“Poland has become our most important partner in continental Europe”, a senior U.S. Army official in Europe said, citing the crucial role Poland has played in supporting Ukraine and in shoring up NATO defences in the Baltics. And in being the best buffer from Russia.

As reported by Politico, Warsaw will raise its target defence spending from 2.4 per cent of the gross domestic product to 5 per cent. Meanwhile, Germany, which spent about 1.5 per cent of GDP on defence last year, is debating whether it can maintain NATO’s 2 per cent goal after it exhausts a €100 billion defence investment fund it approved earlier this year. Poland already has more tanks and howitzers than Germany and is on course to have a much larger army, with a target of 300,000 troops by 2035, compared with Germany’s current 170,000.

Today, Poland’s military is about 150,000 strong, with 30,000 belonging to a new territorial defence force set up in 2017. These are weekend soldiers who undergo 16 days of training followed up by refresher courses. They were initially seen as a bit of a joke, but Ukraine’s success in using mobile militia equipped with anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles now makes the idea seem much more sensible.

Unlike Germany, which struggles to attract new troops, Poland’s recruiting drive is gaining attention. “The Poles have a much more positive attitude towards their military than Germany because they had to fight for their freedom”, said Gustav Gressel, a former Austrian military officer and security scholar now with the European Council on Foreign Relations. “In military circles, no one questions the quality of the Polish army”.

Even as Washington has welcomed Poland’s defence spending pledges, there are also questions about whether Warsaw will really follow through, as well as frustration that the country is turning to South Korea for some of its biggest purchases. Poland signed a 23 billion złoty (€4.9 billion) deal for 250 Abrams tanks from the U.S. this spring, a quick replacement for the 240 Soviet-era tanks sent to Ukraine. Its air force is equipped with U.S. F-16s and in 2020 Warsaw signed a $4.6 billion deal for 32 F-35 fighters.

So far, Poland has ordered between $10 billion-$12 billion worth of weaponry from Korea, said Mariusz Cielma, editor and analyst at Nowa Technika Wojskowa, a military technology news and analysis website. The deals include 180 K2 Black Panther tanks, 200 K9 Thunder howitzers, 48 FA-50 light attack aircraft, and 218 K239 Chunmoo rocket launchers. Complementing the immediate supplies, the Koreans are expected to supply a total of 1,000 K2 tanks and 600 K9 Howitzers by the mid-to-late 2020s.

The attraction of Korea is that its military equipment is generally cheaper than American and European alternatives and they can produce it on a tight timetable. And Polish leaders have made no secret that Europe’s pressure on Poland over its controversial judiciary reforms and other issues has also played a role in the decisions to go shopping in Seoul.

While no one questions the ambition of Poland’s spending spree, some do wonder about its feasibility and the political motives driving the push. By 2035, the country aims to spend 524 billion złoty on the military. Given the importance of security to Poland’s electorate, many suspect PiS is making military investments with an eye toward next year’s national election. If there is a change of government, the new cabinet will have to ask some tough questions about Poland’s ability to finance such an enormous military expansion. While Poland’s economy has been overall robust in recent years, the level of planned military spending is unprecedented and is bound to strain the country’s budget.

Whether Poland’s military might will translate into political influence in Europe is another matter, however. So far that hasn’t happened, in large part because the centrist forces that dominate the EU distrust Poland’s government, which is controlled by the nationalist Law and Justice Party (PiS). The one thing Poland’s fractious political parties can agree on, however, is the necessity of strengthening the military.

Germany, meanwhile, appears to welcome Poland’s military build-up despite the difficult bilateral relationship between the two countries and the troubled history between the two. Berlin regards Poland as a buffer separating it from Russia’s sphere of influence. The more tanks and troops Poland has, the safer Germany will be.