Is The Bundeswehr Going Behind Scholz’s Back To Send Taurus Missiles To Ukraine?
Provided that Scholz was speaking sincerely in expressing the reasons why he’s opposed to sending Taurus missiles to Ukraine, then this suggests that he doesn’t have any idea about what his armed forces are doing behind his back, which risks dragging Germany deeper into this conflict.
RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan claimed in a Telegram post on Friday that she’d heard a leaked recording from senior Bundeswehr officers discussing how to bomb Russia’s Crimean Bridge in a way that would enable German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to maintain plausible deniability. This follows his inadvertent revelation that France and the UK have clandestinely deployed troops to Ukraine to assist with “target control” while explaining why his country won’t send long-range Taurus missiles there.
Although she didn’t share the recording with her followers, it’s possible that either she, RT, or some other source might do so in the future. In the meantime, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova responded to her post urging German media to prove their independence by asking Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock about this claim. In the absence of evidence, one can only speculate on its veracity, but this development is still sufficient for wondering whether the Bundeswehr is going rogue.
Provided that Scholz was speaking sincerely in expressing the reasons why he’s opposed to sending Taurus missiles to Ukraine, then this suggests that he doesn’t have any idea about what his armed forces are doing behind his back, which risks dragging Germany deeper into this conflict. Their country is currently resuming its long-lost superpower trajectory with full American support after comprehensively subordinating Poland in order to contain Russia in Europe while the US “Pivots (back) to Asia”.
This newfound role might have emboldened some elite members of the Bundeswehr into thinking that they can further expand Germany’s influence in Ukraine by competing with France and the UK there through the clandestine dispatch of troops and Taurus missiles without him knowing. Upon doing so and then successfully striking the Crimean Bridge, this could be blamed on those two in order to deflect from Berlin’s responsibility, after which Scholz would be forced to accept this fait accompli.
The pressure that could then be placed on those two might create space for Germany to expand its influence in Ukraine at their expense as the G7 competes with one another over who’ll get the biggest piece of its economic pie in the run-up to that group’s reported plans to appoint a special envoy there. Germany is already Ukraine’s second-largest military supplier, but its arms industry might fear losing out on post-conflict contracts to France and the UK if it continues to withhold these missiles and troops.
Neither of Germany’s historical rivals wants to see it become a superpower, but the only way to decelerate this trajectory is to chip away at its influence in Ukraine through their own “military diplomacy” there, which takes the form of their unofficial deployment of troops. While the “military Schengen” that’s formed between the Netherlands, Germany, and Poland will likely lead to Berlin soon expanding its influence into the Baltics, those two could influence the Balkans as a counterweight.
The “Moldova Highway” through NATO’s increasingly pivotal Greek ports, Bulgaria, and Romania alongside the “Black Sea Corridor” that was informally created with British support after the end of the grain deal could combine to keep a check on Germany’s post-conflict influence across the continent. That’s not to argue that it would be adequate enough to derail that country’s resumed superpower trajectory, but just that it could enable France and the UK to carve out their own “spheres of influence”.
The abovementioned scenario is contingent on them continuing to provide military support to Ukraine that Germany has thus far been unwilling to give, namely long-range missiles and associated troop deployments for “target control”, without which these corridors lose their importance. Although both could utilize the German-led “military Schengen” to these ends, Berlin would of course prioritize the export of its own equipment across this route, hence the need for them to have alternatives just in case.
Circling back to Simonyan’s claim after informing readers of the strategic backdrop, it might very well be that a nebulous faction within the Bundeswehr wants to unilaterally act behind Scholz’s back in order to offset this latent challenge to Germany’s envisaged control of Europe. Their plans were just foiled though since the alleged recording means that their country can no longer retain “plausible deniability” in the event that Taurus missiles and troops are secretly deployed to Ukraine to attack Russia’s Crimean Bridge.
Scholz can now either break up this subversive group or go with the flow if he’s powerless to do so, the first of which is the most responsible option but would cede influence in Ukraine to France and the UK, while the second would further embroil Germany in this conflict in order to retain its influence. The possibility also exists that this faction calls off its plans without being broken up after they were just exposed. At any rate, next week will provide more clarity, both into Scholz’s power and Germany’s role.