Signal No. 189 · Budget 2027: 16 A400M, EUR 10 billion in commitments, half freed by TaWAN
The Bundestag budget committee holds 2027 defence spending at the draft’s level and funds 16 new A400M. TaWAN, the army’s eastern-flank data network, is reported ten months late, the cause said to lie at Rheinmetall.
DEZDINAIR Budget committee keeps Germany’s 2027 defence spending as drafted and adds EUR 5 billion in commitments for later years
Bundestag hib 13 Nov · Bundestag 13 Nov · German defence ministry 13 Nov · hartpunkt 13 Nov, budget · defence-network 13 Nov · hartpunkt 13 Nov, TaWAN · Bundestag hib 12 Jul 2022 · Airbus 7 Jul · Signal No. 157 · Signal No. 163 · Signal No. 187 · Signal No. 188
The Bundestag budget committee finished the 2027 budget at 05:55 on Friday and left Germany’s defence budget, Einzelplan 14, at EUR 109.75 billion, the figure in the government’s draft. Instead it raised the commitment authority, the money the ministry may commit now for payment in later years, by almost EUR 5 billion to EUR 296.88 billion, the Bundestag’s press service reports. Across the federal budget such authority totals EUR 377.77 billion; defence holds nearly four-fifths of that total. With EUR 29.96 billion planned from the special fund for the Bundeswehr, the ministry puts defence spending for 2027 at more than EUR 139 billion, against about EUR 108 billion this year. The Bundestag votes in the week of 24 to 27 November.
The committee also moved money within the budget. The ministry names only the winners: 16 more A400M in tactical configuration, financing for further MEKO A-200 frigates and a fourth fleet service boat, more for SATCOM Stage 3 and the space sensor-effector network, and a new title for buying and testing technology already on the market. It gives no amounts and says the changes cancel out. The losers appear in the amended draft the committee worked from. TaWAN, the army’s tactical data network, lost EUR 1.18 billion in 2027 funding and EUR 5.26 billion in commitments for 2028 to 2035. A frigate line lost EUR 1.34 billion; the reports do not say which one. The F126 contract was terminated in June, and the F128 option, for four further MEKO A-200 DEU, was approved on 8 October.
The A400M money answers a question left open in September, when Boris Pistorius said the ministry was thinking “very concretely” about replacing logistic aircraft with tactical ones. Of the Luftwaffe’s 53 A400M, 16 fly in logistic configuration, without infrared self-protection or tactical datalinks. dpa reported at the time that the replaced aircraft would be offered to partner nations. In July, at Ankara, seven allies including Poland launched a NATO project for a multinational A400M fleet, possibly jointly owned and operated, Airbus said. Buying the new aircraft still needs a separate submission to the committee; none has been reported.
Signal › TaWAN alone gave up more in commitments than the net increase, so the winning lines gained at least EUR 10 billion. Earlier reporting accounts for EUR 3.1 billion of that for space services and EUR 0.5 billion for the Eurodrone. The remaining EUR 6.5 billion or more goes to the A400M, the frigates, the service boat, SATCOM and others, in amounts not published. The A400M plan includes a resale, and Germany has tried that before. It once cut its target fleet to 40 and tried to sell 13 aircraft. None had sold by 2017, when the Bundestag let the Luftwaffe keep them, and a later plan for a multinational unit built around them found no partner because of flight-hour and crew costs. Demand is higher now, and the July pool is the likeliest buyer. But the pool is still only a project, and the 16 aircraft lack the self-protection and datalinks that are Berlin’s reason for retiring them. Until someone takes them, the working assumption is a fleet of 69. The new commitments fall due from 2028, the first year with no special-fund money.
DEZC4IDIN TaWAN, the army’s eastern-flank data network, is reported ten months late and loses most of its later money
hartpunkt 13 Nov · Signal No. 183 · Signal No. 186 · Signal No. 187
TaWAN LBO, the radio-relay network that is to link Bundeswehr units on NATO’s eastern flank with rear headquarters, will reach troop trials about ten months late, hartpunkt reports, citing well-informed sources. About two months might be made up during the trials. The procurement office BAAINBw hired Rheinmetall as prime contractor in early 2025, and the first systems were due for operational testing this year. The radio supplier, DND Digital, and GDELS, which builds the Piranha 5 carrier vehicles, are said to be on schedule. Observers locate the problem in integration, which is Rheinmetall’s job. Rheinmetall said the customer’s contract terms prevent it from commenting.
