CTS_WeimarTriangle_First_Edit
[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to Cosmic Top Secret, the podcast about NATO's past, present, and future. I'm your host, Professor Michael John Williams, and today I have the very distinct pleasure to be joined by Andrea Rotter and Lukasz Kolejsa. Andrea heads the Foreign and Security Policy Division at the Academy for Politics and Current Affairs of the Hans Seidel Foundation in Munich, Germany.
Her research interests focus on transatlantic security cooperation, as well as on German and European security and defense policy. Current research focuses on the evolution of Germany's strategic culture, the transformation of NATO in the wake of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, and the link between geopolitical rivalry and space security policy.
Lukasz Kulesa is Deputy Head of Research at the Polish Institute of International Affairs and Senior Associate at the European Leadership Network. Between 2014 and 2019, Lukasz worked as Research Director at the European Leadership Network. Previously, he worked [00:01:00] as head of the Nonproliferation and Arms Control Project at the Polish Institute of International Affairs.
Between 2010 and 2012, he was deputy director of the Strategic Analysis Department at the National Security Bureau, a body providing support and aid to the President of the Republic of Poland in executing security and defense tasks. Today, we're going to talk about a report they did together called the Weimar Triangle and the Future Security Order in Europe.
The report is based on a workshop organized by the Hans Zeyler Foundation and the Polish Institute of International Affairs with participation of experts from the Weimar Triangle states, France, Germany, and Poland. They gathered in Warsaw in November 2023 and were confronted with two different scenarios related to the future of European security.
A regime change in Russia followed by an offer of a reset with the West and a Ukrainian plea for Weimar security guarantees while the war continues. The seminar proved that it is possible to develop a joint Weimar position by respecting interests, [00:02:00] preferences, and red lines of each of the three countries.
The report presents conclusions and offers recommendations on Weimar Triangle policy towards the UK and Russia, derived from the proceedings of the workshop. I highly recommend you read the report, but in case you're a little too busy, we're going to get down to the details right now. Andrea and Lukasz, welcome to Cosmic Top Secret.
Lukasz and Andrea, it's wonderful to have you here on Cosmic Top Secret. You've written an excellent paper on the Weimar Triangle as an engine for European security and defense. First, can you tell us what exactly is the Weimar Triangle? Where does it come from? Well, thanks for the invitation. And in it, the Weimar Triangle is something that was created back in 1991 in the wonderful German city of Weimar, where the three ministers of foreign affairs of Poland, [00:03:00] Germany, and France met.
And they basically started this process of closer consultations and policy coordination. You know, the initial idea was really to bring Poland closer to the Western European Union. Mainstream early 1990s. We just got out of communism And rejoining europe was a best was it was a team In our foreign policy and of course in paris and berlin at that time We're kind of welcomed and the idea was that there is one framework in which we basically the three big continental european countries cooperate, on the principle of equality Equality And this was mostly at that time the first Weimar Triangle era about Germany and France helping Poland to join NATO or join European Union basically really return To Europe, [00:04:00] and that worked very well.
And the assistance of France and Germany was really crucial. But then, you know, after we became part of this transatlantic and European company, the question was what to do next. And Weimar struggled a little bit to find an agenda that would be equally attractive to Europe. For the three countries and of course, there were attempts to make it about the security and defense cooperation to make it about, you know, relationship with Russia and Eastern Europe, but, you know, that wasn't really that clear.
Have a great day. Effective. So the meetings took place in various formats, including the president and the German chancellor, ministers of foreign affairs various others. But Weimar didn't really, as a framework for cooperation, it didn't really become this engine for, for European integration or European [00:05:00] cooperation.
Okay. And why, why did it fail really in that first instance? What caused it to, to not take off? I can, I can give the Polish perspective. Let's hear the Polish perspective. Let's start with the Polish perspective. And the problem was that, you know, for all this discussion about equality in practice many times it was two plus one.
So you obviously have this very special French German relationship based on the post Second World War reconciliation. And from the viewpoint of Poland, many times, actually, Poland was invited to join something that was developed by France and Germany. And, you know, that included everything coming from so called Weimar battle tanks.
