Olaf Scholz is a big fan of repeating things until everyone has to understand them.

He even won the election, at least he thinks so.

On Thursday in the Bundestag, the Chancellor more or less repeated what he had already said about the Ukraine war.

For example: "Russia must not win this war, Ukraine must remain."

That is what all the support for the country attacked by Russia is about, including the delivery of weapons “including heavy equipment”.

For some that goes too far.

"Helping a country that has been brutally attacked to defend itself is not escalation," says Scholz.

Putin still believes that he can bomb a dictated peace.

But the man in Moscow is wrong.

Only when Putin understands that will he negotiate.

Markus Wehner

Political correspondent in Berlin.

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Then follows what Scholz always says: Germany will not go it alone, NATO must not become a party to the war and Germany will strengthen its own security.

However, there was lively applause from the ranks of the traffic light group only after fifteen minutes, when Scholz turned to “dear friends in Sweden and Finland” and greeted them with a “welcome to us” in NATO – to the resistance against The chancellor does not accept the accession of the Turkish head of state Erdogan.

“Because we know what we are defending”

He speaks of the solidarity fund that the EU must set up now for the reconstruction of Ukraine.

After all, it is a government statement on the extraordinary summit of EU heads of state and government that is taking place at the end of May.

At the same time, the Chancellor makes it clear that there is no short cut for Ukraine on the way to the EU.

Only the six countries in the Western Balkans, which have been trying to join the EU for years, owe that.

Scholz wants to visit the Western Balkans before the EU summit, with the message in his luggage: "The Western Balkans belong in the EU".

However, the consequences of the war in Ukraine will be dealt with in Germany, where the government will "leave no one alone", especially not citizens with small and medium incomes, and also in the EU, where it will be ensured that it will give the member states "no bottlenecks in the energy supply".

Germany will overcome the consequences of the war because it is a strong country and "because we know what we are defending: peace, freedom and" - here Scholz makes a small artificial pause at the end of his speech - "law".

There is decent applause.

Before that, the chancellor had spoken about the planned special fund for the Bundeswehr in the amount of 100 billion euros, the use of which the traffic light groups and the Union have been negotiating for some time because it requires an amendment to the Basic Law.

Scholz addressed the leader of the opposition as "Dear Mr. Merz", saying that good talks were being held.

But the person addressed in this way, who comes to the desk immediately after the chancellor, does not want to be nice this morning.

After the chancellor's appearance, Merz shakes up the Bundestag with a hello-awake speech.

He begins with a quote from Scholz from a recent television appearance when the chancellor explained why he has not yet traveled to Kyiv.

"I will not join a group of people who do something for a short in and out with a photo shoot," Scholz said.

"What double game are you running?"

Merz asks who he meant by this group of people.

The European heads of government, who were already there, or the speaker of the American House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi?

Or perhaps Foreign Minister Baerbock from the Greens and Bundestag President Bas from the SPD?

Merz then expressly thanks the Foreign Minister and the President of the Bundestag "for having made this trip" and then remarks that it is "informative" that only the Union faction applauds these words.