A Secretive Team of Fewer Than 20 Became Germany’s Ukraine Arms Engine

A secretive team of fewer than 20 people inside Germany’s defense ministry has built a fast-track weapons pipeline for Ukraine, striking some deals in as little as two weeks.

The Sonderstab Ukraine, or special staff for Ukraine, sits at the center of Berlin’s €11.5 billion annual military support for Kyiv.

Its methods stand apart from Germany’s notoriously cumbersome defense procurement system.

“We have extremely short decision-making chains,” Brigadier General Joachim Kaschke, the unit’s head, told the Financial Times. “That makes us agile and flexible.”

One person familiar with the team called its approach “incredibly un-German.”

Bypassing the Bureaucracy

The key is how the deals are structured.

Weapons for the Bundeswehr normally pass through a 13,000-person procurement agency.

Under the Sonderstab model, Ukraine signs contracts rather than Germany, allowing purchases to bypass much of that machinery.

Kyiv identifies what it needs. Berlin provides the money.

Germany has spent close to €58 billion on weapons for Ukraine, ranging from small attack drones to air-defense systems worth hundreds of millions of euros.

The Sonderstab emerged from a defense ministry situation center created after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Germany initially sent anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons from Bundeswehr stocks. But officials quickly concluded that Ukraine needed equipment European militaries did not necessarily possess.

“Very quickly, this monitoring became linked to the question: how do we actually support Ukraine?” said Christian Freuding, who led the center before it became the Sonderstab in July 2022.

Buying Direct from Industry

The answer increasingly involved buying straight from manufacturers.

One early case involved five surveillance drones from German start-up Quantum Systems.

Ukrainian forces connected them to Starlink and used them to identify artillery targets during fighting around the Siverskyi Donets River in 2022.

Berlin subsequently financed more Quantum drones and other systems.

The Sonderstab also paid Diehl to supply Ukraine with its first IRIS-T air-defense system, which joined U.S.-made Patriots in defending Ukrainian cities against Russian missile attacks.

Germany later ordered IRIS-T systems for the Bundeswehr.

The unit’s importance has grown as U.S. military support for Kyiv declined during President Donald Trump’s second term.

Germany became Ukraine’s largest provider of military support last year. Chancellor Friedrich Merz has since pushed Berlin’s military aid budget for Ukraine to €11.5 billion this year.

Speed Brings Scrutiny

The fast-track model has also raised concerns over oversight.

Because Ukraine decides how German funding is spent, some officials and industry figures have questioned corruption risks and whether German companies receive enough of the resulting business.

Kaschke said his team checks prices and delivery milestones on contracts financed by German taxpayers.

But he stressed that Berlin does not dictate Kyiv’s choices.

“We are not there to advise them, there is no ‘mentoring’,” he said.

Germany has also backed Ukrainian weapons development, including missiles capable of striking deep inside Russia, while Merz and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have agreed to expand defense joint ventures.

That has made the relationship more competitive. Ukrainian companies are seeking access to NATO markets, creating unease among some German manufacturers.

Lessons Flow Back

The Sonderstab is now becoming more than a purchasing unit.

Germany is drawing on Ukrainian battlefield experience in drone warfare and gaining access to combat data, including information from Ukraine’s Delta system, which combines feeds from satellites, sensors, drones and intercepted Russian communications.

Kaschke described that access as one of the relationship’s most valuable elements.

The shift reflects a broader calculation in Berlin: weapons spending for Ukraine can also feed lessons back into Germany’s own military modernization.

For the Sonderstab, however, speed remains the central requirement.

“With every shot they fire, they can adjust their systems and tactics,” Kaschke said. “Our systems have to keep pace.”