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The newest phenomenon in international politics is Russophobia,” announced moderator and media mogul Dmitry Kiselyov one Sunday on an early June 2017 episode of “News of the Week,” a program on Russia’s largest state TV network, Channel One. It is the new anti-Semitism of the West. The Russians are the Jews of our time.”

His comments enthusiastically echoed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s statements at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum the week before. The message is clear: It is the West seeking conflict with Russia; it is the West leading the information war. It is a reversal typical of the worldview constructed by Russian state media at home and abroad: Everything that the West claims Russia is doing is something it is doing itself.

For years Russian state media outlets have fabricated a picture of a manipulative, unfree Germany and Europe plagued by fear and terror. Whether internationally on RT and Sputnik or domestically on NTV, Russia-1, and Channel One, this view structures the opinions of millions of Russians in- and outside the country’s borders.

Fake news in this worldview is an outgrowth of Western media – lies that above all aim to discredit Russia. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has even created a section of its website with the sole purpose of “uncovering fake news” about Russia. Russian state media purport to be concerned protectors of the truth – the homepage of German-language RT Deutsch’s website even presents a quiz for visitors to practice telling news from fiction called “Fakecheck: Fact or Fake?”

In March, RT English started an online project to break down news stories into their various components in order to analyze in detail what is purportedly false, including an April survey of RT viewers on their degree of concern about fake news. While the Russian state media stand for the truth and nothing but the truth, Germany, in their view, is the European leader of anti-Russian disinformation. ARD, Germany’s primary public broadcaster, is regularly cited as an example of a corrupt, manipulative TV channel. Again and again, there are Russian reports of complaints over ARD’s “propaganda” and “manipulative news presentation.” The key witness in RT Deutsch’s case is often former ARD news editor Volker Bräutigam, who labels the supposed shortcomings as “institutional.” ARD, he argues, cites only organizations and persons uncritical of the German government. In this way, they’re always on the government’s side, according to a May RT interview with Bräutigam.

RT is a master at manipulating words: When the SPD proposed “forcing” Facebook and Co. to privilege publicly-financed news sources in searches and feeds, this attempt at regulation was labeled “repression.” And when the portal CORRECTIV filed a report on the infamous exploits of a far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) politician, it was outright “espionage” – with RT Deutsch adding that “they spied on even her bedroom.” In RT’s world, the German state controls both media and the internet, and their “inspectors” violate individual privacy.

Manipulated Elections

If anyone is manipulating elections, it is the other guy, according to a report on RT English, citing a press conference with Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel. The news that Russian hackers attacked Emmanuel Macron’s campaign team and released their spoils on the internet the night before the election was brushed off as the “usual” empty allegations against Russia. Russian state media claimed the source of this attack was unknown – until Putin explained a month later (in another RT broadcast) that the Russian state naturally did not participate in hacking, but that there may be “patriotic enthusiasts” in Russia who executed such an attack.

Otherwise, Russian media prefer to cite American or European politicians and publications whose statements fit their preferred view – for example, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who claimed that Russian hackers have the ability to interfere in the British elections but that there was no proof they had done so.

While such “news reports” are clearly one-sided, the citation of Western sources paints the illusion of neutrality – much like the sorting of articles barely discernible from one another in style or substance into categories like analysis, commentary, or news feigns a seriousness that is profoundly lacking. The outline suggests independence, yet the contents are deeply steeped in pro-Kremlin propaganda.

Failed Democracy

One repeated narrative is that Germany and Europe are failed democracies. Millions of euros in contributions to the CDU, FDP, and SPD parties since just the beginning of the year, “irregularities” in the North Rhine-Westphalia elections – this is how the German multi-party system is explained to RT Deutsch viewers. Other European states are hardly portrayed better. Macron and his leadership team were, in the eyes of the Russian media’s election coverage, above all laughable and inexperienced. From Macron’s egging to a former porn star’s inclusion on his party’s list of candidates – there was no embarrassment too small to make headlines in Russia. There was also detailed coverage of Macron’s connections to international business elites, which cynically presented him as their puppet.

Reported costs of institutional corruption and decay across Germany paved the way for claims that the system was collapsing under the burden of refugees. Daily RT Deutsch headlines like “Germany’s Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) Missing Thousands of Fingerprints” or “CDU Gives In: Deportations to Afghanistan Limited for Now” repeatedly suggest that German bureaucracy neither has the present situation under control nor is in a position to crack down if necessary. Late May and early June saw the addition of reports of fake bomb threats in Berlin, planned suicide bombings, and concert cancellations due to fears of terrorism.

The situation is no different across the rest of Europe, according to the Russian media. Every terrorist attack – whether “successful” or not – is documented and analyzed on repeat. The message is that the continent has become a dangerous destination. “Until recently, Europe was considered a peaceful corner of the world, enjoying both peace and prosperity. For the past two years, however, one can no longer claim the Old World is a kind of heaven on Earth,” according to Russian newspaper Lenta.ru, as cited by Sputnik. The impression they are spreading: Terrorism defines everyday life in Europe.

“Secret Rearmament”

Another focal point is the military, which in the Russian media’s view is Germany’s central institution. For months, reports of its actual and supposed rearmament plans have been growing. Over the past few weeks, readers have been greeted with reports of “secret” plans to purchase “weaponizable drones” (according to German media outlets: rented from Israel); according to another report, due to the supposed phenomenal success of the web series “The Recruits,” the number of military applicants had already grown by twenty percent (according to Germany’s public NDR channel, there has been no measurable change).

At the same time, Russian media reports on every sign of organizational or moral weakness within the German military. The scandal over right-wing extremist Army First Lieutenant Franco A., who had created a fake identity as a refugee and apparently planned to execute a terrorist attack, was naturally a top story across Russian state media. Sputnik reported that the German military attracts right-wing radicals, and even a weekly news show on Russia-1 discussed an illicit shrine to World War II German Armed Forces discovered at an army base during the investigations.

Between Power and Powerlessness

Chancellor Angela Merkel is portrayed as both darkly determined and powerless. The tenor of these reports paints Germany as a fallen world power straying from its US partner. Merkel’s Munich “beer tent speech” and her observation that Europe needs to take its fate into its own hands dominated Russian headlines longer than any Merkel quotation in recent memory.

RT, Sputnik, and Co. read the chancellor on the one hand as convulsively attempting to improve relations with Russia, and on the other as “silently” constructing a European army – under German command, as reported by RT Deutsch, citing Foreign Policy. NATO units in Poland and the Baltic States also receive an inordinate amount of media attention.

In this way, Russia’s media transmit a view of the West in which it agitates against Russia in its media while also challenging it militarily, in which it regularly betrays its own values and is crumbling under the weight of refugees and terrorism. Western values like democracy and freedom of the press are not outright rejected, but rather pocketed and used against the West whenever possible; incidentally, it is only the West that ever betrays these values.

This is how they hope to pull the rug out from under their Western critics. Viewers and website readers are sent a clear message: How can Western politicians claim Russia propagates “fake news” and harms press freedom when they themselves wipe their feet on these ideas on a regular basis? This method leaves, at the very least, traces of confusion behind: Who is right here? Who is manipulating whom? In the end, they hope, viewers should come to the conclusion that there are different but equal versions of the truth out there. If this succeeds, it would be a Russian win that Europe would certainly need to fear.

The post Protectors of the Truth appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz

On June 15, the US Senate approved an act to sharply expand sanctions imposed on Russia in retaliation for its intervention in eastern Ukraine and annexation of Crimea in 2014. The broadly bi-partisan move that enshrined Barack Obama’s earlier executive orders – intended as a response to Moscow’s alleged cyber interference in US elections – was a stunning rebuke to US President Donald Trump’s Russia policy, essentially taking a broad swath of foreign policy out of his hands.

In light of Trump’s stance toward Germany, the EU, and NATO, one might have expected a gigantic sigh of relief from Berlin. But this was not to be. Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel reacted with immediate indignation to a provision of the bill that would allow the US to target companies cooperating in the Russian-German Nord Stream 2 (NS2) gas pipeline project. A joint declaration with his NS2 partner, Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern, invoked a sort of euro-populism: “Europe’s energy supply is a matter for Europe, not the United States of America … Instruments for political sanctions should not be tied to economic interests.” The irony of citing such a principle in defense of NS2, considering Putin and Gazprom’s labyrinthine record of political and economic pressures on Ukraine, appears to have eluded the pair.

Gabriel’s stance was echoed in an exceptionally stern statement from Chancellor Angela Merkel. Her comments, too, focused exclusively on NS2, ignoring the two key measures the Senate had added to existing sanctions. One would block partnerships with Russian firms anywhere in the world that provide Russia with the next-generation oil and gas technology it so urgently needs to sustain its hydrocarbon state, while the other, even more sweeping measure would actively block cooperation with Russian arms sales globally. Clearly, NS2-targeted sanctions are of lesser significance.

Restraining the Executive

What is perhaps most striking about the comments from Germany is that nothing affirmative was said about the Senate’s motives or rationale. Granted, Gabriel and Merkel – whose parties currently form a grand coalition, but will be battling it out in a September election – are in campaign mode, but this does not fundamentally explain the reasons for their focus on NS2. The explicit motivation of the Senate’s bill flows directly from what former FBI Director James Comey underlined as the “central message” of his June 8 Senate testimony: that he and the directors of all US intelligence agencies were unanimous in their assessment that the Russian government had conducted a cyber campaign against US elections. In fact, as later reported by The Washington Post, US “intelligence captured Putin’s specific instructions” on the operation’s objectives to discredit the election and defeat Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

This determination is of acute interest to the German government. In the run-up to the German election, one might think expressions of solidarity with the Senate’s intent would accompany the NS2 complaints. So too, a section of the Senate’s bill explicitly asserts US commitment to Article 5 of the NATO Treaty, an assurance Trump so disturbingly refused to give to Germany and other member states during a recent summit. The Senate also “set up a process by which Congress can block any attempt by President Trump to scale back those sanctions” – another stunning rebuke to Trump, a man who campaigned on his ability to “do deals” with Putin, who immediately moved to lift sanctions against Russia when he assumed office, and now has several members of staff under FBI investigation for suspicious dealings with Moscow.

