On Wednesday, the 28th of May, the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy together with a Ukrainian delegation visited Germany under the leadership of the new Chancellor Friedrich Merz for the first time.
Throughout the day, both Chancellor Merz and the German Ministry of Defence, as well as the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence, made various announcements of new military commitments.
According to the German Ministry of Defence, this involves a total of around €5 billion in newly pledged military aid for the coming years, although the funds were already approved by the Bundestag in March, when Scholz was still Chancellor of Germany.
Strictly speaking, therefore, the scope of military aid has not changed because funds have only been converted into specific commitments.
Even though Chancellor Merz’s new line was recognisable on the German side with the communication about this package and far fewer details were published, thanks to various leaks to the media and the disclosure of additional details by the Ukrainian government, we now have a good overview of a large part of the package’s contents.
We’ll have a look at the exact, partly unofficial details in a moment. Firstly, let’s have a look at the commitments that have been officially announced.
- Hundreds of millions of euros for the Ukrainian production of a considerable number of far-reaching weapons systems
- Ammunition packages for various weapon systems
- Land weapon systems
- Firearms
- Four IRIS-T SLM fire units and missiles worth €2.2 billion
- Financing of maintenance facilities in Ukraine
- Financing of a significant part of the Starlink network in Ukraine
- Financing of the Ukrainian military command and control communication system
- Financing of medical equipment from Ukrainian production
Germany participates in the “Danish model”
Last year, Denmark and Ukraine introduced a new mechanism for financing weapons systems, ammunition and more for the Ukrainian army. It is known as the “Danish model”.
The trick is that Ukraine’s supporters do not finance their own defence industry, but rather the Ukrainian defence industry directly. The advantage of this is that equipment can usually be procured at a lower price and delivered to the Ukrainian army more quickly.
Although the Ukrainian government has regularly called on its partners to participate in the Danish model and various countries such as Iceland, Canada, Norway, and Sweden have pledged and contributed their own funds, the German government had not yet made any public commitments to participate in the financing of Ukrainian defence equipment with its own funds.
However, it was already announced in October 2024 that this was planned for the future, meaning that the step that has now been taken was already at least partially prepared when Chancellor Merz took control at the beginning of May.
On Wednesday, the defence ministers of both countries signed a memorandum of understanding that provides for the financing of a considerable number of far-reaching weapons systems from Ukrainian production.
With this step, Chancellor Merz certainly wants to kill two birds with one stone.
On the one hand, thanks to the German contribution, the Ukrainian army is equipped with a large number of additional weapons systems, which it deploys very regularly in attacks on the Russian defence industry and other high-value targets on Russian territory.
On the other hand, Chancellor Merz is no doubt also hoping that this step will silence some of his critics, who have so far made no secret of the fact that he has not yet followed up on his own words with action due to the lack of a commitment to deliver the long-dreamed-of Taurus KEPD-350 cruise missile to Ukraine.
Although Chancellor Merz kept a very low profile when making the announcement, the defence ministries of both countries and a WELT investigation give us a detailed insight into the project.
According to official information, it involves an investment of several hundred million euros, which will bear its first fruits in the coming weeks. In total, a “considerable number” of far-reaching weapons are to be produced over the next six months.
According to a WELT investigation, the German government is investing around €400 million in three different weapon systems.
- AN-196 Liutyi
- Bars
- VB140 Flamingo
The AN-196 Liutyi is a long-range OWA UAV costing around $200,000, or to put it more simply, a drone with an enormous range that can be used once to attack a specific target.
This can also be seen clearly in the added video.
The drones with a range of over 1,000 kilometres are used by, among others, the 14th Regiment of Unmanned Drones of the Unmanned Systems Forces.
The Bars is a newly developed weapon system with a range of up to 800 kilometres. So far, hardly any details are publicly available, so I can’t tell you much more about it.
According to security expert Fabian Hoffmann, the Bars shares the most important specifications with the Pekklo mini cruise missile, meaning that the Bars is more of a mini cruise missile than a drone.
Even if the German government is taking an enormous step in the right direction by financing these two weapon systems and supporters of Ukraine can rightly be pleased about this, it should not be forgotten that this is nevertheless no replacement for the delivery of Taurus KEPD-350.
