German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has said his country must prepare for war because of increasing Russian threats.
“We must be ready for war by 2029,” news magazine Der Spiegel quoted Pistorius as saying in the German parliament on Wednesday.
His comments come amid heightened fears among European countries, especially those in Eastern Europe, about potential Russian aggression extending beyond Ukraine.
“We must not believe that Putin will stop at Ukraine’s borders when he gets that far,” Pistorius said.
In recent days, the German army’s chief inspector General Carsten Breuer said it would take five to eight years for Russia to reconstitute its armed forces from the grinding war in Ukraine — putting a 2029 deadline on NATO efforts to prepare for possible combat.
“In an emergency, we need defensive young women and men who can defend this country,” Pistorius said Wednesday.
During a recent visit to the Lithuanian city of Pabradė— where German soldiers conduct so-called Quadriga military exercises together with Lithuanian, Dutch and French troops— Germany’s defense minister said “the world is different than it was before February 24, 2022,” when Russia ordered its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
“For us as the Bundeswehr [Germany army], that means that the mission has changed; national and alliance defense is the focus,” he said.
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