Of course, such legislation is a blunt foreign policy instrument of the legislative branch in restraint of the executive. However, if the act now passes the House of Representatives it will essentially revoke Trump’s ability to set Russia and Ukraine policy. One would normally imagine such a development to be warmly welcomed by both Gabriel and Merkel. But appreciation of this point was absent in their initial, highly-publicized responses.

Geopolitical Rationale

Indeed, the Senate’s bill could severely sanction German, Austrian, and the other European firms working with Russian energy giant Gazprom on the pipeline project. NS2 is slated to bring an additional 55 billion cubic meters of Russian gas from arctic western Siberia to Germany each year. It purposefully avoids landfall in any Baltic, Eastern or Central European state of the former Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, running parallel to the Nord Stream pipeline completed in 2011. NS2 has been championed by Gabriel and former Social Democrat (SPD) Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and enjoys wide support among German elites and energy companies. Gabriel and Merkel’s responses reflect this.

For Russia, the geopolitical rationale is clear. In the final two decades of the Soviet Union, Moscow had fought for its gas to be accepted in Europe as a secure and reliable source of energy. This resulted in huge gas-transit pipeline systems across Poland, Ukraine, and other countries. However, the fall of the Soviet Union resulted in the separation of Russia from its Eastern and Central European neighbors; the latter mostly opted to join NATO and/or the EU as the West had hoped. The dominant geopolitical school of thought in Washington and the EU – as well as most former Soviet satellite states anxious for a lasting divorce from Russia – was that, if Russia were also to reform as a liberal democracy and re-industrialize, it should not have any major problem with this. But, if it did, it would be limited to a rump of its former territory incapable of regaining superpower status.

As it turns out, market reforms and liberal democracy did not take root. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly failed to re-industrialize on a modern basis. He sees the prospect of a rump, isolated, hydrocarbon-export-dependent Russia looming large. Since about 2006 – underlined by his 2007 Munich Security Conference rebuke to what he sees as an encroaching, US-dominated unipolar world – his strategy has been, at minimum, to wreck any further incorporation of Eastern and Central European states into the EU and NATO and, if possible, disrupt or even return some to Russia’s orbit. This is a rational and reasonably achievable strategy, albeit a dangerous and retrograde one.

Turning to Russia’s gas export business with western Europe, the following assertions can be made: First, it is clear that Putin can at present interfere to only a limited extent in major gas transit states such as Poland and Ukraine while he depends on their willingness to transit Russian gas to Western Europe. Second, insofar as these states remain antagonistic toward Russia, Gazprom exports across their territories are vulnerable to government actions and radical elements within their populations. If a way to bypass these states could be found, Russian gas business with Western Europe would be ensured, and the present-day transit states could be subjected to heightened disruption and perhaps even re-incorporated into Russia’s orbit.

The result, in broad terms, is the Kremlin’s strategy to replace existing pipelines transiting the former Soviet bloc with two huge pipeline systems – one extending south through Turkey and into EU states via the Aegean Sea (i.e., the Southern Stream pipeline system) and another arriving into western Europe from the north, via the Baltic Sea (i.e., the Nord Stream pipelines). New liquid natural gas (LNG) shipments will also be added, initially from Russia’s arctic Yamal peninsula, insofar as the necessary technology can be accessed. Notably, the new US sanctions will strike all parts of this geopolitically motivated gas export strategy. Especially in the case of Nord Stream and NS2, the geopolitical motivation is clear, as while there are commercial advantages to the route, the multibillion-dollar projects deliver gas originating from the same fields as Ukraine’s gas currently does, and the Ukraine system has considerably more capacity.

Change through Trade

Germany is and has always been seen as a stalwart of the EU project and of the establishment of liberal democracies based on open and free markets. What would its rationale be for cooperating with Gazprom and Putin in bypassing Ukraine and later possibly Poland and other Russian gas transit states?

There are two important elements to consider. First, the Neue Ostpolitik initiated by Chancellor Willy Brandt in the 1960s always favored direct economic ties between Germany and Russia, especially through large-scale energy projects between big West German corporations and Soviet state monopolies. This policy aimed to defuse Cold War tensions and foster liberal-democratic transition in Russia. While this strategy did contribute to détente and Russian approval of German reunification, Russia’s continued failure to establish free market and liberal-democratic norms and its flagrant violation of respecting European borders by invading Ukraine and annexing Crimea have dealt severe blows to the strategy’s fundamental logic. Though the mantra that peaceful relations are historically guaranteed by deep trade and economic ties is still constantly repeated by German elites, one finds quite broadly that the younger generations are more sanguine toward the real threat posed by an economically and politically unreformed, increasingly autocratic Russia.

This brings us to the second key element. There is good reason to assume that, had Germany and the Western European states succeeded in rapidly fostering free market reforms and liberal democracy, and had they been able to incorporate states such as Georgia and Ukraine into the EU and NATO, German policy might now be quite different in the face of Putin’s revanchist Russia. However, over the past several years, even before the Maidan uprising in Ukraine, it was becoming clear that German elites were broadly losing confidence in the ability of Ukraine – as well as many other Eastern and Central European states – to reform, including some already within the EU and NATO. This is not exclusive to Germany: a similar transformation has been evident in Brussels, where stabilization has explicitly replaced transformation in its policy toward the EU’s eastern and southern neighbors. At the same time, Putin deeply impressed German elites using hard power – including armed interventions in Georgia, the North Caucuses, and Ukraine – and showing his willingness to risk economic and energy stability by interrupting gas flows to Germany and Western European states via Ukraine, all clearly with geopolitical intent. These gas cutoffs were particularly alarming in that they reduced or cut deliveries to Germany and other EU and European states and had the potential to open fissures between member states scrambling for gas in a crisis.

Though in principle Russian gas dependency could and is being reduced by diversifying imports arriving via pipelines from Norway and Algeria and LNG deliveries from Qatar, the US, and elsewhere, Russia will remain a significant, if not the major gas supplier. As there is is no way to break dependence on Russian gas via pipelines for many years, vulnerabilities had to be minimized.

Energy Security über Alles

German elites have become increasingly inclined to reduce the energy security risk to Germany, the EU, and its eastern neighbors from what is seen as Ukraine’s incorrigible energy sector corruption and a Russian-Ukrainian conflict that will not end for many years. The solution: eliminate its own and its EU allies’ dependence on Ukrainian transit by taking over the business itself. While this looks like a mere extension of the Neue Ostpolitik – and indeed, the long-time ideological, political, and business culture of cooperation with Russia as a German national strategy – facilitates today’s new geopolitical turn. Nevertheless, this Neue Neue Ostpolitik is responding to a new situation for the European project and German national interests, while facing new Russian contestation.

Although there are significant numbers of German citizens, lower-ranking party members, and some major politicians who oppose the NS2 project, the reality – as reflected in Merkel and Gabriel’s condemnations of the new US sanctions bill – is that there is overwhelming support for NS2 from the country’s business and political elite. Whether consciously or not, this reflects a new geopolitical role for Germany with respect to Russia and the European project, one aiming to make it an indispensable middleman in energy matters.

Completion of NS2 will ensure that the vast bulk of Russian gas imports to Europe will arrive directly to Germany. As numerous retired and active German diplomats, officials, and energy sector executives have asserted to me in recent years, “the Russians have always been our reliable energy partners” and “will not mess with us.” When the issue of Germany giving up its highly valuable soft-power influence in Eastern and Central European states where this policy is immediately seen as abandonment in the face of new Russian pressures, the German response is simply, “We will distribute the gas!” and, “Don’t they trust us to sell it to them?” It is asserted that Germany taking direct delivery of virtually all Russian gas and reselling it to them is their only path to true energy security.

This can be spun two ways, either as realist or paternalist – in either case the geopolitical and energy security result is identical. This is not to say Berlin does not recognize there are risks in its continued dependence on an unreformed, corrupt, and likely increasingly unstable Russian state for gas supplies, even if those supplies no longer pass through Ukraine, Poland, and the like. However, the key difference from where Berlin sits is that in any future gas dispute with Russia, Germany will now be alone at the table facing its Gazprom and Kremlin partners, without the complications of Ukrainians (or perhaps Poles) engaged in heated struggles with Russia as a part of the process.

Germany as Guarantor

It is wrong to cynically reduce these matters to business considerations and the profits that German and other companies will clearly reap at the expense of ending Ukraine’s gas transit business. Even for a so-called geo-economic power such as Germany, the geopolitical component is crucial, without which the NS2 project might very well not have advanced. European energy unity and security will not be completely ensured by the fact that virtually all Russian-imported gas will at some point be distributed from a German hub. Rather, one could say that Germany is “solving” the problem of gas security in Europe vis-à-vis Russia by employing a strategy analogous to the one the US used to “solve” the problem of the 1970s OPEC nationalizations and instability in the Gulf Region: by putting itself at the center of the oil system, as its guarantor. As a German energy executive told me recently, “You [Americans] have your Saudi SOBs, and we have our Putin.”

This implies the establishment of a form of German hegemonic oversight in the European gas market, just as the global oil system has been subjected to a form of US hegemony globally. If there was confidence in Ukraine and other crucial Eastern and Central European states to actively reform and become economic, political, and perhaps military obstacles to Putin’s geopolitical aims, Germany might decide to ensure that the Ukrainians are treated properly by Gazprom and Russia and continue to rely on gas transiting Europe. Any such confidence has disappeared, however, and Germany is not prepared to use force to enforce, for example, Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

Not everyone liked it when, in ancient times, all European roads led to Rome, but they were good roads that guaranteed commerce, and there were no alternatives. This is not unlike the present German attitude toward resolving problems presented by European and its own gas security. The US Senate, however, does not agree that it is time to give up on Ukrainian gas transit because it is not time to give up on these states generally in the face of Moscow’s pressures. The US is also much more inclined to resort to military power to curtail Russia’s actions. It would clearly prefer Germany (and the EU in general) to continue to push for transformation and incorporation of its eastern and southern neighbors. In this, Trump’s stance remains decidedly a minority opinion among US elites.

The post Neue Neue Ostpolitik appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

Fortunately, the tune-up comes at a time when the Germans are ready to take the wheel. According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in spring of 2016, a majority of Germans felt that their country should “help other countries deal with their problems” (while majorities in every other European country outside of Spain and Sweden wanted to focus on their own issues), and 62 percent acknowledged that their country played a more important role than it did ten years ago. And these confident Germans want to bring the rest of Europe along for the ride: two-thirds of Germans said their country should take allies’ interests into account even if it meant making compromises, and three-quarters said the EU should play a more active role in world affairs.