Which was basically a French German idea, and then, you know, Poland was invited to join in. Or the ideas about the [00:06:00] relationship with Russia, where Poland was much sharper for many years than Germany and Poland, and Germany and France was. So it was from the Polish viewpoint, something of the kind of incompatibility of, of the viewpoints on a number of issues.
Excellent. So what was this Weimar Triangle 2. 0 exercise then that took place? Can you explain the background, how this originated, where did the idea come from, and how did you set it up? Sure. Thank you also for me for having us. We at the Hans Heidel Foundation came up with this idea. So we are a German based think tank and we were really grateful for Lukasz and his team at the Polish Institute of International Affairs that they were willing to do this together with us and also to be part of this little experiment that we did.
As Lukasz has already mentioned in the past, there had been obstacles to the Weimar triangle to fully come to fruit and fully live up to its potential. And I think several factors actually contributed to the fact that we saw an opportunity, [00:07:00] window of opportunity for the Weimar triangle, which made it worth to actually look at it in more detail.
So on the one side of. Of course, certainly the implications of the war in Ukraine, the domestic and strategic debates in the United States, and also the change dynamics within Europe, and especially from a European point of view. So I think against this backdrop of European dependence on the United States, which was clearly underlined by the war in Ukraine, but at the same time with the strategic and domestic debates going on in the United States, which make it very clear that Europe will have to take on way more responsibility for its own security and also will have to contribute more to a balanced earned sharing within the alliance for us.
It was clear that consensus and cooperation among the major European powers, at least the major European continental powers, the Weimar Triangle, was a precondition [00:08:00] for Europe to become a more responsible actor in this way. And also coming from a German think tank, and Lukas has alluded to that, to that in the past.
My personal opinion, we neglected the warnings the perspective of our central and eastern European partners, especially Poland. that in this regard, Germany suffered, and I think kind of rightly so, a tremendous loss of trust among our Central and Eastern European partners. So for us, the idea of looking into more detail into this Weimar Triangle approach, while in this way Listening to our partners in, in, in Poland, but also listening to our partners in France was a natural starting point.
And so we approached the, our colleagues at PISM to have a scenario based workshop and for us, it was perfect. pretty much clear that we would like to have it take place in Warsaw. As I said, since we for a very long time did not [00:09:00] listen carefully enough to what our Polish partners had to say.
And why did we come up with a scenario based workshop? So we decided against a traditional expert roundtable which sometimes leads to long monologues or dwellings of the past and also in this regard leads to mutual recriminations. We wanted our experts to take a look into hypothetical but not utterly unrealistic futures and encouraged a little bit to think outside the box.
And to achieve this we invited a couple of experts from Poland, France and from Germany And from different backgrounds and the military realm and the political realm in the security related realm and also representing different levels of seniority. And we divide them into national groups. So we had five experts forming a German national group, a French [00:10:00] national group and a Polish national group.
And we divided them into these groups to work on the scenarios that we presented to them. And I think one of the main obstacles or challenges was that we asked our experts not to fight the scenarios, but to work on them, to represent an informal group of trusted experts that is asked to advise their respective governments.
On the scenarios scenarios presented to them and to formulate a national position based on their understanding of their national priorities and interests. And after short, lengthy, more or less, it's always a little time in this regards breakout sessions in which they worked on the scenarios presented to them.
We reconvened, presented the national positions and then discussed what What kind of approach would be possible for the Weimar Triangle under this under scenario presented to them? Excellent. So let's look at those [00:11:00] two scenarios. On the first day, you did the future approach towards Russia. So what was that scenario and how did it game out?
So in our first scenario, we focused on Russia's role in the European security architecture and what a common approach by the Weimar Three to Russia might look like. For these, for this reason, we confronted the three groups of national experts with the change in the Russian leadership in 2025 and the subsequent offer of dialogue.
by the new Russian president and the Russian offer included, for instance, strategic arms control talks with the United States, a willingness to discuss all aspects of military posture in Europe based on a mutual basis, limits on troop deployments, a restraint in conducting multinational exercises, a ban on missile deployments in Europe, a withdrawal of non strategic nuclear weapons to national territories.
