© Sputnik/Alexei Druzhinin/Kremlin via REUTERS

Two weeks ago, a wormhole seemed to have opened up at the Élysée Palace, transporting us back to the 1960s. Addressing France’s assembled ambassadors, Emmanuel Macron sounded at times like a 21^st century Charles de Gaulle.

Fresh off his diplomatic success at last month’s G7 summit in Biarritz, the French president proclaimed: “We are not an aligned power… We need to work with our European friends, which we have to respect… But to put it in simple terms, we are not a power that considers that the enemies of its friends must also be ours.” For history buffs, that was nothing short of a direct riff on de Gaulle’s foreign policy tenets.

Once Paris had buried its imperial ambitions in the course of the 1950s and early 1960s, President de Gaulle reimagined France’s role as an independent geopolitical power, removed from the Cold War schism. “Having given independence to our colonies, we have to retake our own independence,” de Gaulle famously said in 1963. France should be a free agent on the world stage, which led de Gaulle to create the force de frappe, France’s independent nuclear deterrent. In 1966, the general ordered Washington to close its French army bases.

In the diplomatic sphere, this so-called “policy of free hands” translated into an early recognition of communist China (1964) and above all a rapprochement with Moscow. In a bid to further distance himself from Washington, de Gaulle embarked on a “Ostpolitik” avant la lettre, travelling from Kiev to Novosibirsk in 1966 and making the case for a détente. “Soviets and French, we can shake hands!” he told a roaring crowd.

“Useful Idiot”?

It seems Paris is gearing up to embrace Moscow once again. The Iranian nuclear deal, the Syrian civil war, the stalemate in Libya and Eastern Ukraine—Russian President Vladimir Putin has made himself indispensable to resolving all these issues. Moreover, with US President Donald Trump pulling out of the INF treaty, the threat of a new arms race is returning to Europe with a vengeance. In Macron’s mind, isolating Putin simply doesn’t work anymore.

In Paris, many doubt that Macron’s overture toward Russia will yield any tangible returns. In 1966, de Gaulle did not obtain much from Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in return for his Soviet pivot. His diplomatic somersault was rewarded with a couple of trade agreements and a direct telephone line from the Élysée to the Kremlin.

Much like in the 1960s, Putin may simply see Macron as a “useful idiot” that might help him to break up the joint US-EU sanctions front. The Kremlin’s gambit seems to be paying dividends already: France supported Russia’s return to the Council of Europe this year.

Return to Grandeur

But like de Gaulle, Macron seems to be thinking above all about his domestic audience. In 1966, the general’s triumphant Russia trip was also a giant propaganda show. It was supposed to signal that France was de retour and—perhaps more importantly—the French themselves were keen to forget the memories of the disastrous Algerian war.

Macron presented himself to French voters in 2017 as a vigorous leader who would reform the European Union and create, in tandem with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, a “Europe that protects.” Politically and fiscally more integrated, such a “sovereign Europe” would be able to resist Trump’s unilateralism and to ring-fence China’s state capitalism.

But Berlin and a coalition of northern and eastern European countries soon frustrated Macron’s ambitions. A eurozone budget was agreed on in name only, and a EU-wide tax on America’s digital giants seems dead in the water. Macron’s powerlessness in Europe became more and more visible, most of all to the French.

But by positioning himself at the center of the global diplomatic game, Macron is now attempting to recover some of his fading authority and standing at home. It seems to be working: after the G7 summit in Biarritz, Macron’s ratings reached their highest level since the start of the “yellow vests” crisis late last year.

A Gaullist European

Banking on Merkel has proven a flawed strategy for Macron. Consequently, talk of Franco-German cooperation was noticeably absent his latest Élysée speech. Instead, Macron could not help pointing out once more that Berlin is much better at organizing support for its views within the EU. His marching order to the assembled ambassadors was clear: go and strengthen France’s bilateral relations, particularly with eastern and Nordic EU countries.

It is these countries that are most worried about a rapprochement with Putin’s Russia—especially since Trump, now that his hawkish national security advisor John Bolton is out of the picture, cannot be trusted to be tough on Putin. The Baltic countries are well aware that in a crisis, France is the only EU nuclear power with a president at its helm that can send troops across the continent on a whim.

Macron is playing billiard diplomacy. By rekindling his relationship with Putin and becoming Europe’s geopolitical wheelhouse, he hopes to increase his leverage within the EU and upend the rivalry with Germany—an old trick in French foreign policy. Ironically, in a Europe where many are still reticent about further integration, Macron seems to hope that going for a walk with Putin may do more wonders than charming Merkel. If Macron is taking a Gaullist turn, he still has his sights firmly set on Europe.

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The German question seems to be back yet again. With speculation about the end of the Atlantic alliance and the liberal international order, there are renewed fears of German dominance at the heart of Europe.

German power now takes a different form than in the past. While before 1945, the German question was geopolitical, the current German question is geo-economic, as I outlined in my book The Paradox of German Power. But things have changed since it was published in 2015—in particular with the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. In a recent thought-provoking essay in Foreign Affairs, Robert Kagan suggests that we should now be less certain that Germany will remain “benign” in geopolitical terms. In other words, for Kagan, the old German question is back.

However, this underestimates the deep cultural change in Germany since World War II. It’s hard to imagine any circumstances that would lead to the country reverting to an old-fashioned kind of German nationalism and militarism. The commitment of ordinary Germans to the idea of peace is simply too strong. For better or worse, this is the lesson that Germans have drawn from their experience in the 20th century.

Moreover, focusing on a remilitarization of Germany actually obscures a more likely—and interesting—possibility. If the United States were to actually withdraw its security guarantee to Europe, or if the liberal international order were to completely collapse, Germany might defy the expectations of realist international relations theorists and simply choose to be insecure rather than abandon its identity as a Friedensmacht, or “force for peace.” In other words, even in this worst-case scenario, Germany might in effect do nothing rather than either develop its own military capabilities, including nuclear weapons, or exchange dependence on the US for its security for a new dependence on France.

How Germany Harms the EU

Meanwhile, those, particularly Americans, who warn about the danger of the return of the old German question underestimate how problematic today’s Germany already is in the European context. Germany’s semi-hegemonic position within Europe is one of the main reasons why the EU has struggled to solve the series of crises that began with the euro crisis in 2010. On the one hand, Germany lacks the resources to solve problems in the way a hegemon would. On the other, it is powerful enough that it no longer feels the need to make concessions to other EU member states, and in particular to France. As a result, the EU has become dysfunctional.

It’s important not to idealize post-war Germany as acting selflessly. German politicians certainly look out for German interests in Europe. In fact, since the beginning of the euro crisis, much of the debate about Germany’s role in Europe has centered on exactly this question of the relationship between Germany’s national interest and the wider European interest. From economic policy and the management of the single currency itself to the refugee crisis and the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, Germany has again and again been accused of putting its own national interest ahead of the interests of Europe as a whole.

Nor has Germany exactly rejected nationalism altogether. Although—or perhaps because—Germans rejected militarism, they found new sources of national pride. In particular, a kind of economic nationalism developed in Germany and increasingly focused on Germany’s success as an exporter—what I have called “export nationalism.” During the Obama administration—long before Trump “targeted” Germany, as Kagan puts it, for its huge, persistent current account surplus—the US treasury had already put Germany on a currency-manipulation monitoring list.

Restoring the Franco-German Balance

Today, the dire state of trans-Atlantic relations and the threat of the withdrawal of the US security guarantee have raised concerns about how Germany might respond. Historically, American power has pacified Europe—that is, it “muted old conflicts in Europe and created the conditions for cooperation,” as Josef Joffe wrote in 1984. There are therefore good reasons to worry that a withdrawal of the security guarantee could lead to European disintegration and even the reactivation of security dilemmas. Yet a US withdrawal could also help to resolve the German question in its current, geoeconomic form—without necessarily re-opening the classical, geopolitical German question.

This is because Germany’s semi-hegemonic position in Europe is dependent on the configuration of the US-led liberal international order, and the particular form it took in Europe, that allowed Germany to “free ride.” In particular, the US security guarantee meant that Germany didn’t need France’s military capabilities and therefore had little incentive to make concessions to France on other issues like the euro. Whatever Trump’s intentions, his threat to withdraw the US security guarantee has given France greater leverage over Germany and thus gone some way to restoring what Harvard’s Stanley Hoffman called “the balance of imbalances” between the two countries. If the United States were actually to withdraw its security guarantee, it would further restore this balance and could mean the end of German semi-hegemony.

Power Politics Persists

In particular, increased German dependence on France for security might—and I emphasize might—force Germany to make concessions to France on other issues like economic policy and the euro, which would be good not just for France, but for Europe as a whole. In this way the removal of the US security guarantee could potentially enable Europe to finally deal with the crisis that began in 2010. The crucial question, however, is whether even this dramatic scenario would be enough to force Germany to rethink its approach to economic policy and the euro. It’s also perfectly possible that Germans would still not feel sufficiently threatened to make concessions to France on these issues as a quid pro quo for a more explicit or extensive French commitment to German or European security.

There is a tendency at the moment to view the world in extraordinarily binary terms. But the situation in Europe today is much more complex. While commentators like Kagan worry that a collapse of the current order would lead to a return of power politics within Europe, in reality power politics never really went away, even if it was no longer pursued using military tools. Within the peaceful, institutionalized context of the EU, member states continued to pursue their own national interests. In short, Europe may not have been quite the Kantian paradise that Kagan famously suggested it was in Of Paradise and Power.

Similarly, since the beginning of the euro crisis, it has become apparent that the Atlantic alliance and European integration did not resolve the German question quite as conclusively as was once thought. Given the ongoing reality of power politics within the EU, the unequal distribution of power among member states continued to matter, though that power was largely economic rather than military. After reunification and enlargement increased German power within Europe, a familiar dynamic emerged—though it only really became apparent after the beginning of the euro crisis. In other words, in resolving one version of the German question, the EU and the United States may have simply created another.

The post Red Herring & Black Swan: Is the German Question Back? appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© REUTERS/Thilo Schmuelgen

It was a mixed day for both France and Germany. It was snowing in Paris. Montmartre was under five centimeters of snow. And the public interest in what was happening in Aachen quickly evaporated. 

The applause in the German border town came only from the selected guests. Outside of the Aachen town hall, the yellow vests protested, demanding the resignation of the French president and the German chancellor. There were also a few blue, pro-European balloons drifting in the damp winter air around the marketplace. 

But when Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel finally left the hermetically sealed ballroom of the town hall for the auditorium of the nearby high school, in order to carry out a so-called citizens’ dialogue with yet another group of selected French and German participants, they marched straight through the marketplace. They didn’t stop by the unselected participants, didn’t wave once, shook nobody’s hand, and didn’t hold hands. 

It seemed as if they didn’t dare, in public on the marketplace, to look to the right or the left. The chants of the yellow vests resounded behind them. It appeared that the president and chancellor were running away from them. Yet the leaders had all the time in the world. They had let exactly 56 years pass before adding this Aachen Treaty, a supplement, to the Élysée Treaty signed by their predecessors Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer on January 22,^,1963.

Founding a Friendship

The Élysée Treaty once founded the Franco-German friendship. When it was signed, De Gaulle and Adenauer did not wade into the jubilant crowd either. But in the years since, everyone has agreed that the Élysée Treaty in particular contributed significantly to the reconciliation between French and Germans. So with the president and chancellor now showing up to renew the peace process of 1963, aren’t there enough reconciled French and Germans around to cheer their leaders on, or at least politely applaud? 

Evidently not. Apart from the yellow vests and the balloon-holders, there were hardly any people there. Not even curious bystanders were on the marketplace. The German public network ARD did show the signing live on TV—certainly by order of the political bosses. In France, though, the BFM network quickly went elsewhere. The snow in Paris was simply more important on this day. 

The president and chancellor seemed to feel that too as they made their businesslike crossing of the marketplace, without gestures or expression. Yet this could have been a moment of triumph—no, in fact, it had to be. For the first time in history, France and Germany assured each other of mutual military aid in a crisis or a war, not as part of a union or larger alliance but as nations themselves. Article 4 of the Aachen treaty states that France and Germany will “provide aid and assistance by all means at their disposal, including armed forces, in case of aggression against their territory”. 

Franco-German Commitment

That means that even if NATO, about whose cohesion many have speculated since Donald Trump was elected US president, breaks up; even if the European Union, which is on its way to losing one of its most important member-states in the United Kingdom, keeps unraveling, it wouldn’t change a thing about this Franco-German commitment to help each other with “all means at their disposal”! For the Aachen Treaty now guarantees that. 

So France would risk nuclear war if it helped Germany. Previously the Germans had always imagined America playing this role in an emergency. Now the words of this treaty demonstrate a new, European security doctrine. Both countries’ goal is now to “strengthen Europe’s capability to act autonomously.” In plain English that means: in the future we want to carry out our own wars, if we really have to. It means that the president and chancellor would be, if necessary, the new supreme commanders of Europe. Still, where was the sign of power from the leaders in Aachen? Where did they show their new common strength? 

“Merkel and Macron sign without conviction,” ran the headline in the leading conservative French daily Le Figaro on the morning of January 22. Without conviction. That summed it up. This day lacked the gesture, the idea of action that would have showed the citizens of both countries: France and Germany are powerful and strong together! That would have showed: everyone has to beware of us, Russians, Chinese, the Americans, too, if it comes to it! We will defend ourselves! 

It didn’t have to be a military gesture. Perhaps simply throwing out an American and a Chinese spy, for example. The president and chancellor could have given the impression that they were serious, that actions would follow their words. But apparently we are not there yet. They preferred to argue about whether a jointly developed fighter plane, that won’t be ready to deploy for another ten years, may be exported to Saudi Arabia or not. Even though they don’t know which sheikh will be ruling then. 

The president and chancellor really should have demonstrated strength on this day, but they didn’t. “Strength is decisively important in politics”, Niccolo Machiavelli once said. One doesn’t have to be a Machiavellian to recognize that. Thomas Gomart, a director of IFRI, the French institute for international relations, cited the old Florentine in his book L’affolement du monde (The Panic of the World). Why, then, did the president and chancellor forego any demonstration of their strength? Didn’t they have anything to counter the world’s panic, its headlessness?

No wonder that most commentators left and right of the Rhine quickly moved on to other things. The right-wing extremist Marine Le Pen spread rumors that the treaty included the German annexation of Alsace and Lorraine. Because there was so little interest, she was able to tell tall tales and get off scot-free. The president and chancellor, in any case, acted as if they had more important things to do at the moment. 

Lacking Romance

One section near the end of Macron’s speech was so heavily improvised that hardly anyone understood him. The president cited the vain Germaine de Stael, who liked to claim in her day, the 19^thcentury, that she would use a German word as soon as she couldn’t think of a French one. In so doing he demonstrated his intellectual laziness. For every French who wants to show off his knowledge of Germany likes to cite de Stael, who was an early master of this sort of bravado. 

Unfortunately, Macron didn’t stop there. He explained that it was precisely the “untranslatable” that drew French and Germans together. It brought about romantic moments. People had to “cherish the irrational as a magical moment” of the Franco-German friendship. He had probably worked on this part of the speech until 4am the night before. (He supposedly always works so long.) And he clearly could have used more romance. 

Chancellor Angela Merkel was not much better. She emphasized again and again that this was mostly about work and duty; she is not always so tritely German. What counts, the chancellor said in Aachen, is the “decisive will to actually fill the treaty with life.” That was supposed to mean: people, the work really begins now. But she didn’t say what she would do to make that all happen. Rather, she added, “Yes, we have this unconditional will. I commit myself to it.” As if any French had ever doubted the conscientiousness of the German chancellor. 

This far and no further—that was the lasting impression of Aachen. As if in the future, despite all the nice commitments on both sides, things could only go backwards. Anyone who does such a poor job of selling Franco-German unity as Macron and Merkel did on this day doesn’t really believe it in themselves. 

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© REUTERS/John MacDougall/Pool

Mr. Escorcia, you describe your relationship with Germany as an “old love story.” In what way?

Alexandre Escorcia: When I arrived in France at the age of eight, I had a “migration background,” as it is called in Germany. I’m originally from Colombia. So I didn’t need to study Spanish as a foreign language at school. Instead, I chose German, which I really enjoyed. But the real breakthrough came later, during my diplomatic training. I spent three weeks in Germany and being able to work together with German colleagues made a big impression on me. As neighbors, our countries are very close in many respects, but there are also huge differences when it comes to culture and our views on the world. I later became an exchange diplomat at the Foreign Office, and then did a long stint at the French Embassy in Berlin. In my current position, I take every opportunity to work on areas that bring together French and German perspectives. That’s the great thing about this cooperation. There’s always a Franco-German factor that can be ramped up or down.

Sebastian Groth: We’re ramping it up!

What about you, Mr. Groth?

Groth: I’m from close to Heidelberg, so France plays an important role there anyway—Strasbourg is just 100 kilometers away. I learnt French at school, and then during my time at university in Cologne, I spent a lot of time in Paris and a year as an exchange student in Montpellier. So I do know the “good life” that Germans associate with France, particularly with the south, but I’ve also experienced the education system and the culture first hand, and made a lot of friends. My most formative experience in France was the four years I spent in Paris as an advisor to the Prime Minister on Franco-German relations and European politics. The most intensive period was under Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, who is a big fan of Germany and very knowledgeable about the country—he later became Alexandre’s direct boss when he took on the role of Foreign Minister.

Escorcia: The “Germans” in our governmental system happen to be quite unique too, because they’re part of the continuity of the French state. Apart from the military, the employees and advisors that come from the forces, the Germans are the only ones that stay put when the government changes. So in a way, Sebastian represented part of the Hotel Matignon’s institutional consciousness.

Groth: My time there was during what was definitely the most decisive period for France and Franco-German relations. Since then I’ve often had dealings with France back here in Berlin, for example around the time of the Brexit referendum, when the two foreign ministers Steinmeier and Ayrault worked together to sketch out a way forward. And now, as Deputy Director of Policy Planning Staff, relations with France are again a part of my day-to-day work.

You have the same job title—do you do the same work?

Escorcia: Not quite—because the systems are slightly different. In my experience the Germans work more closely with the ministries—their head of policy planning staff accompanies the foreign minister more often than ours does. But we have a lot of opportunities to work directly with the German colleagues and to discuss all kinds of issues with them.

Groth: I see a lot of parallels too, especially when it comes to the way we are integrated institutionally and our size. Most European partners have smaller policy planning departments; sometimes they are attached to the political departments. Our tasks as deputy directors are also relatively similar, because we often do preparatory work—in management, in communication with the house. And the core tasks of the policy planning departments are very similar: considering how to shape foreign policy over a time frame of three to six months, and the dynamics we need to adopt for that—looking forwards and sometimes to the past, too, when we’re looking at how historical developments can inform developments now and in the future.

Escorcia: I spend about 60 percent of my time dealing with Germany. We have by far the most intensive cooperation.

Groth: It’s the same for us, our closest cooperation is with our French colleagues—our relationship with them is also by far the most trustworthy. We sometimes inform each other about discussions in our ministries or about developments that have more to do with domestic policy. That’s important, because despite harmonious relations, there are sometimes dissonances, although these are usually a result of misunderstandings or misinterpretations. Then we make an effort to understand the other side’s position or the dynamic of their discussion.

Is there a typically German or a typically French understanding of foreign politics, or are you on the same page?

Groth: It depends on the context, of course. I would say, when it really comes down to it, we are always on the same page. In the current situation especially, I think that in terms of the big issues, we are very, very close. What fascinates me about the French approach is the courage to come straight out with concrete suggestions, while in Germany we usually have lengthy discussions. The overall concept has to be perfect before we can start trying to carefully refine it here and there. In that sense the French way is much more direct. That kind of approach can sometimes really help to set a strong agenda—that’s how we see it at least. Maybe Alexandre sees it differently. I think we would do well to adopt a bit of that French courage and risk the possibility that, now and again, something might not work out. The French have to deal with that too, but we are always very keen to avoid any kind of failure. In France there is a bit more openness toward taking that risk—and then to fight for something. One impression I got during my time in Paris was that French diplomacy is able to identify certain very clearly defined goals, and then tries to fight for them internationally. In that sense we could perhaps learn a little from France.

Escorcia [laughs]: Yes, some people even say we have the ideas, you have the money.

Groth: Not only that, I hope!

Escorcia: No, but seriously, it’s true that in France we have more of a “diplomatie des coups.” We sometimes make suggestions based on tactical rather than strategic considerations, and then some German partners think the French have a master plan. We normally don’t. The disadvantage of our approach is that we don’t always think about the consequences. And of course our foreign policy fundamentally includes a military component—a difference that means its not always plain sailing with Germany. But on the other hand it’s also important to see that Germany, or rather our relationship with Germany, is also a domestic policy issue in France. The government is constantly under scrutiny from the public over how close it is to Germany. Sometimes it’s not good to be quite so close to Germany; some people in France see that as submissiveness, particularly in the economic sector. But being too distant from Germany can be seen as going it alone. It’s not easy for ministers or the French president to find the right balance when it comes to Germany. In Germany, that’s not the case.

Groth: I think these questions play an important role in Germany, too. Germany’s top politicians always do well to approach France directly and make it clear that French-German issues are important to them – which is of course the case even in terms of European politics alone, and especially in the current climate, in which we all know that the foreign policy sphere is not getting any easier. That was also something we experienced after the Brexit vote. The first reflex was a French-German one, as it has been in other geopolitical and foreign-policy developments. So in Germany, too, our approach to Franco-German relations definitely includes strong aspects of domestic and European policy.

I do think [Alexandre] has a point about the military and non-military components of foreign policy. Of course France is much quicker off the mark when it comes to taking military action and also acting autonomously. Germany is always anxious to act in cooperation with its partners. It’s important to stay close enough to the French approach that we are able to have an influence on certain things. But if you look at recent events, there has not been a single big issue on which we haven’t worked together, from the Normandy format talks on Ukraine to UN and EU missions in Mali. It was a real game changer for French foreign policy to have boosted Germany’s motivation to engage in West Africa of all places. That’s an example of a real convergence of our views, although some differences will probably always remain. Those can’t just be pasted over; they’re dependent on historical and socio-political factors, as well as a result of the governmental system.

Escorcia: I’ve often noticed how quickly we drift apart because of our different systems—centralized versus decentralized governments. That can create greater distance unless we, and others, work consistently to build on areas of French-German convergence. Within both of our systems, not everyone knows their neighbors well enough to trust that some things happen for systematic reasons and not because of anything else. I have had a lot to do with security policy, an area where old mistrust sometimes still prevails, on both sides. What are the French up to in Africa—isn’t that all postcolonial? And in the other direction: what do the Germans want from central Europe, with others and not us? Mistrust can return very quickly and usually it has more to do with the way things are approached than with their actual substance.

Groth: When it comes to Africa policy, Germans have been very quick to say, and sometimes still do say, that every French initiative is basically connected to the country’s colonial past—people argue that France is keen to continue with or reignite politics a la “Francafrique.” I think those accusations miss the point, that period is behind us. It’s much more to do with the common European interests we represent there, in particular in terms of security, development, migration and the fight against terrorism. A lot has happened in those areas over recent years. Apart from that, France’s permanent seat on the UN Security Council means it has a different geopolitical grasp on many of the issues in which Germany is also involved. Libya, Yemen, Syria and so on are discussed again on another level among the P5 or within the Security Council. I think that from next year, when Germany is also on the Security Council, our foreign policy will mesh even more closely.

People have long dreamt of France’s seat on the Security Council becoming more European…

Groth [laughs]: I hope Alexandre’s fighting for that!   

Escorcia: Brexit has shifted relations among the Europeans on the Security Council, at least, and we agree that we need to work toward more visibility for the European Union in New York.

Groth: Foreign Minister Heiko Maas once said in an interview that we would interpret the seat in a European way. It will also about strengthening the bonds between Brussels and New York. Particularly for France, as part of the P5, it can be a battle of two souls: on the one hand acting as a national player with its own interests in the security council, and on the other hand to consider its European connections in a way that might be more natural for us than it is for France. But I think that together, we will try and work on that, and there are many interesting suggestions. I think this is a great chance for Europe.

Up to now there has been a lot of talk about the Franco-German engine, or tandem, driving European integration. How smoothly is that engine running at the moment?

Escorcia: That’s an interesting choice of words. The Germans talk about an engine; perhaps because the German car industry is so strong. We prefer to talk about a couple, because we are French. The romantic couple. “Le couple.” But the French “le couple” is also connected to the idea of an engine. “Le couple du moteur” is an engine’s driving force. But “le couple” still mainly refers to a married couple, which suggests that our relationship with Germany, for us, is a matter of the heart. Just as it can be in a marriage, the institution itself and the will to work together is strong, but a bit more romance wouldn’t hurt.

So it’s down to individuals—are things running less smoothly with the Merkel-Macron “couple” than with Schmidt–Gisard d’Estaing or Mitterrand–Kohl?

Escorcia: Individuals always play a role at every level, that’s why I think it’s so important that as many people as possible know the partner country well. From what I’ve seen, people among the German government and civil service know France much better than the other way around. For example, fewer colleagues speak German now than ten years ago.

Groth: The discussion about the quality of the relationship is as old as the relationship itself. Perhaps hindsight casts a rather too rosy glow on many of these old couples. I have the impression that relations are excellent as a rule: for top-level German politicians, their French counterparts are often the first point of contact. And in the lower levels too, in the ministries, coordination with our French colleagues is always the most important. Each of our ministries has, in one way or another; its own department just working on France and our cooperation, so our relations are also reflected institutionally. Still, there will always be questions, and we have to have those discussions when they do arise, because it can happen that we have different opinions. The Euro crisis was of course the big issue from 2010-2014, during my time as an exchange diplomat. People in Paris were wondering why the Germans were approaching the issue in such a juridical, rule-bound way, while those in Berlin were asking why the French were offering such Keynesian and macroeconomic arguments; why, from a German perspective, they didn’t want to do anything more far-reaching for their own competitiveness. These questions and different perspectives will continue to be a part of our work. But even on those issues, I do see a convergence, steps toward common ideas, which we have seen at the Meseberg summit on Eurozone reforms, among other things. There too, the decisive impulse will always come from Franco-German cooperation.