When it comes to priorities, there are several issues the Germans would like to tackle. Over 90 percent said that climate change posed a serious threat to Germany (a result echoed by a Forsa survey conducted in mid-June this year by our sister publication Internationale Politik, more of which below). Germans were less concerned by the rise of China, tensions with Russia, and the prospect of global financial instability, with only 28, 31, and 39 percent, respectively, describing these as “major” threats to Germany, while 85 percent were worried about the Islamic State – well before the December 2016 terrorist attack in Berlin.

Still, few Germans want to address challenges of this kind with stronger security measures: A third wanted to increase spending on national defense, compared to half who wanted to keep it at current levels and 17 percent who wanted defense spending to decrease. Two-thirds said that “relying too much on military force to defeat terrorism creates hatred that leads to more terrorism.” The recent Forsa-IP survey found higher support for more robust measures: 59 percent wanted to strengthen EU defense capabilities, and 55 percent thought it was important to strengthen the EU’s external borders. But many more Germans (71 percent) were interested in combating the causes of refugee flows by working to stabilize states in the Middle East and Africa.

While fixing the strained relationship with Russia is not among the Germans’ top priorities, economic ties are seen as important. In the Pew survey, 58 percent of respondents expressed interest in strengthening their country’s economic relationship with Russia. Only 35 percent opted for being tough on foreign policy disputes.

Lowest on the Germans’ foreign policy priority list is improving transatlantic relations: only 40 percent described it as important. Among East Germans, this ranked even lower: only 29 percent of East Germans think strengthening the transatlantic relationship should be a priority.

In fact, Germans may be willing to look further abroad for future partners: According to Pew, Germans were split down the middle when asked to decide whether the United States or the “countries of Asia” would be more important to Europe in the future.

The post Europe by Numbers: Shifting Priorities appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© REUTERS/Michael Urban

In his final years Helmut Kohl often publicly complained about his estranged political protégée, Angela Merkel, without ever mentioning her name.

As the euro crisis raged in September 2011, he told this journal’s sister publication Internationale Politik he viewed it as unforgivable that doubts existed about German solidarity with Greece, a struggling fellow EU and eurozone member. “The enormous changes in the world are no excuse for having no position or idea where one belongs and where one wants to go,” said Kohl. “The enormous changes cry out for firm and clear orientation, for constancy and dependability.”

Since then, apparently heeding Kohl’s criticisms, Angela Merkel has performed several European policy pirouettes. For instance in the summer of 2012, amid renewed speculation over an uncontrolled Greek departure from the currency union, the chancellor returned from her holiday having decided not to let Greece default on its debts and crash out of the eurozone. Then, that autumn, she told the European Parliament that she favored further European integration. “Nothing else,” she said, “will work over the long term.”

Reconciliation of Sorts

These tentative shifts, on Greece and Europe, set the stage for a reconciliation of sorts with Kohl in September 2012, at an event she organized to mark the 30th anniversary of his election as chancellor in 1982. The occasion offered Kohl a plattform alongside Merkel to proclaim: “Long live Europe!” A short time later she had her press office circulate a photo showing the chancellor and her political mentor sitting harmoniously on the terrace of Kohl’s bungalow.

The next lap came in 2015 with a paradoxical role-reversal, this time involving Merkel’s Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble. Despite his own differences with Kohl, Schäuble sees himself as the executor of the former chancellor’s European legacy. And yet he was the one who put stirred the pot by pushing for the Greeks’ departure from the currency union. Schäuble was wary of the anti-European antics of the new leftist government in Athens and hoped waving the Grexit stick would bring remaining members into line, backing the kind of closer euro union Merkel didn’t want in the first stage of the crisis.

In the end, however, the strategy was too risky for the pragmatists in the chancellery: Merkel didn’t want to go down in history as the woman who destroyed Kohl’s achievement of currency union. By 2015 growing geostrategic pressures on Europe’s fringes made it unwise to tip the eastern Mediterranean into complete chaos. Soon Merkel’s mind was no longer on the euro but rather on the growing refugee crisis, which in early 2015 she dubbed “the greatest challenge that I have seen for the European Union in my term of office.”

She recognized that Germany could no longer use the EU’s Dublin refugee rules to fob off the asylum question to particularly burdened member states like Italy or Greece. In addressing the EU’s refugee shortcomings the European Commission – long viewed suspiciously by Merkel – became an ally. After taking a tough line in the Greek crisis, the chancellor didn’t want to be viewed as the leader who allowed refugees to rot at the EU’s borders, or who sacrificed the passport-free Schengen area on the altar of absolute German power.

But not even that vast humanitarian crisis could transform Merkel from a “sober European” (Vernunfteuropäer) into a “heartfelt European” (Gefühlseuropäer) like Kohl. She believes in EU economic reform because, after watching her East German homeland collapse, she is convinced that the only good Europe is a competitive Europe.

Because her points of reference were always West Germany and the United States, however, she struggled for a long time to grasp – and accommodate – the fundamental importance of France for German EU policy.

Salvage Operation

From the start, her European experience has been a salvage operation: tacking back together the pieces of predecessors’ grand visions that shattered when put into political practice. The EU’s recent existential crises, for instance, exposed the weaknesses of the currency and Schengen unions: two visionary ideas of Helmut Kohl that lacked crucial components in their foundations.

After managing several existential crises, important laps on Merkel’s European journey, the moment when Merkel gave up her fundamental opposition to further EU integration can be traced back to June 23, 2016, when the UK voted to leave the EU. The outcome was something no one in the chancellery seriously anticipated – and it changed everything.

Merkel’s post-Brexit priority: to hold the rest of the union together, at any price. That determination chimed with public opinion. Weeks after the British vote, Germany’s Allensbach polling institute found that Germans had become “more conscious of the European Union’s benefits.” For the first time since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, a relative majority of Germans wanted faster European integration.

The chancellor felt vindicated by pro-European demonstrations under the “Pulse of Europe” banner and launched a round of shuttle diplomacy, visiting all the important and many less important European capitals before the post-Brexit Bratislava summit. By the time of their first gathering after the British vote to leave, the remaining EU leaders were more unified than ever.

The election of Donald Trump as US president was another key moment for Merkel. In a remarkable statement after his election the German leader – a passionate Atlanticist – spelled out a list of western values and added, “On the basis of these values, I offer Donald Trump close cooperation.”

All of a sudden, the community of Europeans had what it had lacked since the end of the Cold War: a common external enemy. And after the Brexit shock and Trump debacle, election results in 2017 have turned out far milder than feared: Dutch voters halted their populists, and the pro-European Emmanuel Macron secured a two-thirds majority for himself and a comfortable parliamentary majority. In Italy, where an election is due next year at the latest, poll numbers for the populist, euroskeptic Five Star Movement are in decline.

After Trump’s sobering visit to European institutions in Brussels and the G7 summit disaster in Sicily, Merkel did something she had criticized her predecessor Gerhard Schröder for a decade and a half earlier: she played the foreign policy card at an election event, this time in a Bavarian beer tent. “The era when we could depend entirely on each other is, in part, over,” she said, before adding a line dropped from the headlines: “We Europeans really have to take our destiny into our own hands.”

Merkel’s Plan

For Merkel the greatest priority in securing the EU’s future is addressing uncontrolled Mediterranean immigration. Another is greater German military cooperation with its EU partners: France, the Netherlands, Poland, and, more recently, the Czech Republic and Romania. A third component is reform of the European economic and currency union.  While Merkel has ruled out pooling member states’ sovereign debt – so-called eurobonds – she has never ruled out sovereign bonds issued by a future eurozone finance minister to support pan-European investment or as bridging loans for reforming governments.

There’s talk of a special tax to finance a eurozone budget and, for the first time since coming to office, Merkel used Macron’s inaugural visit to Berlin to flag readiness to change European treaties “if that is needed to strengthen the eurozone.”

Helping the new French president to succeed, where possible, is another component of Merkel’s European plan. Phase one involved lots of friendly words before the French parliamentary elections in June. The next phase begins after Germany’s federal election at the end of September. With that in mind Merkel will, in the looming election campaign, rule out nothing that could tie her hands afterwards. Quite the opposite: she is deploying pro-EU rhetoric to secure a mandate for further integration steps.

All of this is quite a shift for the German leader. Her decades of engagement in EU policy shows that concrete circumstances will dictate just how much of her plan becomes reality. She may have reconciled herself with the late Helmut Kohl and his European politics, but Angela Merkel will always remain a power pragmatist.

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© REUTERS/Alexander Shcherbak/TASS/Pool

Russia is once again pondering its economic future. At this year’s St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, a new economic reform program topped the agenda. Developed at the request of Russian President Vladimir Putin by former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, the program is ambitious: it demands not only the privatization of the state-owned oil sector in the next eight years, but also reform of the judicial and administrative systems and cuts to the defense budget.

Some of these ideas sound like déjà-vu. Nine years ago, then-President Dmitry Medvedev’s modernization agenda captured the imagination of many European politicians and businesses hoping for a jackpot of economic opportunities, paired with improvements in the investment climate, the rule of law, and governance. These hopes were ultimately dashed with the return of Putin to the presidency in 2012. The innovation center Skolkovo on the outskirts of Moscow – originally intended to become Russia’s Silicon Valley – is a reminder of how grand economic designs à la russe can end in the dustbin of history. Will Kudrin’s reform plans share the same fate?

Kudrin is an ambiguous figure in Russian politics. He has been in and out of favor with the Kremlin, but remains one of the few critical voices allowed inside the echo chamber of Putin’s inner circle. In March 2014 he publicly calculated the costs of Crimean annexation as amounting to between $150-160 billion in capital flight alone.

Kudrin’s political career started in the 1990s in the city administration of St. Petersburg. Both Kudrin and Putin began working for the presidential administration in 1996. From 2000-11 Kudrin served as finance minister and has been credited for steering Russia through the financial crisis of 2008. In the eyes of Western financial institutions, he was a popular proponent of a market-oriented economy, representing the faction of moderate economic liberals within the Russian political elite.

