Merz puts the brakes on Taurus deliveries to Ukraine whilst London and Paris step up missile production

Berlin. During his election campaign in early 2025, Friedrich Merz had said that Germany could send Taurus cruise missiles to Kyiv – something Olaf Scholz had always refused to grant. Once in government, however, Merz quickly adopted his predecessor’s stance. Talk of the Taurus missiles had, at a certain point, died down, until just a few hours ago, when British Prime Minister Andy Burnham announced the sharing of British data on the Scalp/Storm Shadow cruise missile, released so that Kyiv and France could manufacture them in Ukraine. The question in Germany therefore becomes: why does Berlin continue to dither over the Taurus missiles?

As reported by Politico, CDU MP Roderich Kiesewetter comments that the UK and France are now “no longer waiting for or relying on Germany”, whilst Berlin should instead commit to deploying its cruise missiles. The Taurus KEPD 350 is a German-Swedish air-to-ground missile with a range exceeding 500 km and a ‘Mephisto’ bunker-busting warhead. Needless to say, the weapon would be invaluable to the Ukrainian army, enabling it to strike deep into Russian territory. Even the former Russian chess player and activist Garry Kasparov has weighed in on the issue: “Where are the Taurus missiles that Merz promised?”, he asked in an interview with the Free Russia Forum. Chancellor Merz has consistently remained vague on the matter, finally stating last March that Ukraine now possesses its own long-range weapons that are both more numerous and more effective than the few Taurus missiles available in the Bundeswehr’s reserves. Germany’s prevarication on certain key issues regarding strategic and military support for Ukraine dates back to the Scholz government, an administration that has always been wary of the idea of angering Moscow with German aid.

In response to the same British authorisation for data sharing regarding the Scalp, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov has now once again levelled accusations of “direct involvement by British missile forces”. These are words lacking in substance, coming from a state that has directly involved the North Korean armed forces in the invasion of Ukraine.

Among the CDU politicians most active in supporting Kyiv, Norbert Röttgen appears to be less critical of Merz. Speaking to Politico, the MP emphasised that the move by the UK and France “enables production” in Ukraine and that Germany is already doing something similar. Since last year, Berlin has in fact been funding long-range weapons on the ground, as part of a package worth around 5 billion euros, as well as supporting the Ukrainian manufacture of deep-strike drones. Then there is Rheinmetall, which has entered the war-torn country directly, setting up its own manufacturing facilities. The German model therefore remains one of financing and co-production, but not of licensing its own systems. Germany is still supplying Iris-T systems, which are very effective against drones and cruise missiles. However, the system Ukraine needs is, as is well known, a different one: the Patriot.

The problem is not the batteries, but the PAC-3 MSE interceptors – the only missiles capable of reliably shooting down Russian ballistic missiles. By 2026, Ukraine has received or will receive just 264 Patriot interceptors, a 60 per cent drop compared to 2023. As President Volodymyr Zelensky points out, Kyiv will need at least 300 interceptors for the coming winter. Washington is sending almost nothing anymore. Donald Trump appears to have gone back on his promise to grant Ukraine a licence for the independent production of the interceptors. In recent weeks, Zelensky has also asked Germany and Poland to help with their own stocks, but Germany’s are reportedly already depleted by its own minimum requirements and NATO obligations. It remains to be seen what scope the US licence granted to Germany to produce Gem-T interceptors will offer Ukraine: these are PAC-2s, which are valuable nonetheless, but they do not fill the gap left by the PAC-3s.

One thing is certain: aid to Kyiv will have to come from Europe, because Washington is playing a different game. The promises from London and Paris point in this direction. Berlin, for its part, continues to display a mixture of newfound initiative and historical caution in the face of Russian threats. At Monday’s summit of willing nations, Merz was formally a co-host, albeit participating via video link. Even regarding the first exercises involving a European multinational force, Berlin has remained vague since July: first it said no, then it said yes, but added that it was still assessing the form its participation would take.