Or in revitalization of the [00:12:00] NATO Russia Council. In turn, the Russian government asked, for instance, NATO to refrain from any decisions on its enlargement on the eastern flank for the duration of the talks. And our scenario also presented our experts with a, with other conditions. So it took place against the backdrop of an ongoing war in Ukraine, a growing war fatigue all across Europe.
And the significantly reduced commitment from the United States under then reelected President Donald Trump. So all in all, our scenario included a number of factors that could lead political decision makers to accept some of Russia's proposals. And I think when we Look back to the discussion and what came out of the discussion.
I think the key message of the scenario discussion was the evidence of the alignment of threat perceptions due to the war in Ukraine and then in the common and shared understanding of the threat posed [00:13:00] by Russia, as we mentioned before. So none of our country groups outright accepted any of the Russian proposals.
All experts advocated for prudence and restraint. in going forward with Russia. Of course, there were some differences, some anticipated differences, some differences expected or to be expected during the, when it comes to the national views and political preferences, for instance, when it comes to the domestic constraints which are rooted in the public opinion or in the respective political systems.
Also expected differences came up when we thought about talked about what kind of role the European Union could take in engaging with Russia in the future. But I think for me the most stark difference came to light when we talked about Russia's internal stability as a factor of concern for France, Germany, and Poland.
And in the scenario, we [00:14:00] hinted a little bit at a possibility that a new leadership could crumble if the new president's outreach was not reciprocated by the European states. So while the German and French participants were concerned about the potential instability following a potential collapse of the new government, which could then further destabilize Europe, the Polish team warned against focusing too much on Russian stability.
And I think one participant summed it up quite nicely, saying that the greater the distance to Russia, the greater the concern for Russian stability. So for us, this was a very, one of the key messages. And despite these differences, I think our scenario also revealed some broad commonalities that could indeed serve as the basis for a joint Weimar Triangle approach to Russia.
So on the one hand, the centrality of Russian of Ukrainian agency, meaning Ukraine's [00:15:00] participation in and consent to any negotiations with Russia regarding the war and its own future role in European security architecture. Second share preference for a principled and conditional approach to any Russian diplomatic initiative, diplomatic initiatives based on the shared understanding that of the threat posed by Russia, and that Russia first will have to prove its credibility and its goodwill in a verifiable manner.
And thirdly, that no premature changes should be made to NATO's defense and deterrence posture. And the same applies to any kind of arms control talks prematurely based on Russian outreach in this regard. But all in all, the scenario proved, I think, and all experts agreed that the Weimar Triangle could be one important vehicle to move European security forward in this regard.
Can I just highlight one thing, because in a sense we kind of set a trap for the participants or, you know, [00:16:00] provided them with a temptation. And the temptation is a temptation of a Russia that is slightly less aggressive and slightly more engaged in things like arms control. At least that's the promise.
And the starting point is it's mid 2025 and Vladimir Putin is dead for several weeks. That's already a good starting point for many many people. So the idea is that basically the challenge was, do you try to engage this new hypothetical Russian leadership and try to see if a change is needed or do you expect them to actually move first?
And basically none of the groups took the bait. Basically everyone said that Russia would first need to prove that it really is interested in a change. And part of this test is not just stopping the attack on Ukraine where they are right now, but actually also [00:17:00] moving towards withdrawal of, of the troops.
So. I think, you know, whereas in the past you had all these discussions in Europe that, you know, maybe we should engage the Russians, you know, check their peace proposals. Our discussion basically showed that nobody's in this group's naive enough to just say, because there is somebody else than Mr.
Putin, then all of a sudden we can treat Russia as a potential partner that more would be expected from the Russians to put on the table. And with this sort of thing, you always have to make certain assumptions, right? Put a case for it. I mean, do you think that if there's no change in the Russian leadership that we're essentially in a, in a stalemated situation of all the other conditions hold?