Careful Navigation

In 2011, after Medvedev and Putin announced their decision to swap positions again, Kudrin refused to serve as finance minister in a cabinet led by Medvedev. He cited concerns about mounting defense expenditures, and was dismissed by Medvedev in a public spat. Since then, Kudrin has carefully navigated the Russian political arena. During the protests following the Duma elections in 2011 he sided with the protesters by criticizing the election procedures, but stressed the need for dialogue with officials. Subsequently, he founded the Civil Initiatives Committee, a civil society organization that falls short of being a political party, but represents a potential base for any future political ambitions.

Speculations about Kudrin’s return to politics, such as replacing Medvedev as prime minister, have never ceased. For the moment, being outside the government seems a convenient position because it allows for outspoken criticism of the current government’s economic policies. Unofficially, however, Kudrin has already returned to politics: In April 2016 he was appointed chairman of the board of the Center for Strategic Research Moscow, a think tank close to the Russian president, and tasked with developing economic proposals for the next presidential term.

Putin has so far avoided taking ownership of Kudrin’s reform plans and has also asked a rival faction around Boris Titov, the presidential commissioner for entrepreneurs’ rights, to develop parallel proposals. This allows for convenient cherry-picking. In contrast to Kudrin’s ideas, the proposals of the Titov faction advocate for greater state intervention – a Keynesian steering of the economy.

It is important, however, to consider the likelihood that either of these economic reform proposals will be implemented. Back in 2008, against the backdrop of the financial crisis, Medvedev’s reform plans enjoyed at least some credibility in the West. This was the reason why so many European countries forged so-called modernization partnerships with Russia, a concept Germany had been particularly keen on. Conventional wisdom had it that Russian economic reform was urgently necessary, otherwise the country would risk economic decline or collapse.

Reform for Legitimacy

In recent years, however, the Kremlin has demonstrated the opposite: a mediocre oil price and a comfortable buffer of stabilization funds – built up in better times by Kudrin himself – have kept Russia afloat without significant economic reforms. And a new social contract has emerged: In the absence of economic growth and prosperity, the pill has been sweetened with foreign policy adventurism and patriotic fodder for the hearts and minds.

Given Moscow’s wish for “normalization” of relations with the West, a new foreign policy adventure seems unlikely. And with Putin preparing for a fourth term in power, he must offer a substitute to entertain the population and the elites. More of the same is not the fabric grandiose victories are made of. The question of whether to reform or not to reform hence runs the risk of becoming the Potemkin facade in a play staged for the 2018 presidential election to simulate activism and debate in an otherwise stagnating domestic environment.

While Putin’s “winning” a fourth term is certainly not at stake, questions of voter turnout and legitimacy remain important. Discontent among Russian youth is simmering, as demonstrated by the protests following corruption revelations by opposition politician Alexei Navalny.

For European policymakers, the lesson to be learned from this is that Russia’s economic reform plans should be taken with more than a grain of salt. German politicians in particular, having met the Russian president for a personal tête-à-tête in St. Petersburg, should adopt a realistic perspective on the current state of the Russian economy. While Russia’s position in the world has changed fundamentally since 2008, the economic problems have remained the same.

In an economy where direct and indirect state involvement amounts to seventy percent, the vested interests of the political elite are too entrenched for significant changes to the current model to be made without endangering its power basis. In the best case, one can hope for some minor positive adjustments. In the worst case, Kudrin’s reform plans become just another chapter in the eternal play of Russian pondering about their economic future.

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© REUTERS/Umit Bektas

It was a long time coming: On June 7, the German government agreed to the withdrawal of 260 soldiers, six reconnaissance carriers and a refueling aircraft from the Incirlik airbase in southern Turkey. The move marked the culmination of a drawn-out spat over a ban on German lawmakers visiting troops participating in a US-led military coalition against the so-called Islamic State (IS). German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said the troops would be re-deployed to Jordan’s al-Azraq base at the end of the month and that the transfer would be complete by mid-July.

It was the most recent low in bilateral relations that have been laden with tension for months. This time around, however, the timing may be detrimental for Turkey: as campaigning heats up in Germany ahead of the September 24 federal elections against the backdrop of an increasingly intolerant electorate, Ankara risks losing its top economic partner.

Banned from Incirlik, Again

A delegation of German lawmakers had previously been barred from entering the airbase in June 2016, shortly after the Bundestag passed a resolution referring to the massacre of Armenians at the hands of the Ottomans as “genocide.” Ankara eventually authorized the visit in October 2016, but according to Defense Ministry officials, six lawmakers’ entry permits were still pending in March.

Ankara did not issue an official statement on why it considered it necessary to block the parliamentarians’ entry into Incirlik. It only stated that the visit was not considered appropriate at the time and that, if Germany wanted to regain access to the airbase, it had to abandon its hawkish approach toward Turkey. Martin Schäfer, a spokesman for the German Foreign Office, was told through private channels that the steps were taken in retaliation against Berlin’s criticism of Ankara and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

The sides have been clashing over a series of issues for months. Germany has been critical of Erdoğan’s crackdown after the failed military coup of July 2016 and has offered asylum to Turkish journalists, intellectuals, and military personnel that have fled the country since. Berlin also accused Turkey of operating an extensive network of spies on German soil in pursuit of supporters of Fethullah Gülen – a US-based cleric Erdoğan claimed was the mastermind behind the coup attempt. The fact that local authorities withheld permission for Turkish ministers to campaign in Germany in the run-up to the April constitutional referendum on granting Erdoğan sweeping new powers introduced further friction. More recently, tensions escalated over the arrest of German-Turkish journalists Deniz Yücel and Meşale Tolu on charges of disseminating terrorist propaganda in Turkey, as well as Erdoğan’s accusation that German Chancellor Angela Merkel was employing “Nazi methods” against Turkish “brother citizens and ministers” in Germany.

In what seems to have become its standard way of dealing with crises, the Turkish side did not try to de-escalate tensions with its NATO ally, instead remaining defiant. Ankara said it might have been possible for German parliamentarians to gain entry to Incirlik, but only after meeting a series of steep demands: retracting the resolution on the Armenian “genocide,” banning Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) activities in Germany, and returning Turkish asylum seekers that allegedly supported the coup.

Unless Berlin was ready to deliver on these points, Turkish pro-government newspaper Yeni Şafak stated, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel would return empty-handed from a trip intended to resolve the matter. Gabriel’s Turkish counterpart Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu also remarked that Turkey would not “beg” for German troops to stay and that they “[are] welcome to do whatever they want.”

Consider the Economy

There are many reasons why such intransigence is misguided. Even an interest in preserving Turkey’s economic relations with Germany should be enough to prompt Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) to dial down its tone.

Germany has been the top destination for Turkish exports for the past ten years. In 2016, Turkey’s exports to Germany were valued at $14 billion – roughly 10 percent of the value of its total exports. Furthermore, trade relations are dynamic, having almost quadrupled since the end of the Cold War. Although Turkey’s trade volume has shrunk in the last few years, exports to Germany have consistently made up 9 percent of its overall export volume.

In the first three months of 2017, foreign direct investment (FDI) from the EU accounted for more than three-quarters of investments flowing into Turkey. Germany currently ranks among the top four countries investing in Turkey after the Netherlands, Austria, and the United Kingdom. Of the 1,120 Turkish companies founded in 2016 through European FDI, 400 were funded by Germany. In the first quarter of this year, German investments flowed into 68 Turkish companies, or one-third of all companies founded during the period with FDI from the EU.

Frustrated Electorate

Erdoğan is well aware of Turkey’s strategic importance. The country is being used as a base for NATO’s Middle East operations and is instrumental in stemming the flow of refugees into Europe as part of an agreement with Brussels, which many have argued has given Turkey a dangerous degree of leverage in bilateral relations. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is adamant on keeping the deal intact, which has strengthened Erdoğan’s assessment that Europe is wary of escalating the refugee crisis by risking a permanent rupture with Turkey.

The window for reconciliation may be closing, however. In an ARD-DeutschlandTrend survey conducted in February, 83 percent of German citizens said that Germany should confront Turkey more decisively. When asked whether they viewed Turkey as a reliable partner four months later, only 3 percent of respondents said yes, and 57 percent said that the chances of strengthening German-Turkish relations in the coming months were weak. In the run-up to the general election, the German electorate seems to have a low tolerance for Turkey’s transgressions – which may result in a more combative stance by German politicians eyeing political gains at home.

Several politicians have already expressed their frustration over the Incirlik issue. Claudia Roth, a member of the opposition Green Party and one of the vice-presidents of the Bundestag, referred to the ban as a “political provocation” and a new escalation in German-Turkish relations. Christine Lambrecht, the Social Democrats’ (SPD) chief whip in the Bundestag, described the showdown as “a slap in the face” for those trying to engage in dialogue with Turkey.

Merkel, meanwhile, has opted for a more conciliatory approach, describing the incident as “unfortunate.” Even von der Leyen, instead of condemning an act that many defense ministers would consider an unacceptable violation of trust between partners, placed emphasis on the fact that the lawmakers were still permitted to enter the NATO base in Konya. Others argued that this could hardly be framed as a success.

Watch Out for Caveats

Therein lies the crux of the matter: as the leader of a country that urgently requires Turkey’s cooperation, the chancellor is limited in the degree of aggression she can display. Perhaps to her frustration, she is unable to project herself as Erdoğan’s opponent. But in light of her effort to win a fourth term in office, Merkel cannot afford to seem feeble, either, making her more likely to engage in subtle gestures of resistance. The fact that Germany headed the list of countries that declined Erdoğan’s invitation to host next year’s NATO summit in Istanbul is a case in point.

To be sure, Germany will not do anything to jeopardize the refugee deal. But Turkey may feel the brunt of the fallout with Germany in the economic realm: a continued impasse could result in less FDI from Germany due to a lack of trust in the country, a market that is less willing to buy Turkish products, and more difficult negotiations on upgrading the customs union with the EU.

In order to keep the channels for economic collaboration open, Erdoğan would be well-advised to tone down his rhetoric. Instead of vitriolic attacks, what is needed is a recalibration of foreign policy that takes into consideration the economic realities on the ground. Failure in this regard – at a time when German politicians are sensitive toward anti-Turkish sentiment amongst voters – may forge a political climate that is less conducive to cooperation and therefore detrimental to Turkey’s economic interests.

The good news is that the Turkish public will likely be on board: according to a recent study by Germany’s Konrad Adenauer Foundation, Turkish citizens identified Germany as the most reliable in a group of countries that included its neighbors, the United States, and China. Interestingly, trust in Germany was strongest in the western Black Sea region and the northeastern province of Anatolia, despite their overwhelming support for Erdoğan’s AKP in recent elections and the constitutional referendum.

