Merz puts about €1 billion in military aid and €350 million into Ukraine's grid

Chancellor Friedrich Merz, standing with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv on Sunday, said Germany would put about 1 billion euros into a new military package for Ukraine and about 350 million euros into repairs of the energy system. The Guardian reported the military figure as 1 billion euros, about 1.1 billion dollars, and the energy figure as 350 million. Kyiv Post described the combined package as more than 1.3 billion euros, or about 1.5 billion dollars, which is the same two numbers added together. Day 1,685 of the war, by the Guardian's count, fell on that visit.

Merz said Germany would not be intimidated into dropping support. He said Berlin would fund joint production of drones built to intercept Russia's jet-powered drones, and that technical work in recent weeks had sped production up. He also said the military package would cover long-range strike weapons, combat drones and satellite communications, and asked for understanding that the detailed list would not be published. Air-raid sirens and explosions sounded repeatedly in the capital while he was there.

Who signed what

German officials said executives who travelled with Merz signed 14 agreements with Ukrainian counterparts worth about 6.6 billion euros. Kyiv Post counted 15 bilateral industrial pacts valued at over 8.5 billion euros. The gap between 14 and 15, and between 6.6 and 8.5 billion, is a reminder that the industrial total is a bundle of intentions and contracts, not a single wire transfer. Named pieces are clearer. Diehl Defence is to supply IRIS-T air-defence missiles. Hensoldt is in a radar deal. Quantum Systems is in a deal for jet drone interceptors.

IRIS-T is the short-range system Germany has already sent in earlier packages. A new supply contract extends that line rather than opening a new one. Hensoldt's radar work matters because an interceptor drone is only as useful as the track that cues it. Quantum Systems, a German firm that has been building reconnaissance drones, is the named partner for the jet-powered interceptors Merz highlighted. Those three names are the part of the industrial bundle a reader can check against later delivery notices.

The energy half, timed for winter

The energy slice is more specific in use than in geography. Merz said the 350 million euros would buy mobile generators, repair damaged substations and restore transmission lines ahead of winter. That is the civilian half of a package whose military half he would not itemise. Moscow has been hitting power plants and substations before the heating season. A generator does not replace a destroyed turbine. It keeps a hospital or a pumping station running while the larger repair is queued.

Ukraine's grid has spent three winters under missile and drone attack. Repair crews already know the substations that have been hit more than once. The 350 million euros is a cash figure for mobile generation and for transmission parts, not a promise that every city keeps power through January. Merz paired it with the military package because the strikes and the outages are the same campaign.

The winter meeting he flagged

Merz also said a winter meeting of the coalition of the willing would be held in Berlin, with France and the United Kingdom. He did not give a date. The phrase has been used for the group of capitals that have coordinated arms deliveries outside a formal NATO decision. A Berlin meeting would put the next tranche argument in his capital, after a visit in which he has already named a billion for weapons and 350 million for the grid.

The visit does not change the legal basis of German aid. It adds a numbered package on top of earlier ones, tied to three firms and to a winter deadline on the power system. The open item is the unpublished military list. Merz said Ukraine should be able to target Russian launch sites. He did not say which munition, in what number, or on what delivery date. Until that annex exists in public, the hard figures from Sunday are the 1 billion euros, the 350 million euros, the IRIS-T, radar and interceptor deals, and a capital that was under air alert while the announcements were made.