How the population is indoctrinated and prepared for war

On July 13, 2026, the lawyer, writer, and publicist Dr. Wolfgang Bittner thoroughly analysed German politics of recent years in a lecture. He observes how the state is sliding “from the covid-19 state of emergency as a dress rehearsal into ever greater authoritarianism,” and how the next steps will be “forced digitalization, the criminalization of dissenting opinions, and Berlin’s increasing commitment to a confrontation with Moscow.” “Through cognitive and psychological warfare – also with the help of the media – the population is being primed for war.” Will the masses wake up in time and oppose this? The manuscript of this important lecture can be found below.

The deceived society. How the population is indoctrinated and prepared for war

By Dr. Wolfgang Bittner

Conditions in Germany have fundamentally changed in recent years – driven by political forces: insecurity and fear are rampant, selfishness has replaced empathy, and hatred is directed towards internal and external enemies. This makes it easy for those in power to manipulate the population as they see fit. Among other aspects, excessive digitalization, registration, and surveillance are evident. As is becoming increasingly clear, fear, in particular, is proving to be an effective means of enforcing authoritarian political measures, both among compliant followers and among an indoctrinated, passive population.

This was evident during the corona crisis, in which the executive branch, bypassing parliament, imposed unconstitutional measures by decree. Overnight, enshrined civil rights no longer applied, and the separation of powers was suspended. Chancellor Merkel and the state premiers, excluding parliamentary oversight and disregarding fundamental rights, decided on far-reaching contact restrictions as well as limitations in the cultural, entertainment, and hospitality sectors.

Federal, state, and local politicians imposed contact and curfews, which were readily enforced by neighbours, public order offices, and the police. They decreed bans on gatherings, mandatory mask-wearing, and similar measures; the unvaccinated were harassed and ostracized. Families were confined to their homes, and schools, daycare centres, universities, libraries, recreational facilities, and many businesses were closed, as were offices, factories, and other companies. Public facilities were unavailable for weeks. This created an unreal emergency situation, reminiscent of authoritarian regimes and wartime.

Not only the administration, but also the judiciary proved to be a compliant enforcer of an unlawful government policy, for which the media degenerated into a mouthpiece. Only sporadic outcry arose, which was quickly stifled. Doctors who issued exemptions from vaccinations were caught in the gears of the justice system, even a judge who lifted the mask mandate for children at two schools. His home was searched, he was suspended from his duties, and sentenced to two years in prison, a sentence upheld by the Federal Court of Justice in November 2024.

Shocking events took place. I remember two police officers chasing children who were sledding down a mountainside in violation of the curfew, superiors forcing subordinates to get vaccinated, and neighbours filing charges because more people than allowed showed up for a birthday party next door. And I would like to know from these police officers, superiors, and neighbours what they think today about their sadistic zeal back then.

The suspicion is that the humiliating measures implemented after the declaration of a coronavirus pandemic served to discipline the population and prepare them for the ongoing war preparations.

“Power has returned to its deserted command posts,” wrote psychoanalysts Almuth Bruder-Bezzel and Klaus-Jürgen Bruder in the spring of 2025. “It has spread, has once again penetrated all areas of society and everyday life, acting boldly and presumptuously, as if we were already at war – for which we still need to be prepared. And so, this preparation already feels like war. And it doesn’t just feel like war, it is war – against the population.”

Defence Minister Boris Pistorius declared: “Russia is becoming more and more of a danger to NATO”, Germany needs to become “war-ready”; Foreign Minister Wadephul announced: “Russia will always remain an enemy for us”; Chancellor Friedrich Merz informed the population: “We are not at war, but we are no longer at peace either”, in other words: we have no peace, and Russia is the hereditary enemy that should be fought by all means.

So, the citizens are supposed to be glad that the government is spending billions upon billions on armaments, even on preparing for a war against Russia. There’s no more skilful way to manipulate a population; the arrogance has reached a breaking point. And despite ever-increasing food prices, heating and electricity costs, visible impoverishment, and the erosion of the welfare state, a subservient majority follows the policies of a government that betrays its interests.

