Business for German arms manufacturers has been thriving since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—but this is only the beginning. Germany and the European Union have set a new, ambitious goal: military independence from the United States. Achieving this will be costly and challenging. More significantly, it will again transform peace-loving Germany into a terrifying war machine.

Arms manufacturer Rheinmetall’s stock rose more than 12-fold since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Its market value now exceeds that of Germany’s largest car manufacturer, Volkswagen. Rheinmetall’s value will only increase as Europe militarizes.

The funds are already being unlocked.

On Tuesday, the outgoing German Bundestag approved a constitutional change to Germany’s debt brake to allow for hundreds of billions in military and infrastructure spending. This package will accelerate a growing trend in Germany, where manufacturing weapons of war is more profitable than producing goods for peace.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen also presented a plan for the EU to mobilize around €800 billion (us$869 billion) for defense to rearm Europe. In a speech on Tuesday she said:

Member states need to be able to fully rely on European defense supply chains, especially in times of urgent need. And that means creating an EU-wide market for defense equipment [by 2030].

Our world is entering a dangerous new era.

Germany’s car makers are producing weaponry; its highways are being prepared to carry tanks. Its economy is shifting toward military defense, while its population is being primed for large-scale war. The parallels to the 1930s are too numerous to ignore—yet no one seems alarmed.

An Industrial Shift From Peace to War

On February 5, the Franco-German arms manufacturer knds acquired the Alstom train factory in Görlitz, Germany. “Instead of train carriages, parts for the defense industry will be manufactured here from next year,” outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz commented when visiting the site.

Rheinmetall announced plans to convert two of its plants, which currently manufacture civilian components, to produce parts for the military sector. “In the armaments business, Rheinmetall is currently using every opportunity to increase production volumes, particularly in the ammunition sector,” the Düsseldorf-based company announced at the end of February.

Hensoldt, which makes radar systems used on Ukrainian battlefields, plans to take on 200 workers from auto parts suppliers Bosch and Continental. “We are benefiting from the difficulties in the automotive industry,” Hensoldt’s chief executive Oliver Doerre told Reuters on March 5.

“We must consider the defense industry as an economic motor for Germany,” he said. “The sector will play a more significant role than in the past.”

In an e-mail to Defense News, Hans Christoph Atzpodien, head of the German defense industry, said he expected “wholly new dimensions to the question of arms demand,” in terms of faster deliveries and higher volume.

The Telegraph reported March 11 that Volkswagen also expressed a willingness to reenter the military sector. Oliver Blume, the chief executive of Europe’s biggest car manufacturer, told the Telegraph:

First off, I think, given the current geopolitical situation, what we are seeing now in Germany and Europe is exactly the right decisions, in the sense that we need to invest more in order to be safe again.

We are not in specific talks about what Volkswagen can do. My take on it is, if there was the option of military vehicles going forward, we would have to look at the concepts.

We did that in the past. Volkswagen Group has automotive competence. We are ready to provide consultancy and advice.

But where we are, this is just open-ended and initiatives will be brought forward by the defense industry more than anything.

Defense Post wrote on March 14: “Among Volkswagen’s best-known military systems during the Second World War were the Kübelwagen light utility vehicle, with over 50,000 units produced, and the Schwimmwagen light amphibious vehicle, with more than 15,000 units produced.”

Consider this casual reference to World War ii and our world’s careless reaction. Have we forgotten the military horrors of the past? Has the blood of millions dried to the point that we no longer remember it? Have the screams of concentration camp inmates faded into silence?

Are we immune to repeating historic errors?

Our careless attitude to Germany’s rearmament shows we are not.

When Adolf Hitler came to power, he turned Germany’s civil industry into a war machine. He revived Germany’s economy by pumping money into the arms industry and investing heavily in infrastructure projects such as Germany’s famous highway system, the autobahn. This provided job opportunities and caused the economy to boom. But it was unsustainable. Soon the nation went to war. While the use of these weapons surprised many, Adolf Hitler had planned it all along.

Europe’s massive military spending plan financed by debt will certainly bring new job opportunities. Many German laborers will switch to the more lucrative arms industry. But an economy run on building weapons cannot survive unless those weapons are used. Could plans for such use already exist?

The Telegraph wrote that “fears that Donald Trump’s United States is pulling support away from the Continent … have led manufacturers including Rheinmetall and knds Group to retool car parts factories to make weapons.”

This analysis is ignorant of what is really happening: This isn’t about Trump scaring European allies. These plans have been waiting to be implemented.

Defense News wrote on March 10: “Redirecting the German auto sector to produce tanks, shells and other military gear is not an entirely new idea. In June 2024, auto parts giant Continental and arms behemoth Rheinmetall signed a memorandum of understanding to facilitate the retraining of auto workers affected by layoffs in the shrinking industry.”

