There is a new sense of mutual respect and consideration oozing through Chancellor Friedrich Merz’ governing coalition of the center-right Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU) and the center-left Social Democrats (SPD).
It’s a response to the near fiasco in early July, when the CDU/CSU caucus couldn’t be relied on to support the SPD’s candidate for a new judge for the Constitutional Court, despite an earlier agreement (judges on the court require approval by a two-thirds majority in the Bundestag, Germany’s parliament). All of a sudden, the SPD’s candidate, Frauke Brosius-Gehrsdorf, appeared “too left-leaning” to many Christian Democrats, and CDU/CSU parliamentary leader Jens Spahn had to admit defeat. The vote was called off, and trust between the coalition partners was left badly frayed.
Since then, the two parties and their top echelons have been through some team-building measures. Spahn and his counterpart, the SPD leftwinger Michael Miersch, traveled together to Kyiv by night train. In addition to showing support for Ukraine, the idea was also to get to know each other better. In August, they got together again, selfie and all, for a two-day meeting in the picturesque Bavarian city of Würzburg, with Alexander Hoffmann, the parliamentary group leader of the CDU’s Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), also in attendance. Spahn also called on MPs of both parties who didn’t know each other yet to spend an evening together, “as a team-building exercise, so to speak.”
This month, with parliament returning, Merz practiced this at the top level, working on his close relationship with Vice Chancellor and Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil, who is also the SPD’s co-leader. The chancellor made a point of being in the Bundestag when Klingbeil held his speech on the budget, and behind closed doors on September 21 told his MPs to be kind to their coalition partner, particularly to the finance minister as Klingbeil was “very sensitive” (“sehr sensibel”).
This has worked, up to a point. However, the center-right-center-left combination, once known as a Große Koalition, or GroKo, and for most of the past two decades the default government constellation, is still struggling to become more than the sum of its parts. After it managed, with the help of the Greens, to radically shift Germany’s fiscal policy and pave the way for borrowing and spending big on defense and infrastructure, it now seems to have lost its imagination when it comes to forging the path ahead.
A Return to Conscription?
One example is compulsory military service. The Christian Democrats want it reinstalled, after it was suspended in 2011, by another CDU/CSU-SPD coalition led by Chancellor Angela Merkel. There are various problems: It would only apply to men—to include women, a constitutional change would be required, which would mean that the government would need the Greens and the far-left Left Party to support it, which is unlikely. And the SPD doesn’t want an immediate return anyway.
So, a new law, passed in late August is following the “Swedish model” of sending out questionnaires to all men turning 18 (and women, too, who, however, are not required to answer) whether they’d be interested in serving in the Bundeswehr. This is supposed to start in 2026, and from July 2027, compulsory medical examinations for 18-year-old men are to be reintroduced. This is all supposed to help the armed forces reach their personnel goal of increasing from the current 182,000 to 260,000 soldiers by 2035, the number required to fulfill all the tasks and missions Germany has pledged to NATO.
The CDU/CSU keeps banging on about bringing back conscription now. What really worries the Bundeswehr, however, is not so much reaching the targets, but that Germany has next to no fit-for-purpose reserves. Therefore, one wonders why the government, especially the CDU/CSU, are not changing tack and thinking about quicker and more successful ways of rapidly building up a—voluntary—reserve. It would be a much more effective way of making German society more resilient and, backed up with an innovative communication campaign, carry the notion that strengthening Germany militarily is an all-society endeavor much more forcefully that trying to coerce Germany’s dwindling number of 18-year-olds into the Bundeswehr.
In the Doldrums
Perhaps even more worrying is the lack of ideas when it comes to economic policy. Economy Minister Katherina Reiche—Merz’ third choice after CDU Secretary General Carsten Linnemann and Spahn both chickened out—seems almost exclusively concerned about rolling back the policies of Germany’s green energy transformation that her predecessor, Robert Habeck, set in motion. Reiche’s “back to the future” is unlikely to generate much in way of growth or innovation.
Germany’s leading economic research institutes expect 0.2 percent GDP growth for this year —after two years of recession—and 1.3 percent for 2026, mostly as an effect of the infrastructure spending. They warn that Germany’s economic recovery is standing on “shaky ground.” With the United States’ new protectionism and economic coercion putting Germany’s “export model” under stress and a second “China shock” looming that could badly hit Germany’s competitiveness, the Merz government has yet to find convincing answers as to what could keep Germany’s economy going longer term.
The option of pushing for a deepening of the EU’s single market seems not to be a priority, even though it’s Europe’s best hope for returning to greater growth. Indeed, the Merz government’s European policy is overall still underdeveloped.
This is also true when it comes to Franco-German relations. With Merz presenting himself as a more congenial partner for French President Emmanuel Macron after the lack of a personal spark between Macron and Merz’ predecessor, Olaf Scholz, there were high hopes for a revival of the Franco-German “engine.”
However, the one big project both nations were supposed to pursue together, the ill-fated Future Combat Air System (FCAS), which was to produce the fighter jet-cum-drones of the (far away) future is close to falling apart, and there seems to be little idea about what could possibly replace it. An extension of France’s nuclear umbrella seems to have dropped down on Merz’ agenda. With Macron’s second and last term ending in spring 2027, the window of opportunity will be closing fast.
Time for Germany’s government to usher in some new thinking. Indeed, Merz has taken the lead by suggesting using Russia’s frozen assets to provide Ukraine with an interest-free loan of €140 billion (per a Financial Times op-ed, published on September 25). He was following advice that his predecessor as party leader, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, had offered him in our pages back in May. It would be great if this were the first of many more initiatives to come, leaving Germany’s old, often unimaginative thinking behind.
Henning Hoff is executive editor of INTERNATIONALE POLITIK QUARTERLY.
