Beautiful German weapon sale of the week.
Because somebody has to admire them.
Tag Archives: Pacifism
Greece
Beautiful German weapon sale of the week (this time with extra added bribery).
Because somebody has to admire them.
Israel
Beautiful German weapon sale of the week.
Because somebody has to admire them.
Israel is seeking to buy advanced missile boats from Germany to protect drilling operations in its offshore natural gas fields.
Saudi A.
Beautiful German weapon sale of the week.
Because somebody has to admire them.
Saudi-Arabien ist Hauptabnehmer deutscher Waffen.
“Rethinking German Pacifism”
Would the Germany of today help liberate the Germany of 1944? You don’t need to tap Angela Merkel’s phone to find the answer: It’s no.
Defense-minded politicians in Berlin rail against this picture, arguing that postwar Germany has participated in major military operations. Take Kosovo! Take Afghanistan! Big missions! Don’t be fooled. It is perfectly clear by now that these interventions hardly represent the rule; rather, they are two exceptions from a convenient and holier-than-thou foreign policy attitude, one the Germans have cultivated over the past 70 years.
Jochen Bittner is a political editor for the weekly newspaper Die Zeit.
Bundeswehr Afghan Troops Now Marching Through Leipzig
With nowhere to put their dreaded and battle-tried Bundeswehr troops after the recent pullout from the Afghan province of Kunduz (German troops in Afghanistan are now being reduced from 4,000 to 800), Bundeswehr strategists have decided to use them for what they hope will be the decisive battle between Napoleon’s forces and allied troops from Austria, Prussia, Russia and Sweden instead.
German Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere noted that a victory against the cunning French emperor would be “a turning point not only for the Bundeswehr, but also for German society itself” and would finally prove to the GermanVolk and even the rest of the world out there that the Bundeswehr “will actually shoot at people if they like absolutely, positively have to, but of course only if the UN and Starfleet Command have OK’d it in writing first.”
Thousands of people will don period costumes, mount horses and raise their muskets and sabers to recreate the decisive battle between Napoleon’s forces and allied troops from Austria, Prussia, Russia and Sweden.
Syria
Beautiful German weapons sale of the week – or between 2002 and 2006, I mean.*
Because somebody has to admire them.
*It was only just a few harmless tons of chemicals (111 tons worth) that could have been used to make sarin nerve gas but it was absolutely perfectly legal so don’t anybody out there get all hot and bothered about this, OK? Thanks. I know you wouldn’t.
Gulf States
Beautiful German weapon sales of the week – past six months, I mean.
Because somebody has to admire them.
“German System” Suffering From Irregularity
But only in other countries where “German system” weapons are being exported to, of course.
“How do these weapons end up in places they should not be?” a distressed Deutsche Welle asks with concerned Kulleraugen (big wide saucer eyes). They clearly don’t have proper gun control laws down there in those awful places. Not like we do here in Germany.
For example, in Mexico, police forces in states which are embroiled in a drug war are considered even by the central government as part of the security problem in their regions – nevertheless they have been issued with German-built G36 assault rifles, which can fire up to 750 rounds a minute. Germany’s Economics Ministry, which is responsible for export clearance, in fact sanctioned shipment of the weapons to Mexico – but not to the restive regions. The State Prosecutor in Stuttgart has launched an investigation into the German manufacturer of the G36 assault rifle, Heckler & Koch. The arms company told Deutsche Welle that individual employees, who have since left Heckler & Koch, were to blame for the irregularities.
Germany prides itself on having “strict, even restrictive regulations” for the export of weapons of war.
Kleinvieh Macht Auch Mist
Literally, “small animals make manure, too.” But of course this German idiom means more. What they’re really saying is “every little bit counts.”
And the Süddeutsche Zeitung just found a whole bunch of manure when it brought out a report about German small arms sales. They hit an all-time high in 2012, at more than double the previous year’s sales.
And Germans are really concerned about this (not). Not at all, really. As a matter of fact, as far as I can tell, the only time Germans seem to get concerned about small arms is when one of those crazy Americans goes berserk and uses one to kill a bunch of innocent people again because there is simply not enough effective gun control legislation in that dang dern US-Amerika country of theirs. Legislation aimed at stopping small arms imports from Germany, I suppose they mean.
Exporting small weapons is a contentious issue as they are used to kill far more people than heavy weapons and major military equipment around the world. Amnesty International estimates that 1,000 people die each day from gunshot wounds inflicted by small arms. Owing to their size, they are also the hardest weapons to keep track of, and circulate with comparative ease in conflict zones.
Observing Hermann 