The amended budget draft had already priced in the delay. It cuts TaWAN’s 2027 funding from about EUR 1.92 billion to just under EUR 736 million and its commitments for 2028 to 2035 to EUR 277 million, citing “a lower requirement due to project delays”. Last year the first firm order was put at about EUR 1.88 billion including VAT: 56 small and 51 large radio-relay systems and ten management vehicles, enough for one army division.
Signal › This is Rheinmetall’s third German delay in eight days, and the first whose reported cause lies with Rheinmetall itself. On 5 November it cut its 2026 sales forecast to EUR 13.2 billion, citing late acceptance of artillery ammunition and a Boxer order that slips to next year. Its finance chief said those delays came solely from the customer’s processes. TaWAN’s cut removes EUR 1.18 billion of 2027 funding from a programme Rheinmetall leads. Commitment authority is set each year and can be requested again once an order is ready, so the cut to EUR 277 million is not a cancellation. But this budget funds little beyond the first division’s equipment. Rheinmetall’s capital markets day on 26 and 27 November is its first chance to say whether its 2027 outlook counts on TaWAN money the budget no longer contains.
DIPINTPLB EU leaders name five states and the EU institutions to negotiate for Europe, and Moscow has yet to admit them
AP 13 Nov · Irish Times 13 Nov · RFE/RL 13 Nov · Reuters 13 Nov (Moscow Times) · Reuters 13 Nov, Merz (ThePrint) · Yle 13 Nov · Signal No. 185 · Signal No. 187 · Signal No. 188
Europe will send a team to the next round of talks on the war, made up of the EU and five members of the coalition backing Ukraine: Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Poland. António Costa, president of the European Council, announced it after the informal summit in Dublin on Friday. Leaders had debated a single envoy against a team and chose the team. Who takes the EU’s seat is still open. Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign-policy chief, said member states had agreed she represents Europe in foreign and security policy, and that she knows the Russians do not want her. Jared Kushner, who also met European national security advisers, wrote that “both sides have now agreed to expand the next round of negotiations to include our European partners”.
Moscow has not said so. On Thursday Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said Europe must first name a representative: “The Europeans squabble like spiders in a jar.” On Friday he set a different test: “Once we understand their genuine intention and readiness to contribute to the peace process, then it will be possible to make a decision on holding dialogue on a Ukrainian settlement in an expanded format.” Friedrich Merz asked Washington for “no surprises” at the Trump–Putin meeting expected in China next week and said Europe’s security framework already exists in NATO. Bild reported that unofficial Russian proposals shown to Europeans in Abu Dhabi included Finland leaving NATO and no alliance bases in the Baltic states; Finland’s defence minister, Antti Häkkänen, said such matters are “in no way a matter for negotiation”.
Signal › The leaders endorsed a format that already exists. Britain, France, Germany, Italy and EU officials attended alongside the Abu Dhabi talks this week; Poland is the only newcomer. The open question is who takes the EU’s seat at political level, and the only public candidate says Moscow does not want her. The single-voice question Kushner and Peskov raised now sits inside the team. Peskov has already shifted Moscow’s condition from who speaks to what Europe contributes, a test only Moscow can judge. If Bild is right, the terms partly follow Russia’s December 2021 draft and partly go further. No alliance bases in the Baltic states applies its Article 4; Finland leaving NATO would reverse an accession, whereas the draft only barred new ones. Merz’s “no surprises” restates as a request the fourth principle Berlin said on Wednesday that Washington had accepted: no side agreements. Its test comes next week in China, where no European will be at the table.
GRZSEAARC Ukraine hits a Russian missile corvette in the Gulf of Finland, and Estonia explains why its fighters held fire
BBC 13 Nov (Yahoo) · Reuters 12 Nov (Moscow Times) · ERR 13 Nov, Kalmus · ERR 12 Nov, Herem · Signal No. 57 · Signal No. 187
Ukraine’s SBU security service says it targeted the Russian Baltic Fleet corvette Naro-Fominsk, a Buyan-M type carrying Kalibr and Onyx cruise missiles, during its drone strike on the oil port of Ust-Luga early on Wednesday. Finland’s Defence Forces said they detected a strike on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland; Estonia’s defence minister, Martin Herem, put the explosion at about 05:30. At the Estonian defence ministry’s briefing on Friday, Colonel Aron Kalmus, a deputy division commander, said more than three drones hit the ship, causing dead and wounded, and that it stalled on its way to St Petersburg and had to be escorted. The BBC reports that it is thought to be the first Ukrainian drone attack on a Russian ship in Baltic waters open to civilian traffic, and that Finnish defence officials are understood to have reminded Kyiv that the gulf is narrow, carries tankers and holds subsea data cables.
