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It may be unfair to remind a failing party of its past greatness. Men like the great Hamburg strategist Helmut Schmidt, the first Social Democratic defense minister in postwar history, and his SPD successor Georg Leber, who was revered in the troops as a “soldier’s father.” Or a heavyweight like Peter Struck, who moved to the Defense Ministry for three years in 2002, then returned to lead the SPD parliamentary group.
Why did the SPD send its best people to the Ministry of Defense at that time? Because as a popular party it wanted to take responsibility for the men and women in uniform who had sworn to defend freedom and democracy with their lives if necessary. Like the Union, the Social Democrats saw themselves as a party of the Bundeswehr. He had a large following, especially among the NCOs, Sergeants and enlisted men.
Active soldiers and former soldiers were active as local SPD politicians or were elected to parliament. The three SPD foreign ministers, Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt and Gerhard Schröder, fought for detente, international dialogue and disarmament. From a position of strength. Because only then, they knew, was there any chance of success.
Is it unfair to remind the SPD of these times?
After almost eight years of a long and wide debate on armed drones, the SPD parliamentary group surprisingly suspended the drones decision yesterday afternoon. To this day there has not been a “broad and detailed debate,” said the faction leader, Rolf Mützenich, explaining the situation.
Fritz Felgentreu, the SPD’s respected defense policy spokesman, then announced his resignation. It was already clear in advance that he would not stand in the next federal elections. What else is he supposed to do in a parliamentary group whose leadership is stabbing its own experts in the back?
For a long time, the SPD was reluctant to buy armed drones, and in the summer it finally gave the sign of approval under many conditions. But then SPD leader Norbert Walter-Borjans spoke up last week. He does not consider the debate over drones to be “enough,” announced the former NRW finance minister, who has so far carefully hidden his defense policy expertise from the public. The mood in the parliamentary group changed, now the SPD is blocking the purchase of armed drones, presumably until the end of the legislative period.
In the “Tagesspiegel”, Gabriele Heinrich, the deputy head of the SPD parliamentary group, argues that the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan finally made it clear that drones could also be used as attack weapons. With this, “the whole coordinate system” has changed, and a new debate is now “urgently needed”.
It is the oath of disclosure of the SPD leadership security policy. By the same token, it should also abolish tanks, frigates and attack helicopters. Because attack weapons are also possible. However, in Germany it is not the Bundeswehr that decides on attack or defense, but the parliament.
The United States uses armed drones to kill suspected terrorists in distant countries. Such extrajudicial executions are prohibited by German law; the Bundestag would never approve them. Anyone who claims that armed drones could be misused for this in Germany is in fact putting the Bundeswehr under general suspicion.
“Any weapon, including the drone, can be misused,” wrote SPD defense politician Felgentreu in “Vorwärts” in early December, “but the Bundeswehr as an army under the Basic Law is entitled to our confidence in the 66th year of his existence”. That is why troops are allowed. on dangerous missions abroad »without the protection of an armed reconnaissance drone«. He resigned two weeks later.
Because in its decline, the SPD forgot what made it great back then. When it was still a people’s party and felt responsible for the Bundeswehr.
