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Don't get your hopes up. Merz would sell his own mother if it raised his chances of getting elected. He's just listening to what's unpopular about the current government and claiming to do whatever is the exact opposite. A lot of it is just hot air from yet another populist.
I expect him to continue support for Ukraine though, so that's good at least.
Hell, I'm in support of Merz selling his own mother if it means more support for Ukraine.
... I may be in a dark place right now.
Plot twist: his mom is the youth sweetheart of Putin from his vacations in East Germany, the break up is what turned him into a violent autocrat, her return could heal his little broken heart and make him the tsar of love and harmony.
If that showed up on Netflix I'd watch it
That's OK. If this. Message is popular it pushes his opponent in this direction too.
It shouldn’t be that only one side wins, we need to make agreements that are favourable to both sides.
Yeah I really hope he means like, Russia fuck off to their side of the fence and everyone peel back sanctions, as opposed to give Russia some of the occupied territory
Honestly Merz does a lot of shit, but he is for pro Ukranian action, which is relativly unpopular. The issue is more, that he has never been in government and a lot of his other ideas are horrible.
Also the CDU is in parts very pro Russia. Kretschmer comes to mind.
Honestly Merz does a lot of shit, but he is for pro Ukranian action, which is relativly unpopular.
It's not unpopular, the Putin bootlickers just shout louder. The majority still approves supporting Ukraine: https://koerber-stiftung.de/presse/mitteilungen/deutsche-wollen-mehr-in-europaeische-sicherheit-investieren/
Merz says a lot of things when the day is long, especially when elections are getting closer.
Thank you for the perspective.
Don't trust him. Merz is and always has been a bullshitter. He is angling for votes.
It’ll be interesting to see how much the Allies game kicks up in the next 2 months now that the Orange Potato and Elon Musk were elected President.
I hope it’s effective.
Is there any hint of a reason why Putin would ever be scared of Taurus missiles?
from a glance, they look very equivalent to the british storm shadows Ukraine already gets.
Not that Germany shouldn't supply, it just seems that this ultimatum is a purely political idea about the upcoming german elections.
Merz ist a Joke and he will most certainly not pull through if the Trump Administration interferes. Just another US Puppet, which in Turn is a Russian puppet... so yeah, just a stunt.
Also, what would even be the end of the war? By Putin logic complete and unconditional surrender by Ukraine would also be the end of the war.
Merz's threat is not "fuck off behind 1991 borders within 24 hours". Complete smoke and mirrors shitshow.
“I am also willing to promise anything to get elected”
- slaacaa (LM-MY)
Noise from a political candidate who will do something if and when he gets elected.
To quote the Spartans, "If".
Glad to see someone in Europe is growing some balls about standing up to Russia though
sorry to break it to you, but Merz is a populist. He will tell you everything to get voted.
And, frankly, he is a real dickhead. The little Trump of Germany.
The Spartans got annihilated so maybe not a great group to quote.
if something like this works (I am guessing only if many EU countries follow suit) then maybe us Americans can suffer 4 years of Trump in exchange for Ukrainian freedom.
As an american, I'll suffer the bullshit that the right does, if it means Ukraine gets to still exist. Give me some of their pain. I wish I could take that for them.
Oh I'm sure the thought of two dozen cruise missiles will straighten Putin out ASAP.
For starters, this would not be a new or unprecedented capability for the Ukrainians.
If Germany had several hundred to part with immediately, and the capacity to regularly replenish those stocks, that would make a significant difference on the battlefield, but I doubt it would make Putin sue for peace.
But of course, Germany does not have those kind of stockpiles or manufacturing capacity to maintain that.
Still, it would be nice to see more European politicians picking up the banner of supplying Ukraine in the face of likely diminished, or eliminated, American transfers.
Oh, believe me...we have that manufacturing capabilities. I live near where parts of Taurus are made... It's just that there's no "demand" and the bundeswehr doesn't have enough money to just order them to stockpile.
Capability and capacity are two very different things.
Yes, I understand the manufacturing capability exists, but it's capacity is limited i.e. existing facilities could not maintain a strategically significant production volume relative to Ukraine's needs, much less to deter Putin.
The Taurus KEPD-350 is a German-Swedish air-launched cruise missile, manufactured by Taurus Systems ... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taurus_KEPD_350
Makes sense, that’s such a Taurus thing to do
As a Libran, all I can launch are tampons.
As a pisces, I studied the blade.
Wow, I thought I was on NCD for a second.
Wow. The same "we'll easily end this war" bullshit that Trump is spewing. That didn't take long.
When this moron takes over (and he will), it's gonna get real bad.
"End the war or I'll arm the shit out of Ukraine" is different from "end the war please daddy I'll let you have half of Ukraine."
Sounds like this guy is a piece of shit though so who knows.
Halt dein Maul, Merz!
We are in WW3.
He is in the opposition…
Not for much longer unfortunately. He will likely be elected the next chancellor when early elections happen sometime in the next months. It's also not unlikely that he will willingly form a coalition with the far-right extremist AfD that love to suck on Putin's tit and have supported the idea of Ukraine ceding territory to Russia.
He's a disgusting piece of shit and this is just him using Ukraine to fish for votes.
what a muppet.
Finally some leadership. Biden has been slow walking aid this entire war, to Russia's benefit.
Let's see how big on words he is once he's out of opposition. Either way his leadership comes at the cost of him being a 90s style neo libertarian with his own private plane. Other than that he is conservative through and through.
So (I) expect no big investments into health care, education, green technology or public transport but more in tax cuts for the wealthy and investments into "new and revolutionary technologies that will solve all our problems for sure bro" and individual transport infrastructure (which tbh would actually be needed since the German infrastructure is in a pretty bad state with a lot of highway bridges being at the end of their life cycle but on the other hand schools and healthcare are in dire need of investments too). And for all the problems we just blame migrants and strengthen right wing populist positions.
Soo yeah, not really happy with him, not really happy with anyone else atm.