The stoked fear of death

The blogger Uli Gellermann, who runs the sharp-tongued and provocative blog Rationalgalerie, wrote during the corona crisis in April 2020: “The fear of death is the current instrument of power. This instrument is politically successful and democratic insofar as the polls confirm the course of action of the chief physicians in the Chancellor’s Office. The current terror of opinion is healthy; that is how the majority of the people feel at the moment.” At that time, it would have been “the hour of the constitutionally loyal opposition,” but even the Greens and the Left Party welcomed the totalitarian measures, which suggests the devastating state of democratic consciousness in Germany.

Regarding the subjugation of the population through the generation of fear, the psychoanalyst Klaus-Jürgen Bruder commented in June 2020 as follows: “An unsuspecting, clueless population is brought to forget ‘overnight’ without any preparation everything that had previously been important to them: all goals, all movements, all business, all contacts. The ‘balanced budget’ hadn’t been forgotten so quickly, just as the interim goal had been secured in the breathtaking launch of the financial rescue packages, leaving submission only as a displacement activity: as the adoption of new rules of (non-)contact, not letting others get too close, indeed rejecting them if they come too close, generally being suspicious of everyone, loudly sanctioning the previous rules.”

Klaus-Jürgen Bruder continued: “It is indeed threatening: to learn, to hear, that a tremendous epidemic, which has already claimed many victims in Wuhan, China, has now reached us in Europe. And it is equally understandable to gratefully accept the proposed protective measures and to ensure that others also follow them.” But what is astonishing, he said, is “that all this is going on so unquestioningly, that isolated dissent immediately provokes aggressive defensiveness, the likes of which we haven’t seen in a long time, the likes of which we only really know from times when criticism of the state’s actions led to the denunciation of the enemy.”

Bruder gave the “subjugated” some credit for not knowing the directive from the Federal Ministry of the Interior “which proposed manipulating the population through massive and coordinated fear campaigns – because this was only circulating as classified material for official use.” He referred to an apparently leaked strategy paper from the ministry dated March 2020, which spoke of a “comprehensive mobilization campaign” to be launched by the federal government.

Five years later, in October 2025, the president of the German Armed Forces Reservists Association, Patrick Sensburg, predicted approximately one thousand deaths and serious injuries per day in the event of war, yet hardly anyone took notice. It was as if war against Russia were inevitable, as if war were perfectly normal. German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius, who constantly warned of a Russian attack without any evidence, wanted to build the German Armed Forces into the strongest army in Europe. By 2035, the number of active soldiers was to increase from 186,000 to 260,000, and the number of reservists to 200,000, so that at least 460,000 soldiers would be available for deployment in a joint military operation with NATO allies (against Russia).

Germany is being ruined by unscrupulous politicians and maneuvered into a third world war, but there is hardly any protest against this destructive policy. Instead, many people are demonstrating against this and that, especially against the opposition party AfD, and in support of democracy, alongside the very politicians who are currently abolishing it.

Rule through fear

On the topic of domination through fear, the psychologist and cognitive scientist Rainer Mausfeld, in his book Fear and Power – Techniques of Generating Fear in Capitalist Democracies, points to the psycho-technique of the “propagandistic creation of alleged threats.” Elsewhere, Mausfeld writes: “The uncertainty generated in this way can then, in turn, be used to generate fear for purposes of power. A cycle of generating confusion and fear from which it is difficult to escape. The social consequences of the strong irrational affects and the resulting social divisions are becoming increasingly apparent. And they will certainly provide further pretexts for intensifying authoritarian and repressive measures.”

It is not without reason that Mausfeld, an excellent analyst of the failures of representative democracy and the media, is largely ignored.

