Bundestag offers to train Ukrainian military to operate Leopard tanks

Spiegel reported the information citing the statement of the Bundestag Defense Committee head Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann.

According to her, to save time, it is possible to simultaneously train both the Ukrainian military who will master the Marder APC and those who could operate Leopard 2 in the future.

"If this battle tank comes to use, we will not lose anything, it makes sense to train Ukrainian soldiers to operate Leopard 2 to save time," she noted.

In addition, the politician called on the German Chancellor and the Ministry of Defence to start considering further military assistance to Ukraine in the nearest future.

"We need a strategy to assess the military situation for the next few months and take into account the relevant wishes of Ukraine. So that we can finally get ahead of the wave, and not always swim behind it," she added.

The Greens party politician Anton Hofreiter also noted that taking into consideration the difficulties that Germany had with transferring APCs, it should look for ways to avoid the same troubles with Leopard tanks. He also advocated that the Ukrainian military should be trained to operate the tanks.  

The news outlet adds that the Rheinmetall defense concern will not be able to supply 40 Marder APCs for Ukraine from its warehouses in the required time, so the German government decided to provide the remaining from the Bundeswehr stocks.  

• On January 8, the Bundestag called for the transfer of Leopard to Ukraine. President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola supports the transfer of these tanks to Ukraine.
• On January 10, Politico reported that France and Poland are trying to convince Germany to allow the supply of modern Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine.