German Russia policy: Merkel’s mistakes, Schröder’s interests

Putin’s attack is also a defeat for German foreign policy. Was the federal government acting too naively, was it guided too much by interests? Or is the matter more complex? A search for clues.

The course of world history is not a computer game. Anyone who spends their free time on the screen with strategy simulations has an advantage: any number of variants of a scenario can be played through. The question can be answered: What would have happened if you had made this or that decision differently? Restart game, next attempt. In real political events – in the specific case with a view to German Russia policy – that is not possible.

Which decision would the federal government have made better? There are no easy answers. And yet, in retrospect, misjudgments can be recognized. Angela Merkel’s politics are also re-examined. Your foreign policy legacy, highlighted in many farewell tributes, is at least getting scratches.

Nord Stream 2: Warnings ignored

One of the clearest misjudgments in dealing with Putin is related to the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea. For a long time the federal government tried to draw a thick dividing line between Russia as an economic partner and Russia as a political actor. The argument that was repeatedly put forward was that gas had been reliably supplied even in earlier tense times. It wasn’t just about security of supply for the German market. The pipelines raised political concerns early on: in Ukraine, in the Baltic States and in the east of the European Union. But Berlin did not respond to this for years.

At the ceremonial inauguration of the first Nord Stream tube, Merkel turned the symbolic valve. However, her predecessor Gerhard Schröder made the decisions. When it came to Nord Stream 2, Merkel stuck to the story for a long time that it was a purely economic project. She ignored warnings that energy is an important part of foreign policy. There were many reasons during her tenure to put the project on hold or even stop it altogether. But that did not happen after the illegal annexation of Crimea. The federal government was involved in the EU sanctions regime against Russia. The gas connection however remained.

Misjudged Putin?

The German-Russian government relationship later became increasingly frosty. The murder in the Kleiner Tiergarten in Berlin followed, and the hacker attack on the German Bundestag. At the latest, the poisoning of Putin critic Alexei Navalny could have resulted in drastic action. But the pipeline project lived on.

With the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, dealing with Russia is viewed in a new light. Have Merkel and the federal government misjudged Putin for a long time? Did they rely too much on sanctions and diplomatic engagement like in the Normandy format? Andreas Umland from the Stockholm Center for East European Studies called Merkel’s diplomatic efforts after the annexation of Crimea “remarkable”. Perhaps it is thanks to Merkel that Putin did not advance further into Ukraine. But he also comes to the conclusion: “The need for a paradigm shift in German Russia policy, which became obvious in 2014, did not materialize.” This is shown by the start of the Nord Stream 2 project.

risk of dependency

The federal government did not see the risk of an enormous dependency on fossil fuels from Russia, and perhaps did not want to see it. Countermeasures could have started much earlier. It’s paying off now. An import ban cannot be implemented overnight, said her successor Olaf Scholz in the general debate on the budget. If you take hasty steps, there is a risk of a recession.

When Scholz recently proclaimed the turning point in the Bundestag, CDU leader Friedrich Merz spoke of a “shambles of German and European foreign and security policy”. It is an accusation that must also be seen as an accusation against Merkel. Thomas de Maiziere, one of her long-time ministers, agrees, saying: “We misjudged this man’s aggressiveness.” In an interview with the “taz” he also says: “To explain the entire assessment of Putin’s politics of the last 20 years as a historical failure not only of Germany, but of the entire West, that goes too far.”

Russia romance and naivety?

German foreign policy should no longer appear in Moscow as a “mixture of naivety, wishful thinking, romanticism about Russia and guilt complexes,” according to the “FAZ”. There is no doubt that Germany’s relationship with Russia is special. This is based on the gratitude for the reunification, above all on the historical responsibility after the atrocities of the Second World War. The fact that there is also a historical responsibility towards Ukraine, the Baltic States and Poland may have been overlooked too much.

However, it is not just Merkel’s policies that are looked back on. Above all, Merkel’s coalition partner SPD has to put up with critical questions. German social democracy was always very proud of its own Ostpolitik. But the concept of change through economic convergence has not led to success, at least in the current situation. Various well-known SPD figures have long been very reluctant to criticize Russia. Schröder’s various economic posts are a chapter in their own right.

In the coalition agreement, the traffic light government had set itself the task of redefining the relationship with Russia. This must now happen faster than many suspected. For a long time it was the aim of German foreign policy to come to a security order with Russia. Now it is clear that in the short and medium term it is about security against Russia.