“Bunkers, Emergency Plans and the Army Reserve: Germans Growing Increasingly Uneasy as Peace in Europe Looks More Fragile”, Der Spiegel
Ukraine, Gaza, Iran: A growing number of conflicts are fueling unease in Germany. Surveys show rising anxiety, and some have already begun making preparations.
By Lukas Eberle, Fiona Ehlers, Kristin Haug, Florian Kistler, Jonas Niesmann, Hannes Schrader und Jean-Pierre Ziegler
Berlin, 09.07.2025
World events have had a deep effect on Daniel Gay, Lena Speckmann and Jenny Zobel. The three of them have changed their ways of life, either partially or completely. They see their country differently than they used to and are doing things they would have completely ruled out just a short time ago.
They are preparing for everything, because anything has become possible. War in Germany is no longer just a memory. It is, in the eyes of a growing group of citizens, also a possible future.
“Never again.” The pledge became the single most important avowal in the early days of West Germany following the end of World War II. Never again National Socialism. Never again fascism. Never again Holocaust. And never again war. It is a promise that society made to itself. And it is worth recalling, because it provides an insight into the fundamental changes that are currently afoot in this country.
A new unease has gripped the German population, making itself felt around kitchen tables, in classrooms and in offices. It is a focus of late-night talk shows. Many are trying to imagine the unimaginable: a war in Europe, triggered by Russia, involving German soldiers, German sons and daughters, sent to the front to defend democracy.
A war on German territory, air raid sirens in Berlin or Munich, even the use of nuclear weapons – all things that haven’t been tangible for many, many decades. But they are becoming increasingly so now.
Ever since Russia launched its main invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, much has changed. Those in power in the East and the West are more unpredictable than ever as they seek to adjust the world order to their benefit. Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump are eager to expand their territories, with force if need be. The one has long since begun. The other has threatened to follow suit.
The Ukrainian city of Bucha in April 2022: A lot has changed in recent years. Foto: Rodrigo Abd / dpa
In recent weeks, Russia appears to have ramped up its attacks on Ukraine, sending several hundred kamikaze drones into the country. At the same time, the realization is dawning on Germany and the rest of Europe that old certainties may no longer apply. Such as the one which holds that an attack on one member of the NATO alliance is considered an attack on the entire alliance. Every country for itself appears poised to take over for the NATO promise of all for one.
That is one explanation for German parliament’s decision in early March to amend the German constitution and loosen the balanced budget rules found therein. The new government, pairing Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservatives with the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) may now essentially spend whatever it likes on defense. In the coming years, that total may add up to several hundred billion euros. For drones, missiles and warplanes, for deterrence and air defense capabilities.
Jens Spahn, head of conservatives in parliament, even wants to see Germany participate in the nuclear programs of other European countries. Markus Söder, head of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the Bavarian sister party to Merz’s Christian Democrats (CDU), would like to see a German version of the Iron Dome, as Israel’s missile defense system is called.
At the recent NATO summit in The Hague, alliance members agreed to increase defense spending to the equivalent of 5 percent of GDP. Rearmament is the order of the day, a response to multiple hotspots that have developed around the world.
There is the ongoing war in Ukraine, the fighting between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the most recent war between Israel and Iran, with U.S. involvement. There is also the Kashmir conflict between India and Pakistan and rising tensions surrounding both Taiwan and Korea.
In a recent interview with DER SPIEGEL, former Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said that Germany must quickly get accustomed to “a new world order.”
That is already happening in many areas and the consequences can be seen everywhere. Such as industry: Rheinmetall, Germany’s largest arms manufacturer, reported record revenues of around 10 billion euros in 2024.
And in academia: Researchers are producing theoretical scenarios in which present-day conflicts could spin out of control and produce World War III.
The situation is also changing the look of the country: At train stations and on the country’s roads, the sight of camouflage vehicles is becoming more common, with troops of all stripes heading for exercises. In March, a military convoy of more than 100 vehicles rolled through four German States. In September, the Bundeswehr intends to practice troop transfers in Hamburg under the codename “Red Storm Bravo.”
And the situation is also, of course, changing the populace, shaking their faith in peace. The conviction of living in a completely safe country is fading. Instead, the fear of war is on the rise, and it is leading to a variety of different reactions.
