I’ll Issue Putin an Ultimatum—End the War In 24 Hours or I’ll Supply Ukraine With Taurus Missiles, Says German Chancellor Candidate Merz : ukraine

[-] jagermo@feddit.org 87 points 2 days ago

Don't trust him. Merz is and always has been a bullshitter. He is angling for votes.

[-] TheYang@lemmy.world 43 points 2 days ago

Is there any hint of a reason why Putin would ever be scared of Taurus missiles?
from a glance, they look very equivalent to the british storm shadows Ukraine already gets.

Not that Germany shouldn't supply, it just seems that this ultimatum is a purely political idea about the upcoming german elections.

[-] Zementid@feddit.nl 17 points 2 days ago

Merz ist a Joke and he will most certainly not pull through if the Trump Administration interferes. Just another US Puppet, which in Turn is a Russian puppet... so yeah, just a stunt.

[-] woelkchen@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago

Also, what would even be the end of the war? By Putin logic complete and unconditional surrender by Ukraine would also be the end of the war.

Merz's threat is not "fuck off behind 1991 borders within 24 hours". Complete smoke and mirrors shitshow.

[-] PugJesus@lemmy.world 153 points 3 days ago

Please.

[-] Hubi@feddit.org 158 points 3 days ago

Don't get your hopes up. Merz would sell his own mother if it raised his chances of getting elected. He's just listening to what's unpopular about the current government and claiming to do whatever is the exact opposite. A lot of it is just hot air from yet another populist.

I expect him to continue support for Ukraine though, so that's good at least.

[-] PugJesus@lemmy.world 89 points 3 days ago

Hell, I'm in support of Merz selling his own mother if it means more support for Ukraine.

... I may be in a dark place right now.

[-] oce@jlai.lu 28 points 3 days ago

Plot twist: his mom is the youth sweetheart of Putin from his vacations in East Germany, the break up is what turned him into a violent autocrat, her return could heal his little broken heart and make him the tsar of love and harmony.

[-] Siegfried@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago

Space opera material

[-] Hadriscus@lemm.ee 9 points 3 days ago

without the space

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[-] Cethin@lemmy.zip 14 points 3 days ago

That's OK. If this. Message is popular it pushes his opponent in this direction too.

[-] Saleh@feddit.org 4 points 1 day ago

There is only two opponents to Ukraine aid in the current federal parliament. The neoliberal FDP who just got booted out of the government and wanted to use Ukraine aid to ransom away social security, infrastructure investments and work towards mitigating climate change, and the fascist Putin financed AfD. The FDP is Merz favorite potential next coalition partner, if they should make it to parliament again. The AfD is what Merz is working towards since three years, but cannot make a coalition yet, because he needs to work more on normalizing them first. This currently happens on local and state level.

Merz is only been "pro Ukraine" because Scholz messed up regarding Taurus missiles and because the FDP used it as ransom to ruin other aspects of the state budget. Merz focused on this message as a driving wedge in the dysfunctional, now broken coalition. There is little reason to believe, that he is genuinely caring about Ukraine, or that he would make that a deciding factor in coalition negotiations.

[-] MrMakabar@slrpnk.net 7 points 2 days ago

Honestly Merz does a lot of shit, but he is for pro Ukranian action, which is relativly unpopular. The issue is more, that he has never been in government and a lot of his other ideas are horrible.

Also the CDU is in parts very pro Russia. Kretschmer comes to mind.

[-] woelkchen@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago

Honestly Merz does a lot of shit, but he is for pro Ukranian action, which is relativly unpopular.

It's not unpopular, the Putin bootlickers just shout louder. The majority still approves supporting Ukraine: https://koerber-stiftung.de/presse/mitteilungen/deutsche-wollen-mehr-in-europaeische-sicherheit-investieren/

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[-] mavu@discuss.tchncs.de 9 points 2 days ago

what a muppet.

[-] zephorah@lemm.ee 53 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

It’ll be interesting to see how much the Allies game kicks up in the next 2 months now that the Orange Potato and Elon Musk were elected President.

I hope it’s effective.

[-] Nurgus@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago

The new fragrance, Orange Potato Musk. Mmmmmm

[-] zephorah@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

Now I’m trying to figure the bottle and cologne ad for Orange Potato Musk.

[-] Lupus@feddit.org 121 points 3 days ago

Merz says a lot of things when the day is long, especially when elections are getting closer.

[-] GrymEdm@lemmy.world 25 points 3 days ago

Thank you for the perspective.

[-] mistermanko@lemmy.world 47 points 2 days ago

[removed by mod]

[-] barsoap@lemm.ee 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Just for the record, and context: That wasn't misogyny, it's not calling any woman anything (though using a word vulgarly referring to female genitalia), it's the established insult for Merz. Really doesn't translate well, not so much word-wise but connotation and implication-wise. Cf. the American vs. English vs. Australian usage of the word, doesn't translate at all and that's within the same language.

