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Germany’s defense procurement chief says her agency is “liberating” from bureaucratic constraints as Europe’s largest country works to overhaul its neglected armed forces in response to the war in Ukraine.
Annette Lehnigk-Emden, who was appointed in April to lead the committee responsible for a €100 billion upgrade of military equipment, said she aimed to achieve a huge “cultural change” to speed up The process of purchasing weapons and ammunition.
Reinike Emden, whose mechanism Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who has taken a central role in delivering on her pledge to make “radical changes” in Germany’s approach to security and defense in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, said her agency was resisting overregulation and The military’s complex requirements.
She told the Financial Times that the shift was to “encourage people to make courageous decisions…”. . . and make projects move faster,” at every level of this massive organization of 11,000 employees. “Suddenly, a project planned for 2028 could suddenly be delivered in 2025 or 2026. “
Reinicke-Emden, a lawyer and defense official for three decades, was entrusted by Defense Minister Boris Pistorius to lead the Armed Forces’ procurement office in Koblenz as part of the broader German Armed Forces part of the reorganization. In February 2022, two days after Vladimir Putin launched Russia’s offensive in Ukraine, German Armed Forces Commander Alfons Mais said that “the troops are more or less empty” .
The military has long been plagued by shortages, from basic personal equipment for troops to heavy weapons and ammunition that lack functionality, in a procurement process that experts have sometimes described as comical.
A helicopter sector was forced to wait nine years for approval for a new flying helmet with ballistic protection – a product it first requested for commercial use in 2013, according to a recent parliamentary report. In another example, the Bundeswehr has been waiting for nerve agent test kits since 2011, the report said.
Lehnigk-Emden said her agency has suffered in the past from “a lot of time and a lot of money,” adding that this approach ignores off-the-shelf solutions that could be delivered simpler and faster.
Under Pistorius, who took over as defense minister in January after the resignation of his gaffe-prone and unenthusiastic predecessor, Christine Lambrecht, “people are starting to think in new ways, they are thinking differently. way to plan the project,” says Leinicke-Emden.
Even after Scholz promised turning point In what amounts to a “turning point” in German defense policy, the chancellor has faced criticism for the rapid pace of change and lack of resources.
Speaking in the Bundestag this week, Friedrich Merz, leader of the opposition Christian Democrats, said the German chancellor had “failed to deliver” on his promises and warned of severe shortfalls in the defense budget in the coming years.
Parliamentary Commissioner for the Armed Forces Eva Högl complained in March that “not a penny” from the 100 billion-euro special fund for army equipment in 2022 had been withdrawn, even though some orders had been placed.
Leinke-Emden distinguishes between contract signing and money outflow. But she said her agency would allocate about 60 billion euros of the 100 billion euro fund by the end of the year, with major deals including the purchase of U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets and Chinook heavy transport helicopters and contracts for Israeli Arrow 3 missiles. system.
She emphasized that despite efforts to speed up decision-making, her agency still faces other constraints. These include the need for parliamentary approval for any defense spending above 25 million euros – a post-war law designed to prevent the military from gaining powers accumulated under the Nazis.
Lehnigk-Emden said she and her colleagues were “dumbfounded” by the results. arrested last month A military officer working for his agency has been accused of spying for Russia. She said she had no further information about what he was charged with or what information he had access to.
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