{"id":130153,"date":"2025-05-25T08:12:20","date_gmt":"2025-05-25T08:12:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/130153\/"},"modified":"2025-05-25T08:12:20","modified_gmt":"2025-05-25T08:12:20","slug":"germanys-afd-wants-to-copy-hegseths-warrior-culture-in-the-bundeswehr-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/130153\/","title":{"rendered":"Germany\u2019s AfD wants to copy Hegseth\u2019s \u2018warrior culture\u2019 in the Bundeswehr \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe need fighters,\u201d Gnauck said. \u201cWe don\u2019t need CEOs with gender advisers in every staff company \u2014 we need men and women who can lead, fight, and defend our country.\u201d<\/p>\n

His comments track closely with the views of Trump\u2019s current defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, who has vowed to strip the U.S. military of progressive reforms and reinstate traditional values.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since entering the Pentagon under Trump\u2019s second administration, Hegseth has slashed diversity programs and promised to restore what he calls a \u201cwarrior ethos.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

Gnauck mocked climate-friendly upgrades in Bundeswehr barracks as a symptom of misplaced priorities. \u201cClimate protection instead of combat readiness \u2014 that\u2019s madness,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is pure green ideology.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also criticized the current state of troop accommodations: \u201cEvery soldier has their own room, Wi-Fi, a TV \u2014 but no space for camaraderie. Soldiers are not hotel guests. They need weapons, vehicles, and a community they can rely on.\u201d<\/p>\n

The AfD \u2014 the largest opposition party in the Bundestag following Germany\u2019s February election \u2014 has also doubled down on its rejection of arms deliveries to Ukraine. Gnauck warned against Germany’s being drawn into \u201cproxy wars\u201d and accused the government of \u201cbleeding the Bundeswehr dry\u201d to serve foreign interests.<\/p>\n

Germany is the No. 2 donor of military aid<\/a> to Ukraine after the United States, and the government of Chancellor Friedrich Merz has vowed to continue shipping weapons to Kyiv as the U.S. under Trump shows signs of withdrawing from the conflict.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe need fighters,\u201d Gnauck said. \u201cWe don\u2019t need CEOs with gender advisers in every staff company \u2014 we…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[2766,473,32,2000,7704,299,1945,1824,2597,8723,602,657,49,335,1116],"class_list":{"0":"post-130153","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-culture","9":"tag-defense","10":"tag-donald-trump","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-eu-us-military-ties","13":"tag-europe","14":"tag-friedrich-merz","15":"tag-germany","16":"tag-military","17":"tag-pentagon","18":"tag-pete-hegseth","19":"tag-ukraine","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-war-in-ukraine","22":"tag-weapons"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114567469418045552","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}