Some people are looking for help. Last year, Germany’s telephone counselling hotline received 1.3 million calls, with the association behind the hotline saying that an increasing number of people mentioned the unstable global situation as a trigger for their anxiety. Others have begun preparing for the worst-case scenario. Still others are appealing to those in power to make sure that those worst-case scenarios don’t come to pass. And then there are those who have given up and left the country entirely.
Such responses may seem irrational, perhaps overly hasty. After all, the dangers for people in Germany are merely theoretical for the time being. But in Ukraine, a rather unlikely scenario quickly turned into a terrible reality. All those who thought that war in Europe was an impossibility were proved wrong by the Kremlin’s aggression.
How is the new sense of unease affecting people in Germany? And what can be done to counteract the feeling of being powerless in the face of history?
STRATEGY 1
LEARN
Lena Speckmann has begun making preparations in case the worst-case scenario becomes reality. Foto:
Hanna Wiedemann / DER SPIEGEL
Lena Speckmann now knows what a community emergency hub is. Known as “emergency lighthouses” in Germany, they are places that offer assistance to people in times of crisis. Many cities have such hotspots, places where residents can charge their phones or get emergency medical help should the worst come to pass.
Speckmann lives in the Berlin neighborhood of Neukölln. In January, she completed a training course as a fire safety assistant before then taking part in another class called “First Aid and Self-Protection.” The Federal Office for Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance (BBK) paid for the classes.
By the end of 2024, half a million people had taken part in such courses, with the BBK hoping to train an additional 450,000 people by 2029.
In her course, Speckmann learned about the equipment she would need in an emergency, including a possible war. She learned that there is a community emergency hub right around the corner from her apartment in the Neukölln town hall. She learned that it is a good idea to prepare a backpack with enough clothes for three days, a toothbrush, medication and granola bars. That she should digitalize her most important documents and email them to herself. And she learned what to do should she be exposed to radioactivity: Go home immediately, take off all your clothes and put them in a thick plastic bag – and shower over and over again.
Speckmann doesn’t believe that World War III is going to break out tomorrow. She is neither a prepper nor is she eager for the current world order to collapse. She is a linguist, and sitting at her kitchen table, she says that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine made her think. “It made me start wondering how far he might go.”
She is concerned about the current geopolitical situation, in which Europe is largely on its own, trapped between the warmongering Putin in the East and the irrational Trump in the West. She calls him “the orange man.”
Speckmann’s survival kit is sitting on the kitchen table in front of her, a silver soap tin. “I always have it with me,” she says. It contains thread, a plastic tube full of safety pins, a razor blade and a lighter.
It’s a tiny toolbox that could prove helpful if she ends up in a tight spot while away from home. She is also planning to put together an emergency backpack in case she ever has to leave her apartment on short notice.
Speckmann puts the lid back on the tin and smiles. The survival kit and the emergency backpack “are for my soul,” she says. “If Putin drops the bomb, who knows if a backpack will be of much help?”
Her background wouldn’t lead one to expect such preparations for continental conflict. Her parents, she says, were “way to the left.” When Speckmann was a child, they would take her to demonstrations against the stationing of Pershing missiles in Germany. For several decades after that, though, the possibility of a nuclear war wasn’t something she thought much about. Until the Russian invasion of Ukraine, that is.
Speckmann recently became a member of the Left Party. In line with the party’s views, she takes a critical view of capitalism, but she deviates when it comes to the Left Party’s desire for Germany to leave NATO. “I would prefer Germany to have a military capable of defending the country should it need to,” she says. That, though, is not currently the case, she adds.
She’s not much of a fan of Germany’s new chancellor, Friedrich Merz, but the fact that he intends to invest billions in the country’s military is a plan for which she has a fair degree of sympathy. She just doesn’t trust him to spend the money in the right places.
Such are the times we live in: A leftist from Neukölln isn’t critical of the rearming of Germany’s Bundeswehr, rather she is concerned that the chancellor won’t spend the bloated defense budget effectively.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen would probably be proud of Lena Speckmann. Recently, von der Leyen presented a strategy designed to help people and companies prepare for a potential crisis. It includes 30 measures, including a call for the stockpiling of water and food to last for at least 72 hours. Companies should ensure that in the event of war, they will be able to continue producing products that are absolutely necessary, such as medicines, for example.