I mean, there's a question for me whether because we, in a sense, we have something like a Russian peace offensive from time to time. They say that actually, you know, they are willing to talk peace and why are we continuing with with this war? So I could, yeah, I could see the [00:18:00] possibility of Russians.
making similar proposals also with Mr. Putin, but their credibility for not just for the polls would always be skeptical. But I think this exercise shows that also in Berlin and Germany and in, in, in Paris, a lot of people would have serious doubts whether to engage in such peace proposals from Mr.
Putin or from anybody else. So, and also with regards to what Lukash was just saying. When we later talk about policy options, I think, especially from Paris and Berlin, at least from our groups of experts, there was a clear call for refraining from any kind of unilateral outreach to Russia as it happened in the past.
And if so, I think this provides for an ample common ground so that the threat perception, especially in Berlin and in Paris, have changed so much and aligned itself more with the Polish threat perception. During the [00:19:00] discussion while we were talking about the role of the United States and the reduced role of the United States under a potential Trump administration, of course, there was some kind of mistrust that United States could reach out to Russia and make some kind of a deal.
And for me as a German participant, it was really striking that the same kind of mistrust was brought forward by Polish experts saying that in the past, There had been French and German initiatives reaching out to Russia without engaging with our Eastern European partners. So I hopefully, I think this this exercise, but also in total the whole security environment helped to build trust in a way that this kind of mistrust and this kind of outreach without, Taking into account our partners perspectives is no longer an option for our governments in this regard.
So the second day, you did a different scenario, which you looked at actually Ukraine's role in Europe's [00:20:00] security architecture. So where did, what did the teams come up with there? Was there a lot of convergence as well, or is there more disagreement about this? We basically, we, we reset the field. So these are not related scenario, but separate ones.
And this one is much more, you know, short term because we said that in, in July of, of this year immediately after the NATO summit that is to take place in DC. And the idea is that the situation is more or less. prolongation of what we are seeing right now. So heavy fighting in Ukraine, but no real breakthrough.
United States still unable to provide, you know, significant additional military support. And Ukraine, which is frustrated because in at the NATO summit, it didn't get invitation. It didn't really Gets any significant help and you know in the u. s Presidential elections the tone is, you know, why are we helping [00:21:00] ukraine?
So if that sounds familiar, we basically we came with that last year and the idea is that at this point ukrainians go to the three Bimar countries and they say, you know, now it's time to put your money where your mouth is. And if you say that Ukraine is critical for your security, then you should provide Ukraine with tangible and, you know, really workable security guarantees.
Not the assurances, not the nice words, but really security guarantees. that would be implementable also in the, in the military sense. So basically the, they were asking in our scenario for something that looks like U. S. commitments to, to, to, to South Korea or NATO article. And what we tasked our group was, please come up with a proposal that would not Just say no to the Ukrainians, but would engage this [00:22:00] proposal in a constructive way.
And here, of course, the main challenge was that basically what the Ukrainians in our scenario are asking is the possibility of committing troops from our countries to fight in Ukraine, to fight in support of Ukraine. So something that is, can very, very controversial. With regards to the, to the, to the outcomes again what was the joint position of the three teams was that our three countries have this special responsibility for supporting Ukraine, and they would expect Poland, France, and Germany to support Ukraine regardless of the outcome of the U S election.
So regardless of the support that, Would come or would not come from the United States. Weimar countries actually have no other choice but to support Ukraine and that support should be actually increased. But at the same [00:23:00] time and it's an interesting mirroring, because right now we have this discussion around President Macron's comment, who said that no, he would not rule out sending troops to Ukraine.
Here you have the differences in which Polish and the German teams We're actually very, very careful. They were very reluctant, even in that fictional scenario, to commit troops for a potential, you know, involvement in Ukraine. Whereas our French colleagues, which were much more open to this idea, and they said, okay, we have a presidential system, We have a long history of very active and interventionist security policy.
So obviously, if you would see Ukraine collapsing, it would be a major crisis, then no. Our president would probably ask our military to do something, or at least plan to do something, and France would not stand by. If you have this kind of [00:24:00] major disturbance in our neighborhood. So it was interesting that, you know, Poland and Germany, which were much in the are much closer, which were, were, were more reluctant than the French.
