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Katarina Barley at an event in Cologne in January
Photo:
Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa
Can the European Union (EU) adequately defend itself if the USA is not ready? The SPD's top candidate for the European elections, Katarina Barley, doubts this - and can imagine purchasing the EU's own nuclear weapons as a deterrent. But the admission met with decisive criticism from the Bundestag.
The statement raises "doubts about her political intelligence," CDU foreign expert Johann Wadephul told SPIEGEL about Barley. »Is that the position of the federal government and the SPD? How is this supposed to be achieved given Germany's international legal obligations? Has this been agreed upon with France, which already has nuclear weapons?” asked the CDU/CSU MP. The current deterrence of American weapons can hardly be replaced by a comparable EU arsenal. "In this international crisis situation, we need rational decisions and not alarmism," said Wadephul.
“Fire-dangerous and irresponsible”
Traffic light politicians are similarly critical. SPD MP Ralf Stegner warns against rearming “for better or worse,” “especially not in the nuclear sector.” "We should neither act as if Trump has already been elected - the American people are not obliged to be stupid - nor as if we could now take on the role of the USA," Stegner told SPIEGEL. However, the Social Democrat agrees with his party colleague's reading that Europe needs to invest more in its common security policy - especially if US security guarantees are no longer available. "But nuclear armament is not realpolitik at the turn of the times, but on the contrary, it is extremely dangerous and irresponsible."
The Green defense politician Sara Nanni warns of new global armament as a result of an EU nuclear weapons program. »If she meant that the French and the British should be merged: that is naive. None of the nation would do that,” said Nanni. Instead, the Greens appeal for a common European industrial base for conventional defense equipment.
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Green politician Anton Hofreiter: “What we need is closer European coordination within NATO.”
Photo:
IMAGO / dts news agency
The Green MP Anton Hofreiter also sees many unanswered questions. »What should a command structure look like and who decides on deployment? A European nuclear force would require a huge step towards integration in foreign and security policy," Hofreiter told SPIEGEL. However, a common EU army is still far from being in sight. However, like Barley, Hofreiter is pushing for greater cooperation on nuclear issues - just under different circumstances. "What we need is closer European coordination within NATO."
Barley started thinking about the EU nuclear bomb after former President Donald Trump's recent critical comments about NATO. He said at a campaign event that he would not come to the aid of NATO countries that did not spend enough on defense in the event of an attack. He would then even encourage Russia to do “whatever they want” with them.
In addition to the CDU and the Greens, Left Party leader Martin Schirdewan also criticized Barley's statement, accusing the SPD of "saber rattling." "The right answer to Trump's nonsense is not nuclear armament, but a policy of de-escalation and civil conflict resolution," said Schirdewan, who is the left's leading candidate for the European elections, to the AFP news agency. "More atomic bombs won't make the world safer," said Schirdewan. "On the contrary, with all the atomic bombs that currently exist, you can wipe out the world more than 50 times." Instead of "thinking about more atomic bombs, Germany under an SPD government should finally sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons," said the Left Party -Boss.
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