Brussels believes the time has come for Europe to develop a focus on crisis preparation and prevention.
The German government is also currently seeking to expand civil defense and protection, with 30 billion euros earmarked for the purpose over the next 10 years. The goal is that of preparing Germany for attacks to reduce the number of potential victims and prevent the destruction of residential buildings, workplaces and cultural sites.
Plans call for the Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW) and the BBK to hire hundreds of new employees. Logistics centers are to be set up across the country where cots, tents and relief equipment can be stockpiled. Civil protection authorities also want to modify tunnels, subway stops and underground garages such that they can offer shelter to up to a million people.
From Brussels and Berlin to the municipalities: Everywhere, concepts for disaster prevention and response are being developed. One idea in Merheim, a district of Cologne, calls for the construction of an underground hospital. The plan envisions an subterranean garage being transformed into an emergency care facility able to care for hundreds of patients. The concept is based on the belowground clinics that already exist in Israel.
When it comes to education, Finland is the model. Schoolchildren in the country learn how to behave when the alarms sound and how to get to shelters as quickly as possible. Indeed, emergency training has been part of the school curriculum there for years, an element which Chancellor Merz’s Christian Democrats hope to introduce to German schools as well.
In short, the German state is taking possible future threats seriously, which is another reason why citizens themselves have begun making their own preparations. There are those who are willing to spend quite a bit of money on their own personal protection – and those interested in profiting from that willingness. After all, one thing the pandemic reminded us is that widespread fear offers various pathways to making a lot of money.
STRATEGY 2
SHELTER IN PLACE
Christian Klaus at the entrance to his 50,000-euro bunker. Foto:
Mirja Kofler / DER SPIEGEL
Christian Klaus has a secret. It can be found behind an armored door that weighs about a ton. The secret is a room in the basement of his home, eight meters below the earth’s surface.
On an afternoon in late April, Christian Klaus, 46, leads the way into his new bunker. It is 35 square meters (375 square feet) in size and has space for four people: Klaus, his wife and his two sons, aged 12 and 7. The walls, ceiling and floor are all made of reinforced concrete. They are 45 centimeters thick.
“Even if a nuclear bomb of the size used in Hiroshima were to explode 500 meters from here, the bunker would offer protection,” he says.
Klaus is a trained craftsman and head of a small construction company. He spends much of his time working outdoors, as reflected by his tanned skin. His company is clearly doing well; he drives a McLaren sports car. And he is currently building a new home in a city in southern Germany, but he asked that the precise location not be included in this story.
The house is still a construction site, though the foundation has been completed, as has the shell of the bunker. The concrete roof has just been freshly poured, and the air inside is damp and has a sweet smell to it. The rest of the house, however, has yet to be built.
Klaus says that he met a man from Ukraine not too long ago who had fought on the front lines. The man showed him photos from the war zone, including an image of a car that had been torn to bits – in which was a body with no head. “It stuck with me,” Klaus says.
The war, the images, the stories. Klaus began gathering information. He started wondering what would happen of Russian missiles began striking targets beyond Kyiv. And he was dismayed by what he learned about bunkers in Germany.
Around 20 years ago, the federal and state governments in Germany decided to sell off all such public shelters. Some of them were turned into techno clubs while others have become sites for growing cannabis or mushrooms, since they thrive in cooler environments. A German government analysis found that there are 579 bunkers in the country, but that not a single one of them could be used as a shelter due to broken ventilation systems and inadequate water supplies.
So Klaus decided to build one for himself. A search led him to the German Shelter Center, a Bavarian company specializing in designing bunkers. The project cost Klaus around 50,000 euros.
Those without such a hefty budget can try the online shop belonging to Norma. The discounter currently as a “pop-up panic room” on offer from a Berlin company. It looks like a walk-in closet, but it is made of steel and costs 12,000 euros.