Anything that doesn’t fit the narrative is ignored or banned; those who don’t toe the line can be intimidated, punished, or otherwise silenced, be it through unlawfully ordered house searches, fines, sanctions, or – as has occurred in some cases – imprisonment. This is ensured by politicians, media representatives, task forces and programs for recording undesirable opinions, as well as public prosecutors, courts, and even – unjustifiably – the Council of the European Union.

Michael Ballweg, the organizer of several large demonstrations by the Querdenker (Lateral Thinker) movement, was held in pretrial detention for nine months starting in June 2022. He was accused of fraud and money laundering. The proceedings ended provisionally in 2025 with a warning for alleged tax evasion of just under 20 euros. Reiner Füllmich, a lawyer and spokesperson for the Corona Inquiry Committee, was held in pretrial detention from October 2023 and was sentenced in April 2025 to three years and nine months in prison for the alleged embezzlement of collected donations. Physician Bianca Witzschel was sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for issuing medical certificates against mask mandates or for exemption from vaccination, based on her therapeutic responsibility. These cases should be investigated by a parliamentary inquiry committee, as they allegedly constitute blatant violations of state law.

The effort is enormous. In a report by the US broadcaster CBS on February 16, 2025, the reporters stated: “Dozens of police teams across Germany searched houses before sunrise in a coordinated raid on Tuesday. The state police were not looking for drugs or weapons, but for people suspected of posting hate speech online.” The report also revealed that an “online hate task force” has been established and that there are 16 units in the state of Lower Saxony that investigate hate speech on the internet: “They handle around 3,500 cases annually (…….) Nine investigators work outside the office. They receive hundreds of tips every month from the police, watchdog groups, and victims.” In the past four years, the unit has “successfully prosecuted approximately 750 cases of hate speech.”

It’s extremely shocking. House searches, during which the police often confiscate work equipment such as smartphones and laptops, are ordered in Germany by representatives of the state power based on a disapproved expression of opinion, as a kind of pre-emptive punishment, and – believe it or not – the three interviewed public prosecutors are amused by this in full awareness of their usurped power in front of a running camera.

The so-called “forces supporting the state” also include publicly funded associations that oppose reporting critical of the government, journalists who express undesirable opinions, and so-called conspiracy theorists, Putin apologists, or “lateral thinkers.” Denunciation of alleged enemies of the constitution and disinformation agents is the order of the day, and the Centre for Liberal Modernity (LibMod), run by Russophobes Marieluise Beck and Ralf Fücks, serves this purpose. LibMod receives substantial funding, including from the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, and employs numerous staff. In contrast, critical internet forums such as the widely visited NachDenkSeiten, which are defamed as “lateral thinking media,” have their non-profit status revoked.

Among the self-proclaimed “democracy defenders,” lies are told, discrimination is practiced, and defamation is rampant. The publicly funded “fact-checker” of the Tagesschau (Germany’s main evening news program) simply targeted Swiss historian and author Daniele Ganser, German political scientist Ulrike Guérot, and former ARD Moscow correspondent Gabriele Krone-Schmalz in a highly biased broadcast: They were labelled “questionable,” “inferior,” and “absurd,” and accused of “clearly spreading pro-Russian positions.”

These are dubious projects and broadly interpreted terms that state authorities use to promote democracy. The supposedly independent research centre Correctiv, which spied on a private discussion in Potsdam in November 2023 and drew parallels to the infamous Wannsee Conference, thus succeeded in launching a sprawling, mendacious campaign “against the right,” which encompasses pretty much anything that is politically unacceptable.

European Union sanctions against private people

The excesses are increasing. The European Union, through its 17th sanctions package against Russia, adopted on May 20, 2025, undertook a serious infringement on freedom of expression and of the press, representing a new dimension of unlawful intimidation and punishment of journalists critical of the government and their supporters. For the first time, two German citizens were affected: the journalist and author Thomas Röper and the journalist and blogger Alina Lipp. Both live in Russia and report from there. According to the justification for the sanctions, they spread “Russian propaganda” and contribute to “destabilizing activities” through their reporting.

