Greens co-leader Robert Habeck has shown understanding for the position of the SPD leadership in the dispute over the armament of the new Bundeswehr drone Heron TP. “We take a very critical view of the Heron TP drones’ armament,” said Habeck of the German press agency. The Ministry of Defense “did not really take the arguments of the critics seriously”. The armed drones that have been in use so far have often been used to carry out executions from the air that are contrary to international law. “There is a threat of further automation of the war, without there being any clear rules of operation,” he warned.

Armament on hold for the time being The SPD parliamentary group had put the project on hold and announced the need for further discussion. So it is probably off the table for the remaining term of the grand coalition. SPD parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich has joined the concerns of party leader Norbert Walter-Borjans – this annoys specialist politicians of the Social Democrats. The Union is also attacking its coalition partner.

An army must be operational and well equipped, said Habeck. “But there is something to be said against amassing more and more weapons.” Armed drones are new weapon systems. “You have to see what pressure the world community is under.” The Green leader said it was “urgently necessary to start new international initiatives for regulation, disarmament and limitation”, which in his view would be “the task of the European Union”.

Accusation of election tactics The head of the Munich Security Conference, Wolfgang Ischinger, accused the SPD of jeopardizing the protection of German soldiers on missions abroad. It must be “the state political responsibility that our soldiers get the best possible protection,” he told the Tagesspiegel. The SPD is apparently about profiling as a peace party for the election year 2021. The CSU defense expert Florian Hahn told the newspapers of the Neue Berliner Redaktionsgesellschaft that the SPD was leaving the Bundeswehr in the lurch. The Social Democrats acted “purely electorally”.

(mho)