Christian Klaus’s bunker has a 1,000-liter tank in the corner for drinking water. Plans also call for the installation of a flush toilet. Should it cease functioning, there will be a hand pump to expel wastewater. And if even that stops working, there will be a dry toilet option where you just go in a bag.
Christian Klaus’s bunker below the house. Foto: Mirja Kofler / DER SPIEGEL
Klaus intends to outfit the bunker with beds, a safe and an electricity storage unit that will be fed by solar panels on a hall nearby. Should it be necessary, says Klaus, he and his family will be able to survive in the bunker for 50 days until the water runs out. Some of his acquaintances think he is completely crazy, he says, but others think it’s kind of cool.
“The bunker is like life insurance,” says Klaus. He believes that Germany has “made a complete fool of itself” in recent years, with politicians taking too long to decide how to help Ukraine, agonizing over what weapons systems and munitions to send. Germany, he believes, is no longer taken seriously, while elsewhere, there are “too many idiots in power.” The reference is to Putin and Trump.
“If someone tells you they aren’t afraid of war, it’s almost certainly a lie,” Klaus says. “Or they haven’t thought about it.”
Germany’s newfound sense of uneasiness can be expressed in numbers. A poll published by the Allensbach Institute for Public Opinion Research in January found that 61 percent are concerned about the country becoming involved in a military conflict.
Ninety percent of those surveyed said they were “extremely unsettled” by the war in Ukraine. Almost half feel personally threatened by the risk that Germany could become involved in a war.
The most recent Shell Youth Study, released last fall, found that a possible war in Europe is tops on the list of fears for those between the ages of 12 and 25, even ahead of climate change and unemployment.
In March, the pollsters at Infratest dimap surveyed over 1,300 eligible voters in Germany and found that almost 70 percent of them have lost their trust in military protection from the U.S. Almost every third respondent would be prepared to take up arms to defend the country should the need arise, including 39 percent of men and 20 percent of women.
STRATEGY 3
FIGHT
Reservist Daniel Gay: “If we are threatened, I’ll shoot.” Foto:
Anne-Sophie Stolz / DER SPIEGEL
In Scheibenhardt, a municipality in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate on the border with France, Daniel Gay walks up to two gray lockers in his home and opens the doors. Inside are camouflage uniforms, thermal underwear, boots, caps, sleeping bags, sleeping pads, backpacks and bags.
“Good quality,” says Gay. “You can bivouac at minus 10 degrees.” He has so much equipment that he has to store some of it next to and on top of the lockers.
Gay stores his equipment in metal lockers in his home. Foto: Anne-Sophie Stolz / DER SPIEGEL
Gay is the director of an advertising agency. He is married and has three daughters, aged 11, eight and four. A red plastic slide stands in the yard outside and a swing hangs from the tree. In his free time, Gay used to organize forest excursions for children. Now, in the evenings, he has begun spending time considering exactly what the “epochal shift” means that former German Chancellor Olaf Scholz pronounced in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Recently, Gay bought a thermal drone, which can detect soldiers on the ground merely from their body temperature.
Gay has been a member of the reserves for two years after volunteering for the Bundeswehr’s training program for those not serving in the armed forces. People like him provide support to the troops in wartime.
The number of reservists in Germany has recently been rising. In 2022, there were 37,000 and now the total is closer to 50,000. The Bundeswehr says that 90,000 will be necessary in the future.
To prepare for a possible war, Gay participates in an exercise once a month and also takes part in a week-long exercise once a year. The Bundeswehr covers part of his salary for the time he must take off work.
“I don’t know anybody who is excited about war, and I’m not either,” he says. “But if you want peace, you can’t skimp on national defense.”
Gay has set out cookies and coffee in the living room, along with a photo. Everything started with this picture, he says as he takes a seat. It was taken in April 2022, and Gay first saw it on a news website. It shows a dead cyclist on a street in the Ukrainian town of Bucha after likely being shot to death by Russian troops.
Such a crime, Gay thought to himself, could conceivably happen at some point outside his door here in Scheibenhardt. He immediately began immersing himself in news of the war in Ukraine, listening to podcasts and exploring the internet. He quickly realized, he says, that he needed to do something. So he decided to become a reservist.