So that was the, I think the area of disagreement, but then we came up with I think a list of, and more beefed up. By our support to Ukraine where everybody could agree on including, you know, more training, more weapon deliveries, things like this, but it's interesting that, you know, the engagement of troops was seen as, as, as a, as a red line and we can see it being kind of replayed in real life in our political discussions right now in Europe.
Yeah, I thought that when I saw, you know, Macron's statement a little while ago about all options and then sort of how that has unrolled and how sort of forward thinking you were in terms of setting up the scenarios. Actually, for a point of clarification, Lukas, so for the German military, it's a parliamentary military, right?
So obviously [00:25:00] requires the consent of the Bundestag to be deployed. How does it work in Poland for our listeners? Do you have a similar setup? Yeah, so you need to have the president's decision which follows requests from the government. And so the parliament is, is not directly, so the parliament is, is not directly involved, which makes things less complicated than in the, in the German case.
Okay, so based on those scenarios, what do you think is most likely to happen, right? So we've got a range of possibilities and a lot of variables, particularly with the U. S. I mean, and I guess another question would be maybe to start with, how contingent are these developments on the U. S. election, right?
If you have Biden in office versus having Trump in office. I think also the second scenario showed quite clearly, and we discussed this with our groups in the scenarios, is that although our groups of experts advocated for a Weimar approach, [00:26:00] they were aware of the role that the United States plays for European security still.
So, In terms of everything that was discussed during our during our discussion, we put focus on putting things onto the table that are credible because the common the common notion was that anything that would be put on the table with regard to Ukraine and security guarantees would be tested immediately on the ground by Russia.
So, I think in a, in a way what is happening right now in the United States testifies to our, our second scenario and also to, in a way that the European countries are very well aware of their obstacles and of their own shortcomings when it comes to providing security and defense and that's why Credibility and feasibility of all the measures discussed was a huge talking point during our discussion.
Lukáš, if you want to add [00:27:00] anything on this? Yeah, I would also underline that the starting point in these scenarios was the question of what about the United States? What is the United States position? And especially when it came to this kind of implementable security guarantees, you know, how can we be credible for the Ukrainians, but also for the Russians, if we don't have the United States back?
So obviously, you know, the preferred option would be to work with the United States, as I think we have done the last years. But the challenge is, you know, what happens if the United States is missing in action, either because, you know, you can't get certain things across at the, at the Congress, or because you have a president that dislikes Ukraine and distrusts NATO.
So, so I think the idea was that at that point, yes, we have a problem, [00:28:00] but we also would need to work even. Without the United States. It's not the preferred option. I think we were all and we are all committed Atlantis is But you know if the United States is is is not there That would be a major challenge, but that would not make the war stop That would not make russia stop being a threat for for the rest of the european country So then we would need to we would need to work You Around the big hole that would be the absence of the United States and one of the, you know one of the suggestions after the seminar was that we need, we need to do the second one, which would be basically contingency planning for the situation in which the United States would not be, would not be present in European security the way that it is now.
Well, it seems that the best or sort of worst best worst case scenario option is US [00:29:00] absence, but not negative engagement, right? So it's one thing if they're not providing assistance or if they're apathetic, but there is, of course, a dangerous possibility that Yeah. a certain White House might, might work against European efforts with some sort of affection or odd engagement with Russia, right?
That could be a serious problem. Yeah, sure. And also when it comes to European cohesion when you think of the first Trump administration and his attempt to try to divide the European cohesion in this way, and when, when, when Depending on the security situation right now, I think there is a real potential that if there's a second Trump administration, President Trump then would try to divide the European cohesion and unity as well in this regard.
And I think this is also one of the problems we'd be confronted with, how to maintain unity and consensus. We've seen in the past month that this has been. actually hard work to have a [00:30:00] consensus within our common security and defense policy, and with a potential President Trump on the horizon, this would be even more difficult for us to achieve, apart from all the other things that we need to do.