According to Fabian Hoffmann, Ukrainian drones and cruise missiles now cover up to 90% of all targets. However, Ukraine is still reliant on a supply of Taurus KEPD-350s in particular, but also Storm Shadow and SCALP-EG, given the missing 10%.
The VB140 Flamingo goes in a different direction. This is a so-called interceptor drone, which is designed to intercept Russian reconnaissance drones in the air, among other things.
The use of such drones, which can be produced quickly and cheaply, is much more cost-effective than the use of missiles and is increasingly becoming the norm on the front line. Ukraine in particular has recently been investing heavily in this area, as shown by a research article published by the collective “Tochnyi” in March 2025.
In addition to the projects already mentioned, the German government will also invest an unknown, but certainly not too high, sum in Ukrainian-made medical equipment.
It is an area that is unfortunately easily forgotten, even though the two countries have actually been cooperating relatively closely for many years on medical care and the Bundeswehr Medical Service has not only supported the Ukrainian army extensively with supplies from its own stocks, but also plays a central role in training Ukrainian soldiers in Germany.
The Bundeswehr Medical Service is also involved in providing medical care to Ukrainian soldiers and civilians who are being treated for war injuries in Germany.
The fact that the German government will be financing Ukrainian-produced medical equipment for the Ukrainian army in future is therefore likely to have caused cheers not only in Ukraine, but also in Germany.
Land weapon systems, ammunition packages and firearms
New land weapon systems, ammunition packages for various weapon systems that have already been delivered and firearms have also been pledged. Let’s have a look at them one by one.
Land weapon systems
The term “land weapon systems” is of course very vague and can mean many things. These include main battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, armoured personnel carriers and more. Unfortunately, neither the defence ministries of the two countries nor the media have been clearer about this.
However, I would like to point out that the deliveries of Marder 1A3 IFVs and Leopard 1A5 MBTs financed under former Chancellor Scholz are expected to come to an end this year.
For example, 25 Marder 1A3s are currently still promised to Ukraine, of which at least 20 will be delivered to Ukraine by the end of June 2025, according to Rheinmetall. Subsequently, for the first time in more than 2.5 years, announcements, and deliveries would come to an end.
I would therefore strongly assume that this is about additional deliveries of precisely the land weapon systems, whose deliveries should be completed soon.
However, these are unlikely to be massive orders if you look at the scope of the overall package.
The package is said to be worth around €5 billion in total. Around €2.6 billion is already being invested in a contract with Diehl Defence for the supply of air defence systems and ammunition, as well as in financing the Ukrainian defence industry.
This leaves only around €2.4 billion for various land weapon systems, various ammunition packages, firearms, the financing of maintenance facilities in Ukraine, the financing of a part of the Starlink network in Ukraine and more.
Just for context: in 2024, the Netherlands paid a whopping €400 million for the production of several dozen CV90 IFVs with a subsequent delivery to Ukraine. I therefore very much doubt that several very extensive contracts providing for the delivery of state-of-the-art equipment have been concluded here.
Ammunition packages
As far as ammunition packages are concerned, these are probably also the usual suspects. I am thinking in particular of ammunition for the Leopard 1 and Leopard 2 MBTs and the Marder 1A3 IFVs. Such ammunition packages are already regularly delivered to the Ukrainian army every few months.
In addition, I have three strong suspicions. I assume that additional PAC-2 MIM-104 Patriot missiles and GMLRS rockets for the M142 HIMARS MLRS and its various variants were also part of the package.
Shortly after Chancellor Merz took office, the New York Times reported, citing a source in the US Congress, that the US had authorised the delivery of 125 “long-range artillery rockets” and 100 Patriot missiles from Bundeswehr stocks to Ukraine.
The delivery has since been also confirmed by a diplomat to the Washington Post. In fact, however, it is none other than the Ukrainian President who is “to blame” for the fact that I am now certain that both were part of the package and that a delivery to Ukraine is imminent or has already taken place.
In a recent evening speech, he thanked Chancellor Merz for the recently announced military aid package and the decisions associated with it, also mentioning missiles for the MIM-104 Patriot air defence system.
