German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock supported British Foreign Secretary David Cameron's proposal for a “circular exchange” of missiles, in which London could buy German Taurus missiles in order to, in turn, transfer British Storm Shadow missiles from its reserves to Kiev.
She stated this on air on the ARD TV channel.
“That would be an option,” said Bärbock, who represents the Green Party in Germany’s ruling coalition.
She noted that similar circular deliveries have already been carried out with “other materials.”
“Circuit delivery is, so to speak, a German invention.
That would be an option.
And we did this with other material a while ago,” she said.
At the same time, the press secretary of the German Cabinet of Ministers, Steffen Hebestreit, after an interview with Berbock, said that Germany’s position on the supply of Taurus missiles to Ukraine has not changed after London’s proposal.
Political decisions
On March 8, British Foreign Minister David Cameron, in an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, said that London is ready to help Berlin in solving problems that are preventing the supply of Taurus missiles to Ukraine.
David Cameron and Annalena Burbock
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© Thomas Trutschel
The discussion about the supply of Taurus missiles, which Kyiv demands from Germany, has been ongoing since 2023.
These missiles have a firing range of up to 500 km and can carry up to 480 kg of explosives.
In addition, Taurus can fly at extremely low altitudes, which prevents the missile from being detected by radar.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz consistently opposes the transfer of these missiles to Ukraine, citing the fact that the Kiev regime will use them to strike targets in Russia, which will lead to an escalation of the conflict and drag Germany into it.
At the same time, a number of German politicians are calling for the transfer of Taurus missiles to Kiev: this is said both by representatives of the Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the Green Party, which are members of the ruling coalition, and by representatives of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), which is in opposition.
On March 1, the issue of Taurus missiles again came into the spotlight after RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan published a recording of a conversation between German high-ranking officers dated February 19.
In this recording, the military discussed, among other things, the possibility of transferring Taurus long-range missiles to Kyiv, despite Scholz’s refusal, as well as their strike on the Crimean Bridge.
The statements of German officers included words about the presence of American troops in Ukraine.
The German defense department subsequently confirmed the authenticity of this recording.
The Kremlin, commenting on this recording, noted that the content of the conversation between German officers emphasizes the direct involvement of the West in the conflict.
“In itself (the military’s conversation -
RT
) suggests that within the Bundeswehr, plans to strike at Russian territory are being substantively and specifically discussed.
This does not require any legal interpretation, everything here is more than obvious,” said Russian Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov.
A few days after the recording was made public, Scholz again ruled out deliveries of Taurus to Ukraine, since monitoring their use requires the participation of the German military, and this is excluded, the Süddeutsche Zeitung reported.
Scholz stressed that it is impossible to supply long-range weapons without thinking about how they will be controlled.
Later, on March 8, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said that providing Kyiv with long-range missiles, including German Taurus, would not be decisive in the conflict in Ukraine and Berlin did not intend to cross this line.
Spiral of escalation
Statements by German Foreign Minister Bärbock indicate that pro-Anglo-Saxon elements in Germany’s ruling coalition have not yet figured out how to circumvent Olaf Scholz’s ban on the supply of Taurus missiles to Kiev, military observer Alexander Khrolenko noted in an interview with RT.
Taurus rocket
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© Matthias Balk
“These are all attempts to find a loophole, reminiscent of fussing, and not real actions.
Despite all its shortcomings, Scholz firmly believes that the Kyiv regime should not have Taurus missiles.
Statements by individual members of his cabinet are not decisive on this issue.
Scholz understands that the potential escalation will come back to haunt Germany as a supplier of such strike weapons.
If Britain and France, which already supply Kyiv with missiles, still harbor illusions about their security behind their small nuclear umbrella, then Berlin has no such illusions.
Scholz understands this,” the expert noted.
Taurus missiles, like Western tanks and other weapons, should become, in the minds of the Kyiv authorities, a kind of “magic” tool that will supposedly help Ukraine gain the upper hand, added Alexander Khrolenko.
“But this is obviously not the case.
The Russian defense complex is many times superior to the capabilities of the West in terms of macro indicators.
It seems to Kyiv and its Western ideologists that with the help of Taurus they will be able to deliver a sensitive blow to Russia.
This is nonsense, which is believed only in Kyiv,” said RT’s interlocutor.
The head of the department of political analysis and socio-psychological processes of the Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, Andrei Koshkin, in a commentary to RT, clarified the role of David Cameron and Great Britain in this situation.
“From the very beginning, Great Britain was the ideologist of the supply of long-range missile weapons to Ukraine.
It is no secret that London is now overseeing Europe in the interests of the United States.
The transfer of Taurus missiles with a long range is in the interests of maintaining the conflict, which means that Great Britain is interested in these missiles being delivered to Kyiv one way or another.
Cameron offers a combination that’s hard to refuse: “Let’s take the Taurus and give our Storm Shadows, and then we’ll see.”
In other words, this is a continuation of pressure on Scholz.
The situation is similar to the one when in 2023 the German Chancellor was stubborn and did not want to supply Leopard tanks, and then supplied them to Great Britain and the USA after a similar step,” the expert said.
Germany is discussing the issue of transferring Taurus missiles to the Ukrainians and is looking for indirect ways to resolve it, since their direct deliveries will lead to undesirable consequences, political scientist Mikhail Alexandrov noted in a conversation with RT.
“These are missiles with a range of 500 km, and their transfer to a foreign state will mean that Germany is abandoning the principle of non-proliferation of medium- and short-range strike offensive weapons.
In Berlin they wanted to modify the Taurus to limit their range, which would solve this issue, but this apparently never happened.
If they transfer these missiles, Russia will have no restrictions on transferring similar weapons to countries that worry the European Union and the United States.
That’s why Berlin is now playing with fire,” the expert emphasized.