Germany’s defence chief says the level to which Russia is building up its military, which he categorized as an “imminent threat,” is deeply concerning to him.
“What we’re seeing is that Russia is ramping up, that Russia is really getting into new structures, that they are producing more and more main battle tanks, that they are using more battle tanks, not only in the field in Ukraine, but they’re also putting it into depots,” Gen. Carsten Breuer told CTV’s Question Period host Vassy Kapelos, in an exclusive interview airing Sunday.
“And this scares me. This makes me afraid,” Breuer added. “This is really an issue which we have to consider.”
Breuer was in Ottawa this week to meet with Canadian chief of the defence staff, Gen. Jennie Carignan.
The three-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is just two weeks away, and with the re-election of President Donald Trump in the United States, coupled with at-times perilous comments the latter has made about NATO and the war, European leaders are left wondering what impact his second term could have on the war.
When asked by Kapelos how he would classify the current threat level to Europe that Russian President Vladimir Putin poses, Breuer likened it to looking out your front door and seeing a “a wildfire on the other side of the fence.”
“You see the fire, you feel the heat, you smell the smoke, and you also feel it in your eyes, it’s not that much away,” he said. “And this is the situation.”
Behind only the U.S., Germany has provided the most in military aid to Kyiv since the war began.
Germany’s top soldier said Russia is increasing its military personnel levels with the goal of having 1.5 million people within the next year. He said that’s double the strength of Russia’s pre-war military staffing.
“It tells me that, getting these structures together, getting this amount of war materiel together, that it’s not only against Ukraine, that it’s hitting more, and that the aim for Russia is different on this,” Breuer said.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, meanwhile, has warned the situation in Ukraine is not just about that country.
“The U.S. realises that, the European side of NATO realises that: it is China, North Korea, Iran, all getting connected to Russia,” he said in a speech on Monday. “So this is a geopolitical thing playing out at the moment with Ukraine.”
“And therefore, Ukraine must prevail not only for Ukraine’s sake, first of all, but also because of the geopolitical impact,” he added.
When asked by Kapelos about the view expressed by many NATO allies at the outset of the conflict, that Putin has no intention of stopping his territorial expansionism at Ukraine, and whether that’s still a widely held concern, Breuer said: “it’s even more certain.”
He pointed to Putin’s military depots and signs he’s building up capacity, as well as the rhetoric by the Russian president and his top officials, as proof of “the possibility and also the intention coming together,” calling it “worse” than at the outset of the war in 2022.
The Associated Press is reporting Moscow is set on gaining as much territory as possible while the Trump administration calls for negotiations to end the conflict.
The U.S. State Department has also paused nearly of its all foreign-aid programs for 90 days, including to Ukraine. It’s still providing military aid, however, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as reported by The Associated Press.
Breuer said European and Western countries’ “freedom and peace are at stake,” so they must “stand together” to support Ukraine, “especially financially.”