I think Germany will always tend to push harder than France to turn a tactical moment of a common idea into a strategy for as many Europeans as possible. France tends to want to take the step first and would perhaps then look at who can be brought on board. Our planning policy departments have already been working together for a year on a project focusing on the idea of a flexible union, a flexible Europe—which formats, what kind of content can we advance in flexible formats with Germany and France, in foreign and security policy but also in terms of stabilization, economic and innovation policy. We will continue to work on those questions, and the involvement of others. As a rule, I don’t think the psychologizing of the relationships between individuals will get us very far. Our common working ability is stronger than with any other government or foreign minister.

But is there still a certain imbalance, despite that? Macron clearly has higher expectations of Germany than the other way around.

Escorcia: No, I don’t think so. It’s always difficult to bring together the different political calendars. While France is gearing up for an election, Germany is incapacitated and has to wait, and when France is ready to act, Germany is gearing up for an election of its own—that’s how it’s always been. In France we have acknowledged that we have a great partner in Chancellor Merkel—she has the courage to approach us.

Groth: That kind of criticism usually stems from Macron’s Europe speech at the Sorbonne, with his long list of around 70 suggestions. People immediately started asking, what’s happening, what’s the German response to all these suggestions? But when you look at the list, you see that we have already made progress on many things – in part because of German responses and contributions, although our reaction might have taken a while due to the political calendar. But it did come. We didn’t sense any disappointment, perhaps a certain impatience, but that was the case all over Europe until the new German government was in place. I think the Meseberg summit was a really crucial point on that path; the chances are good that we can keep up the momentum and make good use of this period before the European parliamentary elections next spring.

Escorcia: It’s true that the president’s suggestions were very ambitious. But he was not proposing to implement all 70 suggestions in one or two years. He also wanted to get things going.

Groth: And if anyone else has other suggestions, they are of course welcome to present them. The important thing is that the discussion is ongoing and that the aim is to bring ideas forward. The discussion around Permanent Structured Cooperation on Security and Defense or European Intervention Initiatives are good examples—we’ve made good progress there, even if in Germany we aren’t so happy with the term “Intervention Initiative.”

Escorcia: Oh yes. “Intervention!”

Groth: “Initiative” is good, though. We might prefer to go more in the direction of “Initiative for a European Crisis Intervention Team”…

And with that we’re back to the negotiating table.

Escorcia: Yes, we are trying to move our German friends slightly more toward a greater readiness to deploy…

Groth: …And we are trying to encourage our French friends to consider the whole spectrum of action, from military to military-civilian to purely civilian, as an integrated approach—with some success. A few months ago, Macron spoke about a “comprehensive approach” to West Africa, saying military action alone was not enough. Of course that’s not a new concept in France, but I think this area presents many more possibilities for Franco-German cooperation. Not because France has ideas and Germany pays for them, but rather because we both have ideas, both pay and common action makes our policies more effective.

A new Élysée Treaty is in preparation. What should it include—in order to build even better, even more stable relations?

Escorcia: Our policy planning departments have been involved in the discussion…

Groth: … At least in terms of setting the ball rolling at the beginning.

Escorcia: We presented common suggestions – so the policy planning staff’s special channel worked. Now it’s down to the colleagues in the specialized departments to take things forward. But it’s important to mention a few aspects. This is not a replacement treaty, but an additional treaty that supplements the existing one. The 1963 treaty remains the basis of our cooperation. But it needs to be brought up to date in line with the new reality of Europe and new fields of cooperation which in 1963 were not yet in place or not so well developed, from economics to innovation, technology, defense and so on. The basic philosophy is to being a new impetus to our relations, and to the whole European concept. The German-French couple is good for others too. And of course it’s also about preserving flexibility within these new fields and developing our cooperation.

Groth: These are the really key points—what does Franco-German cooperation mean today in a European context? How do we deal with global changes? How can Germany and France work even more closely together on issues like shaping globalization, defending multilateralism and the rule-bound, international order? We’ve already taken a strong stand on climate policy, we are doing the same with trade policy, but there are many other areas where we could develop further. How can Germany and France bring the spirit of the Élysée treaty in the 21^st century and make it relevant? That’s what we’re currently working hard to realize.

The talk was chaired by Henning Hoff and Uta Kuhlmann.

N.B. This is a translation; the exchange was conducted in German. The original version can be found here. The English version was first published on September 7, 2018.

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© REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

When French President Emmanuel Macron announced the European Intervention Initiative (E2I) in his September 2017 Sorbonne speech, many were quick to put it in line with recent European projects such as the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) or the European Defense Fund (EDF). But E2I is not meant for headlines or the creation of big institutions. It’s a non-EU, military-to-military strategic workshop with a more modest perspective. Contrary to initial speculation, E2I does not aim at being a flagship project for European integration, but an operational get-together for partner militaries. Its results will only be seen when the next crisis arises and its participants decide to move into action together.

With nine signatory countries—Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom, and Finland expected to soon become the tenth—E2I has already gained traction beyond France. Although the rationale behind the signature may differ from one country to another, all participating countries now share a common understanding of its structure and purpose, even if they are not always good at explaining them. The next few years will be crucial for demonstrating if this peculiar format works, co-exists well with other EU-wide projects, and delivers results. The most pressing challenges lie in the role and approach that both France and Germany will embrace as part of the initiative, and whether these two countries will find compromises in the implementation process.

French Origins

Although E2I was officially presented by President Macron in September 2017, it is the result of strategic analyses that preceded his mandate. The 2013 French intervention in Mali highlighted that France and its European partners did not share the same understanding of Europe’s security environment—which led to both disappointment in Paris and frustration in some European capitals regarding what they saw as French unilateralism. In Paris, one of the lessons learned from this experience was the crucial need for better intelligence sharing and common contingency planning.

During the Hollande presidency (2012–2017), the French Ministry of Armed Forces undertook the mapping of European defense actors in terms of their capabilities, budget, and actual contributions to operations. Following the 2015 Paris attacks, France’s invocation of article 42.7 of the EU Treaty—the mutual defense clause—also helped to assess concrete acts of solidarity from EU countries and calibrate France’s expectations towards its partners. Through this mapping exercise, the French Ministry of Armed Forces identified a small group of countries considered “able and willing,” a core of which were approached to form the original members of E2I.

E21 is defined in the 2017 French Strategic Review of Defense as an “ambitious cooperative framework.” It also marks the French preference for flexible and non-institutionalized formats of cooperation. It’s aimed at providing a political mandate for the military to consider and analyze potential crises of high-intensity, but E2I can only deliver results if unhindered by EU bureaucracy. From the French perspective, this absence of institutional constraints is one of the key strengths of the initiative. This is why Paris places it at the heart of its European defense strategy and goal of strategic autonomy.   

Debunking the Myths

Macron’s Sorbonne speech included a plethora of new ideas and proposals for the European project. Yet the context of the presentation of E2I, as well as the confusing wording used, led to several misunderstandings that continue to affect discussions around the initiative.

The most problematic of these misconceptions is that E2I would imply the creation of a new standing military force and involve military exercises. In fact, E2I is not an “intervention force” in the making but a military-to-military platform aimed at preparing in advance a series of generic scenarios, in order to better anticipate crises and coordinate military operations. The overall endeavor is therefore modest in its form and will primarily rely on liaison officers already in post in Paris.

E2I has also been portrayed as undermining efforts to improve integration in European defense. France has argued, however, that the initiative complements the EU toolkit, while PESCO and the EDF deal with capabilities. There will be no institutional link between PESCO and E2I, and no official joint project between the two frameworks either. Nevertheless, E2I could influence the design of projects, which could advance into a PESCO project format. For instance, “co-basing”—meant to improve the use and sharing of European military bases outside Europe—was discussed and developed in E2I meetings and will be announced on November 20 among the second batch of PESCO projects.

Beyond this, a further conceptual distinction has to be made: the recent EU effort in the domain of defense is meant to improve both the EU’s capability to act and to show a successful side to the European project; E2I’s immediate goal, by contrast, is to answer specific military issues. Its political significance is limited and it should not be viewed through the same lens as major EU initiatives. Unlike PESCO, E2I is not an achievement in itself but a means to an end.

Calibrating France’s Role

Paris is well aware that the success of E2I will depend on France’s ability to listen to partners and prevent the initiative from being perceived purely as a French endeavor. This openness will have to be showcased in both style and content: the next Military European Strategic Talks (MEST), which will set the political guidance and technical processes for E2I, will take place in different capitals, and the working groups will be headed by different countries. On the substance, high-intensity crises in West Africa and the Sahel region—traditional areas of French interest and involvement—cannot appear as the only matters of discussion, as many in Europe suspect. The fact that the first working session was dedicated to a natural disaster crisis in the Caribbean—a scenario presented by the Dutch—came as a welcomed opportunity to prove that all E2I countries can bring their own security concerns to the table.

Perhaps more important though is France’s ability to compromise on entry and participation criteria. For Paris, E2I is meant to remain a “private club” of a limited number of countries—13 to 14 maximum—and the entry process has remained intentionally unclear. As it is neither a capability nor a procurement project, setting quantitative criteria to enter may not be pertinent, and the most important factor should remain a country’s political willingness to address complex operational issues. Finland seems close to signing the Letter of Intent. Other countries may follow, and their integration will constitute a test for the initiative. Indeed, some members such as the United Kingdom and Germany have clearly stated that they wish to have a say on the future constitution of E2I. Other members of E2I have pushed to set more objective rules, and current discussions surrounding the governing principles of the initiative will have to provide clarifications.

