Germany has announced a massive rearmament plan that includes development of new and sophisticated offensive weaponry and an increase in military manpower to levels not seen in Western Europe since the Cold War.

The plan is built on a dual goal of countering perceived threats from an expansionist Russia and aggressive China while replacing Europe’s defense dependency on an increasingly unpredictable and even hostile United States.

And Germany is prepared to take on the chore of freeing European from big power intimidation.

“We are transforming the Bundeswehr into Europe’s strongest conventional army,” said German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, as he laid out the future “strategic orientation” of German’s armed forces.

“In the short term, we are enhancing our defensive capabilities. In the medium term, we aim for a significant buildup of capacity. In the long term, we will ensure technological superiority.”

Pistorius issued these intentions Wednesday as he put meat on the bones of statements made by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has taken a hawkish view of a need for a strong European defense.

Merz cites both Russia’s war on Ukraine and US President Donald Trump’s hostility toward the NATO alliance as necessitating self-reliance. On occasion, he throws China into the mix of foreign threats.

In February at the annual Munich Security Conference, Merz forecast a dangerous environment for an under-defended Europe.

“First and foremost,” he said, “There is Russia’s violent revisionism, a brutal war against Ukraine, against our political order, with the most severe war crimes being committed on a daily basis.”

He went ominously on, saying that, “If, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, there was a unipolar moment in history, it has long gone. The United States’ claim to leadership is being challenged, perhaps even forfeited.”

He referred to China as a country that “has the ambition to shape global affairs, laying the foundations for this over many years with strategic patience.

“In the foreseeable future, Beijing could draw level with the US in terms of military might,” he warned, “reinterpreting the international order on its own terms.”

According to a Defense Ministry document issued by Pistorius, Germany plans $1 trillion worth of new defense projects to be completed by 2035. Among the priority items are:

• Development of air defense, long-range missile strike capabilities and the ability to wage new data-driven warfare. New technologies such as artificial intelligence are also set to play a new role.

• Creation of “deep strike” rockets, cruise missiles and armed drones to hit targets far beyond front line positions. The weapons will be designed to strike command and control centers, enemy supply routes and infrastructure used by the enemy to launch its attacks.

• An increase of combat manpower from the current 200,000 to 460,000, to combine active troops and reservists. Also non-combat reserve units will be mounted to aid the country’s likely role as Europe’s chief logistical hub.

• Reduction of bureaucratic logjams by employing digital processing to eliminate paperwork. Artificial intelligence short cuts would be introduced to speed decision making.

“These strategies are living documents,” Pistorius cautioned, pledging that they will be periodically updated. Some innovations will not be publicized. “Otherwise,” he explained, “We might as well add Vladimir Putin to our email distribution list.”

Other NATO countries have articulated upgrades in defense capabilities, though none has been as expansive as Germany’s. France has said it will increase its nuclear weapons-deterrent weaponry. Great Britain said that, at high technical levels, its defenses are up to date, but the hardware beneath is antiquated. Italy is developing defense projects with partner countries.

Merz’s opinion of the Russian threat contrasts sharply with the views of two previous chancellors, Gerhard Schroeder and Angela Merkel. Each downplayed military development needs.

Schroeder, who served as chancellor from 1998 to 2005, fostered close and friendly relations with Vladimir Putin. He focused on satisfying Germany’s appetite for supplies of Russian natural gas and on his own desire to distance Germany from Washington’s sphere of influence.

Schroeder’s sponsorship of the Nord Stream 2 undersea gas pipeline that ran from Russia to Germany symbolized his desire for a close economic partnership with the Kremlin and distance from Washington.

After he left office, he worked as a paid lobbyist for Gazprom, the Russian energy giant.

When Putin launched his first invasion of Ukraine in 2014, Schroeder blamed NATO.

Politically, he also took a soft line on Putin’s constant insistence that Ukraine was part of Russia. He blamed Russia’s 2014 invasion and annexation of Crimea not on Putin’s imperialist proclivities but simply on the Russian leader’s “fears about being encircled.”

During his tenure in office, Schroeder reduced defense spending to a post-Cold War low: 1.3% of gross domestic product.

Merkel was less effusively positive with Putin, but nonetheless maintained the notion that dialogue and good economic relations would domesticate Moscow. She opposed placing strong sanctions on Russia after its first invasion of Ukraine. Sanctions were especially desired by Poland and the Baltic states bordering the former Soviet Union.

Merkel insisted on completing the Nord Stream 2 project, which US President Joe Biden gave his go-ahead to finish in 2021. Trump had opposed the project during his first 2017-2021 stint in office. Someone blew up the pipeline on September 26, 2022.

Although Merkel had once been considered Europe’s leading political figure, her notion of taming Putin with the candy of trade and frequent consultations diminished her prestige in Europe, where some dismissed it as Pollyannaish.  

After leaving office, Merkel was unapologetic. She contended that she clearly understood Putin’s bullying proclivities: “I always knew he wanted to destroy Europe.” Yet, she argued, it was important to keep “a trade connection” with “the world’s second largest nuclear power.”

“I don’t see that I should now have to say that was wrong,” she told an audience in Berlin. “And, therefore, I will not apologize.”

Merz’s approach is different: to provide a European alternative in world affairs, an independent yet muscular Europa über alles, with a kinder, gentler Germany in the lead.