Germany set to ease arms sales to Middle East

Germany's new government is likely to ease arms sales to the Middle East, The National has been told, as UAE-friendly politicians vie for the role of foreign minister.

The coalition deal taking shape in Berlin is set to shift Germany's arms sales policy to focus on defence and economic needs ahead of disarmament and human rights principles, according to a draft text.

Conservative allies of chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz are expected to take over the foreign and economic ministries from the Greens, who led a "restrictive" export policy under the previous government. Arms sales would boost Germany's defence industry as the country rearms to deter Russia.

While Germany sold about $176 million of weapons to Israel and $161 million to the UAE last year, the departing Olaf Scholz government blocked several export licences for Gulf nations such as Saudi Arabia and was accused by friends of Israel of imposing an arms embargo in all but name during the war in Gaza.

"The new government will treat arms exports much less restrictively than the former coalition," arms control expert Marius Bales from the Bonn International Centre for Conflict Studies told The National. "It's all about security, and security was one of the issues of [Mr Merz's party] in its election campaign."

Draft text

A draft document being negotiated between Mr Merz's Christian Democrats (CDU) and Mr Scholz's Social Democrats (SPD) shows them drawing up an arms policy aligned "more closely with our interests" in foreign, economic and security policy. Pledges on arms control could be watered down to one vague paragraph.

The draft calls for a "strategically oriented" arms policy that "provides reliability for the German security and defence industry, its foreign partners and its customers". It says licences should be reviewed more quickly.

In the past it was possible to look past strict arms sales criteria only if there was a "clear security or foreign policy interest", Mr Bales said. "Now you can also bring in this economic interest and this was pushed by the conservatives.

"In the past they have mostly talked about having security interests, Saudi Arabia as our most important security partner, stuff like that. Now they can just say 'we have an economic interest'. And of course most European countries, particularly Germany, have a huge interest in economic co-operation with the Gulf states, particularly since the war in Ukraine."

Germany has exported more than $50 million of arms to Saudi Arabia since 2021, including parts of fighter jets, missiles and flight simulators. But it has also rejected several requests and blocked the sale of Eurofighter jets to Saudi Arabia before softening its position last year.

Israel is Berlin's closest Middle Eastern ally but, under pressure from supporters of Palestine, Germany has been at pains to show it is not giving the Israeli military a blank cheque. It told war crimes hearings in The Hague last year that German ministries were "employing stringent criteria with respect to a very limited supply of war weaponry".

Conservative control

The CDU has vowed to boost Germany's defence industry as Europe looks to deter Russia with or without US President Donald Trump's help. The party's manifesto promised “more reliable” rules for German companies, with defence no longer to be treated as a bogeyman under sustainability and social awareness guidelines.

Merz loyalist Carsten Linnemann is expected to take over Germany's Economy Ministry, which has a crucial role in arms exports. Under the Greens' control, the ministry had described its policy as "restrictive", with most weapons going to Ukraine.

By convention, the Social Democrats would normally take on the Foreign Ministry while the chancellor's party gets defence. But a switch could be on the cards so that popular SPD Defence Minister Boris Pistorius can stay in office, opening up the foreign department for the CDU.

One name doing the rounds is Armin Laschet, a former CDU leader who lost out in the 2021 election to Mr Scholz. Mr Laschet has since forged ties to the UAE, describing it as a "preferred partner" in the Middle East, and founded an Abraham Accords Institute to promote Arab-Israeli peace.

In 2022, Mr Laschet said Germany should not leave the UAE to deal with Houthi attacks unaided. "If the UAE asks for help, Germany should not say 'no, we want more hydrogen, we want more LNG gas, we want you to co-operate with us, but when you want to protect your facilities we Germans will stay outside'," he said.

Recent trips to Syria and Armenia have done nothing to dispel rumours that Mr Laschet is vying for the job. Potentially counting against him are a recent driving ban that revived memories of his gaffe-prone 2021 campaign and the potential for a cabinet with too many men from the Rhineland, Mr Merz being another. (It has also raised a laugh that Mr Laschet and Mr Pistorius look so alike that even defence officials sometimes mix them up).

A second name in the picture is the CDU's Johann Wadephul, an army reservist who has helped to write the defence and foreign affairs sections of the coalition deal. Mr Wadephul said in 2023 that if Germany wanted to take effective measures against the Houthis, it should lift all restrictions on arms exports to Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

In 2022, he told The National that Germany should lead the way in “more strongly tackling and limiting the malign activities of the Iranian regime”. The new coalition could now adopt tougher language on countering Iran's influence.

Any reference to Iran "will certainly be used as a basis for legitimising increased exports to other centres of power in the region", Mr Bales said. He said Germany's planned $500 billion-plus spending spree on upgrading its military and infrastructure "could also be interesting to the countries in the Middle East".

"You invest a lot of money in your own defence industry," Mr Bales said. "There are new jobs, economic growth. But then demand drops again because the security situation in five years may be a different one. Then you will see that German companies will start to beat the drum in the Middle East again and look around for potential recipients."