The German Question

Germany has been uncomfortable with E2I from the beginning. Whereas the rest of the participating states have accepted the exclusive and non-institutionalized logic of E2I, these adjectives remain an almost philosophical problem for Germany. Wary of causing tensions with countries not party to the initiative and undermining European unity, German officials—especially among the diplomatic corps—are reluctant to multiply the formats outside the EU institutions which they see as crucial to sustaining political momentum. The date of the signature of the Letter of Intent has been postponed several times due to German hesitations, and officials still criticize certain aspects of the initiative while actively slowing its implementation. Yet the participation of Germany in this initiative is crucial for its success and legitimacy in Europe.

For the French, involving the German military in E2I is also a way to influence the German strategic culture. There is support for the project at the highest political level from Chancellor Angela Merkel and Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen, for the sake of the Franco-German partnership and to avoid sending a negative signal to Germany’s European partners. At the military level, there is a clear understanding of the operational value and modest scope of E2I. Still, the German diplomatic corps and policy-making establishment are reluctant to let the Bundeswehr do military-to-military cooperation without diplomatic supervision.

By empowering the military and giving them arguments to convince the diplomatic corps and political leadership, E2I could contribute to the ongoing debate on Germany’s operational role for European defense. This evolution, however, will only be possible if the larger German strategic community embraces this initiative.

Success without Deliverables

All participating countries agree that the success of E2I is about creating a dynamic rather than quantifiable results. Despite Macron’s original grand rhetoric, E2I is not meant to be revolutionary, but it does have the potential to shake things up at the working-level. Part of a small-step policy, its success will not be measured on the same scale as flagship projects for Europe, but rather as useful for a working group for professionals. At the same time, it holds the potential to become a motor for more strategic convergence between European militaries in practice.

In Paris, E2I will be deemed a success if the core group of Europeans tackle the next crisis together better than Mali in 2013. The outcome will be seen in practice, be it during the 2019 hurricane season in the Caribbean – purpose of the Dutch-led working group – or during the next armed conflict in a region where European interests are at stake. Better intelligence and situational awareness exchange, alongside a raised level of preparedness based on better knowledge of one another’s procedures and contingency planning could become a game changer in the next few years. Thanks to its flexible and light structure, E2I will not require much time to be established, and several participating countries noted that the intensified exchanges between liaison officers have already been useful.

A successful E2I would also contribute to the French pursuit of European strategic autonomy. The dynamic created by the initiative is meant to trickle down to other European and transatlantic defense cooperation frameworks. It will notably make Europeans more aware of how much they still rely on the United States operationally for the defense of their own interests. To that end, the exercise of contingency planning in a small group and without American assets should be an eye-opener.

Expectations, however, do need to be managed. Europe does not need another project that, if it fails, risks hindering the current European defense momentum and reinforcing US discontent with the state of transatlantic burden-sharing.

As a platform for strategic discussions and intelligence sharing, the success of E2I may be difficult to sell politically. Results in both the short and long-term will often remain unknown to the public, and communication is likely to remain minimal. As such, a key effort should be made to better explain the initiative to the German and US policy-making communities, as well as to members of both the EU and NATO. A large part of the transatlantic defense community is still unaware of its purpose and may be suspicious to see an additional project competing with existing ones or simply using scarce resources.

Several officials argue that there is no risk of E2I not working because there is “nothing at stake.” Regarding quantifiable goals that is true, as there is nothing tangible at stake in terms of capabilities not developed or deadlines missed—so Paris could get away with some symbolic proof of success. But the success of E2I takes an obvious political significance, as President Macron will need to show that he can deliver on the European stage. A lot is thus at stake in terms of political and strategic credibility: France’s role as bridge-builder to the UK and natural leader of post-Brexit European defense efforts, and Germany’s operational role in European defense.

A short article based on this research was published on the BPJ website on October 15, 2018.

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© REUTERS/Leah Millis

In May, US President Donald Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal. Now Europeans are waiting for another blow from Washington: the beginning of a transatlantic trade war. On March 23, Trump announced sweeping tariffs on steel and aluminum imports based on national security concerns. Though this decision was mainly directed against China, long-term allies such as Canada and EU member states are also affected. The temporary exemption that the US granted the EU will expire on June 1, and the tariffs will kick in then unless the Trump administration changes its mind.

Troublingly for Europe, the United States only wants to exempt Europe permanently from the steel tariffs if the EU offers significant market access concessions, for example lowering its tariffs on US cars. In addition, Trump has threatened to impose tariffs up to 25 percent on imported cars, based again on the same national security provision used for the metal tariffs, Section 232 of the Trade Act of 1962. If Trump decides to impose these tariffs, it could start a spiral of protectionism.

What are the chances of defusing trade tensions? A compromise on steel is possible. If the US sets a steel quota of 100 percent of last year’s steel and aluminum exports from Europe, EU countries probably would not be willing to retaliate. But if the quota is lower, retaliation is more likely. However, for car tariffs, there is no easy solution in sight. Nor is there any agreement on how to move forward in the future. It would make economic sense in the long run to start talks about an EU-US trade deal (previously known as TTIP), negotiated on the basis of an equal partnership. But for this, Germany and France need to find a common ground. At the moment, intra-European disputes look set to weaken the EU’s position as a global player in world trade.

Using the EU’s Economic Power

So far, Europeans have reacted the wrong way to the American threats. The European Commission is responsible for the Common Commercial Policy, one of the EU’s most integrated policy areas. But instead of going through the Commission and forming a unified position vis-à-vis the US, the two largest EU member-states, Germany and France, have rushed ahead on their own.

For example, the German economy minister, Peter Altmaier (pictured), has proposed talks with the US about a “TTIP light”, which would only deal with industrial market access. He wants talks with the Trump administration to be positive and constructive in order to alleviate the tensions in the transatlantic trade relationship. Through this offer Germany also wants to protect its fabled car industry which has caught Trump’s attention.

Meanwhile French President Emmanuel Macron has made a great show of his close personal relationship with his American counterpart. However, with regard to trade, France is taking a much less conciliatory tone than Germany. France supports the European Commission’s view, namely that there is no reason to negotiate under (an unjustified) threat. Cracks in Franco-German cooperation are also appearing with regard to a potential transatlantic trade deal. Macron has said that such a agreement with the US must also include non-tariff barriers as well as agriculture and public procurement. And he has suggested that the EU should only negotiate trade deals with partners who support the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, though he would likely be willing to make concessions in this regard.

The divergent positions of Germany and France weaken the European position, and help the US to divide the individual European member-states. It sent the wrong signal when German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Macron made individual visits to Washington in April to discuss trade as the US president has difficulties understanding and accepting the concept of the EU.

Still, Donald Trump knows that a unified EU strengthens the European position, which is why he is trying to drive a wedge between European powers. During Macron’s visit he said that “trade with France is complicated because we have the European Union. I would rather deal just with France. The Union is very tough for us. They have trade barriers that are unacceptable.” Trump’s lack of knowledge on the subject notwithstanding, the point of the EU is that its members act together on trade: The EU must use the unified power of all its member states (including Germany and France) to deal on equal terms with the US.

Acknowledging Imbalances

A compromise in trade is an important test for Franco-German cooperation. Paris and Berlin should prove that they take common European interests seriously in the medium- and long-term. In other words, they must be willing to accept that national interests need to temporarily take a back seat. A common European position in trade sends a strong signal, particularly in times where the centrifugal forces in the EU are increasing. Without a common understanding between the two largest member-states, the success of the supranational European common commercial policy would be threatened.

There are three key elements to what should be a common Franco-German strategy.

First, Paris and Berlin should keep in mind that the US remains the most important trade and investment partner for the EU and vice versa, harsh rhetoric and political chaos in Washington nonwithstanding. Therefore, the economic rationale for a transatlantic trade deal has not changed. Both sides would benefit from a reduction of trade and investment barriers. France and Germany should not approach the Trump administration on their own; rather, they should convince the Commission that talks about a comprehensive free trade agreement are important in the long-term.

Paris should move closer to the German position, showing greater readiness to open talks between the EU and the US. Here, the good relationship between Macron and Trump can be used to promote European interests. Macron may not have convinced Trump to stick to the agreement on Iran’s nuclear program, but their apparent friendship is still a basis for future talks. At the same time, Berlin should accept that the agreement needs to be comprehensive and not just focused on good market access for industrial goods, German ones in particular.

Admittedly, the difficult TTIP talks will hardly have any chance of success under President Trump and his protectionist trade policy. However, it is still worthwhile to review the agreements reached in previous negotiating rounds, and to look where negotiations could continue in the long run. To this end, the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC), which was founded in 2007, should be used intensively to talk on a working level about regulatory cooperation.

