Conversation between Dr Hans-Christoph Atzpodien, Managing Director of the Federation of German Security and Defence Industries (BDSV), Berlin and Hartmut Bühl, Paris
At the end of July, I met with Dr Hans-Christoph Atzpodien, Managing Director of the Federation of German Security and Defence Industries (BDSV) in Hamburg to talk about Germany’s current security policy and armament orientations and European armament strategies, political choices, and international competition.
Germany’s security and defence policy
We first agreed on the cornerstones of Germany’s security and defence policy: firstly, national and alliance defence within NATO remains the core task of the Bundeswehr. The German armament industry must bear this in mind while observing the European Union’s (EU) influence in this area. Secondly, the focus for the armed forces is on leadership improvement by innovation and digitalisation, with interoperability as a main objective. Thirdly, Germany gained new weight in the EU and NATO after Chancellor Scholz announced the “Zeitenwende” (turning point) in February 2022, with a €100bn special fund to prepare the Bundeswehr for action. Finally, we agreed that Germany’s armament industry will continue its crucial role for the Bundeswehr as a premium customer.
The BDSV, bringing together the voices of 230 members –Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) as well as small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) – and bundling their internal and external supplier’s interest, plays a major role in this field. “We as a lobbying platform care about our members not only in the overarching approach for Europe, but also in specific matters like sustainability and raw materials”, Dr Atzpodien explained.
Lacking an industrial policy strategy
I noted that Germany, in contrast to France, Great Britain, Italy, Spain or Sweden, is still missing an industrial policy strategy, making it difficult for the German armament enterprises to follow a strategic line. Dr Atzpodien confirmed that “we need a German armament policy that particularly protects and consequently strengthens industry’s strategic core capabilities. Political decision-makers should turn to the highly qualified German products and developments all over the armament sectors and their reliable availability”. In his view, Germany started protecting much too late key industrial defence technologies, however, he expressed the feeling that the new Federal Defence Minister Boris Pistorius is moving in the right direction. “Still in many areas the strategic profile for us as industry could be clearer, but overall, we seem to be on the right track!”, he affirmed.
European armament cooperation
I confronted my interlocutor with the statement that European allies find it difficult to tackle joint armament projects with Germany, because too many hindering regulations prevent industries from reacting flexibly and quickly. He confirmed that “we are still missing a clear and consistent strategic direction for our industrial policy towards Europe. How else could one explain that of the 61 first-wave projects of the European Defence Fund (EDF), Germany only has the lead in three of them (while France is leading 17 and Spain 15)?” He added that certain specificities like Germany’s unpredictable export control policy are far away from a European harmonisation and “does not recommend German companies for European cooperation schemes.”
We then discussed the European Defence Agency’s (EDA) supposed leading role in armament cooperation. On this,
Dr Atzpodien was clear: “the EDA has an analysis and coordination function, though the EU doesn’t really have a mandate to create its own capabilities. It must leave this field to NATO and its members.” Here, the EU should assist and support, even with money from the EDF, “but not lead”,
he added.
The EU – a sea power?
We then addressed European naval armament in times of fragile stability in the Indo-Pacific. I noted that maritime capabilities are at the centre of strategic considerations; China is reaching out for influence and hegemony and making its way island by island in the western Pacific; the US, Japan, Australia and Europe are trying to contain this development by rearmament and a diversification strategy in trade. We spoke about the importance of reliably available maritime transport capacities, freely accessible transport routes and ports and a naval sea power, as it is promoted in the
European Maritime Strategy. Dr Atzpodien stated that
“Europe is well positioned in terms of maritime competencies in individual countries, having the most modern maritime technologies on the continent and can be seen as a global maritime actor, but the EU in itself has, of course, no stakes as a genuine maritime actor”.
Competitive European shipyards
My interlocutor mentioned the example of surface vessels, saying that in Europe there are several powerful competitors such as Naval Group (France), Navantia (Spain), Fincantieri (Italy), Damen (the Netherlands), tkMS and NVL/Lürssen (Germany) but also SAAB (Sweden) – all oriented towards the global market. These countries generally use frigate or corvette programmes to strengthen the competitiveness of their shipbuilding industry, even more so when the state is directly or indirectly involved. Dr Atzpodien was bitter about the fact that Germany has not awarded its largest frigate order ever placed to the German shipyards. “Something like this wouldn’t have been conceivable in any other country, a remarkable carelessness towards its own naval industry”, he commented.
When we were switching to the conventional undersea sector, he argued that the prospects for harmonisation in the submarine landscape appear to be far better than in the field of surface vessels. “We already have a broad family of users of German submarines in Europe and NATO (Germany, Norway, Italy, Greece, Portugal and Türkiye), which should trigger the political reflection that new European demands for conventional submarines – like in the Netherlands and Poland – might also be satisfied with German submarines in order to reach the frequently desired harmonisation.” Dr Atzpodien feared that the Federal Government’s reluctance in promoting German submarines more vividly in such projects would end up reducing their industrial strength even in areas where Germany has claimed its own key sovereign technology strongholds.
European land, air and space industries
I did not want to leave out the subject of land, air and space. Dr Atzpodien outlined that, for land, the most pressing issue is to generate European user families for the well-known German products to keep Korean competitors in clear distance. In the air and space domain “the procurement by the German government of the American F-35 fighter jet and Chinook helicopter has so far been digested as a somewhat painful fact but needs to trigger more local content in terms of manufacturing and especially maintenance, so that our Bundeswehr as the client always is in full operational control of the devices”, Dr Atzpodien highlighted. Procurement from outside the EU, and in particular Korean products breaking into the EU market with big numbers, “can end up as strategic risks for German defence industrial core competencies”, he feared.
Conclusion
Summing up our conversation, Dr Atzpodien took the view that the secret for any successful path towards true European armament cooperation must firstly be initiated by the military users and the procuring governments, and not by participating suppliers. “Governments need to clearly define their priorities regarding both their sovereign technology demands as well as their industrial interests.” Regarding Germany, he added: “the 100% privately owned German defence industry has to sustain itself with the helpful support of BDSV but in full competition, while other nations subsidise or support their defence companies strongly.”
