The Threat of Nuclear Rearmament

A Tuesday report on Frontal21, a TV news magazine on the German second TV channel (ZDF), raised the issue of the new tactical nuclear weapons to be stationed in Germany. It is the first time that a prime-time broadcast has addressed the issue of the danger posed by the U.S. policy of nuclear rearmament in Europe. The broadcast has already prompted a statement by the Kremlin and might mobilize public opinion in Germany.

Frontal21 sounded the alarm: In an official Pentagon paper, it is reported that German Tornado aircraft at the Büchel air base will begin to be “integrated” with the new B61 guided nuclear bombs in the third quarter of 2015. The new bombs will replace the old B61 bombs which are still there, but they represent a new capability for tactical nuclear weapons. That is, nuclear rearmament has already begun.

(NB: “Integration” does not mean that bombs are mounted on the planes: It means that planes are being adapted to be equipped with the new bombs. This is the beginning of a procedure in which will see, sometime down the line, the bombs being delivered.)

The broadcast confronted Angela Merkel in a press conference, asking two questions (in the reverse order): “Does the government support nuclear rearmament here in Germany?”

Merkel: “We will talk with U.S.A. about it. Maybe the Defense Ministry has already started, I don’t know. I will inform myself and at the appropriate time we will give you the information.”

ZDF also asked Merkel why she broke the government coalition agreement in 2009, when the CDU and FDP had agreed to force the withdrawal of U.S. nuclear weapons from the Büchel base.

Merkel: “My position in the 2009 coalition agreement was always such, that we should consider the consequences. We must see that if nuclear weapons are stationed in other places and there are none in Germany, then one should ask: Does this better serve security and balance?”

Merkel’s answer covers the fact, revealed by Frontal21, that she double-crossed her coalition partners. In November 2009, she met with security advisors of the U.S. ambassador at the U.S. Embassy. After the meeting, a dispatch was sent to Washington: Merkel does not want withdrawal of nuclear weapons.  “The agreement on the withdrawal of nuclear weapons was forced on the Chancellor’s office by [then] Foreign Minister Westerwelle … it makes no sense to unilaterally withdraw the 20 tactical nuclear weapons.”

Another focus of the TV report was the so-called  “Nuclear Sharing,” a NATO practice by which German Tornados flown by German pilots will be equipped with the B61 bombs and will be ordered to participate in an attack.

Former West German Defense Undersecretary Willy Wimmer recounts how he was involved in the last Wintex-Cimex exercise before the fall of the Berlin Wall, and at one point he was supposed to push the button that would have sent nuclear bombers to annihilate Dresden and Potsdam, then in East Germany. He consulted with the Chancellor and refused to do it, breaking the exercise.

Today, under Nuclear Sharing, German pilots might be asked to drop the new B61 bombs.

A peace activist living near the Büchel base, where the old bombs are stationed and the new bombs will be stationed, is quoted saying: “One could presume that the old B61 bombs would never be dropped, because they should work as deterrent. But the new weapons, as planned, they are built so that one can use them. And this for me makes the danger of a nuclear war much bigger.”

Frontal21 described the new B61 accurately as new weapons. This is therefore a breach of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. They interview a spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, who says: “We are worried that states which do not possess nuclear weapons, train for the use of such weapons, and this in the framework of the NATO practice of so-called Nuclear Sharing. This is a violation of Articles 1 and 2 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.”

Yesterday, the Kremlin issued a response: Spokesman Dmitry Peskov was quoted by Sputnik as saying,

The full transcript of the show, (in German), can be found here.