German Government Sends Panic Signal: Ask Citizens to Stockpile Food, Water and Cash! Why?

A few days back the German government reportedly asked their citizens to stockpile food, water and cash or essentially prepare a survival kit supposedly for ‘civil defense’

From Quartz

In English, stashing away food for times of need is “squirreling.” In German, it’s “hamstern.” Hamster pictures, tweets, and jokes are everywhere in Germany this week, since the Frankfurter Allegemeine Zeitung (link in German) revealed that the government is asking citizens to stockpile food and water in case of a national emergency.

It’s the first major update to the country’s civil defense policy since the Cold War, and a paper about the new “concept” will be presented to parliament by interior minister Thomas de Maiziere today (Aug. 24). While the document says that “an attack on German territory, requiring conventional defense of the nation, is unlikely,” it adds that it can’t rule out a major security threat that would make it so emergency services couldn’t reach people quickly.

The paper calls upon individuals to put aside enough food for 10 days and enough water for five, based on a two-liter allowance per person per day. It also recommends that people keep sufficient cash reserves, medicines, blankets, and energy supplies in their homes.

Many see a clear link between the new guidelines and the series of deadly attacks that have unsettled Germany in recent weeks, but according to interior ministry speaker Johannes Dimroth, the guidelines were last amended in 1995 and were long overdue a comprehensive overhaul. He said that many of the recommendations are nothing new—the Federal Office for Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance has been offering the same tips for a long time.

Politicians from the Green and Left parties slammed the new recommendations as scaremongering, saying that asking people to stockpile emergency supplies will make them feel insecure. “The government could completely worry people and even lead them to panic buy,” Dietmar Bartsch, co-leader of the Left party said.

Read same reports from Reuters and Independent.co.uk

Has terrorism reached a boiling point where it has morphed into a pandemic? Or has the German government been using civil defense as pretext to expand the police state? Or has it been that the German government senses some other risk or potential black swan event which has used instead ‘civil defense’ as a cover?

The irony is that early this year, the German government proposed that cash transaction be banned or limited to just € 5,000 euros. And this has been met with stiff resistance.

Nevertheless, because of the ECB’s “do whatever it takes” policies, finance companies like reinsurer Munich Re and lender Commerzbank have already been stashing up millions of cash in vaults.

So cash hoarding seem to be a snowballing dynamic even before the German government’s announcement. Could this be actually linked to 'civil defense'?

Besides, negative interest rates regime has already prompted a German cooperative savings bank to charge negative rates to retail clients. And this means likely more people flocking into cash.

And another thing, this has not just been limited to the German government, the Czech government have also called for a similar contingency preparation. 

The point here is WHY has the Europe's governments been evincing signs of panic?