Angela Merkel

Can Germany Summon the Will to Lead?

Jorge Benitez — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 12:52:57 -0600

From John Vincour, the International Herald Tribune: Mr. Putin’s goal is not only to paint an American-led enemy in time for next month’s vote, but to get the West to back off on Iran and on deployment of NATO’s missile shield in Europe through threats and by sowing the notion that America is shoving its friends into confrontations they don’t need.

Germany counts enormously here. It has the West’s biggest economic hold on Russia and, historically, a (sometimes delusional) vision of the two countries’ potential for a golden destiny together. With Germany having gained in power and influence through its appearance of rigor and solidity, if not flexibility, during Europe’s debt misfortunes, the issue now is how assertive Ms Merkel wants to be in naming Mr. Putin’s game. If she chooses to lead, she will make clear that a review of relations with Russia is under way, that its election procedures will be under intense scrutiny, and that in prolonging the extermination of thousands of people by a regime armed by Russia, Mr. Putin will find only contempt in Germany.

The occasion and the urgency are there. The alternative is a Germany seeking to hide behind a comfortable default position as an above-the-fray go-between. It would be a sign of the West’s weakness and a failure of German political instinct.

The precedents and current indicators of a demonstration of German resolve are not terrific: When the heat was on in Libya this spring, Ms. Merkel’s Germany turned its back on France, Britain and the United States, and — abstaining alongside Russia and China — refrained from standing with its allies in approving Security Council intervention. . . . .

Ultimately, Germany, now supposedly leading Europe, faces the question of how much responsibility it wants to take concerning the world’s most jagged political issues. To me, the West seems at a point when a heavy injection of German political courage could make a greater contribution to its role in world stability than Germany’s austerity-for-all economic vision. . . .

So, what are the odds on Ms. Merkel, in a position of rare influence, saying something true and meaningful now about the implications of the awful behavior of Mr. Putin and what to do about the reality of his return to the Russian presidency?

I asked John Kornblum, a former U.S. ambassador and a keen observer of Germany, what he thought of the likelihood of a new kind of German commitment to leadership beyond economics (although the massive trade imbalances favoring Germany are a root factor in Europe’s debt and deficit grief).

“The Germans take more responsibility?,” Mr. Kornblum asked, as if having to field the dumbest question of the week. “They’ll run from it.” (photo: Reuters)

World leaders praise Havel's legacy

Jorge Benitez — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 12:24:50 -0600

From the BBC: Tributes have been pouring in for the man many consider a driving force in the overthrow of communist rule in eastern Europe. . . .

German Chancellor Angela Merkel hailed Havel as a "great European" in a letter of condolence to Czech President Vaclav Klaus.

"His fight for freedom and democracy was as unforgettable as his great humanity," wrote Mrs Merkel, who grew up in communist East Germany.

"We Germans in particular have much for which we are grateful to him. We mourn this loss of a great European with you," she wrote.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said he was "deeply saddened" and that Europe owed Havel a "profound debt".

"Havel devoted his life to the cause of human freedom. For years, Communism tried to crush him, and to extinguish his voice. But Havel could not be silenced.

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt wrote on Twitter: "Vaclav Havel was one of the greatest Europeans of our age. His voice for freedom paved way for a Europe whole and free."

From CBS News: "With the death of Vaclav Havel, the Czech republic has lost one of its great patriots, France has lost a friend, and Europe has lost one of its wise men." — French President Nicolas Sarkozy. . . .

"Barbara and I join in mourning the death of Vaclav Havel, a gentle soul whose fierce devotion to the rights of man helped his countrymen cast aside the chains of tyranny and claim their rightful place among the free nations of world," said former U.S. President George H. W. Bush. "His personal courage throughout that twilight struggle inspired millions around the world, including those of us who worked with him during a historic period of transformation for Europe."

From CTK: In the NATO headquarters, flags have been flown at half-mast since Sunday. A book of condolences will be available at the Czech mission to NATO. (photo: John Macdougall/AFP/Getty)

Germany calls for decade of engagement after Afghan troop withdrawal

Jorge Benitez — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 16:05:09 -0600

From Deutsche Welle: Germany called on the international community on Monday to remain engaged in Afghanistan over the next decade even though NATO troops are scheduled to withdraw from the war-torn nation by 2014.

