Germany has been intensively debating the provision of additional military assistance to Ukraine for some time now. To achieve this, a package worth around €3 billion was compiled back in November 2024 and is now about to be approved.
Until now, this was not possible due to funding issues. Thanks to major future investments in the Bundeswehr and infrastructure, which have already been approved by the Bundestag and will soon also be approved by the Bundesrat, the Chancellery has abandoned its original blockade stance.
In response to this, the German Ministry of Defence has finally announced some details of the soon-to-be approved package.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Defence said at today’s Federal Press Conference that “a considerable proportion of assistance (part of the €3 billion package) will be delivered this year”.
How high the proportion really is, he left completely open, but “considerable” could be lower than it initially sounds. Thanks to Agnieszka Brugger, deputy parliamentary group leader of the Greens and member of the Bundestag’s defence committee, we already knew that about 60% of the material that would be financed could have been delivered to Ukraine in 2025 if the funds had been approved in January.
So unless the contents of the package have changed, two months later the proportion has most likely not increased, but rather slightly decreased. It is therefore possible that we are now only talking about half of the package which can be delivered this year.
We have now also received further clarification on the contents of the package. The spokesperson explained that the package includes IRIS-T air defence systems, guided missiles, surveillance radars, drones for reconnaissance, as well as loitering munitions, protected combat vehicles, small arms and other items.
This list immediately highlights several interesting details, which I would like to discuss briefly.
Contradictory information on IRIS-T (SLM)
What I find particularly interesting is the information that IRIS-T air defence systems are part of the package and that, according to the spokesperson, “the chances are good” that they will be delivered (at least in part) this year.
As recently as January, Minister of Defence Boris Pistorius refuted corresponding media reports and said that IRIS-T systems are not part of this package.
In the past few days, government spokesperson Steffen Hebestreit has already said various times that IRIS-T SLM systems are part of the package, which is why I had already asked the German MoD for clarification on Tuesday night, which remained unanswered at the time of publication of this article.
Nonetheless, it must now be assumed that Pistorius either lied in January to counter negative PR shortly before the federal elections, or that the contents of the package have changed fundamentally in the past not even two months.
Possible quantity and delivery date
Nothing was said about possible quantities or when exactly they will be delivered, but it can be assumed that at least four IRIS-T SLM fire units will be financed as part of this package.
The 12 IRIS-T SLM fire units ordered so far have also been announced as three batches of four. It is therefore unlikely that only one or two fire units are part of this new aid package.
As mentioned above, according to the Ministry of Defence spokesperson, the “chances are good” that they will be delivered (at least in part) this year. However, the delivery of the newly ordered fire units is more likely to take place towards the end of this year, as three additional ones were already scheduled to be delivered this year and none of them have yet been supplied.
Just looking at air defence equipment, alongside IRIS-T systems, guided missiles and surveillance radars are also to be supplied. Again, no details were given, but it should be relatively self-evident what this will be about.
The German SPIEGEL already reported months ago that an ammunition package for the MIM-104 Patriot fire units is part of the package. Hebestreit also confirmed this at the Federal Press Conference on Monday. Considering how expensive these interceptors are, it is likely to be a high double-digit or low triple-digit number at most.
The surveillance radars are likely to be additional TRML-4D air surveillance radars manufactured by Hensoldt. They are highly advanced, capable of tracking up to 1,500 targets within a radius of up to 250 kilometres, and would therefore significantly improve Ukraine’s airspace coverage.
Hensoldt’s TRML-4D air surveillance radars are not only part of the 12 IRIS-T SLM fire units already ordered, but 16 of them have already been financed by the German government and delivered to Ukraine as a stand-alone product.
A delivery to Ukraine is likely to be realised relatively quickly after the funds have been secured. Hensoldt currently produces 15 TRML-4Ds per year and plans to increase its capacity to 20 to 25 per year as quickly as possible.
Drones, drones, and even more drones
Let’s move on to the next part of the package: drones for reconnaissance, as well as loitering munitions.
In the area of reconnaissance, I personally assume that we are talking about either RQ-35 Heidun UAVs or Vector UAVs. More than half a thousand of both were supplied to Ukraine by the German government and in both cases long-term contracts involving larger quantities have either already been fulfilled or are about to do so.
In the case of the Vector UAVs in particular, it would be absolutely necessary for the German government to conclude a further contract with the manufacturer Quantum Systems, as the latter has invested quite a lot of its own resources in supporting the Ukrainian armed forces not only with drones, but also with training, maintenance, and production on site.
The Ukrainian MoD is highly appreciative of the Vector UAVs and has informed the German MoD of the needs for around 800 additional Vector UAVs just for the current year. It would therefore only be logical for these to be now financed by the German government.
When it comes to loitering munitions, Helsing’s HX-2 is the most likely candidate. About a month ago, Helsing announced that it would produce 6,000 HX-2 loitering munitions on behalf of the German government and deliver them to Ukraine.
However, it was already clear at the time that the announcement was certainly somewhat premature, as no funds had been available for months to finance additional armaments. It is therefore very likely that the drones are part of the €3 billion package (this was also reported by BILD).
With the approval of the funds, production is likely to start shortly and deliveries should be completed before the end of the year.
However, things could turn out quite differently! I hear from industry sources that negotiations on the financing of alternatives to the HX-2 by the German government have not yet been finalised, which means that it is quite possible that a different model will be delivered to Ukraine after all.
Lack of artillery? Not at all!
Finally, I would like to talk briefly about artillery. Although this was not mentioned in today’s statement, Minister of Defence Pistorius mentioned during the visit of his Ukrainian counterpart at the beginning of March, that assistance could also be increased in the field of artillery if the financing of the package is secured.
Germany could supply “further state-of-the-art artillery systems” such as the PzH 2000 or the RCH 155. SPIEGEL also reported three months ago that 10 wheeled howitzers are part of the package.
At the time, I was expecting that this would mean that Ukrainian 2S22 Bohdanas would finally be financed, but I have almost given up my hopes after the recent statements in which the RCH 155 was mentioned.
If the RCH 155 is indeed chosen, a delivery will probably only take place in the coming years, as Germany has already contracted 54 of these state-of-the-art artillery systems, which are scheduled to be delivered starting this year until 2028 or 2029.
Additional artillery ammunition will also be delivered. Since the Czech Minister of Foreign Affairs recently announced in an interview that ammunition deliveries via the Czech ammunition initiative are also planned for 2025, I sincerely hope that a high three-digit million sum will be invested in a renewed funding.
Last year, Germany was by far the largest donor with €576 million and was therefore able to deliver 180,000 155mm shells to Ukraine within about half a year. In fact, these deliveries accounted for the majority of German artillery ammunition supplies in the past year.
Further details on the package will certainly be published in the coming days and weeks as soon as the financing for the package has been finalised and the contracts concluded.
If you liked this post, consider following me on X, Bluesky, or Telegram. If you like, you can also leave me a tip on Ko-fi.