The K(orea)-factor in the Zeitenwende: South Korea and the rebuilding of Germany's defence industrial base

Eric J. Ballbach

No 4/2026, SWP Comments from Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Abstract: Germany is facing a security policy Zeitenwende whose industrial dimension has not yet been sufficiently addressed. The war in Ukraine, rising military threats in Europe, and the long-term underfunding of the German Armed Forces have exposed the limits of existing defence industrial capacity, while the reliability of the United States (US) as a security guarantor is increasingly uncertain. This creates a strategic need for Germany to quickly rebuild its defence industrial base. Yet, despite the increased demand and funding, German defence industries are struggling to scale production quickly, exposing capability gaps that endanger both national defence and NATO commitments. In this context, cooperation with South Korea gains strategic relevance, as plans for localised production by Korean defence firms in Germany could ease bottlenecks, shorten supply chains, and enhance operational readiness without creating new strategic dependencies.

Keywords: German defence industries; Germany's defence industrial base; German defence market; South Korean defence industry; defence supply chains; defence production; military equipment; armaments; defence industrial cooperation; Germany; South Korea; European Union; EU; Nato; NATO (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cis and nep-min
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/338232/1/1950553523.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:swpcom:338232

DOI: 10.18449/2026C04

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in SWP Comments from Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), German Institute for International and Security Affairs
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics ().