Russian course: “The SPD must not turn wrong”

I was born in peace. 1972, at a time when Chancellor Willy Brandt fought passionately for his Eastern politics. My mother, born in 1937, experienced terrible things as a child: one of her brothers fell in the very last days before the end of the war, as a sixteen -year -old soldier in a senseless defensive fight. She herself experienced the Red Army in Pomerania, became full oral, and lost her childhood home.

This is also why my mother became a convinced supporter of Eastern politics. She was the daughter of a Prussian officer family and became an anti -militarist through her own war experiences. When, in 1983 at the German Evangelical Church Day in Hanover, the NATO double decision and retrofitting were passionate about the NATO, she was naturally worried the purple necker with the inscription “For a no without any yes to weapons of mass destruction”. And as her 10-year-old son I also had one. It was these family characteristics that, as a young man, made me refuse to serve the weapon and to do community service.

In 1989/90 we experienced the peaceful end of the Cold War and German unity. The American historian Francis Fukuyama even dreamed lightly from the end of history. But the Balkan Narcissuses of the 90s already refuted this thesis and also changed my personal view of things. Wasn’t it necessary to intervene militarily in case of doubt instead of watching people like the slaughter of people like in Srebrenica?

When I moved into the Bundestag in 1998 as a young SPD member of the Bundestag, I had to vote quite soon as to whether the Bundeswehr took part in a military fight in Kosovo. At the SPD party conference on this question, no color bags flew like the Greens against Joschka Fischer, but there were violent discussions.

The Erhard Eppler, perceived by many as a moral instance of the peace movement, promoted with all the effort for use. His arguments were convincing for me. He plausibly explained that sometimes there are decision -making situations in politics that are reminiscent of Greek tragedies: No matter how you decide, you always invite moral guilt.

The decisive factor is what you do with more guilt: if you intervene militarily and thus also risk civilian victims and the life of soldiers or continue to watch that people die in an even greater number than victims of murderous imperialism. So we are not only responsible for what we do, but also for what we fail. I agreed to use it at the time.

My mother died in 2014. This year Putin annexed the Crimea and my daughter was born. Today, in these unsafe and unnecessary times, I wonder as the father of two children and social democratic foreign politicians: Which world are our children growing into? what is today The right German foreign and security policy? How do we actually ensure permanent peace and how do we ensure our freedom?

The answers to these big questions in this confusing world are not easy. It is right that our society and also the SPD People’s Party debate. But ultimately such debates have to be clarified and decided. I know and appreciate many personally who have signed the so -called manifest in the SPD, and I find it wrong to assume unfair motives. Nevertheless, I want to clearly contradict your position.

As a responsible government party, the SPD must not turn wrong. With Federal Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, she will continue the security policy course that Olaf Scholz has taken with the speech in 2022. I also think that the CDU Foreign Minister Johann WadePhul also struck the right tone in the first few weeks of his term. The SPD should not be too good to protect it from the excessive criticism of some media and parts of the CDU/CSU.

One of the foreign policy realities that we have to face is double the turn of the times. The first part of the turning point is and remains Vladimir Putin’s war of attack on Ukraine. Previously, a peace regulations that were largely shaped by the Social Democratic Federal Chancellor Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt were understood. She meant that state borders in Europe must not be postponed by means of military violence. Putin has destroyed this European Peace Ordinance, we are not allowed to make any illusions about this.

For the second part of the turn, Donald Trump is the second term. As European democracies, we experience that we can no longer rely on our most important allies outside of Europe when it comes to our security and freedom. That is why we have to invest more in our own military skills. At the same time, we still have to support Ukraine in its self -defense.

The twice the turn of the times does not mean the end of every diplomacy – on the contrary. For example, it is imperative to get the USA for security guarantees for Ukraine on board in the event of an armistice (which must not be a dictation of Putin). The answer to the twice the turn of the times is not pure thinking in military categories or the end of prudence, which strictly makes sure that this war does not become an irresponsible confrontation between Russia and NATO. The SPD must counter these claims from AfD and BSW with deeds and words.

It is more than annoying when Wagenknecht and Co. draw a falsified picture of Willy Brandt’s Eastern Policy. “Change from approaching” was not “change through pabbing” in the 1960s and 1970s. It was a wise policy that was looking for compensation for peace in Europe in the Cold War without revealing its own democratic values. The Chancellor Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt were not militarists, but also not naive pacifists who neglected our country’s security interests. It was these SPD Federal Chancellor who massively invested in the Bundeswehr’s skills in times of Eastern politics. Eastern politics did not mean dreaming of realities. On the contrary: Rather, Eastern politics meant recognizing realities first, but not to be tidied with the conditions.

If times change, responsible politics must still be able to change themselves. I will never become a militarist out of responsibility for our German history and the history of my own family. Today, of course, I see some things differently than 10-year-old Hubertus Heil with the Lila Halstuch: Helmut Schmidt was right with the NATO double decision! And even today I would probably no longer refuse military service. At the same time, I don’t want to talk like some who used to be absolute pacifists and are now expressing themselves like jagged talk show generations.

I am certain today: A significantly stronger Bundeswehr for state and alliance defense as part of a plausible deterrent is necessary to secure our peace and freedom. Yes, you also have to talk to difficult regimes in this world, but you shouldn’t be able to meet Putin’s aggressive imperialism naive. The desire for peace alone does not create any. Peace demands a lot more hard work, prudence and courageous decisions today.