Second, Europe must commit itself to defining new rules in international trade and solving existing problems on a multilateral level. The American concerns about Chinese subsidies for key industries and theft of foreign intellectual property are not imaginary; indeed, Europe shares many of them.

However, the introduction of punitive tariffs is the wrong way to move forward. For example, the problem of (largely Chinese) steel overcapacity should not be solved bilaterally, but on a multilateral level in the context of the G20/OECD Global Forum on Steel Excess Capacity. German and France should work with the White House to ensure US cooperation in these forums.

Third, there should be a discussion about international trade imbalances. Germany should take seriously the American and European—and particularly French—criticism of its huge export surplus. Trump’s claim that trade deficits are a sign of unfairness lacks any economic credibility. But it is true that Germany does not comply with European rules stating that a member-state’s trade surplus may not exceed 6 per cent of GDP. The typical German response—that its surplus is a sign of competitiveness—is no longer sufficient. Germany should strengthen its internal demand through increased investment in infrastructure and digital networks, thus reducing its surplus. If the new German government is still committed to restrained spending and no budget deficits whatsoever, the least it could do is to show more openness for dialogue. This would be an important gesture of goodwill with regard to Paris, Brussels, and Washington.

If Germany and France incorporate these three elements in their trade strategy, the EU will be less divided and better able to reach a deal with the difficult partner in the White House.

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© REUTERS/Stoyan Nenov

Emmanuel Macron’s frustration is mounting as Angela Merkel, his indispensable partner in Europe, continues to delay negotiations over EU reform. “France has reformed, France has made proposals, and then France has waited,” the French president told journalists at an EU summit with Western Balkans countries in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia in mid-May. “I have high expectations of the German response…. The summer before us constitutes a moment of truth.”

In fact, the moment of truth may be even nearer. In Italy, the anti-establishment Five Star Movement and the anti-migrant Lega are preparing to form a populist, euroskeptic government. These two parties have renounced the rules for fiscal stability in the eurozone and promised enormous increases in public spending. Already, shivers are going through the financial markets. Over the next several weeks, the stability of the euro will once again be tested—only now, it is not about tiny Greece, but about Italy, the eurozone’s third largest economy. That makes agreement between France and Germany, always a prerequisite for decisions at the wider EU level, even more urgent. 

Merkel arguably contributed to the Italian populists’ success by insisting on bringing deficits under control and pushing policies on refugees that have strained EU coherence. But even now, the German chancellor is refusing to reveal what her own vision of Europe’s future is—if she in fact has one.

In Sofia, Macron devoted 45 minutes to a press conference to convey his sense of urgency over EU reform. Merkel, after the same event, lingered on for a mere ten minutes, drily explaining to journalists that the Western Balkans weren’t quite ready to join the EU yet, and that Europe needed more innovation and a common stance on trade and Iran policy. Macron pleading, Merkel ducking—that pattern has been established over several meetings by now, adding to Macron’s despair as time is ticking away. European Parliament elections will take place in May 2019, to be followed by the lengthy process of appointing a new European Commission. That means that there is less than a year to agree meaningful steps toward EU reform among the 27 EU member states remaining after Brexit.

The French president, elected on promises of profound reforms of France and Europe, has been in power for just over a year. While Macron’s reforms in France have delivered beyond expectation—even beyond what many French people believe is digestible for their society—his initiatives for renewing European integration have so far fallen flat.

Still, those initiatives are at least public. Macron set out a hugely ambitious European agenda last September in a speech at the Sorbonne, one carefully timed to take place immediately after the German elections, where Merkel’s conservative bloc was confirmed as the country’s largest political force. There he proposed, among other things, a comprehensive European asylum and immigration policy as well as a joint military budget and intervention force.

Most concretely and urgently, he suggested an overhaul of the eurozone to strengthen the euro against future crises. His plans include a eurozone budget, a finance minister and transforming the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) into a full-blown European Monetary Fund.

However, the French president was left waiting for an answer to his proposals. It took Merkel nearly six months to put together a government coalition. Remarkably, the tone of the coalition agreement was very pro-European, with the first chapter opening the way to a eurozone reform and even promising that Germany would pay more into the Brussels budget. When Merkel was sworn in for her fourth term in office on March 14, Paris must have hoped that Berlin would finally engage with the French proposals. 

New Term, No Answers

Yet Merkel still had no answer for Macron. April came and went, and the only thing that Merkel ever said was that there would be a Franco-German agreement in time for the EU summit scheduled for the end of June. Then on May 10, Macron was awarded the prestigious Charlemagne Prize in Aachen as a recognition of his commitment to European integration. Merkel gave the laudation, which would have been an ideal opportunity to set out her own vision of the future of Europe. Once again, she remained silent on the big issues.

The chancellor did reportedly meet several times with her new finance minister, the Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, to discuss Germany’s response to Macron, but no information has leaked out. Not even the parliamentarians who support her are willing to speak out—no interviews on EU reform before the June summit, one of them told the Berlin Policy Journal.

It is true that on eurozone reform, Merkel faces a difficult dilemma. Overall, Germans still are pro-European, and polls regularly show a majority in favor of closer EU integration. But the chancellor’s conservative bloc is less committed, having come under fierce pressure from the euroskeptic Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). Merkel’s Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, is becoming particularly jittery ahead of state elections scheduled for October.

Basically, Germany’s conservatives are afraid that Macron’s proposals mean that Germany will end up paying for spendthrift countries in Southern Europe. They insist that fiscal risks must be reduced through structural reforms before Germany can enter any new commitments within the eurozone.

For his part Macron, having undertaken enormous efforts to reduce France’s public deficit within record time, believes that Germany must show a bit more good faith. “Germany can’t have a perpetual fetish about budget and trade surpluses, because they come at the expense of others,” Macron said in Aachen.

Over the next few weeks, Merkel will have to decide how to proceed. And there is much to do: She needs to support the French president, keep on board the other EU countries—some of them quite skeptical—and convince her own governing parties of any proposal she makes.

Which way will she go? Is she hatching a grand response to Macron that will save the French president, the European Union and her own legacy all in one go? Or will she bow to coalition pressures and play it safe in a short-term approach?

For all of Macron’s impatience, Merkel is keeping her cards close to her chest. 

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© REUTERS/Vincent Kessler

The mood is changing in the Franco-German relationship. Spring has sprung in Berlin and Paris; in the elite Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood and on the Bastille square, the change of season is tempting residents outside to the café terraces. Senior government officials and diplomats sit among them. Warm feelings for one another could blossom, and President Macron’s seminal speech on Europe last autumn at the Sorbonne could finally prompt them to take joint action.

But the opposite seems to be the case. Bitterness and anguish are once again on the horizon. The elites of both capitals look back at a year of lofty statements and joint plans only to realize, with either glee or solemn acceptance, that nothing ended up happening at all. The naysayers already have the upper hand: “Didn’t I tell you guys? You can’t rely on Paris.” Or: “Je vous disais toujours, Germany was never going to take action.” Those in Paris and Berlin seem to prefer talking about new enemies—Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and Xi Jinping—than about their traditional remaining allies. There is little sign of the reaction these four villains ought to trigger: strengthening the countries’ respective national ranks and, subsequently, the Franco-German alliance.

The Return of Lethargy

Nothing better epitomizes the return of Franco-German lethargy than the reaction of both sides to Macron’s proposal to renew the 1963 Treaty of Friendship between Germany and France. The treaty is the historic, intergovernmental foundation for the reconciliation of France and Germany after the Second World War. It is a masterpiece of two great politicians: Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer. Who would want to reformulate that legacy? Who can reconcile German soft power and French nuclear power? Who will forge German civilian-power thinking and French military-power thinking into a durable European alliance against the threats of the 21st century?

I raised these questions in April with Pascal Bruckner in the Café de la Poste, an establishment in the Parisian district of Marais. Bruckner is among France’s “new philosophers,” who have long since begun to age. He is one of the most-translated French authors in the world. Still, he’s never above polemics. So I suggested he write a new Élysée Treaty, France’s less cumbersome name for the historic document. Bruckner laughed—he barely knows Germany, he said. That’s irrelevant, I responded, since no one else seems to be leading the public debate, and someone has to kick it into gear with a bit of common sense. Bruckner squirmed. He had just, in our conversation, committed himself “fully and completely” to Macron, and probably sensed that he could indeed help his president if he picked up where Macron left off in the Sorbonne speech and got behind a new treaty with the Germans. But major Parisian intellectuals like Bruckner are vain and egotistical; they don’t allow others to dictate their topics. The fact that Bruckner had not immediately rejected my suggestion and wanted to think it over was already a great success.