Gay filled out a questionnaire, signed a number of data protection agreements, withdrew his conscientious objector status and drove to a military medical examination. His training began in April 2023 together with 50 others, including lawyers, doctors, engineers and landscape maintenance professionals. The youngest was 19, the oldest 62. The group included only a few women.
Gay had to get up at 5:30 a.m. He learned how to run across a field wearing a 12-kilogram protective vest clinging to his body and later was instructed in how to operate a bazooka. He learned how to take apart weapons and put them back together again. And how to form a line formation together with others.
Daniel Gay in the forest. Foto: Anne-Sophie Stolz / DER SPIEGEL
He now knows what to do if the enemy is approaching. He is familiar with the language used by soldiers. If danger is approaching from ahead, he must yell “contact front!”
“I am well aware of the dangers,” says Gay back in his living room. “I know that I could be hit and that, in the worst case, my children would no longer have a dad. That would be shitty, for sure.”
For him, though, it is important to be prepared to defend his homeland, to defend democracy, the right to freely express your opinion. When it comes to people like Gay, arms training is not a cause for concern, it is a necessary part of deterrence. It is the basis for being able to negotiate with other countries on an equal footing.
Should Russia attack NATO, reservists like him would first be deployed to ensure that soldiers from allied nations could quickly move through Germany – that they would receive sufficient food and fuel. Gay would be involved in standing guard at ports, pipelines, power plants and barracks.
There is a book that narrates what a war might look like in Germany. It was written by the Munich-based political scientist and security expert Carlo Masala, and it is called “If Russia Wins.”
The book is a fictitious, dystopian scenario in which Masala describes the overnight occupation of a NATO city by Russian troops in March 2028. The town in question is Narva, Estonia, population 50,000. There are explosions, and as dawn breaks, the Russian flag is flying from the tower of city hall.
In the book, Germany hadn’t managed to prepare the Bundeswehr prior to the invasion. It hadn’t closed the gaps in munitions procurement and digitalization. Masala writes about lethargy in European capitals and about how the attack on the Baltic nation plunges NATO into crisis.
The book isn’t exactly helpful in warding off fears of war, rather the contrary. Masala’s goal appears to be that of bringing Europe to reason and of describing what he thinks Germany can do in the face of a potentially looming catastrophe.
German society, he believes, must realize that its current way of life is under threat by Russia’s hybrid warfare techniques – by its propaganda and disinformation. And for that to happen, Masala believes, the government has to clearly explain to the population what exactly is at stake: namely democracy itself.
There are those, however, who have their doubts. People who believe that such an attitude actually increases the risk of war and that diplomacy is more important than investing in the military. Several politicians with the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) recently called for less armaments and more negotiations with Russia in a paper they called “Manifest.”
Three years after Putin’s full invasion of Ukraine, there is still no broad consensus in Germany about just how serious the situation is and what might help defuse it.
How real are the dangers? When does concern cross the border into alarmism? Disagreement on such questions can fuel fears.
The last government under Chancellor Olaf Scholz left the impression of hesitancy when it came to providing Ukraine with weapons systems and munitions, even though only the U.S. has thus far sent more war materiel to the country than Germany. Whereas Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said the country had to “prepare for war,” Scholz himself never used such language.
But the level-headed Scholz has been succeeded by the more energetic Friedrich Merz, or at least so it has seemed. During the campaign, the CDU leader said he would send Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, for example, a step that Scholz consistently rejected. Since moving into the Chancellery, however, Merz has changed his tune, announcing early in his term that he was not interested in discussing possible arms deliveries in public.
Some people might find that reassuring, others will be even more unsettled. Either way, there is clearly a necessity to explain defense policy more clearly to the public at large.
How it should not be done was recently demonstrated by CDU floor leader Jens Spahn. In speaking of the multi-billion-euro defense spending package during an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, he said: “What good are balanced budget laws if the Russians are standing outside the door? To put it bluntly, we Europeans have just two options: We can learn to defend ourselves or we can learn Russian.”
STRATEGY 4
HOPE
An Easter peace protest in Hamburg. Foto:
Daniel Chatard / DER SPIEGEL
It’s Easter Monday at the Landwehr commuter train station in Hamburg and 2,600 people have gathered to demonstrate for peace and disarmament. They have brought along cardboard signs with messages like “Education instead of Bombs” or “Be Active instead of Radioactive.”