Entry and transit bans were imposed on Röper and Lipp, and their assets in Western Europe were frozen. Furthermore, it was ordered that they may not be provided with any funds or economic resources, either directly or indirectly. This also means that any supporters or donors are liable to prosecution, and a deliberate violation of sanctions under EU regulations, which must be incorporated into national criminal law, can be punished with imprisonment.

The EU Commission’s ban also targeted Hüseyin Doğru, a German journalist living in Berlin, and Jacques Baud, a Swiss military analyst and author, who was accused of having connections to Russia that he claims to have none. In an interview on December 19, 2025, Baud said: “This decision came like a bolt from the blue. I hadn’t expected it at all, especially since I’ve done everything to avoid propaganda. I do analytical work.” As a question at the Federal Press Conference on December 17, 2025, revealed, the German Federal Government welcomed the unlawful EU sanctions against Baud.

In doing so, the European Commission – in agreement with the German government – is arrogating to itself powers to which it is not entitled. The sanctions are imposed without a hearing of those affected and without a court proceeding. There is neither a judgment nor a legal remedy; it is pure arbitrariness on the part of the EU, a treaty-based entity without democratic legitimacy. With these measures, the Council of Ministers of the European Union is imposing life-destroying punishments on European citizens that are not covered by any treaty. It is acting unlawfully, as is increasingly the case in other instances, and is thus definitively forfeiting any legitimacy.

Cognitive warfare

The struggle for dominance in shaping public opinion has entered a new phase. Since around 2020, NATO has had a program for “cognitive warfare,” encompassing information warfare, psychological operations, and psychological warfare. The intended goal is the most comprehensive possible manipulation of perception, which is evident in the official measures taken against alleged fake news and disinformation, or Russian propaganda.

Propaganda researcher Jonas Tögel writes about cognitive warfare: “The battle for people’s consciousnesses is thus made into a separate war technique, with the declared aim of making the people a separate, official NATO theatre of war. Thus, every person is at the centre of this highly modern, psychological warfare at all times.”

NATO has declared the fight against “disinformation” to be one of its main tasks. Tögel quotes from a NATO document: “The most efficient way to overwhelm an adversary is to influence their thoughts and beliefs and thus turn them against themselves. The advancement of research into disinformation and its impact on societies will lead to the development of new battle plans to counter these attacks.”

The aggression against Russia has escalated into outright hysteria. There is constant talk of hybrid Russian attacks on German infrastructure and of Russian drones reconnoitring military installations. It is possible that government circles in Germany are seeking a fundamental shift in the status quo through opinion manipulation, incitement, and fear-mongering. A false flag operation could be used to declare a state of emergency, which would then allow for the implementation of emergency legislation and potentially a ban on the AfD party.

Even top politicians are involved; political opponents are to be eliminated, their views discredited. In a remarkably provocative and divisive speech on the anniversary of the Nazi pogrom of November 9, 2025, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier advocated for upholding the “firewall” and for a ban on the AfD, once again intervening in the political discourse in a partisan manner and thus abusing his position. He argued that the rule of law should not stand idly by until its opponents are too powerful, and emphasized: “…….the answer of our constitution is clear: A party that embarks on the path of aggressive hostility to the constitution should always reckon with the possibility of being banned.” However, there are already ways to combat the AfD without a party ban; for example, enemies of the constitution cannot be judges, teachers, or soldiers, “enemies of the constitution can also be excluded from elections for district administrator or mayor,” Steinmeier stated. With this, the Federal President campaigned for the reintroduction of professional bans in Germany.

Disturbing plans of the federal government

On April 9, 2025, the CDU/CSU and the SPD concluded a coalition agreement to form the new government, which turned out to be a further step on the road to totalitarianism. Right at the beginning, it states: “Clarity about the right path for the coming years requires, first and foremost, clarity in defining our position: Externally, the opponents of our liberal democracy are attacking our freedom. Authoritarian powers are gaining strength. The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine also threatens our security. We are experiencing hybrid attacks on our country with the aim of destroying cohesion in Germany, undermining our democracy, and endangering our security. But democracy is also under daily attack from its opponents within our own country.”