On one point, however, Bruckner was very clear: Enemies form alliances, he said, naming Trump, Erdogan, and Putin, and this ought to prompt Macron and his German partner, Chancellor Angela Merkel, to do the same by standing firmly together. France’s new philosophers have always had a tendency to plow the great field of foreign policy with simple moral messages. During the Cold War they used sharp rhetoric to resist Germany’s Ostpolitik. Forget Wandel durch Handel, as Germany’s then-chancellor Willy Brandt put it. For Bruckner and his most famous comrades-in-arms, André Glucksmann and Henri Bernard-Lévy, it was all about resisting the “power of evil” in the form of the Soviet Union. Every military build-up was considered legitimate. They consistently took the side of eastern dissidents, from Lech Walesa to Vaclav Havel.
Courage and Humanity

To some extent, Macron has followed in their footsteps over the past year, but with a twist—he has unequivocally declared Germany a force for good in the face of the new global state of disorder. One may recall his appearance at Berlin’s Humboldt University on January 10, 2017. “I’ve already said it once, but I’ll repeat it here: German society has confronted the mass arrival of refugees with admirable clarity, with courage and humanity,” Macron said at the time, in the heat of France’s presidential election campaign.

It was on that January day, if not earlier, that Macron declared his allegiance to the good Germany. He repeated it in every campaign speech. He never took the podium without his “German friends.” For Macron there were never any other allies, say, the Italians or the Spanish, who were quite as important. No, the good guys at his side were, above all others, “les amis allemands.”

Word got around. A new Franco-German impetus for the EU seemed possible. Macron’s electoral victory moved closer and, when the newly elected president took office and began courting the German chancellor more forcefully than ever before, the Franco-German pair seemed, at their summit meeting on July 13 in Paris, almost on par with the world’s greatest powers.

The German federal election in autumn 2017 did little to disturb the feeling of gentle euphoria on both sides of the Rhine. On the contrary, the fact that Germany was governed by a caretaker cabinet for months after the election explained perfectly why no action followed Macron’s speech at the Sorbonne shortly after the German election, where he had once again made the Franco-German awakening seem close enough to touch. After all, Macron was just waiting for Merkel, whose fourth term as chancellor was never really in doubt. In the spring, at Easter, they would really get going together.

Until Merkel’s re-inauguration on March 14, 2018, the optimists held onto hope. After that, however, the euphoria to the west and east of the Rhine began to evaporate. It is as if all participants suddenly realized, at the ring of an alarm clock, that they had been dreaming for a year. As if Merkel’s new term came with the understanding that the time for lofty speeches by the French president was over, and it was time to get back to the hard work of day-to-day business. In other words: enough with the chatter about a big eurozone budget!

Back Burner Thinking

Macron proposed a eurozone budget worth several per cent of eurozone GDP in August 2017. One per cent of eurozone GDP is 130 billion euros. Officials from the German Finance Ministry, who did not want to be named, responded immediately by stating that spending more than 25 billion on new measures for the eurozone was not on the cards. This sort of back burner thinking seems to be shared by the new German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz. Macron has already dialled back his expectations. It will be “a few years” before a eurozone budget is devised, according to people close to Macron who have watched the beginning of Merkel’s fourth term unfold.

Evidently, the long winter, which for government-free Berlin was also a winter of political wrangling, drained Franco-German energy. But there was no rest for the wicked. Trump kicked off his trade war. Putin and Erdogan kept playing their games in Syria. Xi had himself elected president for life. And Paris and Berlin had no response. That called the doubters into action.

From the Hôtel Matignon in Paris’ 7th arrondissement, where the prime minister governs, one can already anticipate the backlash against the president’s German-friendly plan. The memories are still fresh; it was exactly the same during the refugee crisis in 2015. Francois Hollande, the lord of Elysée Palace at the time, did not hesitate to get behind Merkel’s decision to open Germany’s borders to refugees stranded on the Balkan route. But his prime minister, Manuel Valls, revolted. Valls would later visit a refugee camp in Munich to declare his opposition to Germany’s asylum policy. A coherent Franco-German position on refugees, one that every EU citizen could understand, remained elusive.

That could well be different in spring 2018. Paris and Berlin want to put forward a joint concept for a European refugee policy at the European Council summit in June. So far, however, it does not look like it will be well-received.

Scholz’ first appearance as German finance minister on the seventh floor of the French Finance Ministry—with a view of the Seine and the Notre Dame cathedral—was a humiliation for the French esprit. Before further decisions could be made, Scholz announced, expert groups had to meet and do the ministers’ homework. He was referring to the European banking union, introduced back in 2014. For years, the French have considered the completion of the banking union through a common European deposit insurance scheme the closest minimum target for the further integration of the eurozone.

So to the French, the issue had long been settled. Not for Scholz. The man quibbled, as if both sides hadn’t been negotiating this since 2009, as if most of the work had been left for the new German finance minister to do. Scholz held a lengthy press conference with his counterpart Bruno Le Maire. At its conclusion, a French journalist—who apparently had not understood Scholz’s message—asked if he, the German social democrat, would nevertheless be the man in the German cabinet to push for further integration of the eurozone. Scholz answered with one word: “Ja!” But at this stage hardly anyone present was buying it. If they had, the question wouldn’t have been necessary.

Gaining the Upper Hand

The Germany-skeptics in Paris are even stronger after lost opportunities like that. Macron had muzzled them for a year. He had installed only obvious friends of Germany at Elysée Palace. Above all there is Philippe Etienne, the former French ambassador in Berlin, whom Macron made his Sherpa for the G7 and the G20 and thus his most important foreign policy coordinator. This made it clear that Paris was seeking to close coordination with Berlin on every foreign policy decision. Etienne and the other advisors around Macron spoke fluent German—a novelty that needed no diplomatic explanation.

Macron’s Prime Minister Edouard Philippe speaks good German too. But he comes from the political school of Alain Juppé, who wanted to run against Macron in the last presidential elections, though he lost in the conservative primaries and bowed out early. Juppé has a reputation as an exemplary pro-European, but he is a southern Frenchman through and through and Germany has always been foreign to him. Many of Juppé’s former employees are now in Philippe’s circle of advisors in the Hôtel Matignon. The fact that resistance to a seemingly naïve, pro-Berlin president is brewing there should not surprise anyone.

Macron’s Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian might also condone opposition to Macron’s German-friendly policy. In Paris one hears stories that he once enjoyed bashing Germany in his home province of Brittany. In the autumn of 2016, in the turbulence that followed the British vote to leave, Le Drian, then defence minister, held a press conference with his German counterpart, Ursula von der Leyen. He agreed to enhance Franco-German defence cooperation, but many military experts in Paris were reluctant to believe him. For he had previously, on a visit home to Brittany, aired his conviction that France’s military superiority over Germany was actually a blessing, and ought to be preserved.

So Le Drian is probably a Germany-skeptic—just as Scholz is presumably a France-skeptic, compared to the avowed Macron fans Sigmar Gabriel and Martin Schulz, who are no longer relevant within the SPD. The anti-French grumblers have a long tradition. They are a force to be reckoned with. The they inserted a Bundestag preamble to the 1963 Franco-German Treaty of Friendship that emphasized their country’s alliance with the United States. With that, the treaty was stillborn. De Gaulle announced France’s withdrawal from NATO shortly afterwards.

Today one wonders which preamble the German Bundestag would put before a new version of the treaty, which, according to current plans, the president and chancellor are to sign in January 2019. Will the Bundestag, at the request of the right-wing AfD and the pro-business FDP opposition parties, specify that a balanced German budget is a precondition for any increase in the eurozone budget? Or will it, at the request of the Greens and the Left, stipulate that Germany will take no responsibility for any future use of nuclear weapons by France?

Turning the Tide

There is still time to turn the tide. High time! Pascal Bruckner and Durs Grünbein, who most certainly read and esteem one another, should write a new Elysée Treaty together—and why not as a poem? Sigmar Gabriel and François Hollande should, as retired politicians, write a new Élysée Treaty—they have already teamed up to save Greece from Wolfgang Schäuble and his intention to toss the country out of the eurozone. But CEOs Joe Kaeser of Siemens and Henry Poupart-Lafarge of Alstom should also write a treaty of friendship—they are currently negotiating the merger of their respective companies and yet continue to compete for every contract.

Ultimately it comes down to the question of whether, after 1963, after German reunification, after the financial crisis of 2008, after the rise of China and Putin’s Russian renaissance, after Brexit and the Trump vote, there is wisdom in Franco-German unity. The Brit Gideon Rachman, columnist at the Financial Times, seems to believe there is. He sees the EU as the “only real mechanism for trying to find solutions to pan-European problems that are legal, humane and equitable.”

That is exactly what the Franco-German friendship should aim to do. With regards to how best to go about it, well, the elites in Prenzlauer Berg and on the Bastille ought to rack their brains this spring. There ought to be quarrels and sparring between Paris and Berlin. If that is the case, Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel could soon reap the rewards. For that to happen, however, the German side may have to adopt some of France’s arrogance: the arrogance to say, we, Germany and France, are the force for good. That is something many Europeans would understand.

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© REUTERS/Kay Nietfeld/Pool

Which will be finished first: Europe’s post-Brexit reforms or Berlin’s rebuilt Prussian palace, rechristened the Humboldt Forum to not scare the neighbors? That was the thought on my mind as I watched German Chancellor Angela Merkel welcome French President Emmanuel Macron to the palace building site on Thursday to discuss Europe’s reform building site.