The march in Hamburg is one of around 100 Easter demonstrations that took place in the country this year. Several tens of thousands of people took part, an increase over previous years, organizers said. The motto of the marches was the same in many cities: “Education instead of Preparing for War.”
At the demonstration in Hamburg, one participant, a retired woman, says that she has been having trouble sleeping because of the news she reads during the day. “If war really does come, I don’t want to survive it. But God in heavens, what will become of my grandchildren?”
A law student says that the government should pump the billions of euros into the country’s schools instead of handing it to the Bundeswehr. And that Russia and Ukraine should start negotiations over the embattled region of Donbas. “I would rather cede Schleswig-Holstein than be killed.”
Hardly anyone at the Easter march wants to be quoted by name. Which is perhaps a sign that pacifists these days are facing far stiffer headwinds than those who protested the stationing of American nuclear warheads in Germany in the 1980s.
Magdalena Kundtmann, though, has no problem standing by her opinion in public. A 66-year-old fashion designer, Kundtmann has come to the march on her bicycle. A peace-dove pennant flies from her handlebars.
Fashion designer Magdalena Kundtmann regularly takes part in peace demonstrations. Foto: Daniel Chatard / DER SPIEGEL
The conflict in Ukraine would have been avoidable if clever agreements had been hammered out beforehand, she believes. “It’s better to negotiate for 1,000 hours than to fire a single bullet.” The current race to arm the country reminds her of the period before World War II, she says, adding that she simply cannot understand why history always has to repeat itself.
Yes, Kundtmann says, she believes that there will be a big war in Europe. For that reason, she says, she bought a VW bus last year. She used to be a girl scout, she says, and can survive in the forest for a year if she has to.
“If it ever starts, I’ll drive far away to somewhere I can chop wood and milk cows,” she says. Until then, she goes to demonstrations. She wants her voice to be heard while there is still hope.
Germany isn’t the only country where fears of war are on the rise. The public opinion research institute Ipsos regularly conducts online panel surveys in which people from 30 different countries are asked about the political issues that are currently bothering them. The study is called “What Worries the World.”
The most recent survey took place in May and June. In response to the question as to what is currently worrying them, 27 percent of the participants from Germany mentioned military conflicts. Only in Poland (38 percent) and Israel (35 percent) was the share higher.
In February and March, the numbers of those fearful of a war increased in nine European countries, including Sweden, the Netherlands, France and Britain. Nowhere, though, did fears increase as significantly as in Germany.
Perhaps the emotional state of people in Germany can be explained by a stereotype: German Angst. It is a term that the British and Americans like to use to poke fun at the Germans’ alleged pessimism and excessive need for security. But in every cliché, they say, there is an element of truth.
STRATEGY 5
LEAVE
Biologist Jenny Zobel at her home in Costa Rica. Foto:
Privat
Maybe it was the Russian surveillance plane that set its course toward Rügen and zoomed over Jenny Zobel’s head when she was visiting the German Baltic Sea island.
Or perhaps it was the text messages sent as part of a test of the country’s emergency notification system that unsettled her. More than anything, though, says Jenny Zobel, 40, it was a concern that had been growing increasingly concrete in her mind: “What happens if Putin feels like he has been backed into a corner by the West like a sick animal and goes crazy – and we are quite close by?”
For the first time in her life, she started growing fearful of a war on German soil.
It was spring 2022, Putin had just launched his invasion of Ukraine and Zobel, a doctor of biology living near Munich, decided to leave the country together with her six-year-old daughter. Because she no longer felt safe in Germany.
Since then, Zobel has been living in Costa Rica. She agreed to talk about her move in a video call. “The decision was a good one,” she says, speaking from the veranda of her house on the Caribbean coast, cicadas chirping in the background.
In 2015, 138,000 Germans moved out of the country. By 2023, that number had risen to 265,000. There are consultants who offer seminars and workshops for those interested in emigrating. The agency Global Setup in Dubai confirms the trend: In the first months of this year, says agency head Clemens Kohlbacher, they were receiving calls on a daily basis, with almost all of the callers citing their fears of war. Switzerland is a popular destination, since it doesn’t belong to the European Union or NATO, as are New Zealand, the United Arab Emirates, Panama and Georgia. Places where Germans can bring their money to safety, save on taxes and make a fresh start.