Around 1,000 delegates from 100 nations and international organizations have gathered in the former West German capital, Bonn, to discuss Afghanistan's future amid rising tensions between its estranged US and Pakistani allies as well as stalled efforts to bring the Taliban into talks aimed at a political settlement to the decade-long war.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said Afghanistan would require "long-term engagement for the next decade beyond 2014."

"We say to the people of Afghanistan: We will not leave you alone, we will not abandon you," Westerwelle told the delegates at the conference.

As the 130,000 troops from the 49 nations participating in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) prepare to withdraw from Afghanistan in the ensuing years, the NATO-led coalition wants to avoid leaving behind a security vacuum.

"Our objective is a peaceful Afghanistan that will never again become a safe haven for international terrorism," the German foreign minister said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Afghanistan to do more to fight widespread corruption and the drug trade. Merkel said that while the international community can offer its support, "only the Afghans themselves can solve these problems." (photo: AP)

Does Germany Really Want to Save the Euro?

Julian Lindley-French — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 09:05:14 -0600

Does Germany really want to save the Euro? The great Austrian strategist Count Metternich once famously said that when Paris sneezes, Europe catches cold. Today, he would probably substitute Berlin for Paris.

I have just spent the weekend with close German friends in beautiful Vienna. The sense of pending doom was everywhere. Much of the blame for this was placed on the very narrow legalistic approach Chancellor Merkel has adopted in this crisis. Her focus on a ‘new treaty outside the treaty’ is seen as the financial equivalent of discussing patio design as the house burns.

The Euro may be beginning the death-dive from which it is unlikely to recover. The costs of Italian borrowing reached record highs last week, Belgian and Hungarian national debt was reduced to junk status and even a bond auction for mighty Germany flopped. And yet Berlin continues to insist on disaster-defying ‘red-lines’ that seemingly have little or nothing to do with the danger of the moment.

Vienna knows a thing or two about death dives. In the nineteenth century the death-dive of the Austro-Hungarian Empire led to the ‘shot that rang round the world’. By trying to hold onto a swathe of the Balkans its final dying act led indirectly to World War One. It was the mother of all unintended consequences that swept the ruling Hapsburgs away. A relatively minor shock brought the whole rickety edifice crashing down. Just like the Euro today. In fact it was a miracle Austria-Hungary endured as long as it did. This was due to a mixture of luck, geopolitical convenience and a few able leaders and statesmen such as Count Metternich. Absent of any of the above and the empire’s fate was sealed.

However well-meaning Chancellor Merkel may be, ‘able’ is not a word I would associate with her leadership thus far of what is fast becoming an existential European crisis. The French and Germans last week failed to agree a common strategy and thus failed to reassure the markets. In a clear sign of the times my sources within the European Commission tell me the minor ‘nobility’ of the Euro-Aristocracy who work therein have been told to say nothing that might harm the Euro, whilst being encouraged to consider how best they might protect their own savings. Nice people. Of course, the rest of we Europeans are being left to the dogs. That is what aristocracies do at times of crisis – look after their own. It is the Brussels Onion at its very worst, and there are some who actually want these people to run our lives.

The thing about crises is that the choices they generate are never comfortable. I found last week’s picture of ‘Merkozy’ instructing Mario Monti, their new man in Rome, quite nauseating. Naked German and French power and electoral politics are clearly at play behind the pretence of Berlin and Paris to be speaking for Europe. As a Briton I also find it galling that the world’s fifth or sixth largest economy has been deemed by the disaster-defying duo simply not to exist. Although much of the blame for that I lay at the door of PR-Meister Cameron who has been ‘outed’ by this crisis as a very little leader of an increasingly irrelevant country. Above all, as a Dutch taxpayer, I find it particularly distasteful that two so narrowly-motivated foreign politicians are deciding the future fate of my hard-earned money.

That said someone has to act. The stakes are now simply too high. Debt defaults, bank failures, single-market destroying currency swings are just around the corner, maybe even widespread social unrest. Indeed, if the investors who have hitherto provided the bridge between what EU member-states can afford and what they spend really take fright the EU itself could be in danger. And yet Chancellor Merkel seems strangely immune to the immediate, the need to reassure the Dark Lords of the Market Universe and fight the fire which is threatening to engulf us. We get lots of strong posturing (finger-pointing, stern faces etc.) but little by way of strong leadership.

