The disunity in the EU is reaching a boiling point. German conservatives are preparing to deliver a blunt ultimatum to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen: dismantle the regulatory machine she has built, they will try to oust her.

As IntelliNews reported, Europe is suffering from a slew of economic difficulties that is putting mounting pressures on leaders across the Continent and fuelling the rise of the right-wing popularise parties that will likely take power in the next election cycle. All of French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer are suffering from record low ratings and casting around for solutions that remain elusive.

The relationship between European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and her own political family is one of the victims and she has already faced four no-confidence votes and become increasingly vulnerable.

In their frustration, conservative members of the German Bundestag are preparing to present von der Leyen with tougher demands for an accelerated reduction in what they see as burdensome EU rules that hamper German businesses, according to Politico, which obtained drafts of the conservative faction's new strategy document.

The conservatives are attempting to shift the blame for Germany’s lacklustre economic performance and deindustrialisation from themselves to Brussels, but experts say the underlying cause of Germany’s slipping into recession has more to do with the end of cheap Russian energy supplies than Brussels’ red tape.

Von der Leyen was scheduled to meet with Bundestag conservatives in a closed-door session in Berlin on April 28, with Chancellor Friedrich Merz also expected to attend. The meeting comes immediately after the Cyprus EU summit at the weekend where von der Leyen presented herself as the architect of European solidarity on Ukraine and the Iran war — while her domestic political base says its patience with the slow pace of reform in Brussels is exhausted.

The 27-point ultimatum

The latest draft of the strategy document, dated April 23 and entitled "Agenda for a sustainable reduction of bureaucracy at EU level," included a list of 27 demands addressed to the Commission. The specificity of that number — 27 demands to an institution governing 27 member states — appears deliberate.

The conservatives insist on a "narrower interpretation" of the powers of EU institutions and suggest that member states consider reducing staff in European structures. Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) intends to ask von der Leyen to reduce “burdensome” EU regulations that put pressure on German businesses, and the draft document frames the exercise not as a wish list but as a structured ultimatum: comply, or face new attempts to formally limit the Commission's powers.

"Germany's harsh tone is telling," Politico noted in an opinion piece. "Merz conservatives are becoming increasingly aggressive towards Brussels."

The confrontation is politically unusual because von der Leyen is herself a CDU member and has long been considered an ideological ally of Merz within the European People's Party.

Following the release of the Draghi report, which detailed the fact that Europe was falling behind the US and China and needs to invest hundreds of billions of euros to catch up, the two have publicly agreed on the need to improve European competitiveness and reduce regulatory burdens. That alignment is now straining under the pressure of an increasingly harsh economic reality, made worse by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and now the energy shock caused by the Iran war.

This pressure comes at a time when Merz and the conservatives are failing to deliver on election promises to revitalise Germany's long-struggling economy through sweeping reforms. Last week, the German government cut its growth forecast for 2026 in half as the economy faces new challenges from the fallout of the war in Iran.

Militarisation

Merz is increasingly grasping at straws and seizing on issues to make himself look decisive. As Europe becomes increasingly sidelined in the Russo-Ukraine ceasefire negotiations, but at the same time takes on the entire burden of funding it – Germany contributes a third of the EU aid to Kyiv – the coalition government has launched a plan to create the largest conventional army in Europe.

With heavy industry closing down and the automotive sector planning to cut another 30,000 jobs by 2030, the plan is to convert idle car-plants and produce tanks to give the economy a military Keynesianism shot in the arm. Immediately on taking office, Merz forced through an easing of the constitutional limits on government borrowing and raised €500bn of debt to pay for the transformation.

Germany unveiled its most ambitious military blueprint since the Second World War on April 22, when Defence Minister Boris Pistorius presented a package of foundational strategic documents at a press conference in Berlin — the most comprehensive overhaul of Bundeswehr planning in decades and only the second time Germany has published a national defence strategy in the post-war era.

The centrepiece is a military strategy titled "Verantwortung für Europa" (Responsibility for Europe) which sets a goal of becoming the “strongest conventional fighting force in Europe by 2039.”

