Germany Ramps Up Mobilisation Efforts
The drums of war are beating louder, yet no public debate is to be had
We’ll stay on the topic of Germany’s mad dash towards war a bit longer for the time being, and today’s piece is a follow-up to ongoing war mobilisation efforts we spoke about last year:
See if you can spot the issues™ involved that smack of the greatest grift of all.
Translation, emphases, and [snark] mine.
NATO Hub—Bundeswehr Calls on Logistics Companies
In order to transport enough soldiers and equipment to the east in the event of a NATO alliance, the Bundeswehr is requesting support from companies such as Lufthansa and DB. But there's more to it than that.
By Jens Koenen and Christoph Schlautmann, Handelsblatt, 22 April 2025 [source; archived]
According to Handelsblatt, the Bundeswehr is in confidential talks with major civilian companies such as Deutsche Bahn, Lufthansa, and Rheinmetall. The military’s demand is primarily focussed on their logistics capacities to transport armed forces, ammunition, and military equipment in the event that Russia attacks NATO territory.
In its 2023 National Security Strategy, the German government defined Germany’s role as a ‘logistics hub’ for NATO [who’s going to do the fighting?]. In the event of a conflict, the country must supply tens of thousands of allied soldiers on their way to the eastern flank—under great time pressure.
‘The Bundeswehr relies almost exclusively on civilian service providers for the logistical transport of military goods and materials outside of crisis areas’, confirmed the Bundeswehr’s Operational Command on request. ‘In sea and air transport for oversized and overweight material, even 100%.’ Even in crisis areas, the Bundeswehr is still dependent on commercial transport services to a considerable extent.
Handelsblatt spoke to people familiar with the negotiations. The challenges for the Bundeswehr are enormous—even beyond logistics. According to industry insiders, talks are being held to determine whether Lufthansa’s flight school will take over the basic training of fighter jet pilots.
Intermission
This is where the piece stops, but due to the paywall, we must now turn to the write-up and commentary in the Nachdenkseiten (an alt-media outlet founded by old labour hand Albrecht Müller and one of the more reliable outlets there is).
Note that the below-reproduced piece is much more than a summary of the above article; it’s, in fact, an article that expands massively on the topic.
With the Diesel Engine to the Front: Germany Practises Civil-Military Solidarity
Lufthansa is training fighter pilots, the railway wants to transport tanks, and Rheinmetall is creating transshipment centres for weapons. The internal militarisation of society is in full swing. On shaky ground in terms of the rule of law, the Bundeswehr and corporations are joining forces on the mission of war training. What’s going on is not really secret, and it is extremely dangerous.
By Ralf Wurzbacher, Nachdenkseiten, 25 April 2025 [source]
Prize question: What does Deutsche Bahn need most urgently? Diesel locomotives and flat wagons! Well, if we were living in normal times, it would probably need both least of all. In fact, almost half of the German rail network is still not electrified, which is why it needs overhead lines above all and, for the sake of the mobility turnaround [orig. Mobilitätswende], more passenger carriages to transport commuters and travellers. But times are not normal and neither are the trains of thought of many politicians and so-called experts. They believe that Germany must prepare for war and that the railways must be quickly put in a position to transport large numbers of heavy war equipment and soldiers.
