“Physical arguments” against Taurus
Kiesewetter: Scholz can, but he doesn’t want to
By Frauke Niemeyer
December 12, 2023, 10:50 a.m
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Chancellor Scholz refuses to deliver Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine. Government circles have been saying this for weeks, among other things with a view to unresolved legal questions. Now it turns out that the federal government is doing nothing to clarify such questions.
CDU defense expert Roderich Kiesewetter accuses the federal government of “deliberately deceiving parliament, the population and partners” on the Taurus issue. That is the conclusion that Kiesewetter draws from the federal government’s response to a request he made.
The German Taurus cruise missile has been urgently requested by Ukraine since May. For five months, Chancellor Olaf Scholz did not respond to the request from Kiev, then the rejection came in October. With reference to “pseudo-legal sham arguments,” as Kiesewetter tells ntv.de.
“There were never any legal questions about Taurus”
According to reports, Scholz had told the Foreign Affairs Committee behind closed doors that France and Great Britain, both of which support Ukraine with cruise missiles of a similar design and from the same manufacturer, could do something “that we are not allowed to do.” This means that the question of delivery does not arise. The Chancellor did not become more specific in front of the MPs, but other SPD politicians also raised legal ambiguities several times.
However, in response to a request from the federal government, Kiesewetter was informed that no report had been commissioned since May that would clarify any open legal questions regarding the Taurus delivery. “In answering my question, the federal government is now making it clear that there were never any legal questions at Taurus,” says the CDU politician. “Otherwise a legal opinion would have been drawn up.” For Kiesewetter, the question arises “how the ministers wanted to clarify supposedly open questions and why no report has been prepared since May.”
Among other things, concern was expressed in government circles that Bundeswehr soldiers would be needed on site in Ukraine to program Taurus. This would actually not be possible without a Bundestag decision and would also cross a red line that all NATO states draw, because Germany could become a party to the war. Shortly before Scholz’s subsequent decision, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius pointed out that Germany would have to weigh the consequences of every step.
However, a legal assessment using expert reports apparently did not take place at all. Kiesewetter sees this as confirmation of what he sees as “obvious”: “The Federal Chancellor is denying Ukraine the necessary and effective weapons systems like Taurus with full political intention. Neither out of consideration nor out of prudence, but with full political will.”
Security expert Gustav Gressel also believes the legal concerns raised against a Taurus delivery are not valid. The support of Bundeswehr soldiers in Ukraine is also not necessary to program Taurus. “There are other countries that also use Taurus, such as Sweden, Spain and South Korea. There, too, no permanent Bundeswehr contingent is required, neither for navigation data nor for the integration of the cruise missile into the existing systems.”
The BND also supplies data to Ukraine
The German cruise missile needs more data than the British and French variants Storm Shadow and SCALP. “But there is a protocol for exchanging sensitive data,” says Gressel, who researches at the European Council on Foreign Relations. Ukraine also receives data from the Federal Intelligence Service, for example from satellite reconnaissance. “There is already a protocol for other data formats. So it is a purely protocol-related question as to how to provide Ukraine with the geodata for the Taurus.”
According to Gressel, the manufacturing company takes care of the integration into existing systems. “To clarify how to hang the cruise missile under Ukrainian aircraft, personnel from the manufacturer in Ukraine can look at what the British and French have made for Storm Shadow and SCALP and to what extent it can be used for Taurus.”
For Gressel, the reason for the Chancellery’s refusal to deliver Taurus to Ukraine is primarily emotional. “When you see the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet disappearing into smoke after a Storm Shadow attack, these are iconic images,” says the military expert. “No matter how the war ends, these images will appear in every history book about it.” Scholz and large parts of the SPD did not want German weapons to produce images of this kind or be associated with them. “This cannot be explained rationally,” says Gressel. “That’s where their blockages come from.”
From the perspective of defense politician Kiesewetter, Scholz lacks the will to prevent Russia from setting up further supply lines in Ukraine and further terrorizing the civilian population. “He doesn’t want Ukraine to liberate its territory.” The CDU politician sees the aim of the Chancellor’s strategy of not communicating this openly as “to deceive Parliament, the population and international partners in an astonishingly perfidious manner.” Gressel sees it similarly: “The British and French are just scratching their heads about what’s being said here in Berlin.”