The appearance of Polish President Andrzej Duda in Lviv sends a strong political signal: in front of the cameras he announced in the western Ukrainian city that Poland had decided to hand over Leopard tanks to Ukraine.
Next to him was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
You had to listen carefully to understand that Duda only set the accents differently, but didn't go much further than Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki last week.
Morawiecki had said that Poland would not deliver a Leopard to Ukraine on its own.
Duda also made the delivery of the tanks conditional on them being part of an international coalition.
In this way, Poland is putting pressure on the German government to agree to the delivery of Leopard 2.
If others are just waiting for Germany to intervene in order to hand over the equipment they want to Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz's mantra that Germany will not go it alone when it comes to arms deliveries will lose its force.
After the US made it clear some time ago that it had no objections to the tank supply, Berlin is in danger of being seen as the major brake on support for Ukraine again.
If the federal government does not want to play this role in the long term, it should quickly respond positively to the Polish initiative.