Maybe Berlin has made a secret choice; Germany would prefer the Euro in its current form to collapse, the unreformable southern Europeans to be pushed out and the currency rebuilt around a northern, western European core. Maybe it could even include the British. Now there’s a thought. Did Cameron and Merkozy do a deal?

Certainly, Berlin's behaviour means the very real prospect now looms that the whole rickety Euro edifice will come crashing down. Just like Austria-Hungary. If Berlin does indeed have a Plan B it should perhaps consider one other truism of legalism; the law of unintended consequences. Vienna learnt that the hard way.

Nice patio, Chancellor. Shame about the house.

Julian Lindley-French is Eisenhower Professor of Defence Strategy at the Netherlands Defence Academy, Fellow of Respublica in London, Associate Fellow of the Austrian Institute for European and Security Studies and a member of the Strategic Advisory Group of the Atlantic Council. He is also a member of the Academic Advisory Board of the NATO Defence College in Rome. This essay first appeared on his personal blog, Lindley-French's Blog Blast. Photo credit: Getty Images.

Dead Politics: Europe's Enemy Within

Julian Lindley-French — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:53:49 -0600

One of the great doyens of nineteenth century British foreign policy Lord Salisbury could turn a phrase or two. Speaking of Britain in the 1870s he may well of been speaking of Europe (and the British bit of it) today when he said “…the commonest error in politics lies in sticking to the carcases of dead politics…we cling to the shreds of an old policy after it has been torn to pieces, and to the shadow of a shred after the rag itself has been torn away”.

The Banquoesque ghost of Lord Salisbury stalked Chancellor Merkel and Prime Minister Cameron in their 18 November Berlin talks. They talked of “decisive action” and of “working together”. Far from the making of strategy the talks were in reality about the mutual covering of domestic political rear-ends. My sources tell me a deal was done by which Cameron would accept some change to the Lisbon Treaty in Germany’s favour in return for a relaxation for Britain of what is known as the Working Time Directive. Berlin has thus provided London with a political fig-leaf to cover yet another British retreat. Berlin was thus non-business as usual, Euro-inertia at its very worst. More toy bazooka than big bazooka. Indeed, given the scale and nature of the struggle with the Dark Lords of the Market Universe, the meeting was little more than the strategic equivalent of re-arranging deckchairs on the Titanic. Britain out, Germany up, Europe nowhere.

On Friday night I attended the annual dinner of the Oxford and Cambridge Society of the Netherlands and I saw yet again the strategy-free malaise at the heart of the Euro-Aristocracy. The speaker was a senior British-born judge at the European Court of Justice. After making the usual sad ‘it’s all Britain’s fault’ apologia to impress his Continental friends he suggested that had Britain joined the Euro a) the project would have been strengthened (perhaps); and b) that Club Med would have found it far harder to have broken the rules (no way). My Continental colleagues of course gratefully accepted his offer of British guilt; pass the buck is one of Europe’s less endearing qualities. The white flag of surrender had been raised for the price of a free dinner.

However, his remarks did for me raise two fundamental questions. How do we break out of the Euro-inertia and dead politics that are killing effective crisis management? What would it take to get all EU member-states working together towards something like a credible solution? Now, I am neither an economist nor a politician, which is probably just as well given the mess that has been created by the marriage of dismal science and dismal appliance. What I am is an historian and strategist; I understand failure and thus the need for a change of plan. Put simply, we need to shift the centre of gravity of this crisis from the Euro to the single market and how to make it work better.

Plan B for Europe would have three basic elements: First, a new crisis leadership group is needed to foster fiscal discipline, political unity of purpose and leadership legitimacy. Chancellor Merkel should have insisted that in this existential crisis confronting all twenty-seven EU members it is vital London joins Berlin and Paris. It would be leadership overseen by a new Special EU Council of Ministers to replace the proposed Eurozone organiscramble that came out of the 26 October summit. For too many years France and Germany have actively excluded Britain from their EU leadership tryst. For too long the British have pretended that what happens on the Continent has ‘nuffing to do with us, guv’.