And this is something that also, of course, came through in our gaming exercise, that we need to to enhance our own military spending, to fill in our conventional military gaps in line with what NATO has planned out, that we need to raise our defense industrial capacity. Just last week, the European Union published its strategy on how to enhance our defense industrial capacity.
Since We are still very much depending also with regard to supporting Ukraine on what is coming from the United States. So I think cohesion will be one of the major things to, to look out for. And I think also in this regard the Weimar Triangle can [00:31:00] give important impetus. to really keep this cohesion up in terms of concern.
I can just say that in this particular exercise, we focused on the three Weimar countries, but you know, luckily for us it's more, more players in, in Europe. And some of them are very active both in regards to supporting Ukraine and, you know, formulating policy for, for Russia. So we didn't really, in a sense, we phased out the, the UK, the position of Baltic countries, Nordic countries.
A number of, of, of others who, you know, in reality, in our political reality, of course, would also be in this group of countries that would not necessarily look at the United States but would make their own decisions with regards to support to Ukraine. Right now, for example, we have a coalition led by the Netherlands and Denmark, which is providing [00:32:00] F 16 to Ukraine.
And we have a coalition led by the Czech Republic. That is buying additional ammunition for Ukraine. So it's not always the bigger ones. Sometimes the, the, the smaller and mid sized countries can also actually make a difference. You know, that's it raises an interesting question. And again, where I, where all of us on this podcast are very transatlantic diehard transatlanticists as you know, I've lived there for many years and worked on it in a very pro NATO and pro Europe.
But I guess also is how much of this is sort of linked to the threat of abandonment, right, that you sort of see that the US failing to well failing legislatively to support Ukraine, of course, and then, of course, the greater threat of abandonment, depending on the election. And then suddenly, you know, the checks have found a coalition together.
get more ammunition, right? And we see increases that it's, it's a little heartbreaking for those of us who are more pro Europe. I mean, it's good to see the capability development, but it seems it only happened when, you know, there, there's someone roughing, roughing up the scene, so to [00:33:00] say, right? So one thing I wanted to actually ask you, you went ahead and, and I identified the countries that you might also work with beyond that, but looking at Poland and Germany and also France, but particularly Poland and Germany, where are you capability wise?
Could you give us a little overview on where the Zeit und Wende is in Germany? Cause we hear a lot of good stuff, a lot of bad stuff. And of course the chancellor is having a rough go of it. And then of course in Poland, the perception is, Or in the U. S. The perception of Poland is is that Poland has been spending.
I mean, it's been meeting targets for quite a while, but it's serious defense expenditure. And that's really putting it as sort of the maybe the tip of the spear for European capabilities. So whoever wants to go first, but it would be great to kind of just where are we in terms of because you're making guarantees, right?
You need to have the capability to back that up. So how realistic are those guarantees? And over what time horizon could we see this sort of really taking hold? Mhm.[00:34:00]
Okay, I can go first. Although the Zeitunwende, of course, is a topic for another podcast, I guess. So just a couple of days ago, we had a two year anniversary of our Zeitunwende, our watershed moment in our foreign and security policy. And looking back, I think you could give a mixed assessment or you see a mixed picture.
So there are some positive sides, there are also some negative sides. So on the positive side, of course, everybody's been talking about the 100 billion euro special fund for the Bundeswehr after some initial obstacles to how to, to spend the money. It is now well underway and for the very first time since more than 30 years, Germany finally reached a 2 percent goal of NATO.
This year. So for the first time, we're spending a little bit more than our little bit more than 2 percent off our [00:35:00] GDP on military defense. On the negative side, however, is that this has a limited time frame. So we are spending 2% On our military spending due to this Sondervermögen due to the special fund of the Bundeswehr.
However, once the money of the special fund runs out, which will happen in about four to five years, we will fall back to our previous levels unless we find another source or we define another budget for our military. So, on the one time, on the one hand, this is good news, but right now, the real worth of the Zeitungen, at least in financial terms, will be determined once the special fund of the military runs out.
As of now, the special fund is also barely enough to really fill the military gaps that we already are, that we know that the Bundeswehr has, but in terms also in future [00:36:00] investment, we don't see that where that money should be coming on from right now. With regard to our strategic culture, I think on the political level there has been some positive development in really being aware that we need this kind of change in our foreign and security policy.