The package also includes a new capability profile, a personnel growth plan, a redesigned reserve strategy and a 153-measure bureaucracy-cutting agenda.

"We are transforming the Bundeswehr into Europe's strongest conventional army. In the short term, we are enhancing our defensive capabilities; in the medium term, we aim for a significant buildup of capacity; and in the long term, we will ensure technological superiority," Pistorius said.

The strategy names Russia as the greatest immediate threat to peace and security in Germany and the Euro-Atlantic region, warning that "Russia is creating the conditions for a war against Nato and is already conducting hybrid operations against the Alliance's member states."

European leaders are regularly indulging in scaremongering to distract punters from the economic woes of the wholesale change in Germany’s economic model wrought by the end of cheap Russian energy. The document warns that the pace of Russian rearmament could lead to a confrontation with Nato within the next year – shortening the previous German intelligence reports giving Europe five years to get ready for the return of Russian forces to the heart of Europe.

The Kremlin has repeatedly said it has no intention of invading Europe. Some analysts have pointed out that if after four years, the entire weight of the Russian military can only conquer 20% of Ukraine, what chance does the same army have to take and hold any significant part of Europe which is orders of magnitude more powerful, richer and better armed than Ukraine.

Nevertheless, to meet the Russian threat, the German plan calls for the Bundeswehr to expand from its current 185,000 active personnel to at least 260,000, with a total force including reservists of approximately 460,000. Priority capability areas include air defence, long-range deep-strike capabilities and data-driven warfare, with artificial intelligence set to play a significantly larger role across the force. Reservists, long treated as a backup to be activated only in emergencies, are now explicitly positioned "on par with the active force," with Germany expected to serve as Nato's primary logistical hub in any eastern-flank crisis — a role Pistorius described as "the hinge between the military and civil society."

The tensions between Berlin and Brussels are further splintering and the EU is already fragmented. The calculation in Berlin appears to be that the political cost of appearing to prop up a Commission that is delivering too little, too slowly, now outweighs the cost of open friction with an ally, Politico opined.

Germany is not alone in its frustration. Former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban was a lighting rod for his outspoken pro-Russia stance, criticism of sanctions and anti-EU rhetoric, but many other countries quietly stood behind him, letting Orban take the flak, as became clear in Ukraine’s stalled efforts to open the cluster negotiations in its EU accession bid last summer.

More recently other leaders have started to become more vocal. Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever blocked the idea of seizing Russia’s frozen $300bn to fund Ukraine at the EU summit for the Reparation Loan in December together with Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Since then he has become an increasingly outspoken critic of the EU's regulatory and sanctions framework, going as far as calling for sanctions to be lifted and commodity imports from Russia to resume. Last week he warned that "there are other countries and leaders in Europe who do not always agree with the consensus." Greek and Maltese objections also gutted key provisions of the twentieth sanctions package against Russia.

The Merz ultimatum should be read in that context — as the visible tip of a broader restiveness among member states that had previously been whispered in committee rooms and rarely espoused from the podium.

Von der Leyen's position

Von der Leyen has proven a formidable institutional survivor. Her opponents have long tried to dismantle the Brussels machine she has built, but she has survived two votes of no confidence in the European Parliament this year.

She entered the April 27 meeting from a position of recent institutional strength — the €90bn Ukraine loan approved, the twentieth sanctions package adopted, the Cyprus summit concluded with declarations of purpose — but the challenge from Berlin is different in character from previous attacks, precisely because it comes from within her own political family and is framed not as opposition but as impatient expectation from allies, Politico argued.

The Commission has been moving in the direction of deregulation — von der Leyen's second term agenda explicitly includes a "competitiveness compass" and regulatory simplification commitments — and she has been forced to backtrack on some key green agenda restrictions and rules, which has been her legacy agenda while president. But the pace has not satisfied Berlin. The question now is whether the CDU's formalised 27-point agenda and the threat of a power-limiting challenge will accelerate that process or harden positions on both sides.