German defence spending worth €50bn up for approval this week

The acquisition of weapons systems for the German military is progressing, with the parliament's budgetary committee to discuss €50 billion ($59 billion) in arms projects this week, Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said in Berlin.

He said the "amounts and speed" of these acquisitions gives the defence industry the required planning security to ramp up their operations, noting that some 225 major projects had been launched over the past three years, with a scope of more than €138 billion.

Many of these systems were now reaching the troops, Pistorius added.

Immediately after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, then-chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a €100 billion special fund for military spending, breaking with decades of caution on defence expenditure in Germany.

Investments of €25 million or more must be passed by the budgetary committee. Many of the current projects are much larger. At its meeting on Wednesday, the committee will consider expenditure of €22 billion for personal protection equipment and clothing.

Other items include funding for the Israeli-US Arrow 3 missile defence system, amounting to around €4 billion, plus €2 billion for the US Patriot air defence system and more than €4 billion for a second tranche of Puma infantry fighting vehicles.