This “assessment” alone makes clear the true nature of these politicians into whose hands the German population has fallen after the formation of the coalition. For the claims that external “enemies of our liberal democracy” are attacking our freedom or that the “Russian war of aggression against Ukraine” threatens our security, no evidence is presented. In contrast, it has been evident for years how the collective West, led by the USA, has been threatening Russia with constant new provocations.

No evidence is presented for the alleged hybrid attacks; instead, a dangerous aggression and incitement against Russia is being stirred up. And who attacks democracy in our country daily, if not politicians who are in the process of abolishing it, as the coalition agreement proves in many passages?

The text continues: “Internally, our economy is experiencing persistent weak growth. Life in Germany has become more complicated, expensive, and strenuous.” The reasons for this are neither asked nor answered. Not a word is said about the blown-up Baltic Sea pipelines and the resulting ruinous energy prices, which are driving many companies into bankruptcy or abroad, and this was already going on long before the invasion of Iran.

Immediately afterward, promises are made that the government under Friedrich Merz will create “prosperity for all,” strengthen defence and deterrence capabilities, and “stand by Ukraine, which is also defending our freedom and the principles of a rules-based order.” All of this reads like an advertisement for a detergent manufacturer. Prosperity for many already existed in Germany, and defence or deterrence were secondary concerns because there were no potential aggressors. A threat scenario was only constructed as a result of the West’s destructive policies.

But what was Ukraine defending, a country that, after the 2014 coup, fell under the regime of nationalists and fascists and – instigated by Washington – launched a civil war against the Donetsk and Luhansk regions? And what kind of “rules-based order” is this, whose principles Ukraine supposedly defends? Who sets the rules for such an order? Has the Charter of the United Nations, which governs international law in the spirit of humanity and peaceful coexistence, been suspended? And if so, by whom?

The coalition agreement repeatedly and uncritically invokes the commitment to NATO and the USA, as well as to Great Britain and France; conversely, in an attempt to curry favour with Washington, the “destructive role” of the “Iranian regime” in the Middle East is to be curtailed. Furthermore, Germany, due to its geographical location in Europe, is to be “further developed as a central hub of NATO,” defence spending is to increase “significantly and consistently,” and the necessary conditions are to be created for “military registration and surveillance.”

The Merz government clearly wants to prepare Germany for a war with Russia. It is their “democracy,” not that of the people, that is to be protected; the government of another state, declared an enemy, is called a “regime,” and war is to be waged in Ukraine with enormous financial and material resources. Many pages of the agreement deal with the military, rearmament, antagonism towards Russia, and support for Ukraine until the desired victory over the arch-enemy, personified in the figure of Vladimir Putin.

Frightening ideas about domestic policy

The coalition agreement also contains highly controversial announcements regarding domestic policy. In the chapter “Reducing Bureaucracy, Modernizing the State, and Modernizing the Justice System,” it states: “Germany needs genuine state reform.” It continues: “We are committed to consistent digitalization and a ‘digital-only’ approach: Administrative services should be easily accessible digitally via a central platform (‘one-stop shop’), meaning without having to visit a government office or submit a written application. Every citizen will be required to have a citizen account and a digital identity. We will provide the EUDI wallet for citizens and businesses, enabling identification, authentication, and payments.”

This sounds like a sheepfold where each animal has a tag punched into its ear containing all its personal data. Business journalist and Handelsblatt editor Norbert Häring writes: “‘Digital only’ means that the traditional ways of obtaining government benefits and transportation, as well as fulfilling state-imposed obligations, are being systematically eliminated in order to force people to handle their affairs digitally and automatically. This necessarily also applies to payments, where cash is among the analogue solutions to be abolished. This not only means that citizens will be completely subject to surveillance. It also means that they will have to adapt entirely to the system that bureaucrats and technocrats have devised and programmed together.”

