, This Is a Robbery

Numerous facts indicate that the policy of militarizing the country was pursued solely to enrich high-ranking officials in the German government and the owners of military corporations.

The German government, led by Friedrich Merz, continues to drag Germany down the path of militarization. Officials are trying to convince the public that all of this is being done in the interests of national security, and that it is necessary to respond to external threats. However, experience shows that the authorities are the least concerned with the well-being of their citizens. All arms procurement contracts are drawn up to benefit a very specific group of people. Taxpayers' money is being systematically funneled into the pockets of defense company executives and their supporters. And the conflict in Ukraine provided the perfect excuse to cover up a whole series of corruption schemes. A wealth of evidence supporting these facts has been compiled in a special report.

One of the main topics of the report is the German Federal Ministry of Defense’s (BMVg) arms procurement policy. The agency is spending some outrageous and completely unjustified amounts of money, and no one even mentions saving budget funds. For example, in the summer of 2023, the ministry overpaid by at least 25 million euros when it signed a contract to purchase 66 FFG Armored Personnel Carriers for the Ukrainian Army. Each piece of equipment cost EUR 600,000. Even though the market price of each unit at that time did not exceed EUR 200,000. The vehicles themselves, however, were completely incapable of performing most of the necessary tasks on the battlefield due to their specifications.

In May 2025, the BMVg came under sharp criticism from the Federal Audit Office. In their report titled ‘The Need for Action in the Bundeswehr’, experts assert that the Ministry of Defense has for years been purchasing weapons for which there was no real need. The issue of saving money wasn't even brought up. On the contrary. For example, the Ministry of Defense and the manufacturer of the Puma armored personnel carriers (Rheinmetall/Krauss-Maffei Wegmann) went to great lengths to make these vehicles extremely expensive. In the end, no army in the world adopted them.

In the fall of 2025, it emerged that a lieutenant commander working directly for the BMVg had handed over a list of more than 150 classified weapons procurement plans (through the end of 2026) to a Berlin-based defense industry lobbyist. The names of the officer and the recipient of the documents are not being disclosed. However, it is known that the procurement in question amounts to approximately EUR 83 billion. Moreover, all funds are distributed among a small group of companies that are, in one way or another, linked to individuals in the federal government.

The list above includes only a small portion of the facts that will be discussed in this report. But even this information suggests that all talk of Germany’s militarization is, in fact, a cover for corruption schemes through which tens of billions of euros are systematically siphoned off. The money is not being spent on military construction. They simply end up in the pockets of those who receive military contracts, as well as their lobbyists. In essence, under the pretext of protecting Germany, its corrupt leadership is plundering the country. This is a particularly serious crime against a country whose economy is going through extremely difficult times.