In fact, however, these were not officially part of the package and, in general, no Patriot missiles have been publicly pledged to Ukraine under the leadership of Chancellor Merz. The last time this happened was in April, when Minister of Defence Boris Pistorius promised 30 missiles from Bundeswehr stocks in Brussels, the delivery of which should have been completed by now.
Taken together, I now consider it very likely that 100 Patriot missiles were actually part of the military aid package. This would of course also mean that the GMLRS rockets are also a part of it.
Interestingly, the New York Times spoke of 125 “long-range artillery rockets”, which is at least in theory not logical. These artillery rockets are usually only available in so-called “launch pod containers”, while each launch pod container holds six rockets.
So if the delivery of 125 rockets was approved, either a single rocket would have to be missing in one of the launch pod containers, which would be very unusual, the newspaper would have to be wrong and Germany would actually deliver 120 or 126 rockets (20 or 21 launch pod containers), or the Bundeswehr would have to give up an enormous part of its own reserves and actually deliver 125 launch pod containers, which would mean a delivery of 750 GMLRS rockets.
To the best of my knowledge, this would be a record delivery.
Finally, I also assume that further artillery ammunition is part of the announced package. The German Ministry of Defence refers to the ammunition packages as deliveries in addition to the artillery ammunition already promised for 2025.
Since Germany not only supplies artillery ammunition to Ukraine, but also ammunition for infantry fighting vehicles, main battle tanks, firearms, grenade launchers and more, highlighting the artillery ammunition only makes sense to me if the new package also contains additional artillery ammunition.
Firearms
As with the land weapon systems and ammunition packages, no details have been announced for the firearms, so we can only guess.
Even if the German government does not draw much public attention to it, it is actually financing very extensive deliveries of firearms, most of which are being used by Ukrainian special forces, but also by the airborne troops.
In recent weeks and months, however, we have come closer and closer to stopping all deliveries.
The contracts concluded under former Chancellor Scholz for the delivery of HK 416 & MK 556 assault rifles, MG4 & MG5 machine guns and more have now all been completely fulfilled. In fact, in the case of the MK 556 assault rifles, even more than the originally planned 5,000 units have now been delivered.
To date, only 16 HLR 338 precision rifles and 39 CR 308 rifles remain publicly pledged. All other originally promised firearms, totalling around 20,000 units, have been delivered in full.
It was therefore urgently necessary to improve the situation with new contracts. In time, we may be able to say what and how much is ultimately supplied. Even if you wouldn’t expect it, soldiers from Ukrainian special forces, who receive a large proportion of the weapons financed by Germany, are not particularly discreet when it comes to showing off their own equipment.
Exceptional extent of air defence
As usual, a great deal of attention was paid to air defence in particular.
Even though Chancellor Merz has not commented on the subject at all and the German Ministry of Defence has only made public that a contract has been concluded with the defence company Diehl (Defence), we still know a lot of details because the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence and the Ukrainian President have commented on the subject in detail on several occasions.
Whether this is secretly a protest against Chancellor Merz’s new communication guidelines or whether classified details have been unintentionally revealed on several occasions is for everyone to decide for themselves. I do find it a little suspicious.
According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence, a contract (financed by Germany) was concluded with the defence company Diehl Defence for the delivery of four IRIS-T SLM fire units including missiles worth €2.2 billion.
This brings the total number of IRIS-T SLM fire units already delivered and still pledged to 20!
Ultimately, this should also secure deliveries for another year, which in my estimation means that a constant flow of new and state-of-the-art air defence systems from Germany will be ensured until at least the end of 2027.
Although it has not been officially announced, it can be assumed that two additional IRIS-T SLS launchers will be integrated into each of the four fire units. This follows the standard practice for all previous deliveries to Ukraine.
Finally, I would like to point out what I consider to be a very special circumstance. As already mentioned, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence has announced that the contract also includes the delivery of missiles and has a total value of €2.2 billion.
