https://sputnikglobe.com/20230128/former-austrian-vice-chancellor-blasts-berlins-extremely-dangerous-decision-on-tanks-for-kiev-1106790491.html
Former Austrian Vice-Chancellor Blasts Berlin's 'Extremely Dangerous' Decision on Tanks for Kiev
Former Austrian Vice-Chancellor Blasts Berlin's 'Extremely Dangerous' Decision on Tanks for Kiev
Sputnik International
Germany announced this week that it would send 14 Leopard 2s to Ukraine as a first step to the eventual delivery of over 100 main battle tanks to the Eastern European country.
2023-01-28T15:20+0000
2023-01-28T15:20+0000
2023-01-28T15:35+0000
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The Scholz government’s reversal of longstanding policy not to send weapons into an active warzone constitutes a dangerous development, former Austrian Vice-Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache has said.The politician pointed out that both Scholz’s Social Democrats and Baerbock’s Greens, who constitute two of the three parties in the "Traffic Light Coalition" government created after the 2021 election, had categorically rejected the sending of German weapons to active warzones before the vote.The former vice-chancellor fears that Russia can now freely characterize Berlin’s actions as those of a warring party, and that the tank delivery might not only escalate the crisis in Ukraine, but threaten to turn the security crisis into a full-blown European war.Strache called for the creation of a “strong German, international and non-partisan peace movement” which can resist further escalation. “We will be able to end the madness of war and prevent the conflict from escalating only through peace negotiations,” he stressed.Heinz-Christian Strache served as Austria's vice-chancellor between 2017 and 2019, and is the former leader of the national-conservative populist Austrian Freedom Party. He resigned as vice-chancellor in May 2019 after being accused of corruption - which he dismissed as illegal entrapment and a "dirty campaign" against him by "mafia" figures and both German and Austrian mainstream media.Germany and its allies plan to send well over 100 NATO tanks to Kiev to replace Ukraine’s losses and prepare the country for a possible spring offensive against Russia, with emboldened Ukrainian officials responding with demands for Western fighter jets and advanced long-range missile systems.Berlin caved to months of US pressure and NATO on tank deliveries on Wednesday, promising to send a company of 14 Leopard 2 A6 MBTs for a start, with Germany and its allies expected to deliver two battalions' worth of Leopards, or 112 tanks total, over time. Along with tanks, Berlin promises to provide training on their operation on German soil, plus ammunition and logistical support.Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov slammed the West’s escalatory step, saying Moscow sees “everything that the [Western] alliance” is doing “as direct involvement in the conflict.” The spokesman nonetheless assured that “the potential” that Western tanks will give to Ukraine’s military “is clearly exaggerated,” and that “those tanks will burn just like any others.”Separately this week, responding to Baerbock’s proclamation that Berlin and its allies are “fighting a war against Russia,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova suggested that this constituted an admission of “a premeditated war,” especially in combination with the admission by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel in December that the 2015 Minsk Agreements on Donbass peace were just a sham designed to buy Ukraine time to build up its military.A German Foreign Ministry spokesman walked back Baerbock’s “war against Russia” comments on Friday, suggesting they were designed to show the “unity” of the European Union, NATO, and G7 in confronting “Russian aggression,” and reiterating that supporting Kiev with weapons “doesn’t make” Germany a party to the conflict.
https://sputnikglobe.com/20230128/almost-60-of-italians-oppose-tanks-other-weapons-being-sent-to-kiev-poll-finds-1106783500.html
https://sputnikglobe.com/20230127/russia-will-turn-all-western-weapons-sent-to-ukraine-into-scrap-kim-jong-uns-sister-says-1106767360.html
https://sputnikglobe.com/20230128/truth-about-tanks-how-nato-lied-its-way-to-disaster-in-ukraine-1106786081.html
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Former Austrian Vice-Chancellor Blasts Berlin's 'Extremely Dangerous' Decision on Tanks for Kiev
15:20 GMT 28.01.2023 (Updated: 15:35 GMT 28.01.2023) Exclusive
Germany announced this week that it would send 14 Leopard 2s to Ukraine as a first step to the eventual delivery of over 100 main battle tanks to the East European country. Washington responded by promising 31 Abrams tanks to Kiev. Moscow slammed the escalatory step, saying it demonstrated the West’s direct involvement in the Ukraine crisis.
The Scholz government’s reversal of longstanding policy not to send weapons into an active warzone constitutes a dangerous development, former Austrian Vice-Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache has said.
“A large proportion of German citizens are truly appalled that the German government of Chancellor [Olaf] Scholz and the Greens’ Foreign Minister [Annalena] Baerbock has agreed to this delivery of weapons and tanks from Germany,” Strache
told Sputnik’s German sister agency, SNA, on Saturday.
The politician pointed out that both Scholz’s Social Democrats and Baerbock’s Greens, who constitute two of the three parties in the "Traffic Light Coalition" government created after the 2021 election, had categorically rejected the sending of German weapons to active warzones before the vote.
Strache lamented that instead of forging a “broad front for a peace initiative and peace negotiations,” Berlin has now “positioned itself here as a supporter of the further escalation of the conflict, which many Germans consider ‘warmongering’ and as an extremely dangerous [development].”
The former vice-chancellor fears that Russia can now freely characterize Berlin’s actions as those of a warring party, and that the tank delivery might not only escalate the crisis in Ukraine, but threaten to turn the security crisis into a full-blown European war.
28 January 2023, 12:37 GMT
Strache called for the creation of a “strong German, international and non-partisan peace movement” which can resist further escalation. “We will be able to end the madness of war and prevent the conflict from escalating only through peace negotiations,” he stressed.
Heinz-Christian Strache served as Austria's vice-chancellor between 2017 and 2019, and is the former leader of the national-conservative populist Austrian Freedom Party. He resigned as vice-chancellor in May 2019 after being accused of corruption - which he
dismissed as illegal entrapment and a "dirty campaign" against him by "mafia" figures and both German and Austrian mainstream media.
Germany and its allies plan to send well over 100 NATO tanks to Kiev to replace Ukraine’s losses and prepare the country for a possible spring offensive against Russia, with
emboldened Ukrainian officials responding with demands for Western fighter jets and advanced long-range missile systems.
Berlin caved to months of US pressure and NATO on tank deliveries on Wednesday, promising to send a company of 14 Leopard 2 A6 MBTs for a start, with Germany and its allies expected to deliver two battalions' worth of Leopards, or 112 tanks total, over time. Along with tanks, Berlin promises to provide training on their operation on German soil, plus ammunition and logistical support.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov slammed the West’s escalatory step, saying Moscow sees “everything that the [Western] alliance” is doing “as direct involvement in the conflict.” The spokesman nonetheless assured that “the potential” that Western tanks will give to Ukraine’s military “is clearly exaggerated,” and that “those tanks will burn just like any others.”
27 January 2023, 16:00 GMT
Separately this week, responding to Baerbock’s proclamation that Berlin and its allies are
“fighting a war against Russia,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova suggested that this constituted an admission of “a premeditated war,” especially in combination with the admission by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel in December that the 2015 Minsk Agreements on Donbass peace were just a sham designed to buy Ukraine time to build up its military.
A German Foreign Ministry spokesman walked back Baerbock’s “war against Russia” comments on Friday, suggesting they were designed to show the “unity” of the European Union, NATO, and G7 in confronting “Russian aggression,” and reiterating that supporting Kiev with weapons “doesn’t make” Germany a party to the conflict.
28 January 2023, 12:00 GMT