Second, the creation of a bad sovereign debt bank would buy time for the debt recovery and thus give all-important growth a chance. 50% of all Club Med debt would be placed in this off-shoot of the European Central Bank to be guaranteed by the northern and western European taxpayer and overseen by the new Special Council of Ministers. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) would also guarantee this bad debt bank. The new bank would probably also have to include some Belgian, Irish and dare I say French and British debt and must thus be seen as a long-term structural change to the Union, requiring an amendment to the Treaty on European Union to which London should agree.

Third, strict new rules for all Euro members are needed allied to a mechanism for the suspension of any member-state that breaks them from either the Euro and/or the single market. The creation of technocratic governments in Greece and Italy whilst expedient must be seen as mere stepping stones to a democratic future committed to sound financial governance. Technocracy is an alluring danger in Europe. What matters is that democratic governments better adhere to rules and thus avoid a repetition of this disaster. That means meaningful and credible compliance across all twenty-seven EU members.

As an Englishman who pays his taxes to the Dutch state I am willing to make the necessary sacrifice for the common good. However, before I do so I need to be convinced that my money will be used to work a sound plan of action and not simply despatched down yet another profligate black rhetorical void beloved of the self-serving Euro-Aristocracy. Critically, Plan B could see Britain stay in the EU. The alternative is that London permanently accepts second-class status within the EU, even as it remains the second highest net contributor. Neither the French nor Germans would ever countenance such injustice. Millions of my fellow Britons would bring down a British government rather than accept that...and I would be amongst their fold.

Cameron and Merkel missed a trick in Berlin. What is needed is real, radical and concerted action. What we got is more dead politics.

Obama says Europe's problem is lack of political will

Jorge Benitez — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 15:52:09 -0600

From Laura MacInnis, Reuters: President Barack Obama said on Wednesday he was deeply concerned about the continued euro zone crisis, blaming it on a lack of political will, and that market turmoil would continue until Europe has a concrete plan to deal with its debt woes.

Obama praised French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, along with Greece and Italy and their moves to form unity governments to implement reforms, but he was critical of wider Europe.

"The problem right now is a problem of political will. It is not a technical problem," Obama told a joint news conference with Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard in Canberra.

"I think there is a genuine desire on the part of leaders like President Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel, but they've got a complicated political structure," said Obama.

"We saw some progress with Italy and Greece putting forward unity governments that can implement some significant reforms. But at this point the larger Europe community has to stand behind the European project."

Obama's comments, some of the bluntest to date, added to a chorus of non-European policymakers urging greater action to deal with the 2-year-old crisis, and came as equity markets fell in response to a sell-off in euro zone bond markets.

"Until we put in place a concrete plan and structure that sends a clear signal to the markets that Europe is standing behind the euro and will do what it takes, we are going to continue to see the kinds of market turmoil we saw," said Obama. (photo: Getty)

The Strategic Influence Game 5: A German Europe or a European Germany?

Julian Lindley-French — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 11:44:05 -0600

Germany has never found the leadership of Europe easy to attain or to execute. And yet Germany today finds itself the unrivalled leader of the European Union. Can Germany for once get leadership right?

Only at the very 1871 beginning of modern Germany’s uneasy existence was Berlin led by a man who grasped both the possibilities and dangers of German power. The very creation of the then German Empire rocked the rickety European balance of power to its core. And yet somehow Iron Chancellor Otto von Bismarck steered Germany (relatively) peacefully through a minefield of competing European interests. With his dismissal in 1890 by an unbalanced Kaiser Wilhelm II Germany and Europe began the long slide towards the twin and linked catastrophes of World Wars One and Two.

Today Germany is back. It would be easy to think that the ‘sudden’ emergence of Germany as Europe’s natural leader is a consequence of the Eurozone disaster. In fact Germany has been slowly recovering its position at the centre of European power politics since 1945. And yes power politics still exist in Europe even if masked by the political correctness of Euro-speak. The Eurozone Summit Statement of 26 October simply made German leadership official.