The strike crossed Estonia. One drone entered from the direction of Latvia at about 03:30, and others that had reached Ust-Luga circled over the Gulf of Finland and briefly crossed into Estonian airspace, Herem said; Kalmus put their time over Estonia at “minutes, not hours”. Turkish fighters stationed at Ämari were airborne and did not fire. “If it’s very close to the border and Russia is on the other side, shooting it down isn’t sensible either,” Herem said, adding that Russia does the same near its own border. Estonia had not authorised Ukraine to use its airspace and Ukraine had never asked; Tallinn has asked Kyiv for an explanation.
Signal › The Baltic Fleet’s Kalibr carriers in the Gulf of Finland, some 900 kilometres from Ukraine’s border, are now within reach of Ukraine’s drones, as the neighbouring port already was. Some of the restraint on the next strike now comes from two NATO members: Tallinn has said it never authorised the flights and has asked for an explanation, and Finnish officials are reported to have reminded Kyiv of the tankers and cables in the same water. Counting crossings will not show whether that works: Kyiv plans the routes but cannot always keep its drones on them, and in May it blamed Russian jamming for pushing two into a fuel depot at Rēzekne. The explanation Tallinn asked for will be the evidence, if either side publishes it.
Procurement · Industry · Capability
SEADIN France is to buy 20 CB90 fast assault boats from Sweden, government to government
In its 2027 budget bill, tabled on Thursday, Sweden’s government asks the Riksdag to authorise the sale of 20 Stridsbåt 90 (CB90) to France, with equipment, training and support, opex360 reports. France asked for a government-to-government deal: FMV, the Swedish procurement agency, would order the boats and hand them to France’s DGA for the navy, with the proceeds covering Sweden’s costs. No price or delivery date is given. The 24.5-tonne boats, sold by Saab, carry about half a platoon at up to 40 knots. France borrowed three in 2025 after its own order for 12 fast boats for the naval commandos stalled at two deliveries; that order has since been cancelled.
UXSGRDPLB Poland seeks ground drones that lay minefields for army trials, with bids due by 30 November
The Polish armed forces’ inspectorate for uncrewed weapon systems has invited makers of unmanned ground vehicles with scatterable-mine launchers to qualify for army trials: the vehicle must run for at least five hours and the launcher hold at least 80 mines. Submissions close on 30 November. WB Group offers a launcher for MN-123 mines as a module for the crewed-uncrewed vehicle in the Future Task Force platoon concept. The call covers trials only, not a purchase.
Forward Look
Next week. Monday 16 November: EU foreign ministers meet; France says they will list 150 more entities and 50 banks (Reuters 12 Nov). Tuesday 17 November: the Ukraine Defence Contact Group at NATO headquarters, convened by Britain and Germany (Ukrainska Pravda 29 Oct); EU defence ministers meet (Irish Council Presidency). 18–19 November: the APEC summit in Shenzhen, where Ushakov says Putin and Trump will meet (Kremlin 12 Nov). Thursday 19 November: the Coalition of the Willing in Berlin (Ukrinform 3 Nov); the German army stands up eight battalions at Munster, among them the artillery and supply battalions of Panzerbrigade 45 (German Army 12 Nov); the Folketing’s final vote on the Greenland agreement (Ritzau 22 Oct).
Later. 24–27 November: the Bundestag’s second and third readings of the 2027 budget, with the Bundesrat on 18 December (defence-network 13 Nov). 26–27 November: the European Council on Ukraine’s financing for 2027 (European Commission 12 Nov) and Rheinmetall’s capital markets day (dpa-AFX 5 Nov).
Exercises. Dynamic Merlin 26 ended on Friday; Poseidon 26 ends on Saturday. In Freedom Shield 26-II, Panzerbrigade 45 practises crossing the Nemunas on 20 November (German Army 12 Nov). Full calendar: Großwald NATO Exercises 2026.