Häring fears a dystopian development: “The system no longer offers human contact persons who can ensure that it adapts flexibly to people’s needs, including those with special needs that the programmers didn’t consider, and those in special situations. In other words, the new government is working intensively on realizing the technocratic dream of a centrally controlled society, from which humans are eliminated as autonomous decision-makers and instead made into functioning cogs in a centrally controlled social megamachine.”

The announcement of a mandatory citizen account and digital identity is indeed alarming. This would give state institutions access to all information about every citizen. If this information is then used “to indicate potential benefit entitlements and simplify the application process,” privacy is completely lost. With feigned concern, the coalition partners offer: “We will increasingly operate without requiring applications. For example, parents should automatically receive a child benefit notification after the birth of a child.”

The state can therefore grant benefits without application – and consequently, it can also revoke them. It can help citizens, it can even protect them from “disinformation” or “hate speech,” but it can also cut them off from information, misinform them, reprimand them, sanction them, and punish them for insubordination. The state knows everything, this means, and it can use this knowledge as it sees fit. This is Orwell’s surveillance state.

Accordingly, the coalition partners intend to initiate a “cultural shift and modern leadership,” apparently with a leadership elite: “Public sector employees are the anchors of stability for the German state. We will establish and promote a modern and appreciative leadership culture.” Since many people are now seeking security in the public sector during these highly uncertain times, these privileged citizens will then lead the herds who take to the streets with the politicians who conclude such a coalition agreement, demonstrating for democracy or party bans. The division of society has been progressing for some time; if orchestrated by the state, it could become explosive. But preparations are being made to prevent this.

This aligns with the following announcement: “As far as the enemies of democracy are concerned, the principle of ‘zero tolerance’ applies. It is the responsibility of the entire state and society to counteract any destabilization of our free and democratic order and not to leave our security authorities alone in this endeavour. ……. The security authorities should be granted the power to conduct automated (AI-based) data analysis for specific purposes. Under certain, narrowly defined conditions in cases of serious crimes, we want to enable law enforcement agencies to use retrospective biometric remote identification to identify perpetrators.”

The problematic “biometric remote identification” will therefore likely become standard practice, and the persecution of dissidents under the guise of social responsibility will increase. Experience shows that security agencies have largely become autonomous, hostility towards democracy and “narrowly defined prerequisites” are open to interpretation, and even system-critical statements in internet forums or in private emails monitored by intelligence services can be considered “destabilizing our free and democratic order.”

Control is to be intensified: “We are tightening the sanctions available to platforms, particularly in cases of systemic deficiencies in the removal of illegal content.” To this end, media regulators will receive legal guidelines enabling them to take stronger action against “fake news, hate speech, and incitement.” Virtual communication platforms will be expected to actively combat what is perceived as disinformation; otherwise, they face penalties or account suspensions. Criticism of the government will thus become even riskier, especially since denunciation and the manipulation of public opinion against critics are being made the norm: “We will continue to support projects promoting democratic participation through the federal program ‘Democracy Live!’”

Germany is to become an “AI nation,” and security authorities are to be allowed to analyse data using “AI-based” methods, apparently without regard for data protection. This will presumably require a “more open understanding of data use,” which is being recommended. For those who refuse or deviate from this, the following applies: “As part of strengthening the resilience of our democracy, we are regulating the revocation of passive voting rights in cases of multiple convictions for incitement to hatred.”

The coalition agreement also addresses migration and integration: “Germany, as a country of immigration, is characterized by people of diverse origins. We want to remain an immigration-friendly country and make skilled immigration to our labour market attractive.” To this end, legal pathways to immigration need to be created. Integration should be intensively promoted, while irregular migration needs to be “reduced,” and the possibility of turning back asylum seekers at national borders should be established.

