Thread by @sumlenny

Germany's Chancellor Scholz says today #Taurus4Ukraine are "out of question". He arguments that for Taurus delivery German soldiers must be sent to Ukraine and this is impossible. Numerous experts say Chancellor lies. I agree. Let me remind the timeline of this disgrace THREAD /1

Taurus discussion takes place since Summer 2023 at least. To send Taurus, a decision must be taken by Germany's "Security Council" where Chancellor has saying. Arguments against sending Taurus have never been made public, but Scholz-near politicians dropped numerous ideas /2

Amid those, the fear of escalation was named, the need to program with Germany-delivered geodata, the need to send missiles together with other Western allies etc. (Some of them are dismantled in this interview: ) /3

Still, there have never been announced, what are criteria in the discussion at the "SecCouncil", and how fast a decision will be taken.
In Oct'23, oppositional faction @cducsubt in the Bundestag tried to organise a vote urging Taurus to Ukraine. It was not allowed to voting. /4

@cducsubt Instead of preparing their own proposal, the ruling parties SPD, Greens, and FDP just de facto supported the stalemate. In January, @cducsubt proposed the next voting to urge Chancellor to send Taurus to Ukraine. All ruling parties voted no - together with a far-right AFD. /5

@cducsubt Still, Bundestag's defence committee head @MAStrackZi (FDP) promised that until the end of February, a coalition proposal on Taurus would be ready (also non-binding, but with a chance of getting voted). Argumentation: one may not pressure chancellor, it is controproductive. /6

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi End of Feb, the proposal was ready. It did not mention Taurus at all (surprise!) but "long-range weapons". NONE of coalition's deputies answered a question if Taurus are meant by that. @MAStrackZi voted out of protest for a parallel proposition by @cducsubt with "Taurus" word. /7

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi She was the ONLY ruling coalition deputy who voted for Taurus in the @cducsubt proposal. All other voted no, but supported ruling coalition's proposal without Taurus. They all rejected to say, if this proposal included Taurus. But every time one criticised them, they exploded. /8

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi The argumentation remained the same: do not pressure Chancellor, we do good job, we fight for Taurus, it takes time, and the @cducsubt are populists who are conterproductive and damage the cause. Pfff.
So, now the Chancellor finally says what everyone knows: no Taurus. /9

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi Effectively, this means the following:
1) Scholz personally and his team do not want to support Ukraine with Taurus, they give any arguments;
2) The coalition parties are interested in keeping this government more than pressure Scholz, I do not mention remove him. /10

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi Can Scholz be removed? Yes and no.
German Basic Law (Constitution) does not foresee a parliament-initiated impeachment with new elections. The parliament can only replace a chancellor with another person, but their candidacy must be agreed before voting ("constructive vote") /11

@cducsubt @MAStrackZi For such a vote, one needs majority of votes. The SPD is currently obviously seized by friends of Russia. They will not remove their own Chancellor. So the Greens and the Liberals need to unite with the CDU/CSU. This means Chancellor Merz. And Greens hate Merz more than Putin./12