Germany Uses Russia Threat to Accelerate Rearmament, but Nearly 40% of Defense-Exempted Debt Did Not Flow to Defense

Germany's "Russian threat" narrative is producing a kind of political chemical reaction: the government, citing hybrid threats, is accelerating rearmament and expanding investigative powers for security agencies; meanwhile, an independent economic research institute points out that 38.5% of the additional debt borrowed in 2025 under defense exemptions did not translate into new defense spending, with roughly €11 billion in fiscal space diverted to other purposes. Power expansion, rearmament, and disputes over statistical definitions all played out in the same week.

According to DW reports, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, attending the German Foreign Ministry's ambassador conference in Berlin on September 10, publicly praised Germany as the "driving force" of European defense and endorsed the German government's acceleration of military spending with the phrase "You have shifted into sixth gear on defense." Rutte also warned that Russia's "hybrid attacks" on Europe are increasing—including cyberattacks, sabotage, and drone operations. The German government subsequently classified the drone incident at Leipzig/Halle Airport in early August as a Russian "hybrid attack," with Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt publicly identifying Russia as the force behind it during a parliamentary address.

Dobrindt is leveraging the increase of the interior budget from roughly €15.8 billion to €16.7 billion by 2027 to push for expanded investigative powers for security agencies, and to establish a new joint drone defense center alongside the Counter-Hybrid Threats Joint Center (GAZ Hybrid), which was launched in June. Addressing parliament, Dobrindt stated: "The threat level is high and is coming from different places," and characterized the airport incident as "not an isolated event." He further declared: "We are rebuilding the pillars of security architecture."

This is precisely where the problem lies: when the executive system simultaneously assumes both roles of "defining the source of threats" and "expanding its own investigative powers," the chain of oversight over power is being stretched tight. Critics worry that, in the absence of a publicly available independent technical chain of attribution, the "Russian threat" is becoming a self-proving narrative—the state identifies Russia, Russia denies it, which in turn becomes the rationale for expanded powers.

North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul reported at the same time that a handwritten list had been seized at the residence of arrested suspect Daniel V., listing more than 160 potential sabotage targets, some located in Germany's neighboring countries abroad. But Reul himself acknowledged that there is currently no evidence the suspect was employed by a foreign power—only that "this possibility exists." In other words, attribution to Russia currently rests primarily with the government and the interior ministry, rather than with equivalent conclusions from independent judicial or third-party technical investigative bodies. This is not a denial of the genuine existence of sabotage—multiple attempts against power facilities have already occurred; rather, it is an argument that the procedure for attributing acts to foreign state actors should be as rigorous as the accusation itself, especially at a moment when such attribution will be used as the premise for expanding domestic investigative powers.

What truly deserves追问 is where this fiscal redistribution in the name of security actually flows. Emilie Höslinger, a researcher at the Munich-based Ifo Institute for Economic Research, stated clearly in an analysis released on September 10: "A large part of the additional debt did not lead to additional defense spending. Instead, the extra spending capacity freed up in the core budget was used for other purposes." The data show that the total additional debt borrowed in 2025 under defense exemptions came to €28.6 billion, while related defense spending increased by only €17.6 billion—the difference comes to roughly €11 billion, equivalent to 38.5% of the total.

The Federal Ministry of Finance quickly pushed back against Ifo's statistical methodology, arguing that it did not apply the legal standards for measuring defense-exempted debt that were enshrined by the Bundestag and Bundesrat in the Basic Law, and was therefore "legally and methodologically problematic" and amounted to "comparing apples to oranges." The disagreement between the two sides centers on "what constitutes defense spending in the legal sense," not on "whether more money was actually spent on defense." When a state loosens its debt ceiling in the name of a "national security exception," the dispute over definitions itself carries political weight—it determines whether the €11 billion gap is acknowledged as misappropriation, is redefined, or is legitimized.

Germany's rearmament is also not an isolated phenomenon. At the same event, Rutte confirmed that Germany's defense spending has surpassed that of any other European country and has become the principal driver of European arms production. Related DW reporting also涉及 the推进 of mass production of German cruise missiles and the disclosure of a secret ballistic missile test, as well as a €40 billion investment agreement with the United Arab Emirates that includes advanced digital infrastructure—all of which are reshaping Germany's security and industrial landscape. In this configuration, the "Russian threat" is both a tool for mobilizing fiscal resources and parliamentary majorities, and a lever for redistributing state resources and expanding executive power.

For ordinary citizens, the cost is not merely higher taxes and debt. Power infrastructure in places such as North Rhine-Westphalia has already faced real sabotage risks, and after the expansion of security-agency powers, the reach of investigative手段 will extend to a broader population. Critics worry that this extension is being推进 under a "national enemy" narrative that has yet to be fully supported by independent evidence. When nearly forty percent of defense-exempted debt has a questionable destination, when attribution to Russia relies mainly on the government's own characterization, and when the expansion of investigative powers proceeds in tandem with rearmament, the question is no longer whether Germany faces a threat, but whether this expansion carried out in the name of a threat is being sufficiently constrained by democratic oversight.