Armed Forces Association head Col. Andre Wuestner told Reuters in an interview this week that shipping defense resources to the front lines of Ukraine has depleted their already crippled military.

“Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, we had eight brigades at around 65% readiness,” Wuestner said, pointing out that now, “German land forces are down to a readiness of around 50%.”

It’s a grim assessment of the exiting government when national defense is among the country’s top concerns in the Feb. 23 election.

Overhauling the military was a key promise of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, outlined in his Zeitenwende speech, or “Turning Point” in English, immediately following the Russian invasion.

The chancellor proclaimed a new era of German strength through increasing domestic readiness while bolstering the nation’s influence in NATO. This included a $104 billion fund for revitalization efforts, including the outfitting of tens of thousands of troops for a new NATO division.

“We need to strengthen the European part of NATO and further increase defense spending,” Scholz proclaimed as recently as last month alongside NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.

But a lack of sincere passion for the project, coupled with financial woes and other obstacles, has left the revitalization of the German military dead in the water despite the government’s refusal to recognize the matter.

The German Council on Foreign Relations declared in August that Scholz’s Zeitenwende “no longer carries political force and should be abandoned as a term of use.”

“Overall, Germany is not living up to Chancellor Scholz’s promised ‘special responsibility’ for Europe’s success and for European security,” the foreign affairs think tank said. “Too often, Germany has assumed a right to lead, while in fact failing to do so — and also failing to follow the lead of others who have a strategy that is appropriate to the geopolitical situation.”

Scholz’s left-wing government collapsed in December 2024 amid insurmountable infighting and a lack of faith from the German public, triggering this month’s election.

The conservative Christian Democratic Union is expected to take first place, with recent polls showing it winning approximately 29% of the votes.

CDU leader Friedrich Merz, likely the next chancellor, is pushing for Europe to reform and streamline its military weapons system production for efficiency and quality. European countries are in development or operation of 178 separate weapons systems, compared to the United States’s 30.

“These redundancies cost a lot of money and waste potential,” Merz said last month. “I want ‘Made in Europe’ to match the quality and quantity of defense equipment of the USA.”

Second place in the election is likely to go to the Alternative for Germany, a right-wing party that boasts the heavy support of tech billionaire Elon Musk and is polling at 21%.