Although I would add that everything that's been done so far has been done based on internal and external pressure. But with regard to Ukraine, we have now emerged as the second supporter into, in financial and military terms behind the United States. So we are really have, we have stepped up our game also with regard to our With regard to the population, with regard to public opinion, I think Germans are now more aware that Germany has to take on a more responsible role in the international, on the international stage.
Although I'd [00:37:00] say that we had a momentum to really talk, to really have a security and strategic debate in Germany, but right now I see that window of opportunity closing. So whenever I talk to experts and they ask me what would I advise them to do with regard to to Germany I was always saying I always say please keep pressuring us So we're doing steps and I think from from a German point of view we have come a long way But we're still way lifting How's the thing beyond our weight?
So we there's still way more room to go for us to really assume our Responsibility given our economic weight given our central situation geographical situation in Germany and given also our dependence on on European security in a way So, I think in many instances the government has been too hesitant and right now I see negative signs in a [00:38:00] way in supporting for Ukraine.
So instead of, you know, this kind of bickering within our government, we should focus at focus our efforts on, on supporting Ukraine. And right now I don't see that so much happening. So although we are doing enough compared, as Lukash has mentioned, compared to the Nordic countries and central and eastern European party partners who have been the driving force behind strengthening our defense and deterrence approach and behind supporting Ukraine.
I think Germany still has and can do more and especially also assume a more leading role in this regard and certainly not resort to bickering on the international stage as we sometimes see right now. All right. And how about Poland? Well, first and, and, and, and just to link with under us a presentation of the site and, and I think the vast majority of the Polish security community is [00:39:00] actually cheering up and supporting Germany in, in this effort.
And sometimes I'm being asked, you know, aren't you worried because of all the history? I said, no, we were, we actually, we are worried that it's so slow and it's so difficult to get certain things across because it is in our vital interest to have the German armed forces, which are capable and ready to defend their partners and allies in NATO forces, which are present in Lithuania that, you know, sometimes are present in Poland.
So, you know, there's actually there is this big, you know, cheering up of, of, of the German forces. Of the German Seidenwände, but at the same time, I would say, you know, our feeling of threats is more direct and the urgency is higher. So the process of modernization started much earlier and which much more focused.
on the territorial defense and on [00:40:00] Russia as a potential and then, you know, most likely an opponent. So the armed forces were not basically prepared for global missions. Even though they can do a little bit of that as well, but for the defense of, you know, our part of Europe and with regards to the percentage of the GDP right now, it's, it's 3 percent of the regular budget.
So about 30 billion, but then you add. 1 percent of extra money. So more than 4 percent of GDP. So twice the kind of NATO norm, a very long list of weapons that we are buying, starting with F 35, Patriot missiles, Heimer launchers, tanks, from Korea you know, you really, you name a major weapons system and we are either buying it or we are trying to develop it.
Ourselves, the main challenge would be, you know, how do we [00:41:00] integrate it into the armed forces? How do we actually manage also when it comes to the manpower, when it comes to, you know, bringing all these things together you have, you will have some units with Leopard stacks while some units with the U S Abraham's time, which we are also buying, then some units of the Korean and Polish produced.
Korean designed tanks. So of course, it's a big nightmare for you know, any any logistician but I think there is a high degree of political and social support for making our armed forces as strong as possible and you know, even if you have, you know, some kind of a ceasefire or a temporary break in, in the war, that wouldn't mean the, the end of the threat that we are seeing in Warsaw.
And what do you think, based on where this is right now, and it was interesting, you mentioned the manpower issues, right, because this is a [00:42:00] challenge, it seems, for everyone, including the U. S. military, which is now revising its numbers downwards what, what do you think is realistic to expect, or what do you think, what would you say needs to be done in the next 6 to 12 months to sort of actualize some of the, the ideas for cooperation between the, the Weimar Triangle countries?
