The German head of state will speak for 45 minutes this Friday at Bellevue Palace. It’s supposed to be a big speech. With sentences that will be remembered later, perhaps similar to Roman Herzog’s famous Ruck speech in 1997, which was read at the time as criticism of the reform backlog in Germany. The expectations of Steinmeier are high. He’s been in office for five and a half years, but his critics say he hasn’t made one big speech yet.
“Strengthening everything that connects us” is the title of what Steinmeier wants to say. Steinmeier’s predecessors Christian Wulff and Joachim Gauck are present at Bellevue Palace, as well as CDU leader Friedrich Merz. On the other hand, Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the ministers of the Federal Government are not among the direct listeners.
The war in Ukraine – an “epoch break”
It was said in advance that Steinmeier would address the war in Ukraine in particular – and in fact he begins his speech on February 24, the day on which Russian President Vladimir Putin began the war of aggression. Everyone who woke up that day knew “that the world is different now”. February 24 marked an “epoch break,” a word that Steinmeier had often used before. But this date also marks years of failure – “my failure too,” says Steinmeier – to prevent this war.
Steinmeier traveled to Kyiv just a few days ago and met the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky there. He made up for a trip that had not taken place in the spring because Steinmeier had suddenly been unloaded by the government in Kyiv under circumstances that have not yet been fully clarified.
It was probably important to Steinmeier to complete the visit to Kyiv before his speech so that he could speak more credibly on this matter. For years, Steinmeier played a key role in Germany’s Russia policy, which many now regard as riddled with mistakes: as chancellery minister in the Schröder government and later as foreign minister in the Merkel government.
“On February 24, Putin not only changed the rules of the game, he overturned the entire chessboard,” says Steinmeier. The Russian attack on Ukraine is “an attack on all the lessons learned from the 20th century and the two world wars,” says the Federal President. It was an attack “on everything that we in Germany stand for”. Anyone who asks what the people in Germany are doing with the war is acting “forgotten about history”.
Even in times of headwinds, “we remain what we are,” says Steinmeier. “Democracy is also part of the critical infrastructure.” As for the financial consequences of the war, he emphasizes that the state will not be able to absorb every burden. “Impressive relief packages” are important, “but no less important is fairness in the distribution of the burden”. In the end, it was crucial “not to let yourself be driven further apart”. The country must “strengthen everything that connects us”.
The climate catastrophe is “reclining too much in the background”
Even if the war has shifted the political agenda, the fight against climate change should not be neglected. “To be honest, I’m worried that this task for humanity is being pushed into the background too much,” says Steinmeier. Everyone can do their bit to reduce emissions, but these “individual efforts” are not enough in the end. It is necessary to restructure the entire economy and an economic model that once made Germany great. “We are entering an age increasingly without coal, oil and gas, in which Germany must and will prove itself again,” he says.
At the end of his speech, Steinmeier called for social cohesion: “New unity can grow from the challenges,” says the Federal President. “Let’s not be discouraged by the headwinds that are blowing against us in these new times. It doesn’t matter that everyone does the same thing – but that we have one thing in common: to strengthen everything that connects us. That’s the task. Let’s do it.”