Germany faced mounting pressure to supply battle tanks to Kyiv and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy aired frustration about not obtaining enough weaponry as Western allies conferred Thursday on how best to support Ukraine nearly 11 months into Russia's invasion.
Just hours into his tenure, Germany's new defence minister, Boris Pistorius, welcomed U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin to Berlin. He declared that German weapons systems delivered so far have proven their worth and that "we will continue in the future, together with our partners, to support Ukraine in its fight for freedom, territorial independence and sovereignty."He didn't, however, immediately mention the Leopard 2 tanks that Ukraine has long sought.
He bemoaned a "lack of specific weaponry" and said that to win the war, "we cannot just do it with motivation and morale." "We guarantee that we will use these weapons responsibly and exclusively for the purposes of protecting the territorial integrity of Ukraine within internationally recognized borders," Dmytro Kuleba and Oleksii Reznikov said in an appeal to Germany and several other countries that use the German-made Leopard 2 to join an "international tank coalition."
Scholz has been wary of such pressure, insisting that Germany wouldn't go it alone and pointing to a need to ensure that NATO doesn't become a party to the war with Russia, though every time so far Berlin has eventually moved ahead. He has portrayed his cautious weighing of each step as a virtue. Austin said on Twitter that he plans also to meet Scholz's chief of staff, Wolfgang Schmidt, while in Berlin.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Ukraine's Western backers this week will discuss ways to supply heavier and more advanced weapons.
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