I can start with just saying that when it comes to Russia, it's one, the issue of actually strengthening the terrorists. So we have the plan. We have the plan. We adopted the plan in, in NATO. So it's mostly about making sure that at the national level, we kind of stick to the commitments that we've made.
With regards of the units being available to NATO specific capabilities that can be deployed in the Eastern Flag, not just in Poland, but, but also in Poland. So we suggest that we might also have the room for more deployments of German and, and French units and troops [00:43:00] to Poland and to, to other places in the Eastern Flag.
Then basically having a set of. general guidelines when it regards to the strategy towards Russia. And we are talking about the longterm strategy. So the idea that Russia would be our competitor in the cold war, we call it containment or active containment. And, you know, I wish we were in a different place, but it seems like we are kind of back to the containment.
Days. And then the last thing which was very much based on this discussion about the, the, the scenario and Russian peace offers is to have a very close coordination and a very similar approach to any kind of Russia peace proposals so that they don't, managed to divide us by, you know, suggesting that they talk to Washington and they don't talk to Berlin or they talk to Berlin.
They don't talk to Warsaw. They don't really like, like to play this kind of games. So it's, [00:44:00] it would be good to have some kind of the initial agreement of, you know, how do we react to any really serious and substantial Russian proposals, which they would call the peace proposals. And just to add to what Lukash has just said, I think when we look at the Weimar Triangle and this also came up during our discussion, I think the main goal would be, first of all, and we're doing a pretty good job so far, is to harmonize our respective views and approaches to Ukraine and to Russia, to identify the common ground, to also openly talk about national interests, and national red lines and boundaries and limitations in terms of expectation management and to basically coordinate more effectively what we're already doing by either having, and we talked about this in our report, having a common strategic approach to the Weimar Triangle within a certain time frame, [00:45:00] we said about 12 months and there, of course, to really go through all the contingencies and what would be necessary.
to support Ukraine further on for it enabled or to enable it to win. We also talked about the possibility of an additional Weimar military assistance package to underline our cohesion among the major European continental powers, which Could start with a pooling of our national plans for the arms and equipment and ammunition supplies.
Lukash already mentioned training before that, that we could coordinate our training efforts to at a later stage, also join production as it is currently being talked about in the, within the European Union timeframe. For us, it was also very critical that we think of a Weimar consultation mechanism with Ukraine.
to not just also manage expectations in a way, but also to prepare for different contingencies and to [00:46:00] prepare for different contingencies and how we might react in this kind, in this, in this way. And perhaps also the last thing I'd like to highlight, since this is something that It's also becoming more and more clear on the European Union level is that we need to start the process to, to assess more in more detail, the implication of Ukrainian accession to the European Union on the industrial level, on the operational level, especially with regard to Article 42.
7 of the Treaty of the European Union. So I think we have a huge agenda. In a way where we can also among Poland, France and Germany harmonize our approaches and also coordinate better what we're already doing. And of course, in with regard to, to recurring, always in close coordination and close consultation with Ukraine in this way.
And to go into detail the report, the Weimar Triangle, the Future Security Order in [00:47:00] Europe produced by the Polish Institute of International Affairs and the Hans Seidel Foundation it's really an excellent piece of work that outlines the, the challenges and the many possibilities. Lukasz and Andrea, it was really a pleasure having you here today to, to outline the ideas.
And I encourage listeners to, to read the report because there's a lot to think about. And chew over as we sort of look at the future order in Europe and how to try and end this war successfully for Ukraine and also for the rest of the European continent. Thank you very much. Thank you for the invitation.
Thank you for having us. It was a pleasure. Well, that's all for today's edition of Cosmic Top Secret. Thank you so much for joining us. Please do subscribe. You can find Cosmic Top Secret on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Audible, and Stitcher to name a few. If you're a NATO nerd, please do tell your friends about Cosmic Top Secret.
And if you're not a NATO nerd and just an interested and informed listener, please also tell your friends that might be interested in learning more about the Alliance. I'd like to [00:48:00] thank our producer, John Kura of Wayfair Recording, for producing the episode, as well as the Fulbright Program of the United States that made some of the research for this podcast possible.
Many thanks for joining us, and please do tune in again.
