(de-news.net) – Several politicians of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) have advanced a critique of the Federal Republic’s extant security and defence paradigm, with particular emphasis on recalibrating relations vis-à-vis the Russian Federation. Substantively, the manifesto advocates a phased détente and the resumption of cooperative frameworks with Russia, while denouncing further militarisation. It urges intensified diplomatic initiatives aimed at expediting a cessation of hostilities in Ukraine, recommends re-prioritising defence policy away from competitive armament and toward strictly defensive capabilities, and proposes reallocating fiscal resources from military expenditure to poverty alleviation and climate-protection measures, emphasising the disproportionate impact of ecological degradation on socio-economically marginalized populations. Moreover, it warns that the deployment of United States hypersonic missile systems on German territory would render the Federal Republic a target in any prospective confrontation.
Prominent signatories include former parliamentary leader Rolf Mützenich, foreign-policy specialist Ralf Stegner, as well as former party chair Norbert Walter-Borjans. Stegner described the document as a catalyst for public deliberation, asserting that peace policy ought not be monopolised by military technocrats and cautioning that excessive defence expenditure to the detriment of social priorities would provide fertile ground for populist mobilisation.
The manifesto has elicited pronounced resistance within the SPD itself. Foreign-affairs spokesperson Adis Ahmetovic contended that the document deviates substantively from both party and parliamentary-group resolutions, further deeming its principal arguments epistemically tenuous. Domestic-policy spokesman Sebastian Fiedler registered marked dismay, indicating that the call for renewed diplomatic engagement with Moscow engendered frustration and disquiet. Reinhold Robbe, former Parliamentary Commissioner for the Armed Forces, repudiated the manifesto as temporally anachronistic, asserting that it disregards the post-2022 transformation of Europe’s security architecture precipitated by Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.
Criticism has likewise emanated from Bündnis 90/Die Grünen. The defence-policy spokesperson of the party, Agnieszka Brugger, maintained that the strategy delineated in the text would not compel the Kremlin to terminate its conduct. The far-right Alternative für Deutschland, on the other hand, expressed approbation of the manifesto.