Months before Trump was elected president, detailed war preparations were already being implemented. Their blueprint was made even before Germany lost World War ii.

Preparing Society for War

It’s hard to fathom the magnitude of Germany’s war preparations. Its whole society is being prepared for combat.

“Germany and the Bundeswehr must be prepared to respond to current threats and territorial defense in peace, crisis and war,” said a Bundeswehr paper published September 2024. “With this goal in mind, experts from all areas of the Bundeswehr are developing the military component of a national defense plan, the ‘Operations Plan Germany’ (oplan deu), in a joint planning group comprising the federal government, the federal states and local authorities, the so-called blue-light organizations and industry. oplan deu is a secret document that is continuously being worked on and updated under the responsibility of the Territorial Command of the Bundeswehr.”

The military command that orchestrated two world wars is now preparing Germany for a third.

“We need to raise awareness of how important a well-prepared and resilient economy is for Germany’s civilian and military defense,” said Malte Heyne, managing director of the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce.

“If it were essential to avert serious dangers, the regulations would even allow the entire economy to be converted to a planned economy by the state,” said Bertram Brossardt, managing director of the Bavarian Business Association, according to a Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung report published November 18.

Germany is also considering a massive expansion of its bomb shelter network. Plans include converting public and private facilities such as metro stations, car parks and basements.

The mindset of the younger generation is being shaped to expect warfare. The government approved a draft law in November that will compel young men to answer a survey about their willingness to serve in the military.

“In view of the military threat posed by Russia, a clear majority of citizens are behind the turnaround in defense policy and are specifically calling for a Bundeswehr that is fit for war,” military sociologist Timo Graf noted. He said the belief that Russia’s foreign and security policy is a threat to Germany’s security has increased from 28 percent in 2018 to 66 percent in 2024.

All According to Plan

After World War ii, Germany’s weapons makers went underground, intending to later revive the economy and rearm.

On Aug. 10, 1944, Adolf Hitler’s second in command, Martin Boremann, informed a gathering of industrialists through an emissary: “The war cannot be won by us; we must take steps in preparation for a postwar commercial campaign.”

Boremann took the Nazi Party and its enablers underground. World War ii cbs News correspondent Paul Manning detailed these plans in his 1981 book Martin Bormann. The document of the August 10 meeting was not declassified until 1996. Its implications for today are profound.

“The document, detailing an August 1944 meeting between top German industrialists, reveals a secret postwar plan to restore the Nazis to power,” Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry writes in Germany’s Conquest of the Balkans. “By 1944, the Germans knew they would lose World War ii and were already planning for the next round!”

The leaders of Messerschmitt (now Airbus), Volkswagenwerk, Rheinmetall and other companies were at this meeting. These companies enabled Germany’s economic rise after the war. Should it concern us that they are now enabling its military rise?

Time to Wake Up

Many have dismissed the reality of a Nazi underground due to a supposed lack of evidence. But on May 9, 1945, the late Herbert W. Armstrong warned:

We don’t understand German thoroughness. From the very start of World War ii, they have considered the possibility of losing this second round, as they did the first—and they have carefully, methodically planned, in such eventuality, the third round—World War iii! Hitler has lost. This round of war, in Europe, is over. And the Nazis have now gone underground. … Now a Nazi underground is methodically planned. They plan to come back and to win on the third try.

Eighty years later, we see this plan being implemented. The German military empire is rising before our eyes. But most people simply don’t care. They believe it impossible that Germany could start another war. However, Bible prophecy reveals Germany will start another war, and this time, America and Britain will not be able to stop that war machine.

A prophecy in Revelation 17 reads: “The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder …. And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space” (verses 8, 10).

Mr. Flurry explains in Prophesy Again:

This revelation is about the period when Mr. Armstrong, God’s end-time Elijah, was doing this work of God. …

During World War ii, we saw the Hitler-Mussolini axis, but then it disappeared from the scene. It “was not”! And yet, God says, “it is”! The Axis powers lost the war, but as Mr. Armstrong preached time and again, they just went underground—into “the bottomless pit” (verse 8). They’re still there—they’re just underground.

Now they are reemerging, yet we are blind to this reality.

The Bible reveals our world is heading toward what Jesus Christ called “great tribulation” (Matthew 24:21). This war will no doubt involve nuclear weapons. Christ warned the destruction will be so great that no one would be left alive unless He intervened (verse 22).

No one wants to imagine what all-out nuclear war would mean for mankind. No one wants to imagine the horrific suffering caused by nuclear fallout. Yet the Bible warns that God will cause this military nightmare to take its course so we see where our rebellion against Him has led.

This is what it takes for God to get mankind’s attention. The prophecy in Matthew 24 continues: “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory” (verses 29-30).

Soon Christ will return, and mankind will learn to obey God.