One of the experts in question is the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP [are you surprised?]), a ‘think tank’ whose representatives often like to explain the world on ARD and ZDF. Back in July of last year, the organisation's website featured an article entitled ‘Military mobility’ [orig. Militärische Mobilität] which stated that Deutsche Bahn had far too few flat wagons [needed™ for heavy equipment, such as tanks]. Author and DGAP analyst Jannik Hartmann quotes: ‘Due to the low capacities, it is almost impossible to quickly deploy a large number of tanks from and through Germany towards NATO’s eastern flank.’ [small wonder that he US is considering going around Germany…] And the same Hartmann recently told Handelsblatt (paywalled [I tried to find the original source in the above piece]):
In the likely event that the power grid is attacked, Deutsche Bahn will need many more diesel locomotives than it does today. [in plain English, Germany would be unable to ‘perform’ as well as Ukraine]
Main Artery to the Front
What has been said gives you an idea of where all the money from the €500 billion debt package for the repair of the ailing infrastructure is going, which was pushed through by amending the Basic Law; and, perhaps, what these funds are earmarked for primarily: wartime refurbishment of railways, roads, bridges, tunnels, hospitals, and everything else that needs to be repaired so that German soil can be used for war again. But not everyone may have noticed: large-scale mobilisation is already in full swing. The Handelsblatt article ‘Bundeswehr’s call for help’ from last Tuesday thankfully reports in all openness what is actually top secret because it is not actually legal [see the above piece].
The text traces, among other things, how Deutsche Bahn is involved in war logistics, Lufthansa contributes to the training of fighter pilots, private shipping companies are to transport weapons and heavy equipment to the front lines, roads, bridges, and harbours are officially tested for resilience, and Rheinmetall sets up transshipment points for weapons, ammunition, and fuel. All of this is taking place under the motto ‘help’, help for the German troops to be able to fulfil their alliance obligations as part of the new NATO strategy ‘New Force Model’. According to the requirements set out in the ‘Operational Plan Germany’, which came into force on 1 January, Germany must have 35,000 soldiers [that’s about half the active troop strength] and more than 200 ships and fighter aircraft ready for deployment within 30 days from 2025 in the event of an alliance and defence situation [none of this is realistic given a) the poor state of maintenance and b) massive aid™ that was given to Ukraine]. Due to its position as the central ‘logistical hub’, Germany would also have to take care of the deployment and supply of foreign troop units—800,000 men are being talked about—and would therefore be something like the main artery to the front [ever commuted on a regular day in Germany? If so, good luck adding these troops, their equipment, and the stuff they take along].
In the Grey Area
However, as long as a state of alliance has not been declared, the German army has no authority or powers that go beyond administrative assistance in the event of a disaster in accordance with Article 35 of the German Basic Law. This is why the Welt am Sonntag newspaper (behind paywall) wrote at the end of March that the troops are operating in a ‘legal grey area’ if they are already setting up structures with the support of private and state companies in order to be prepared for day X [all these qualms: there’s no comparison to, say, the 1930s]. However, both the outgoing and the incoming federal governments are already in the process of adapting the legal [sic] situation to the new realities. According to the Welt’s article, the ‘Operational Plan Germany’ in question is to be expanded to include ‘civilian contributions in the sense of “defence of the state as a whole”’ [orig. gesamtstaatlich; last time that word popped up in polite discourse was—in the Covid response, which was also said to be such a gesamtstaatlicher effort].
The ‘Green Paper ZMZ 4.0’ (Civil-Military Cooperation), which was drawn up by top military officers and politicians and published at the end of January, is likely to point the way forward. In the event of a scenario according to which there will be a military conflict between Russia and NATO in 2030, it outlines in detail how the military and civil society can merge in order to meet the challenges. One point concerns medical care. It is calculated that ‘up to 1,000’ soldiers will be injured every day, which is why civilians could only be treated as a secondary priority [in principle, that’s a no-brainer: imagine, though, for a moment the logistics of evacuating a wounded soldier, transporting him from the front line to Germany, and treating him there—all the while troops and equipment are moving in the opposite direction].
‘Hybrid Threat Situations’
The ‘Green Paper’ also presents a solution as to how a civil-military alliance could be legally established well in advance of a hot conflict. The key to this is the concept of ‘hybrid threat situations’ in the form of ‘cyber attacks’, ‘disinformation campaigns’, and ‘sabotage/espionage’—all things that the West blames primarily on Russia, often without any evidence. In any case, the authors recommend the ‘introduction of an independent law to regulate hybrid threats’ [if done at the EU level, it will overwrite all nat’l legislation] while they categorise a constitutional amendment as ‘hardly practicable’ due to the high hurdles and ‘constitutional implications’ that are difficult to assess [see what I mean? ‘Regular’ legislation won’t do it…].