Jenny Zobel didn’t hesitate for long, quickly booking one-way tickets for her and her daughter to Costa Rica. She had been to the country once before on vacation and really liked the people, the natural surroundings and the fact that it is neutral.
Costa Rica, sometimes referred to as Switzerland of Central America, is far enough away from a potential war in Europe, Zobel figured. The country has no military “and hardly any natural resources, just bananas,” she says. How long does she want to stay there? Forever, she says. “Particularly now, with Gaza, Trump – since everything has grown so much more tense.”
Her worries, she says, unleashed “unexpected energy” back then. She gave notice on her apartment and sold her belongings on eBay. In the days before her flight to Costa Rica, she says, she became a catastrophe junkie, looking at her phone in the morning even before getting out of bed to see if there had been an attack somewhere and googling terms like “ABC weapons” and “nuclear strike” and also checking to see which roads out of Munich she should take in the event of a mass panic.
She began imagining a scenario that had nothing to do with German reality at the time, picturing a situation in which she would no longer be able to fly out of Germany. Her Mazda, gas tank full, stood outside on the street until one day before her flight. That was her emergency backup plan, driving to Madrid overland to catch a direct flight from there to Costa Rica.
There is a photo from the day of their departure showing her and her daughter at the gate, exhausted and alone. “One of the darkest moments of our emigration,” she says. After that, everything was fine. The first months abroad also weren’t easy, she says, but they were safe.
Zobel says that her daughter has come to terms with the fact that her mother took her out of the country. “The main thing is that she sees that I am completely certain of my decision.”
Zobel does network marketing for a U.S. company in the healthcare industry, a job she can do from anywhere. She says she earns enough to live on. All of the challenges she has faced in Costa Rica, all the unknowns, have been less frightening for her, she says, than remaining in Germany for one extra day.
For most people, emigrating isn’t an option, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Germany must become tougher, both militarily and psychologically. With a society that is resilient against the fear of war, and which learns the difference between rational concerns and irrational fears. How might that be possible?
It is a question best posed to psychologist Eva-Lotta Brakemeier, the president of the German Psychological Society and adviser to the government as a member of the German Science and Humanities Council. Anxiety, she says, is a normal reaction to the current global situation, a kind of defense mechanism.
Many people have a hard time accepting the fact that there are some things they cannot change. To confront this feeling of powerlessness, it is helpful to focus on things that you can influence, such as your private life, your free time, she says. Instead of trying to fight the fear, says Brakemeier, it is better to become active. Those who get involved feel useful: a volunteer position, meeting with the neighbors, networking with others – such strategies are useful for overcoming insecurities.
Brakemeier refers to it as “collective self-actualization.” The most important thing is the realization that people realize that individuals can find a useful remedy for anxiety in the community.
In his interview with DER SPIEGEL, Joschka Fischer responded to the question as to what gives him confidence by saying: “Europe. We have to ensure that this Europe is a success. Period.” Self-actualization is also possible between nations.
In his book about a fictitious Russian attack on NATO, the political scientist Carlo Masala writes that scenarios aren’t merely useful for representing potential futures in order to prepare for them, they can also help prevent precisely these futures.
And that might be the good news: Asking yourself what war means for you could sharpen your senses such that you aren’t surprised later. The best way to deal with fear is to face it.
So what next?
Magdalena Kundtmann, the demonstrator, has resolved to attend protests held by the peace initiative in Hamburg every Saturday.
Jenny Zobel is expecting additional emigrants to move from her old homeland to Costa Rica soon. There is plenty of room, she says.
Lena Speckmann from Berlin intends to continue expanding her stockpiles, including emergency rations. She is thinking about coordinating with her neighbors. Who will store water? What about rice and beans?
Daniel Gay has managed to convince his wife to join the Bundeswehr, and she is now also a reservist.
Christian Klaus says he intends to use his bunker for other purposes as well. For as long as the peace holds, he wants to turn it into a party room.