The Humboldt Forum is a €600 museum of world cultures, housed behind the historic facade of the kaiser’s palace, dynamited by the communists in 1950. It’s supposed to open next year but many Berliners are still in the dark about why it has been rebuilt at all. It’s a kind of field of dreams with Prussian eagles stuck on: if you build it, they will come.

So too Europe’s reform agenda, kicked off last September by Macron in a stirring speech at the Sorbonne in Paris. One of his dominant ideas is a radical integrationist push within the eurozone. Without a solidarity advance into the euro area from Europe’s prosperous countries, Macron argues, the continent’s unresolved problems can’t be solved and integration will come to a halt.

Seven months on, however, his ideas are evaporating.

Macron’s big ticket proposal – for a euro finance minister overseeing a common euro budget – has been knocked back by Berlin – and by northern European finance ministers. Undeterred, the French are pushing a eurozone investment budget and a crisis-era ESM bailout fund transformed into a permanent monetary fund.

The unofficial reaction in Berlin was cool while, for six months, Merkel kept Macron dangling as she fought an election then struggled to form a coalition. Now she is trying to meet him halfway, but even that could be wishful thinking if the MPs in her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) have their way.

Germany’s conservatives are traditionally allergic to any EU reform proposals that could be perceived as a shake-down of German taxpayers. It’s a prosperity chauvinism trap that has grown more dangerous since the euro crisis was framed here as a debt crisis caused by spendthrift countries.

Since then anything that looks like a “transfer union” is viewed with wariness and, in the CDU, the Macron reform proposals are perceived as one big, flashing “transfer union” sign.

Resistance among CDU MPs has only grown now that, in the Bundestag, they have the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) breathing down their necks, insisting that a euro budget would run contrary to German law. On the CDU right and into the AfD, Macron is viewed as some kind of sorcerer’s apprentice, using fancy rhetoric to hypnotize Germans and magic money out of their wallets to plug the holes in others’ budgets.

Squaring the Circle

Trapped between this German caution, even hostility, and Macron’s energetic ambition, is Angela Merkel. Trying to square this circle is the first challenge of her fourth term. But already it is looking like CDU 1 Macron 0.

Earlier this week, at a boisterous CDU parliamentary party meeting, Merkel earned applause when she made treaty change a pre-condition of a key Macron idea: transforming the ESM into a European monetary fund – a process that would take years.

Another neuralgic point for CDU MPs: a proposed common European deposit insurance. Germans are a nation of savers and fear being left to underwrite debts of more spendthrift eurozone countries. On Thursday Merkel said she backed the idea of common deposit insurance “not in the immediate, but the distant future”. Goodbye to that, so.

As Berlin picks apart Macron’s ideas one by one, it loads up the French president’s agenda with others. With Macron listening on Thursday, Merkel insisted the EU reform process must be broadened beyond economic and currency union to include a more coherent EU foreign policy and a joint EU asylum system. “We are bringing different solutions which, put together, will, I think lead to a good result,” she said.

Two days earlier, Macron had warned in the European parliament that the window of opportunity is closing to tackle the rising challenge of populism and nationalism in Europe. But in Berlin, conscious of CDU reform resistance, Macron started to use language more palatable to his host and her party. He called for greater EU “competitiveness” and euro reforms that balance solidarity among member states with countries’ self-responsibility.

The same balancing act, he said, would aid compromise in the banking union and sharing the asylum burden. “We need solidarity in a currency union, and cannot live without convergence between member states,” he said. “But it’s important not to talk about one instrument or another, what’s important is the political goal we want to achieve.”

Fading Hopes

He hasn’t given up yet but Macron realizes his hopes of Berlin backing his reforms faded with the departure of Martin Schulz. As leader of the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), Schulz was an enthusiastic Macron supporter who showed off in public about how often the two spoke by phone. But Schulz is now a backbencher and the most influential party figure now, SPD finance minister Olaf Scholz, is more equivocal on French reform proposals.

For Franco-German observers, the problem is over two capitals with contradictory approaches to the same goal: strengthening the EU and its shared currency. Paris hopes to restart the EU integration project with a show of solidarity, pushing ahead with a smaller group of willing eurozone allies. Berlin wants to tackle Europe’s competitiveness problem first and is determined to work with the entire EU, not just the euro or even smaller clubs.

After a series of invigorating and inspirational speeches, Macron has landed back in the inelegant political reality of European horse trading. But it remains to be seen if Angela Merkel is ready, willing, or able to tackle a German narrative of Europe, which knows the price of everything in EU but the value of nothing.

Like the Humboldt Forum in Berlin, an ambitious but unwieldy project of competing interests, Franco-German proposals for an EU reform agenda faces a central dilemma: how many concessions can a project withstand before it collapses into meaningless?

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© picture alliance/Michael Kappeler/dpa

The sun is shining in Berlin for Emmanuel Macron’s inaugural foreign visit. His host, Chancellor Angela Merkel, has just one wish: that the sun will continue to smile on Berlin’s most crucial bilateral relationship, and that her fourth French president is the man to reform France – and, by extension, save Europe’s ailing Franco-German motor.

Macron’s three predecessors – the charming Jacques Chirac, the mercurial Nicolas Sarkozy, and the lame duck François Hollande – talked the reform talk but couldn’t walk the walk. That has left Berlin’s trust stretched and its patience wearing thin, leaving France’s youngest leader since Napoleon a kind of Gallic Ben Kenobi: the EU’s only hope.

“I haven’t the least doubt that we will work well together,” said Chancellor Angela Merkel after Macron’s election victory, before adding archly: “What France needs now is results.”

German officials note drily that, like his predecessors, Macron is no stranger to grand plans. Accompanying Hollande to Berlin in 2012 as an adviser, Macron pushed the president’s campaign promise of deficit spending to “reorient Europe.” Without Paris undertaking economic reforms, though, Berlin wouldn’t budge.

As sherpa a year later, he co-authored an 11-page Franco-German declaration of intent, promising more French reform as part of a wider quid-pro-quo of greater German public investment to stimulate pan-EU growth and even deeper eurozone integration. That plan disappeared into a draw amid revived euro crisis tensions.

In 2014 Macron was back with a “new deal” plan, promising that France would make €50 billion in public savings if Germany spent €50 billion more in public money to reduce its highly controversial trade deficit. Macron’s latest Franco-German reform-for-investment plan was given a cool reception by Merkel and her flinty finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble. He conceded in Saturday’s Der Spiegel that, at around 8 percent of economic output, Germany’s trade surplus is too high for its neighbors, but a solution is unlikely in the immediate future.

While France and others in Europe want Berlin to even out the trade imbalance with public investment, Schäuble insists that influencing the surplus is out of his hands, a consequence of the single currency and the competitiveness of German firms.

Upping the Game

So, as before, Germany’s answer to Macron is: We aren’t going to become less competitive. Instead, you must up your game. A decade after its own social and economic reforms, with the German economy booming, Berlin insisted it was in the French national interest to take a similar path.

In 2012, Macron’s description of the Franco-German dilemma drew nods of agreement in Berlin: he characterized the two partners as willing to dance, but in disagreement on the steps. But Berlin insists the steps are clear: Paris has to go first, and, until it brings its deficit below the euro area’s debt ceiling – three percent of GDP – there is nothing to talk about.

On Monday Merkel will repeat her good wishes for the French leader but, facing her own election season, will warn him not to ask for too much too soon. The most Macron can hope for at the end of Merkel’s third term is Berlin’s support for a European Monetary Fund, along IMF lines.

In a pre-emptive strike, Germany’s Bild tabloid last Tuesday suggested Macron’s previous European proposals – from EU joint sovereign debt “eurobonds” to joint bank guarantee schemes – “should sound the alarm.” For Germany’s center-right, too many French demands amount to the same thing: reform shortcuts bankrolled by Berlin.

For that reason, Macron is hoping that, by year-end, he will no longer have to deal with Chancellor Merkel. Social Democrat (SPD) challenger Martin Schulz, the former president of the European Parliament, has signaled greater openness to French concerns. “We have to use our strength more effectively to make our European partners stronger,” he said on news of Macron’s win. Unlike Merkel and Schäuble, the SPD leader agrees that it is not sustainable if Germany continues to export far more to its trade partners than it imports from them.

But, after a regional election disaster in North-Rhine Westphalia on Sunday, Schulz and the SPD are on a slippery downward slope in polls. That put strict limits on how far they can support Paris, given that ideas like eurobonds are a vote killer in Germany.

Berlin observers expect little progress for the rest of this year, given the uncertain outcomes of French and German parliamentary elections. Still, Macron’s presidency means a chance to at least restart Franco-German dialogue on eurozone issues, as well as on security and defense policy.

Across the German political landscape, the new French president enjoys huge goodwill and no small measure of hope in Berlin. But as they say here: hope dies last, but then it dies.

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