But for the time being, the necessary law [sic] is still missing, and all internal mobilisation activities are in fact a breach of the constitution [ah, same with the Covid shit, but thankfully™ the judiciary doesn’t care]. No matter. After all, according to Handelsblatt, nobody in German boardrooms is questioning ‘the need to help the armed forces’. And that’s why they just do it—out of patriotism perhaps, but even more so because war training promises to be a big business, if only in view of German defence spending, which could run into the trillions over the next ten years. And the Bundeswehr is grateful. When it comes to the logistical transport of military goods and materials outside of crisis areas, ‘almost exclusively civilian service providers are used’, the business newspaper quoted the Operational Command as saying. Even in crisis areas, ‘a considerable share’ of the services are still reliant on commercial providers.
Deutsche Bahn at the Ready
According to Handelsblatt, the confidential negotiations with private and state-owned companies initially involved ‘initial preparatory rounds of talks’, with many issues ‘still unresolved and highly sensitive’. Examples: Lufthansa is to take over the basic training of fighter jet pilots. Germany’s largest airline is already training Bundeswehr drone pilots at Rostock-Laage Airport. The Federal Ministry of Defence is currently in negotiations with several manufacturers of attack drones with the aim of significantly expanding the corresponding combat arsenal. In order to pilot them, regular pilot training is required first. Only on this basis can graduates assess the impact of manoeuvres controlled from the ground. It was only at the beginning of March that Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr referred to the close relationship with Hardthöhe [the Bonn site of the Defence Ministry] and declared his intention to intensify the training programme. The Group’s subsidiary Lufthansa Technik now has its own ‘Defence’ division, which is to take care of the maintenance of combat aircraft and helicopters for the army in future.
Deutsche Bahn is also at the ready. Even tanks weighing 80 tonnes can be ‘transported without any problems’, they say. Since 2023, there has been a reserve contract with the freight division DB Cargo, which obliges the railway subsidiary to reserve up to 343 flat wagons and two daily time slots for military transports on call. However, this is not enough for the war planners. Ben Hodges, former commander of the US armed forces in Europe, recently told the industry service RailFreight.com (behind paywall) that DB Cargo does not even offer a quarter of the capacity required in an emergency. His mantra: ‘The Russians need to see that we can move tanks and howitzers faster than they can.’
Transa Remains German
Hartmann from the DGAP [German Council of Foreign Relations] has a whole series of suggestions at the ready, such as prioritising routes ‘that can be used as military corridors’ in the ongoing general renovation of 40 high-performance corridors. Furthermore, the German government should ‘reserve sufficient reserve locomotives and trailers’ in consultation with Deutsche Bahn. The most urgent priority, however, would be to achieve a capacity of ‘1,000 flat wagons’. In addition, military transport on rail and road must be able to be carried out ‘regardless of night-time driving bans or noise protection zones’. According to Welt am Sonntag, plans are already underway for ‘convertible ICE wagons to be used as “bed wagons” for the return transport of the wounded’.
For road transport, the Bundeswehr relies, among others, on the freight forwarding companies Quehenberger, based in Salzburg [Austria, and thus technically also in breach of Austrian constitutional law], and Transa from Offenbach, Germany, as prime contractors. The company was once part of the Deutsche Bahn logistics subsidiary Schenker, whose sale to Danish competitor DSV is nearing completion. It’s safe to assume that the German government didn’t want to lose Transa as a major military service provider. Therefore, the company was likely separated from the bulk of the sales mix in good time and transferred to Deutsche Bahn Cargo in 2022.
Public Debate Required Immediately!
