The whole world is arming—but Germany is arming faster. Global military spending rose by 9.4 percent from 2023 to 2024: Europe’s by 19 percent, and Germany’s by a staggering 28 percent. In a single year, Germany surged from the world’s seventh-largest military spender to fourth place, behind the United States, China and Russia, the latter currently embroiled in a full-scale war.

But this rapid transformation raises an unsettling question: What if “never again” happens again?

According to the latest report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (sipri), published Monday, Germany spent $88.5 billion on defense in 2024. And it’s not alone in dramatically increasing military spending. Japan raised its defense spending by 21 percent to $55.3 billion, while Poland and Sweden saw even sharper increases of 31 and 34 percent, respectively.

Yet what sets Germany apart is not just the size of its surge, but its potential. Germany is only getting started in ways others simply can’t.

“For the first time since reunification, Germany became the biggest military spender in Western Europe, which was due to the €100 billion special defense fund announced in 2022,” said Lorenzo Scarazzato, researcher with the sipri Military Expenditure and Arms Production Program. “The latest policies adopted in Germany and many other European countries suggest that Europe has entered a period of high and increasing military spending that is likely to continue for the foreseeable future.”

In March, Germany passed a constitutional reform to loosen its debt brake, unlocking hundreds of billions of euros in additional funding. This move clears the way for defense spending to reach 3.5 percent of gross domestic product or more in the coming years, easily surpassing the $150 billion mark. At this pace, Germany is on track to overtake war-time Russia in military expenditures.

Most astonishing of all, no one is alarmed by Germany’s military rise. As Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry wrote in our latest Trumpet issue:

Americans and others whose grandfathers fought and died from German weaponry are now cheering this development. They are oblivious to the feelings of revenge simmering deep down in many Germans.

[British Prime Minister Winston] Churchill saw German car manufacturers and other industries shift toward arms production. We are now seeing the same thing. The country’s autobahn is more than a symbol of speed—it is part of its strategic military mobilization plans. Investments are made to turn the whole German landscape into a field ready for battle.

Germany is repeating the actions of the 1930s, yet no one is alarmed!

Some things are very different from the 1930s. In the infamous decade leading up to World War ii, Germany was restrained by the Versailles Treaty and debilitating debt. It was surrounded by rivals instead of allies. The memory of the first world war was still in vivid national memory.

Today, Germany faces no considerable international restraints, financial limitations or industrial restrictions on its ability to militarize.

The last who opposed German military domination, the Serbs, were bombed into submission in the 1990s. Britain, which opposed German political domination, gave it free rein when it left the European Union in 2016. Under French President Emmanuel Macron, Franco-German cooperation means working on tanks, fighter jets and perhaps even nuclear bombs together. Under United States President Donald Trump, nato’s motto to “keep the Germans down” has effectively been reversed.

But some things are just like the 1930s. One of the most alarming trends is the rise of anti-Semitism, which is on pace with German military spending. “The new anti-Semitism is everywhere in Europe—including Germany. A cocktail of cowardice and convenience is turning the promise ‘Never again’ into a hollow formula,” Israel’s ambassador to Germany, Ron Prosor, wrote in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on April 25.

What happens when “never again” turns “into a hollow formula” at the same time that Germany militarizes? It means that the past not only can but will repeat itself.

Almost no one wants to face this reality. Indeed, it is too frightening to think about. Yet it is the subject of dozens of biblical prophecies warning our world as a plea to avert catastrophe.

The Trumpet and its predecessor, the Plain Truth, have observed German military developments for decades. We foretold German militarization when the nation lay in ashes in the late 1940s and when it retired thousands of active-duty soldiers in the 2000s. This Bible-based forecast started with the late Herbert W. Armstrong. In “Germany’s Astonishing Military Rise,” Mr. Flurry highlighted Mr. Armstrong’s forecast, how it seemed impossible, and how it was being fulfilled today.

Now that we are seeing this astonishing prophecy fulfilled, we would do well to look into the source of this forecast to see what will happen next.

Numerous biblical prophecies warn that our world is heading toward the ultimate escalation. In Matthew 24, Jesus Christ warned of a time of Great Tribulation, so great that it threatens human survival. No doubt, He spoke of our time when mankind has acquired this frightening ability.

But through the pages of the Bible, God speaks: “As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?” (Ezekiel 33:11).

As Mr. Armstrong explained, modern Israel includes America, Britain and the Jewish nation in the Middle East. God emphatically says that national calamity is about to strike—unless these nations repent. And who will God use to execute the punishment? Assyria, or modern-day Germany (Isaiah 10:5). (To learn more, read our free book The United States and Britain in Prophecy.)

For decades Mr. Armstrong proclaimed this truth. Today we see Germany amassing the military strength in cooperation with others to execute this prophesied punishment. Will you heed the Bible’s warning and accept God’s hope-filled solution?