Again, many empty words and only modest attempts to solve the growing problems created by an unlawful “immigration policy.” But on closer inspection, Germany is not, like the USA, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand, an immigration country; it is a country of migration, and this flaw in Merkel’s migration policy should finally be recognized and rectified. If every country to which people from other parts of the world want to immigrate were an immigration country, then Switzerland, for example, would also be included. But the Swiss would certainly reject that outright.

In Switzerland, it seems that independent thinking has been preserved even with regard to the “technocratic dream” of absolute digitization and registration. For example, on November 28, 2024, Norbert Häring reported on a referendum in the canton of Neuchâtel, which, through a constitutional amendment, guaranteed its citizens a right to “digital integrity,” meaning “protection against misuse of data, security in the digital space, an offline life. ……. The canton commits to offering access to human contacts in the administration” – a glimmer of hope.

The path to an uncertain future

The coalition agreement was supposed to provide clarity about the right path for the coming years. Instead, it reveals disturbing, threatening, and in some cases frightening intentions of a group of politicians who presume to manipulate, bully, monitor, and potentially lead citizens into war, like puppets in a puppet show. The coalition partners are proud of initiating this course of action.

Friedrich Merz, chairman of the supervisory board of BlackRock Asset Management Germany until 2020, who had promised to supply Ukraine with Taurus cruise missiles, apparently already sees himself as the supreme commander in the fight against Russia. And the hitherto rather colourless co-chairman of the SPD, Lars Klingbeil, boasts: “We are the most important country and the strongest country in Europe, and stability will emanate from us if we manage to have a stable government here.”

But no sooner had the coalition agreement been signed than the partners were already arguing about the minimum wage, pensions, the reduction of income tax for low and middle incomes, and inheritance tax. And what about stability in a country that is currently ruining itself? What about great power ambitions in a country that still considers itself a potential enemy state (according to the UN Charter) and is in a state of unconditional surrender?

Klingbeil and Merz want to continue supporting Ukraine in its war with weapons and money “as long as it is necessary.” Klingbeil reveals his intellectual position when he says: “I was there – which was a truly moving moment – when the first Ukrainian soldier fired a shot from a Leopard 2 tank.” He, like his coalition partner, seems unable to grasp how much damage they are causing to democracy and what they are doing to “our country,” which they constantly refer to.

Conclusion

Bringing about a policy shift focused on peace and prosperity for the population would require a fundamental reorientation. This cannot mean abandoning transatlantic relations. Rather, a neutral Germany should remain open both overseas and to the East. Furthermore, it would be crucial to seize the opportunity presented by Donald Trump’s rapprochement with Russia and the centrifugal tendencies within the EU, while this window of opportunity still exists, to end the overreach of the EU’s treaty-based organization and return to a Europe of sovereign states, the so-called Europe of Fatherlands, without jeopardizing cooperation among them.

Instead of taking this path of reason, Germany is being led to the brink of disaster by the Berlin government under Friedrich Merz. The level of incitement to hatred and war propaganda is evident in the statements of leading politicians: Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul declares that Russia will always be our enemy. CDU politician Roderich Kiesewetter, a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the German Bundestag, believes: “We must take the war to Russia.” Former Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said: “We must ruin Russia.” Chancellor Friedrich Merz considers Russian President Vladimir Putin “perhaps the greatest war criminal of our time.” How can Russian politicians even speak to German politicians under these circumstances?

How the situation will proceed is currently unpredictable. But it doesn’t look good. Internationally, there is a growing disregard for international law and the integrity of other states; nationally, Germany finds itself in a pre-war state under the tutelage of a foreign-controlled government that disregards the interests of its own population. However, to bring about the urgently needed transformation in policy, a strong and conscious civil society is required. This is a paradoxical situation, because the current government, with the help of the judiciary and the European Commission, suppresses everything it calls “delegitimizing the state” or “propaganda for Russia.” Therefore, the only remaining chance for those who advocate for peace is to advance public awareness of the true political situation, despite all resistance.

 

yogaesoteric
September 4, 2026

 

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