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Breakdown plane A340
Annalena Baerbock and the unwillingness to fly: That’s why the Foreign Minister has a political problem
Annalena Baerbock and her breakdown pilot (archive picture)
© Michael Kappeler / DPA
A series of breakdowns on the government plane forces Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock to cancel her trip to Australia. Now she also has a political problem.
Sometimes in life it’s all about the perspective, that is, the point of view. Is Abu Dhabi now glamorous or swanky? Is a situation hopeless or does it promise potential? “For us as crew and you as passengers, this is now a completely intact aircraft.” That was how optimistic the flight commander welcomed the Foreign Minister and her delegation back on board the A340 government aircraft shortly before midnight on Tuesday evening.
Unfortunately, it is often not perspectives that define our lives, but rather ugly facts. And so, fifteen minutes after takeoff, it’s clear that the plane doesn’t give a damn whether you consider it safe or not. And so Annalena Baerbock’s second attempt to finally continue her journey to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji had to fail. She had only wanted to stop briefly in Abu Dhabi to refuel. Now she should land here for the third time.
The first mishap embarrassing, the second shameful
Baerbock is the first to know, directly from the pilot. He then speaks over the on-board intercom. “Unfortunately, the same problem that we had yesterday happened to us again.” Again, the landing flaps cannot be retracted. Again, 80 tons of kerosene must be dumped as fog sprays over the Arabian Gulf to meet the required landing weight. Again, the government plane has to turn back to Abu Dhabi. Again the flight commander has to explain to the delegation what cannot be explained. Less than 24 hours earlier, the exact same program had run before. It was embarrassing. The second time it’s shameful. For some, maybe even: a scandal.
Which brings us back to perspectives. From a purely technical point of view, neither the Foreign Minister nor the flight crew are to blame for the mishap. A pressure switch designed to control the hydraulics so that the flaps extend and retract evenly to keep the plane balanced, one of those switches was apparently defective. The commander explained that it was a mistake he had never made in more than three decades as a pilot. Especially not that it would have repeated itself after the technicians “shut down” this defective switch and the machine passed a test flight without any problems.
That is the technical point of view. From a political point of view, however, the German “unwillingness to fly” is causing problems for the German foreign minister on several levels. The fact that some confused heads accuse her of why she would even fly as a Green – is one thing. The fact that she twice blows 80,000 liters, a total of 160 tons of aviation fuel unused into the environment, throws a dirty veil over the climate foreign minister. In addition, there is the diplomatic damage, as is also said in delegation circles.
Canceled vacation for a canceled trip
Baerbock had wanted to keep it so small. Her plan was not to annoy her partners, who were finally given the attention they deserve with this trip. What’s the point of a national security strategy with its own Indo-Pacific chapter if you don’t even show up in the region? The trip should be the signal for a new beginning. The opening of the embassy in the Fiji Islands, the Pacific Brussels, where a German foreign minister has never been before. The entire cabinet of the island nation had announced that they would be present at the opening, and some ministers had specifically postponed their vacations.
In Australia, the damage is hardly smaller. The country’s foreign minister is just attending a Labor Party conference, but for days she has been juggling parallel appointments between the Germans and a delegation of Australian natives who, after years of talks, should finally get back a few relics of their exterminated ancestors from German museums. Visit to a frigate, cyber security, keynote speech, World Cup semi-finals – the same applies to Australia: What is such a close partnership, especially since, as Baerbock emphasized, really worth when the last foreign minister to visit was Guido Westerwelle.
13 cases in five years
Merkel, Scholz – now Baerbock again: The series of breakdowns by the government planes continues
For Baerbock, the question of travel had long since become a question of credibility. Accordingly ambitious, she had done everything to continue it somehow. First with the repaired government aircraft, if necessary by scheduled flight, even if the first thing she had to do was drop New Zealand from the program – actually a must-see if you’re already in the area. Yes if.
That night it was said: We’re going to fly on, who’s coming with us? Baerbock himself knows that such a trip cannot be made up for, certainly not this year. The appointments of the minister are planned for months, the goals coordinated with those of the chancellor. So keep going, keep going?
Canceled due to deadline pressure
Until half past seven in the morning it looked exactly like that. Back at the hotel, her people spent the whole night poring over flight plans, checking capacities and estimating costs. It is a mammoth task to maneuver a delegation of 69 participants through three countries and to the date line. Every detail is clarified in hundreds of emails and meetings. Not only are declarations coordinated, times are also stopped, routes taken, forms exchanged – behind this there are weeks and months of meticulous preparation.
Baerbock had to see it at half past seven in the morning. She pulled the rip cord. The expedition was simply too complex. The last participants might not have returned from the Fijis until next Tuesday, she herself would hardly have made it to Sunday. And at the beginning of the week, the foreign minister from Senegal is coming to visit. It’s about the tense security situation in the Sahel, the coup in Niger.
the world is small And at the same time so far. This, too, is not just a question of perspective.