Rheinmetall secured the contract for the establishment of so-called Convoy Support Centers as part of a Europe-wide tender. According to Handelsblatt, the plan is to establish rest stops for the supply of personnel and equipment at regular intervals along a ‘secret deployment corridor from the western Netherlands to Poland’ [this is hilarious: how to keep these not-exactly-camouflaged convoys ‘secret’?]. The Düsseldorf-based weapons manufacturer has been doing ‘a killing trade’ [orig. Mordsgeschäft] since the beginning of the Ukraine war and was a long-time darling of stock market investors. However, its shares have been declining in value for several days. The background is an emerging deal between Donald Trump and Moscow regarding a possible peace agreement with Kyiv. This sort of thing doesn’t go down well with investors.
‘Internal militarisation is progressing—quietly, systematically, profoundly’, states Arno Gottschalk on his X account. He represents the SPD in the Bremen Parliament and is one of the few remaining ‘peace-loving’ Social Democrats in the country. ‘Militarisation is not a vision of the future—it is the present’ and ‘penetrates deeply into civilian life—into companies, administrations, and everyday life’, Gottschalk explains. ‘It is high time for a critical public debate.’
Bottom Lines
Oh, when will ‘we’ ever learn?
We’ve literally seen all of this crap before, esp. in Central Europe.
I do understand the need for being able to protect oneself, but I’ve yet to see one plausible argument that explains, in no uncertain terms and using logic, an answer to the following question:
What would Russia gain from attacking the West/NATO?
It ain’t resources, as they already have virtually all they need.
It ain’t security, as an attack would render Russia less secure.
It ain’t power, as that typically dwindles if you’re not winning.
From the Western perspective, at least resources and power stand to be gained, although the age-old question remains: at what price.
[Russia can't even defeat Ukraine! Look at how pathetic Putler's "army" is!]
[Russia is poised to pounce on Europe and sweep to the Atlantic any day now!]
The above is often stated in the same conversation by the same person. Including so-called experts, and actual military planners and government ministers. In their defense, these experts have been selected by the media as the go-to persons for their always reliably correct views.
We're well used to that song and dance up here, and no-one with an econ/pol-sci background is unaware of it; in fact, fresh students are often jokingly told that the surest career is trying to become the media's go-to expert on a specific issue. As long as you say what they want to hear, you're golden and the money and the gigs will keep rolling in. Just don't expect any professional respect from people in the field. That's me paraphrasing almost verbatim what was told us when I started as a student in Lund, long ago.
You can replace Germany with Sweden and the text works just as well. Two years back they made a big noise about starting to use the Inlandsbanan (inland railroad, disused and unserviced since the mid-1970s) for military transports. Mockery abounded. You can physically drive your finger through the wooden supports in many places, and you can pick up and move the rails if you're stong enough, and the bridges are made for train-cars as they looked and weighed in the 1950s. Plus, it was originally built for steam-engine trains.
I used to try to explain to politicians and students that you cannot decide and decree what will happen. Ýou can only try to figure out what actions of yours brings about the result desired, and to do that you must be humble and have a little humility towards the task so that you look at reality as it is, not as you believe it ought to be.
Germany is now discovering what 30 years of female politics results in: the governing principle has been "things ought to be the way we have decided" and when they aren't, throw a tantrum and blame whomever you dislike. I shouldn't say female perhaps, but at the core is the spoiled Daddy's Little Princess-mentality typical to a subset of the female psyche: they are owed, by men and their family and people and the universe and reality itself to have things their way, always.
It's not even narcissism or sociopathy - it's simply immaturity and having been coddled and spoiled. Now, they are sitting there crying because people they cannot control won't do as the Girl's Club have decided they must.
In fairness, this is nothing new. All European militaries have relied on the road and train networks going back to the war of 1870. In fact, the German train network was developed with military considerations first, commercial second. Of course, back then the enemy was France.
During the Cold War, the Fulda gap strategy again relied on massive amounts of troops and materiel to be deployed quickly towards the east using whatever means available.
What’s frightening now is that all this planning is about moving a division hither and fro. Might as well not bother. These are not serious people.