Pressure grows on Germany on tanks to break Ukraine war stalemate
Allies express frustration as Scholz government weighs next steps
Germany found itself under intense and growing pressure Sunday as the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz weighed whether to authorize the shipment of its coveted Leopard-2 tanks to Ukraine.
Top U.S., Ukrainian and European officials all urged Berlin to act after a meeting of nations supporting Kyiv in its 11-month war with Russia failed to nail down an agreement at a summit at the American military base in Ramstein, Germany, on Friday.
Ukraine says it needs some 300 Western tanks to bolster its forces against dug-in Russian troops in eastern and southern Ukraine, as both sides prepare for expected new offensives when the weather allows.
A new intelligence assessment of the fighting over the weekend from the British Defense Ministry described an increasingly deadlocked struggle in Ukraine‘s Donbas region, with new Russian overall commander Sergei Shoigu reorganizing his forces and apparently settling in for a long, grinding war of attrition.
Germany has balked so far at supplying its own Leopard-2 tanks to Ukraine or authorizing other European countries such as Poland to transfer their own Leopard-2 tanks to Ukraine, in part because of divisions within Mr. Scholz‘s own coalition government and in part for fear the move would prove too provocative to the Kremlin.
Berlin officials have also suggested agreeing to ship the Leopards in tandem with a U.S. move to authorize the heavy-armored M1-Abrahms tank as well, but the Biden administration has rejected that move.
“Today’s indecision is killing more of our people,” Mykhailo Podolyak, a top advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted Sunday. ” Every day of delay is the death of Ukrainians. Think faster.”
A delegation of U.S. lawmakers and former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on visits to Kyiv in recent days also expressed frustration with the delay.



“I am tired of the s—-show of who is going to send tanks and when they are going to send them,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, told reporters.
“To the Germans: Send tanks to Ukraine, because they need the tanks. It is in your interest that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin loses in Ukraine.”
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/jan/22/pressure-grows-germany-tanks-break-ukraine-war-sta/