It could be considered a relief that, when time is running out, Erdoğan has the domestic support he needs to take the necessary steps to change track. One can only hope that Turkey’s increasingly powerful president will reconsider his stance and act accordingly.

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© REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

When it comes to European affairs, Berlin has traditionally had a great deal of confidence in its own role. Since the European Union’s founding, it has been part of Germany’s political identity to regard itself as one of the chief architects and advocates of European integration. Nonetheless, Berlin seems to have been punching below its weight in Brussels lately. Though it would be too simplistic to blame Berlin for the lack of progress on major issues such as eurozone governance, migration policy, and European security, German policymakers would be well-advised to ask themselves where their approach has failed them.

A recalibration of Berlin’s role in the EU seems overdue considering the upheaval in the past decade – the global financial crisis, the Russian annexation of Crimea, and the failure by EU members to forge a joint response to the refugee crisis. An already embattled EU now faces additional pressure from nationalist movements across Europe, a majority of British voters deciding to leave the EU, and the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency.

The Brexit vote in June 2016 meant that the disintegration of the union was no longer unthinkable. Britain’s departure worried Berlin less than the prospect of a domino effect within Europe. Rubbing salt in the wound just days before his inauguration, Trump told German tabloid Bild that the British decision to leave was “smart“ and predicted that other member states would follow suit. (FN1) The reality that the United States – Europe’s most important ally – was calling into question the value of the EU suggested a fundamental shift in transatlantic relations, and came at a time of unprecedented weakness for the union, making it even more dangerous.

All Talk, No Action

At this early stage, it was not quite clear to what extent Trump’s remarks would actually translate into policy. But the comments nonetheless shook the foundations of German foreign policy. Berlin suddenly understood with threatening clarity how much was at stake for Germany if both the EU and the transatlantic alliance could no longer be taken for granted.

“I believe we Europeans have our destiny in our own hands,” said Angela Merkel in a January 2017 press conference when quizzed about president-elect’s comments. “I will continue to do my part to ensure that the 27 member states cooperate intensively and above all in a forward-looking manner.“ (FN2) In its simplicity, this phrase reflected a strategic choice. Its latest interactions with London and Washington had conveyed to Berlin a large degree of unpredictability. Berlin came to the conclusion that improving the cohesion and performance of the EU and its member states could amplify its leverage. Berlin would not shy away from dealing with the UK and the US on core issues, but would invest more energy in re-engaging its EU partners and strengthening the cohesion of the EU 27.

Role Reversal

It may seem as though these aims are no different from what has been promised over the past decade, with Berlin reiterating time and again its commitment to EU integration. But the German government is becoming increasingly aware of the pressure to deliver. The past decade has demonstrated that paying lip service to one’s commitment to the EU while failing to deliver reform is not enough to avert a crisis.

It could be considered ironic that – after years of German dominance – France is the country pushing Germany out of its comfort zone. President Emmanuel Macron has invested significant political capital in favor of domestic and EU reforms and is thereby forcing Berlin’s hand. As campaigning heats up ahead of German federal elections in September, this is not an easy game for Berlin to play. In the days after the French election, both Bild and Der Spiegel warned readers that the young and ambitious Macron would plunder their bank accounts to pursue his vision for the EU. (FN3)

Indeed, the current policy controversies at the EU level are less than suitable in making a case for EU unity and collective strength. This is particularly true for eurozone reform, where French and German views continue to diverge. However, there has been a renewal of the debate regarding a more “flexible EU.” (FN4) The old concept of a multi-speed union as a remedy against centrifugal forces regained some prominence with a declaration adopted in March in which EU leaders referred to “different levels of integration,” saying, “Some countries will go faster than others.”

Out in the Cold?

What Germany and other like-minded countries – in particular France, Italy, and Spain – intend to do is to build on the new momentum for cooperation in the EU. Recent ECFR research showed that there is a readiness to explore new ways of working together in order to achieve better results. Flexibility is no longer seen as propelling disintegration. Instead, after years of division over the euro, migration, and security, flexibility is viewed as something that can actually help overcome divisions and rebuild much-needed trust among EU citizens.

One should not underestimate the impact such an initiative can have among reluctant partners like Warsaw and Budapest. Neither have an interest in a position as outsiders, particularly at a time when flexible cooperation projects are being launched in areas of core interest to them (external border security in the case of Hungary, and European defense in the case of Poland, for example). This is why there is a calculated threat in recent initiatives put forward by Germany and other like-minded countries that implies to reluctant partners that they may be left out in the cold if they fail to adhere to EU rules. This kind of implicit pressure has been a feature of previous rounds of flexibility debates in the 1990s and early 2000s. What has changed is that being an outsider has become a much more threatening prospect. The UK currently serves as an unglamorous example of what it means for a member – even one of its size and economic strength – to be left out in the cold.

Germany’s Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, a member of Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) and a veteran of EU politics, recently published an article in conservative newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FN5) in which he argued that the EU needed to strengthen its capacity to act in areas where even nationalists acknowledge that going it alone is not enough, for example the protection and management of the EU’s external borders, European security and defense, and eurozone governance.

Appealing to Voters

Berlin is trying to get a sense of public opinion as the German electorate gets ready to head to the polls in September. What almost a decade of crises has failed to bring out in voters has been prompted by the prospect of Brexit and a Trump presidency: According to a recent Eurobarometer poll, Germans’ trust in the EU has risen by 20 percent since November 2016. (FN6) Since the end of 2016, a growing number of citizens across the country is joining the weekly “Pulse of Europe” marches. A non-partisan movement, “Pulse of Europe” brings together people who oppose nationalism, advocate unity, democracy, and human rights, and believe in the EU’s ability to reform.

Trump’s election has demonstrated to many Europeans in a clear-cut way what might happen if the commitment to fundamental values – often taken for granted in Western democracies – comes under attack. This example has given depth to public debate across Europe and has made European citizens stand up for the values that unite them.

Ten years of crises have not created an EU fatigue among Germans – on the contrary, the European narrative seems to have a renewed sense of purpose. It now seems as if the public is encouraging the political establishment to regain its confidence in the EU and to implement reforms.

Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel recently put this theory to the test. In a March op-ed also for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, he argued that Germans needed to stop obsessing over their contributions to the EU budget. (FN7) “The truth is that Germany is not a European net payer, but a net winner … Each euro that we pay into the EU budget multiplies and flows back to us.” He went on to suggest that Germany do something “outrageous” in the next debate about Europe’s budget: “Instead of fighting for a reduction of our financial contribution to the EU, we should signal our willingness to pay even more.”

A Franco-German Compromise

2016 marked a watershed moment for Germany and for the EU as a whole. The prospect of disintegration after the Brexit vote and the election of an unpredictable US president placed almost a decade of EU infighting over prosperity, security, and migration in a completely different light. The EU 27 found themselves suddenly out in the open, with their vulnerabilities laid bare. Berlin reacted in an impressively sober and strategic way to signs of EU disintegration and the new transatlantic constellation.

In this moment of unprecedented uncertainty, Germany has started “taking the bull by the horns” by moving more decisively to contain the threat of disintegration and continuing to invest in the EU as the preferred model of regional order. Germany has also started to forge coalitions of like-minded partners on core policy issues through flexible forms of cooperation.

Both the presidential and parliamentary elections in France have triggered a new sense of dynamism in Berlin’s political establishment. But both Paris and Berlin are aware of the hard work that lies ahead. The fact that Macron put eurozone reform on the public agenda in Germany initially highlighted differences between the two countries, but this is not necessarily a hurdle for a Franco-German compromise. It is about time Berlin get used to the idea that the EU is more than a sporting field that the Germans always leave victorious. The ability to compromise is deeply enshrined in Germany’s political identity, and this part of its culture has also served the EU in the past. The next government in Berlin should learn from the current administration’s underestimating the readiness of a majority of Germans for greater EU cooperation, and, indeed, integration.

1    “Was an mir Deutsch ist?,” interview with Donald Trump, Bild, January 16, 2017.
2    “Ich denke, wir Europäer haben unser Schicksal selber in der Hand. Ich werde mich weiter dafür einsetzen, dass die 27 Mitgliedstaaten intensiv und vor allen Dingen auch zukunftsgerichtet zusammenarbeiten.”, press conference by Angela Merkel and the prime minister of New Zealand, Berlin, January 16, 2017.
3    See, for example, the Bild headline “How Much Will Macron Cost Us?” (“Neue Zeiten in Frankreich: Wie teuer wird Macron für uns?”, May 8, 2017) and the cover headline of the weekly magazine Der Spiegel – “Macron Saves Europe … And Germany Is Supposed to Pay” (“Teurer Freund: Emmanuel Macron rettet Europa … und Deutschland soll zahlen,” 20/2017, May 13, 2017).
4    See Almut Möller and Dina Pardijs, “The Future Shape of Europe. How the EU can bend without breaking,” ECFR Flash Scorecard, March 2017.
5    Wolfgang Schäuble, “Beste Vorsorge für das 21. Jahrhundert,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, March 20, 2017.
6    European Commission, Special Eurobarometer 461: Designing Europe’s future, 2017.
7    Sigmar Gabriel, “Deutschland: kein europäisches Nettozahler-, sondern ein Nettogewinner-Land,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, March 22, 2017.

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© REUTERS/Michaela Rehle

At the Munich Security Conference three and a half years ago, you joined Germany’s president and foreign minister in calling for the country to take on more responsibility in the future. Given the huge changes in global security, and the fact that the liberal status quo can no longer be taken for granted, are we ready for this responsibility? You grow with the job. In hindsight, this clear expression of political will to take more responsibility was important, coming as it did in 2014, just a few weeks before the annexation of Crimea and before Mosul fell to the so-called Islamic State. But we didn’t know our resolve would be tested so soon. Despite emerging from 25 years of shrinkage, the Bundeswehr was quick to take on difficult tasks. For instance, it was the first nation to spearhead NATO’s rapid reaction force.
The long-standing approach of “less and less, smaller and smaller” has left huge gaps in terms of personnel and equipment. With shrinking capabilities on the one hand, and rising global security challenges on the other, it was important to make a decisive turnaround and reverse the downward trend. Since 2014, we have increased the defense budget several times. When I took on this job in 2013, the budget was to be reduced to about 32 billion euros, but it is now set to rise to 42 billion euros by 2021. The Bundeswehr is growing again, with 18000 additional posts approved. These measures should enable us to meet the demands we are likely to face, together with our allies, using modern equipment, and with the safety of our personnel in mind.

