The German chancellor-in-waiting, Friedrich Merz, has won a vote in parliament to allow a huge increase in state borrowing that is set to super-charge the country’s military spending.

Germany's parliament voted Tuesday in favor of incoming chancellor Friedrich Merz's massive debt reform, which will free up hundreds of billions of euros for Europe's defenses amid Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine.

Germany's parliament approved plans for a massive spending surge on Tuesday, throwing off decades of fiscal conservatism in hopes of reviving economic growth and scaling up military spending for a new era of European collective defence.