The German chancellor brought up the topic at a Plenary session but some shouting could be heard in the chamber soon after. In response to the divisive reaction, Ms Merkel laughed and said: “I’m really pleased about this! “This is great – I’m annoying some people!”
The Chancellor had been floating the idea of a common European army in conjunction with NATO.
She said: “This is really important. If we look at the developments of the last few years we have to work on a vision of one day creating a real true European army.
“A common European army would show the world that there will never again be war in Europe.”
She continued: “We can be a good supplement to NATO.
“But colleagues, it would be a lot easier to cooperate with us if we have more than 160 different weapons systems and the US has only 50 or 60.
“And if we could work together and pool our efforts together then we could work together with NATO with a European army.”
The German Chancellor announced last month that she would be standing down in 2021 after her party, the CDU, suffered devastating losses in an election in the west German state of Hesse.
Many believe that even staying that long is deeply optimistic.