Which areas still need to catch up? A process which has been ongoing for a quarter of a century cannot be fully reversed in a matter of two or three years. That is why it is so important to ensure stable growth over the next few years, focusing on budgets, armaments, and modern personnel management methods – and following a safe, sensible strategic path.

Is continuity even possible when regular changes of government are in the nature of the system? Isn’t a fundamentally different outlook required? Absolutely. It was a very painful process at first, laying all our cards on the table to ensure transparency. After some tough experiences to start with, especially with regard to equipment, we had to publicly explain to the defense committee what the problems were and what we proposed to do about them. That sparked a debate about those issues, but it was an important debate to have. The same was true of personnel management, an area in which we now know that we must invest very differently than we did before. Last year, we submitted an investment plan of 130 billion euros, and that is the bare minimum required to meet the demands we can currently foresee up to 2030. Another area to consider is modernization. We have set up a new service for the cyber domain, which also clearly requires investment. This is a highly-specialized operation, in terms of both personnel and equipment. And all of it must be coordinated with NATO and the EU.

It’s one thing to spend money, quite another thing to ensure that it’s spent wisely. The defense procurement system has been heavily criticized for years now. How do you propose to make it more efficient? We have already launched far-reaching reforms under the “Armaments Agenda”. We have introduced a modern risk management program, which identifies risks before they become critical. There is now greater transparency before the general public and before parliament. We have introduced an entirely new concept of twice-yearly armaments reporting. And we have a structured dialogue with the armaments industry, in which we stress the fact that we are the customer and they are the contractor – in which we make our intentions clear in order to allow for clear planning.
Our interests do not have to be the same. Contracts are now drawn up in painstaking detail, which means they now take longer to agree, and are much more specific, with costs rising to begin with. However, taken over the 10 to 15-year period covered by these contracts, the extra costs will pay off. This will prevent the nasty shock of delays suddenly leading to huge unforeseen costs, or of risks arising which must be passed onto the tax payer because things were not specified in the contract.

That requires quite a big change in attitude, doesn’t it? It means the armaments industry can’t simply give the Bundeswehr whatever it has to offer, but must give it what it actually needs to meet its strategic requirements. Yes, and that change has already come about. Historically, the armaments industry has been closely interlinked with the Ministry of Defense, and for a long time a key priority was to preserve jobs in the armaments sector, whatever the cost. However, the Bundeswehr can no longer afford to subsidize jobs in the armaments industry. Instead we need high quality weapon systems at competitive prices. The armaments industry, for its part, has become freer, more European, more global; and it is being consolidated in the process.

Have the policies of the new US administration given a boost to European defense? The issue of burden-sharing has been on our agenda since long before the US election. NATO’s two-percent target, which was supported by Germany and other countries in Wales, dates back to 2002. But it’s true that the lack of clarity coming from the White House on foreign and security policy matters has sped things up. The need for consensus, which I have long been campaigning for, is now clearer than ever. Regardless of our interest in a strong and reliable United States, Europe needs to solve its own problems; and to do so it must make major advances in the area of security and defense. We actually kicked off this process before the US election, and immediately after the Brexit referendum, with the German-French initiative for a European Security and Defense Union. Many people were skeptical to begin with, but that has now changed dramatically. As soon as the US election results came in, we knew it was time for us Europeans to set to work.

There is talk of a new independence from the United States. It’s not so much a question of more independence, but of being better able to deal with matters of key interest to us. Capabilities developed by the European Union also benefit NATO. If we create a well-functioning logistics hub in Europe, it will benefit NATO. If we build a European drone, it will benefit NATO. If Europe increases security in Africa, it will benefit transatlantic security. In other words, we must remain transatlantic but become more European.

The White House currently seems unreceptive to the idea that European security is a transatlantic issue. Cooperation with the Pentagon couldn’t be better. Secretary of Defense James Mattis is prudent and experienced; he has an excellent reputation and thinks strategically. I know the president listens to him, but we also know…

…the president listens to a lot of people. …the president gets input from many sides. At ministerial level things couldn’t be more straightforward, but the White House is difficult for everyone to understand.

If we look at cooperation under the European Security and Defense Policy, we tend to find it works in isolated pockets. How can we move from these small pockets to a proper continental defense structure? We took an important first step this year by establishing a joint civil-military command center for missions abroad, in Brussels. It was instantly effective. A number of other European Security and Defense Policy initiatives can be carried out under the Permanent Structured Cooperation scheme, or PESCO* – a term which I’m sure will soon become familiar. PESCO allows countries wishing to move forward more quickly than other countries on certain areas to join together in small groups. Examples could include: coming together to develop capabilities like the eurodrone, organizing ourselves more efficiently for the European logistics hub, creating a combined medical command, preparing for combined missions in a more focused way, establishing a competence center for training missions, or taking our first steps together into the vast new cyber domain.
These are all projects we have proposed; other countries will propose other projects. Furthermore, CARD [Coordinated Annual Review on Defense] will harmonize the various planning processes, making it easier to identify capability gaps, while the European Defense Fund will facilitate investments in shared capabilities. All of these things will hopefully be launched this year, making European defense more efficient and more relevant.

Many people will be sorry to see the UK leave the EU, not least because of the contribution it could have made to European defense. On the other hand, the British have tended to put the brakes on any steps which they thought might lead to a European army. Will Brexit make our lives easier in terms of security and defense? It’s true, the UK has consistently blocked everything in this area, but a European army was never the issue. The fact is, nobody really wants one. But the British even blocked the harmless European Medical Command because it contained the word “European”. Their negative positioning will now work to our advantage: since defense and security is the one area in which nothing much has grown together in Europe, there will be very little for us to pick apart. However, we still want a good, strong, solid relationship with the UK under NATO. And we will continue to maintain that relationship. Whether the UK will be invited to take part in European security projects in future – and if so in what role – remains to be seen. In our mutual interest, I would like to see Europe retain access to London’s security and defense expertise.

If you ask Europeans in which areas they would like to see “more Europe”, they say security. In Germany in particular, people are proud of Europe’s soft power but have a problem with the idea that hard power is also required to maintain peace. We have many peace research institutes, but no national debate on civil-military issues. Isn’t it time for people to change the way they think? Our reluctance to have that debate is, of course, partly due to Germany’s difficult past. However, in recent years I have noticed new angles opening in the discourse, especially since the fight against ISIL and as a result of the refugee crisis. There is now talk of whether our history makes it all the more incumbent upon us to be more proactive on security and defense. A country of Germany’s political and economic stature cannot simply look the other way during a genocide, which the Yazidis almost suffered at the hands of ISIL in 2014.
It was then, for the first time since World War II, that we delivered weapons to an area of crisis and conflict. However, we acted within a partnership, under a comprehensive approach, and people felt that was important. We know that nothing short of military measures will have any impact on ISIL: they don’t negotiate, they decapitate. But we also know that as soon as ISIL is defeated militarily, the work of stabilization begins: building the economy, fostering reconciliation between different groups, good governance and political stability. These are two sides of the same coin.

But there’s still the question of how the Bundeswehr can find its place within German society. You once quoted former German president Walter Scheel, who in the 1970s said that (West) German society quietly acknowledged the existence of the Bundeswehr but still had not accepted it. The Bundeswehr now has a completely new set of tasks, and it has carried them out successfully. But its efforts still don’t resonate with German society at large. Yes, but there’s an important distinction to be made here. First of all, people in Germany think their security is in good hands with the Bundeswehr. That’s quite an endorsement of our military personnel. At the same time there is a prevailing sense of caution when it comes to deploying them on operations. And that’s as it should be.
But we urgently need a much wider public debate. That might sound like a platitude, but amid the current debate about the influence of the Wehrmacht on the tradition and identity the Bundeswehr, I am always struck by the fact that the Bundeswehr has 61 proud years of history, but has never had a narrative of its own. And yet it has quite a story to tell: the story of a German armed force emerging from the shadows of world war and the holocaust, a force which would soon become renowned among our neighbors and allies, always acting in the service of democracy, human dignity, and freedom. It is also a story of transition from the division of the Cold War to the “Army of Unity” [when the Bundeswehr integrated the former East German army]; then came the first operations abroad, and of course the high international esteem in which the Bundeswehr is held. These are stories we need to tell. We should shine a light on those who were part of it: the fallen and wounded, of course, but the successes should also be honored; because all of these things are part of our tradition and identity.
This is why we will be conducting a wide-ranging debate, with a view to updating the Bundeswehr’s Directive on Tradition, which was last done 35 years ago. We will conduct this debate in the same way we conducted the White Paper debate (much to the surprise of our partners): adopting a wide-ranging approach rather than specifying certain topics and saying, “Here, debate this!”

The White Paper process was important because it involved so many contributors. But ultimately it remained a topic for a relatively small foreign policy community. If we are serious about finding a narrative for the Bundeswehr through discourse, shouldn’t we be taking that discourse to an even wider community? We should. And that’s also true of other topics affecting the Bundeswehr. We can’t just say, “We need to be more appreciated by society”. Instead we must have a conversation with as broad a section of society as possible – a conversation about our history, what we do, and why we do it. Here in Berlin, we have launched a brigadiers’ workshop to identify key topics from 61 years of Bundeswehr history. But we also go out to regional locations, where we invite local communities (the church, administrative associations, even NGOs) to talk about such topics with Bundeswehr personnel directly. We don’t just have civilians in uniform, we also have soldiers in plain clothes. But we have to accept that not every soldier who says something in public is completely representative of the Bundeswehr; rather, the Bundeswehr has a wide range of personnel, with an even wider range of opinions.

But what do you say to those who accuse you of iconoclasm, who say it’s basically all about renaming barracks? One only has to think of the controversy that broke out over whether it was acceptable to take down a picture of Helmut Schmidt dressed in Wehrmacht uniform, and if so, what could be hung in its place. Why not show Helmut Schmidt dressed in his Bundeswehr uniform? He wore one of those, too. These are just the kinds of issues we need to debate. Metaphorically speaking, plain white walls have been left where the Wehrmacht pictures once hung. And the Bundeswehr must use those spaces to proudly portray its own 61-year history.