It's an imputed high-school nickname calling him, in my reading, an immature braggart. You know, 12yold brags about their extensive sexual experience, gets called "pussy hunter" in return to make fun of him. There's also the additional linguistic quibble that the word, to the amusement of the rest of the republic, simply means "face" in Bavarian and can be used there more or less in the sense of "gob", as in "shut your gob". He indeed has a big one.

[-] slaacaa@lemmy.world 39 points 2 days ago

“I am also willing to promise anything to get elected”

slaacaa (LM-MY)

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[-] LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago

We are in WW3.

[-] Jumi@lemmy.world 14 points 2 days ago

Halt dein Maul, Merz!

[-] Don_alForno@feddit.org 19 points 2 days ago

Wow. The same "we'll easily end this war" bullshit that Trump is spewing. That didn't take long.

When this moron takes over (and he will), it's gonna get real bad.

[-] SkyezOpen@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

"End the war or I'll arm the shit out of Ukraine" is different from "end the war please daddy I'll let you have half of Ukraine."

Sounds like this guy is a piece of shit though so who knows.

[-] ristoril_zip@lemmy.zip 30 points 3 days ago

if something like this works (I am guessing only if many EU countries follow suit) then maybe us Americans can suffer 4 years of Trump in exchange for Ukrainian freedom.

[-] P00ptart@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

As an american, I'll suffer the bullshit that the right does, if it means Ukraine gets to still exist. Give me some of their pain. I wish I could take that for them.

[-] psmgx@lemmy.world 37 points 3 days ago

Noise from a political candidate who will do something if and when he gets elected.

To quote the Spartans, "If".

Glad to see someone in Europe is growing some balls about standing up to Russia though

[-] cjk@discuss.tchncs.de 15 points 2 days ago

sorry to break it to you, but Merz is a populist. He will tell you everything to get voted.

And, frankly, he is a real dickhead. The little Trump of Germany.

[-] RisingSwell@lemmy.dbzer0.com 13 points 3 days ago

The Spartans got annihilated so maybe not a great group to quote.

[-] circuscritic@lemmy.ca 28 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Oh I'm sure the thought of two dozen cruise missiles will straighten Putin out ASAP.

For starters, this would not be a new or unprecedented capability for the Ukrainians.

If Germany had several hundred to part with immediately, and the capacity to regularly replenish those stocks, that would make a significant difference on the battlefield, but I doubt it would make Putin sue for peace.

But of course, Germany does not have those kind of stockpiles or manufacturing capacity to maintain that.

Still, it would be nice to see more European politicians picking up the banner of supplying Ukraine in the face of likely diminished, or eliminated, American transfers.

[-] nexusband@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago

Oh, believe me...we have that manufacturing capabilities. I live near where parts of Taurus are made... It's just that there's no "demand" and the bundeswehr doesn't have enough money to just order them to stockpile.

[-] circuscritic@lemmy.ca 12 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Capability and capacity are two very different things.

Yes, I understand the manufacturing capability exists, but it's capacity is limited i.e. existing facilities could not maintain a strategically significant production volume relative to Ukraine's needs, much less to deter Putin.

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[-] kreskin@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago

Finally some leadership. Biden has been slow walking aid this entire war, to Russia's benefit.

[-] zyratoxx@lemm.ee 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Let's see how big on words he is once he's out of opposition. Either way his leadership comes at the cost of him being a 90s style neo libertarian with his own private plane. Other than that he is conservative through and through.

So (I) expect no big investments into health care, education, green technology or public transport but more in tax cuts for the wealthy and investments into "new and revolutionary technologies that will solve all our problems for sure bro" and individual transport infrastructure (which tbh would actually be needed since the German infrastructure is in a pretty bad state with a lot of highway bridges being at the end of their life cycle but on the other hand schools and healthcare are in dire need of investments too). And for all the problems we just blame migrants and strengthen right wing populist positions.

Soo yeah, not really happy with him, not really happy with anyone else atm.

[-] kreskin@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

ah, wasnt aware he was a conservative. Thats unfortunate. Lately it seems like all the conservatives are paid off by Putin-- this one seems to have not gotten his check.

[-] zyratoxx@lemm.ee 1 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

Germans actually have a great ideological variety to choose from:

Pro West right wing conservatives

Anti West right wing conservative fascists

Pro West right wing progressives

Pro West left wing progressive social democrats

Pro West left wing progressive greens

Neutral but more anti west leaning left wing progressives (I think they are pro EU but anti NATO and anti war)

Anti West left wing conservative putin dickriders

Too bad they are either unsympathetic or have proven to be incompetent.

[-] A_A@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

The Taurus KEPD-350 is a German-Swedish air-launched cruise missile, manufactured by Taurus Systems ... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taurus_KEPD_350

[-] xkbx@startrek.website 12 points 3 days ago

Makes sense, that’s such a Taurus thing to do

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[-] DudeImMacGyver@sh.itjust.works 18 points 3 days ago

Wow, I thought I was on NCD for a second.