Armed bath duck draws criticism as Bundeswehr shop crashes

Germany's military launches anniversary merchandise, but a Left Party politician says one item trivializes the risks soldiers face.

Channel: ZDFheute Nachrichten · GermanyStory of November 14, 2026Trari Newsroom

Why this story? One of ZDFheute Nachrichten's most watched videos since yesterday, with 221,404 views.

ZDFheute Nachrichten: The news division of ZDF, a German public broadcaster. 1.9M subscribers and 2.1B views.

Crash und Kritik: Der neue Merch-Shop der Bundeswehr | #bundeswehr #merch

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A bath duck carrying an assault rifle has become the disputed item in Germany's new military merchandise shop, whose website also crashed at launch.

ZDFheute Nachrichten, the news service of Germany's public broadcaster Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen, reports that the Bundeswehr launched its official online store for its 71st anniversary. The range includes college-style jackets and drinking bottles. Heavy demand brought a long digital queue and a website failure on Thursday, according to the report.

The military's aim is to become more visible and approachable in everyday life, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius explains in a press-conference excerpt. The report adds that an external company operates the store.

But the armed bath duck prompted objections. Sören Pellmann, a parliamentary co-leader of the Left Party, criticized it as an inappropriate trivialization of soldiers' dangerous work, the report says. The video shows the product and examples of online criticism, placing the merchandise dispute alongside the technical problems that interrupted the launch.

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The numbers

The report drew about 220,000 views since yesterday, placing it first among Shorts from Germany's leading news channels over that period.

subscribers

1,900,000

no significant change in the last 7 days

total views

2,082,007,967

views per day

4,998,203

typical day: 2,629,293

the video

views

300,903

likes

3,059

comments

526

days online

2

As of November 14, 2026 · Data source: Trari Social News, Trari Traffic Trends and Ranking Platform, Google YouTube

Subscriber, view, like and comment counts are YouTube's. Rates, usual days, rankings, comparisons and categories are Trari's own calculations.