* The term PESCO stands for “Permanent Structured Cooperation”, which is part of the EU’s Common Security and Defense Policy. This instrument was introduced under the Lisbon Treaty in 2009 to give interested member states the option of intensifying their military cooperation. The aim is to expand Europe’s defense capabilities and bring more coherence to its security policy. It is up to individual member states to set the pace and choose the defense areas they wish to develop.

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© REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz

The French general simply could not believe it: “All of that expense, all that effort – for nothing?” The discussion in Paris regarding European security had lasted a few hours, and, as usual, the conversation had finally turned to the matter of Germany. Despairing, the non-German participants asked what it was that Berlin actually wanted. The German contingent – equally desperate – attempted to explain to the others that the debate surrounding foreign policy in Germany entailed few ambitions, especially where security policy was concerned. This was too much for the general, who began to reel off a list of Germany’s assets: the Bundeswehr had first-class defense programs in the pipeline, its restructuring effort was progressing, the reserves system was exemplary, training likewise, and the German personnel actively serving were all highly professional. It simply could not be that Germany would take all these steps without a desire to effect more ambitious change. The absence of any larger political planning felt ridiculous.

At first, there was no way of telling which element of this statement was more alarming: this leading representative of the French military misjudging his German neighbors so profoundly, or his secret mistrust of Berlin’s intentions, unwilling as he was to accept claims of passivity and restraint.

This mistrust is perhaps the greatest loss caused by Germany’s lack of foreign policy ambitions. Those who are unfamiliar with the perpetual German ambivalence concerning power and interests smell a rat: A country as successful as Germany must surely be up to something! When a little digging produces nothing substantial, however, this quickly turns to recrimination or mistrust. Those closer to the country, such as the French and the Poles, are inclined toward the latter, while those at a greater distance, such as the Americans, complain that Germany is letting others do its dirty work.

Germany is not freeloading when it comes to matters of security policy, nor is it (contrary to frequent assertions) a particularly pacifist country. Yet where issues of foreign policy are concerned, Germany has a problem with political will. The fact that it no longer participates in the race for national prestige – once a significant driver of foreign policy ambitions – represents a step forward, not backwards. Nevertheless, the fact that it has no real concept of the order it would like to foster – for its neighborhood and for the global system at large – is increasingly problematic.

It’s All Reactive

Ultimately, this is why Angela Merkel has yet to become the leader of the free world. Despite her proven strengths in leadership, be it in the Ukraine crisis, the eurozone crisis, or on the issue of refugees, her response is always reactive. During the crisis in Ukraine, Berlin was late to intervene, taking the reins once it became clear that the usual powers could not or did not want to do so and the status quo ante was unlikely to be reinstated. It then did an exemplary job reassuring its Central and Eastern European allies, and demonstrated its power to lead in crafting both sanctions against Russia and the Normandy discussion format. But why did it not act sooner? Why not as early as the negotiations surrounding the association agreement between the EU and Ukraine – which triggered the Ukraine crisis – when geopolitical tact was needed rather than bureaucracy in Brussels?

The case was similar with the euro. The German political elite had long hoped that the crisis would blow over somehow; Germany only showed up when the problem had become a catastrophe. The same is true for the issue of refugees, with Germany initially hiding behind the EU, acting as if the crisis in Italy and Greece was not happening, and only taking a pan-European position when it ultimately best served German interests. Even in those cases where Germany has wanted to be ahead of the curve, such as its Energiewende, or energy transition, it took great domestic pressure (which increased following the meltdown at Fukushima) for things to truly get started.

However, to lead one must occasionally take the first step, rather than join at the last minute.

The question is why a country that relies on global stability, on the functioning of multilateral organizations, and on free trade and open markets would be so reluctant to take a stance on these issues, choosing instead to restrict itself solely to a reactive approach. Here, the notion of taking a stance is understood to mean both advancing concepts and using diplomatic and military means to protect them.

In August 2007, Karl Heinz Bohrer and Kurt Scheel published a special edition of Merkur magazine. Bearing the title “No Will to Power. Decadence,” the issue explored Germany’s curious lack of agenda. In his still breathtakingly clear-sighted introductory essay, Bohrer described the multifaceted complex which comprises the typically German concept of a “division of law and power,” a consideration of military matters from a clear perspective of “National Socialist preoccupation” and a reluctance “to want something, to represent something, to present something.” For Bohrer and Scheel, decadence is not the dwindling of a society’s vitality, nor is it a general moral decline; for them, decadence begins with a lack of self-respect.

This is where they hit the mark concerning the “state of Germany.” It is alarming how little Germany’s fundamental problem has changed since their analysis was published ten years ago, despite a groundbreaking speech from Joachim Gauck on this issue, as if it is now enough to whistle a little louder in the darkness and hope that all will be well.

Fundamental Weakness of the Ego

Germany’s lack of ambition is first and foremost a product of its fundamentally weak ego. A deeply traumatized country does not trust itself and its aims, because it cannot forgive itself the transgressions of the past. It favors the moralistic flash in the pan that an absence of self-confidence presents over the cold wind of obligations to its interests and responsibilities, and is surprised to find this leaves nobody feeling any warmer. It recoils at the hard work required of moral compromise, something entirely unavoidable in international politics – not, however, because risky actions may harm others, but because Germany itself would feel the pain should something go wrong. The pragmatic and moral compromise of realpolitik falls more lightly on nations which can tolerate a mistake or two, but strains Germany’s image of itself as the good guy – built so painstakingly after 1945 – to the brink of collapse. Germany’s top national interest is not freedom, nor is it peace, nor wellbeing; it is rather to remain morally spotless.

Perhaps some explanation for Germany’s passivity, beyond the trauma of Nazism, lies in the country’s postwar success. No other middle power was as successful in achieving its strategic aims after 1945 as Germany, writes Stephan De Spiegeleire, security policy analyst at the Hague Center for Strategic Studies. And he’s right: the country has been rehabilitated, has regained its sovereignty, and has reunified; it is an economic giant, integrated in all relevant alliances, has avoided a war on its own territory, and is, geographically speaking, surrounded exclusively by friendly nations. And it has achieved all of this without needing to practice brutal power politics or pay the price with the lives of its citizens. Who could read this summary and conclude that any other way was possible?

The problem with this view is that all of this was indeed achieved by the Germans, but only with the aid of a crucial strategic subsidy: the American security guarantee, which protected the country, trained it in military assistance, and kept it as far as possible from the heavy lifting and the moral abyss of international governance during the Cold War.

Now Germany is paying for its success. For one thing, Germans are now being credited with an almost sinister skill for achieving their hegemonic aims in secret, something they do not actually possess (neither the skill nor the aims). The French general quoted at the start of this article exemplifies this attitude.

At the same time, Germany’s partners and neighbors have noticed the country’s performance and now promote its involvement in all the things from which it has kept its distance for so long. The country has become a victim of its own success: it is now required to gradually give up precisely that which was the original source of its strength. Thus, Germany participates, but only as far as is required, grumbling to itself all the while.

“A lack of ambition is normal,” says German scholar Ulrich Speck, one of the most vocal critics of Germany’s passivity for many years. “What’s more is the fact that Germany is not a project state, in contrast to France and the United States, with an understanding of itself that is strongly shaped by a normative idea.” But the normality ends, says Speck, when a lack of ambition clashes with the realities of a globalized world.

The aforementioned clash has hardly ever been as dramatic and as sudden as in the past three or four years. The euro requires a form of political integration which will far exceed anything that has gone before. The strategic inexperience of the American president means Europeans have a new task concerning security policy, which they will have to go to great pains to achieve. The strategic positions of the EU’s neighbors (Russia, Ukraine, the Balkans, Turkey, the Middle East, the Gulf region, Egypt, Libya, sub-Saharan Africa) are more dramatic than they have ever been since the end of the Cold War.

Fortunately, the topic of Europe is once again in vogue after a long period of malaise, thanks in part to the election victory of the talented Emmanuel Macron. In light of the present challenges, a cry has gone up, quite rightly, for more European intervention, even in foreign policy. Yet is it clear to these enthusiastic pro-Europeans, especially those in Germany, that a stronger Europe must include a will to power? The time for integrating more deeply while neglecting to ask questions about the continent’s basic interests and the means for implementing them is over. A strong, independent Europe will not be achieved by dreams of apolitical, uncontaminated integration, and not without hard realpolitik riddled with compromise. And it will be obliged to fall back on German resources as the means for this power.

No Megalomania, No Denial of Reality

Germany needs healthy ambitions where foreign policy is concerned – ambitions based on neither megalomania or a denial of reality. The former is not necessarily anything to worry about, but the latter is the national consensus. Where, then, will these ambitions emerge from? How can Germans know what it is they are permitted to want and what they must be capable of?

Two elements must come together. The first is an insight into the realities of international operations, where classic power-political rules apply. The rules are easy and eternal: interests are what fuels international politics. They arise from necessities of the will to survive, from the need for material and physical security. And they arise from ideology, from questions of meaning and identity. Interests, therefore, are unavoidable and lead – equally unavoidably – to conflicts with the interests of others. Conflicts are not always resolved with violence, but they often are. In order to curb violence as far as possible, to secure peace, it is as necessary to establish incentives for good behavior as it is to be ready, in case of emergency, for violence. If a fundamental understanding of this were to be restored in Germany, much could be achieved as regards the development of healthy ambitions.

The second element is the recovery of the country’s self-respect and the confidence of the German people in themselves. The country must forgive itself, just as others have forgiven it already. It sounds transcendental, as if it has very little to do with politics, and that is true to a certain extent. This form of self-granted absolution – which is not a clean break, but something which, in contrast, feeds off the triumph of coming to terms with the past successfully – requires faith, primarily a faith in oneself. The other step Germany must take is recovering its trust in its own positive aims. This only succeeds if the limits of one’s comfort zone – where foreign policy is concerned – are gradually shifted toward reality. Germany has recently been doing more of this: the arming and training of the Peshmerga in Iraqi Kurdistan in the fight against the so-called Islamic State is testament to this, as is the open confrontation with Russia following the annexation of Crimea. Germany can and must trust itself more on such matters. Small, baby steps can develop into an upright, confident stride. The danger of backsliding into disgrace is practically zero. Germany and its neighbors attend to one another much too well, and their democracies and institutions are much too stable, for this to be a genuine risk.