At a price of around €140 million (as of 2022) per fire unit and a smaller amount for a total of eight additional IRIS-T SLS launchers, I put the price tag at a maximum of €600 million. Even if you are a little more generous and factor in a price increase for the fire units, you don’t even come close to half the total scope of the contract.
As a comparison: the Bundeswehr paid just around €950 million for its six IRIS-T SLM fire units including 216 missiles. Meanwhile, Ukraine is getting two fire units less and the bill ends up being more than twice as high!
I can therefore only draw one conclusion. This contract will build up additional production capacities and/or ensure deliveries of missiles in enormous quantities. I am talking about quantities that we have never seen before in terms of deliveries to Ukraine by Germany.
Maintenance facilities in Ukraine
According to the German Ministry of Defence, the German government will also finance maintenance facilities in Ukraine in the future.
In view of the fact that various weapon systems supplied by Germany have been suffering from long downtimes since the very beginning, which are partly due to the fact that the material first has to be transported out of Ukraine and then transported back to Ukraine after repair, this is a huge step in the right direction!
According to WELT, KNDS is to be awarded a contract to carry out maintenance work in Ukraine. On the German side, the company is responsible for the PzH 2000, Gepard SPAAGs and ATF Dingo 2 supplied by Germany, among other systems.
The German company Quantum Systems, which has delivered around 700 Vector UAVs to Ukraine on behalf of the German government, also received funding for its Ukraine-based facility and the expansion of production capacities.
A Quantum Systems official confirmed this to me, without wanting to go into details due to the new communication guidelines of the German government under Friedrich Merz.
However, it will certainly involve the doubling of the Ukrainian production capacities of the company, which announced its plans three months ago.
Germany commits to satellite communication
Last but not least, let’s have a look at what was announced first and foremost during the Ukrainian president’s visit.
In a joint press conference with President Zelenskyy, Chancellor Merz announced that Germany will finance a “significant portion” of the Starlink network in Ukraine.
Starlink is an entirely irreplaceable instrument for Ukraine, both on the battlefield for its own army and beyond the battlefield, the loss of which would be very difficult to cope with.
Jakub Janovsky, head of the Oryx project, who has been working in the field of telecommunications for over a decade, told me that he estimates that around 70,000 Starlink terminals are currently being used by the Ukrainian military, most of which are paid for by Poland and the US.
However, according to Janovsky, both the funding from Poland and the funding from the US are secured for the foreseeable future. For example, it was recently announced that the US funding will continue until 2027.
In his professional opinion, Germany might therefore cover the costs of several thousand terminals that are not paid for by Poland and the US and have so far been paid for by various individual sources. This would secure previously unclear funding arrangements.
The German government could also finance special services related to the satellite network of the US company SpaceX. These could include technical adjustments that become necessary due to Russian jamming.
Additional money could also be paid to ensure that Ukraine enjoys the highest priority level of customer service. In addition, the German government could also finance other special services related to the operation of the network in a war zone.
The costs that Germany will have to bear have not been made public, but they can be roughly estimated. In March 2025, the Polish Ministry of Digitisation announced that it had paid around €77 million for the procurement and operation of 24,560 Starlink terminals between 2022 and 2024. A further €18.3 million in operating expenses are planned for 2025.
The total amount of German funding is therefore likely to be in the high single-digit or low double-digit million range.
With the funding that will soon be provided, the German government is further expanding its ambitions in the field of satellite communications. In addition to the new Starlink funding, the bill for the OneWeb satellite network in Ukraine, which consists of less than 1,000 terminals, has already been paid by the German government for more than a year. In addition, 331 Satcube terminals are also being paid for.
According to Janovsky, neither OneWeb nor Satcube represent a real alternative to Starlink to date. OneWeb currently functions more as a small backup and will need several more years before it can be considered a serious alternative. The situation with Satcube is even worse.
To summarise, the following can be said. Even if the desire for a European alternative is great considering the current relations between the US and Europe, including Ukraine, it is currently only a pipe dream and there is no alternative to financing the satellite network headed by Elon Musk.
Whether the terminals now funded and the possibly additionally funded services are a “significant portion”, as announced by Chancellor Merz, when both the US and Poland are funding a much larger portion, is something everyone will have to decide for themselves.
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