Germany slows aid to Ukraine from Poland

Bloomberg reports that amid the unity of international partners in armed support for Ukraine, tensions have emerged between Warsaw and Berlin in supporting the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

After Chancellor Olaf Scholz gave the green light to send the most modern Leopard tanks - for which Poland took much of the credit - the Poles tried to fulfill the obligation to send their own older model Leopards, accusing Germany of not sending spare parts.

“The main responsibility rests with the Federal Republic of Germany, the main producer of those tanks,” Polish President Andrzej Duda said last week. “We’ve been urging the German side for so long to join the tank coalition and not only deliver the tanks, but also the spare parts.” 

According to a Polish official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the government often believes that Germany is more focused on competing with Poland for international recognition - responding to training Ukrainian soldiers or providing tanks - than on giving Kyiv what it needs.

Germany responded. At a NATO meeting in Brussels, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius called Poland's decade-old Leopard 2A4 stockpile “nothing to write home about, to put it diplomatically.” 

According to him, the goal of assembling two full-fledged Leopard 2 battalions in time to respond to the Russian spring offensive is in jeopardy.

The journalists noted that officials in Berlin, however, claim that apart from the tanks and weapons talks, other bilateral areas are working more smoothly. One senior official pointed to the strong cooperation on the Patriot missile defense system, which Germany gave to Poland to support its air defense.

“And on the spare-parts spat, Germans point to light at the end of the tunnel. Scholz advisors met with industry officials at the Feb. 17-19 Munich Security Conference, with both sides expressing a measure of relief that production can be scaled up in good time,” Bloomberg writes. 

• German Ambassador Anka Feldhusen said that 18 Leopard 2 A6 tanks would arrive in Ukraine from Germany by the end of March.

• On February 24, Poland became the first country to successfully transfer the first four Leopard 2A4 tanks to Ukraine.

• Ukraine will receive 10 Leopard 2 tanks and 60 T-72 and PT-91 Twardy tanks from Poland in a few weeks, as soon as the Ukrainian military exercises are completed.