And then there is a third, secret element. Germany’s ambitions must ultimately be a little different from those of other countries. This has to do in part with the past, but much less than one would assume. It is due primarily to the country’s strength and its economic power, its central geographical location, the fact that all of its neighbors are smaller than itself, and it is also due to the fact that the country needs to be embedded in a circle of other countries in order to be able to live in peace with itself.

For all these reasons, German ambitions are not simply a matter of leadership, but one of “servant leadership,” a concept which Germany can employ to square the circle between its own trauma and the external pressure to act. Servant leadership enables Germans to fulfill their fateful task of leading in Europe without constantly fearing their leader. The same can be said for others: the Servant Leader builds trust by always yielding a little sooner in the knowledge of their strength and responsibility and always paying a little more than the others, aware that this investment will ultimately yield a larger profit than insisting on a small, short-term benefit. As a mighty servant, the Servant Leader retreats behind their partners but, when the occasion arises, stands before them and protects them. Forcefully, they develop, advertise, and take a stand for the ideas that serve the common cause. This gives rise to a true greatness, one which considers ambition worthwhile and which grants inner – and outer – peace.

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© REUTERS/Eric Vidal

An audible sigh of relief emerged from Berlin when Emmanuel Macron triumphed in France’s presidential elections, overcoming right-wing populist Marine Le Pen and her Front National. Germany’s two main parties, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Social Democrats (SPD) led by Martin Schulz, made no secret of their support for Macron and his unabashedly pro-EU stance. From the beginning, Macron vowed to reform his country and to deepen its ties with Germany in particular, eliciting the much-quoted retort from Le Pen: “France will be led by a woman: either me or Ms. Merkel.”

Both the CDU and the SPD are looking to Macron as the European Union’s new hope, reviving the Franco-German tandem, particularly as the EU continues to face various crises: Brexit, populism, the rising threat of terror, refugees, migration, as well as increasing friction among the member states, which had led the EU to the brink of collapse. In Berlin a great deal of hope has been placed on the political newcomer, and for good reason: Macron’s victory in the presidential and parliamentary elections could be the last chance to stabilize and restore the EU’s legitimacy. If his presidency fails, it cannot be ruled out that anti-European and anti-German forces will surge to power in France in five years’ time. Regardless of which party wins the German election in September, it is in Berlin’s own interest that Macron’s presidency will be a success.

It remains to be seen whether the couple franco-allemand will finally be Europe’s integration engine again. In Germany, most signs point to a victory for Chancellor Angela Merkel in September’s elections, but even were Martin Schulz to pull off a dramatic upset, both candidates are strong champions of the European project and closer ties with France.

Still, in some areas, cooperation could be easier said than done.

The Future of the EU

The debate about the EU’s future is playing out against different backdrops on both sides of the Rhine. In France some 40 percent of the electorate chose anti-EU candidates in the first round of voting on the far left and far right of the spectrum. In fact, Macron emerged as the only unequivocally pro-EU candidate in the running.

In Germany, meanwhile, commitment to the EU is part of the political mainstream. Even if the right-wing populist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has successfully thrust euroskeptic views into the spotlight, those have not reached the center of political or public discourse. Consequently, Berlin still enjoys greater room for maneuver in European affairs.

Still, crises have battered and destabilized the European Union, and both Germany and France are well aware that the argument for an ever closer union is starting to ring hollow. Macron is therefore championing a differentiated approach to integration – an approach that grants member states willing to integrate deeper more scope to push ahead, particularly in the eurozone and within the realm of Common Security and Defense Policy, but also in energy and digital policies. In these areas, Berlin and Paris are in step.

But Macron is also in favor of a smaller core circle of member states led by the two countries that would function as an avant-garde. Merkel’s government is hesitant to support such an idea, conscious of the criticism that Germany has grown too powerful in Europe. Berlin has sought to protect the interests of less powerful EU countries that are suspicious of a stronger German-French duo.

Neither the CDU nor the SPD has taken up one of Macron’s campaign proposals to establish conventions in each member state in order to enhance the EU’s democratic legitimacy. Since all member states’ governments would need to get behind this idea, it is likely to fall flat.

The Eurozone and Europe’s Economy

The eurozone and economic integration have always been among the points of real friction between Germany and France. The two governments have wrangled over economic policies often in recent years.

Macron’s views on European economic policy took form during his time as economy minister under François Hollande. Today Macron is pushing to overhaul the ailing French economy by reforming the labor market and welfare regulations and consolidating the budget, thereby restoring France’s credibility on the European stage. In Germany, his approach has been well received across party lines.

But Macron’s ambitions do not stop at France’s borders: He is bidding to reshape European policy as well, finding ways to deepen integration and cultivate greater solidarity among member states. He has advocated for a European economics and finance minister for the eurozone, complete with their own budget to finance mutual investment projects, help member states in need, and offer backing in crisis situations.

Such proposals have met with positive response from Schulz and the SPD: They have thrown their support behind Macron’s bid for common European investment projects, and are calling for binding minimum wages across the EU. Chancellor Merkel’s conservatives, meanwhile, have distanced themselves from such initiatives thus far, although Merkel has not ruled them out entirely.

Moreover, the new French president welcomes global free trade but has urged Europe to extend anti-dumping regulations, sharpen laws on foreign investment, and integrate environmental and social standards into the EU’s trade agreements. Macron has also called for a Buy European Act that would ensure that public tenders are only awarded to companies that produce at least half their goods in the EU.

Protectionism does not serve Germany well; it has profited from global trade more than any other European country. That is why Germany’s main parties have largely rejected linking environmental and social standards to any trade agreements. After all, such demands could deal a blow to Germany’s powerful export industry.

Common Defense and Security

There is far more common ground on common defense and security policy (CSDP). Even before the vote, Germany’s Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen and her French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian (now Macron’s foreign minister) released a joint policy paper on expanding the EU’s CSDP.

The policy paper links this deepening cooperation to PESCO, short for Permanent Structured Cooperation, an article in the Lisbon Treaty allowing a core group of member states to integrate security and defense policy without dividing the European Union. The defense ministers also called for a permanent EU headquarters for civilian and military defense and security operations, closer cooperation on logistics, and coordinated training. A revised Athena mechanism for financing common EU military costs would provide a framework for funding CSDP initiatives. The SPD has already signalled its approval of many of these proposals.

Macron aims not to build a European army, but rather to better coordinate member states’ existing resources and create a path toward a European defense union. The French-German partnership stands at the core of that policy. Merkel and Schulz are well aware that common defense and security would grant France a platform to appear bold and strong, on equal footing with Germany (and thus make Germany look less dominant).

France suffered a series of major terror attacks in 2015-16 that reshaped its security and counterterrorism policy. Like his predecessor, Macron sees military missions abroad as a key element of counterterrorism and has vowed to carry forward the military’s current engagements along with its partners. That is why Paris is likely to demand more military engagement from Berlin. In Germany, however, opposition toward military missions abroad remains significant.

Merkel and Macron believe military cooperation with the US is still a core element of European defense. Schulz, however, has positioned himself as the anti-Trump, and would seek to untangle defense and security cooperation with Washington. While Merkel and Macron have pledged to ramp up defense spending and meet the two percent GDP target for NATO members, Schulz has argued he will not bow to Trump’s ambitious weapons aims.

The Refugee Debate and Schengen

The refugee crisis of 2015 tested ties between Germany and France: Paris and Berlin strove for common solutions but were driven apart by their different interests. Asylum policy will remain a core issue that will require them to work together constructively – especially because the EU has yet to come up with a sustainable solution to the influx of refugees and migrants.

Macron has advocated defensive measures and called for a reform of the Dublin asylum system. He has proposed the fast-tracking of asylum and deportation procedures and checkpoints in the refugees’ countries of origin and transit areas.

His proposals are in line with Chancellor Merkel’s strategy. The German leader has launched a campaign to strike deals with countries of origin and transit countries, like Turkey and Afghanistan, in order to stem the flow of migration. Macron has pledged more development aid as well to help create opportunities there and battle smuggling operations – proposals welcomed by both the CDU and the SPD.

Although Macron was the only candidate to praise Germany’s refugee policy during the presidential campaign in France, he has not indicated that his government would be willing to take in more asylum seekers. Instead, he is seeking a fair distribution of refugees across Europe and sanctions levied against member states that refuse to honor their obligation.

More “solidarity” in the fair distribution of refugees and migrants has also been championed by Schulz. He has avoided speaking of sanctions but has indicated that he would try to link refugee policy with the distribution of funding for agriculture and infrastructure. Merkel, on the other hand, has positioned herself against any initiatives to punish uncooperative member states with fines.

Macron has also argued for the need to strengthen the EU’s external borders; he has suggested making Frontex more robust, adding 5,000 new positions and additional resources and responsibilities. Both the CDU and the SPD have made the securing of external borders a focus as well. At the same time, Macron has made clear he stands behind the Schengen agreement, championing the free movement of people. This does not prevent him from striving to reform the guidelines for foreign (“posted”) workers, though.

Europe in Paris

The new French president is a crucial partner for Germany in the attempt to reform the European Union. He is the most EU- and Germany-friendly leader France has seen in years, if not in history. On the campaign trail and now in office, he has strived to both show French voters the benefits of European integration and make Paris a powerful player in Brussels. The strengthening of the Franco-German tandem is at the core of this: His cabinet includes several policymakers with close ties to Germany, like Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire (see our Close-Up of him in this issue), and Philippe Etienne, ambassador to Germany 2015-17, who now serves as one of the president’s top foreign policy advisers.

Both Merkel and Schulz have already emphasized that they are ready to work closely with the French president. “Mercron” has the potential for advances in the defense and security field and with regard to migration policy, whereas eurozone reform and implementing a “social Europe” would be easier with “Schucron.”

However, the next German chancellor and the French president are likely to face major structural hurdles in further strengthening Paris-Berlin ties. Many French voters are still skeptical of an overly powerful EU – and of Germany, the most dominant member, in particular. Macron’s proposals for eurozone reforms are highly unpopular among Germans who are wary of carrying the financial burden while other member states continue to pile up debt.

Paris and Berlin will need to strike clear agreements to show their own citizens the will to compromise goes both ways – the first steps in deepening trust and cooperation for the path forward.

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