The facts speak for themselves. The 2011 German economy at $3.3 trillion or €2.5 trillion is at least 30% bigger than that of either France or Britain and thanks to reforms in the mid-naughties structurally far more efficient than either. At 81,729,000 the educated German population is again 30% bigger than the two other members of the EU’s so-called ‘Big Three’. Critically, Germany is the world’s second largest exporter with exports accounting for some 33% of national output. For all the current German angst the Euro has been the great German wealth creator. Indeed, Germany’s 2011 trade surplus stands at $20.7 billion or €15.2 billion, some 66% of that exports to its indebted Eurozone partners. Quite simply, the Euro has offset the high cost of German production and created a customs union (Zollverein) for German exports, which was Germany’s 1914 war aim.

So, the EU has done for Germany what two disastrous wars could not, cement Germany as the natural leader of Europe and by extension supplant Britain as the natural European strategic partner of the United States. But here’s the rub; just when Europe needs decisive German leadership Berlin is unable to deliver. Indeed, having gained the power and influence that her political forebears dreamed of not-so-Iron Chancellor Merkel is probably incapable of exercising it either for the good of Germany or Europe.

First, the German Constitution is a direct descendent of the 1948 settlement imposed by the victorious allies upon a defeated Germany. Its very purpose is to prevent the concentration of power in one set of political hands in one Berlin place at any one time. Consequently, Chancellor Merkel possesses nothing like the domestic political authority of either President Sarkozy or Prime Minister Cameron.

Second, the current generation of German leaders are the heirs of a political culture that was so successfully ‘de-nazified’ they still find the concept of German leadership at worst abhorrent or at best uneasy. The whole point of German power is not to have strategic influence, especially of the ‘nasty’ military variety and especially over other Europeans. Germany will thus endeavour to ‘rule’ through the European Commission.

Third, having gained more from the Euro than any other EU member-state the German people are not at all interested in paying to rescue it, demonstrating the limits to their (and Germany’s) ‘Europeanness’. This explains Chancellor Merkel’s reluctance to let the European Central Bank act as the lender of last resort to the Euro-rule-breaking southern Europeans. It also explains her efforts to get countries that have far poorer GDPs per capita to pay for the still-born European Financial Stability Facility.

Equally, there are signs that Germany is slowly re-learning the art of Realpolitik. The opening of the Nordstream gas pipeline last week suggests a new strategic energy relationship with Russia which will concern Central and Eastern European states. The democracy-defying Franco-German presumption of Eurozone leadership suggests that Berlin might be overcoming some of its power reticence. And, the implicit anti-Britishness that has long been a factor in German foreign and security policy has been evidenced by the effective exclusion of the EU member-states with Europe’s strongest financial market from Franco-German leadership of this first order European crisis.

Consequently, Berlin and London are now on collision course. On 14 November both Chancellor Merkel and Prime Minister Cameron made speeches calling for fundamental reform of the EU. However, whilst Merkel called for "...not less Europe, but more" and an overhaul of EU treaties to force fiscal union, Prime Minister Cameron called for the aviodance of "grand plans and utopian visions" and saw the future of the Union as having the "...flexibility of a network, not the rigidity of a bloc". They meet soon; that should prove interesting.

For all that history is only so eloquent when considering Germany and Germany’s place in Europe. Berlin’s leadership must therefore be given the benefit of the doubt so long as there is any doubt left about how Germany intends to exercise strategic influence. Germany is no longer ruled by the Kaiser or Hitler and the wars are now but distant memories. Germany is a model European democracy and shows no signs of wavering from a path set for it by the victorious allies.

But the question remains; a German Europe or a European Germany? Berlin will need to work hard to convince ALL Europeans that it knows the politically-correct answer to that most seminal of strategic questions, whatever the temptations for domination afforded by the Eurozone crisis, whatever the democracy-destroying expediency of the moment.

In Europe, new fears of German might

Jorge Benitez — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 11:29:08 -0500

From Michael Birnbaum, the Washington Post: For decades, Germany’s role in Europe has been to supply the cash, not the leadership. With fresh memories of war, the continent was cautious about German domination — and so were the Germans themselves.

But the economic crisis has shaken Europe’s postwar model, and Germany increasingly calls the shots. As countries struggle to pay their debts, only Chancellor Angela Merkel has enough money to haul them out of trouble. And the price Merkel is demanding — more control over how they run their economies — is setting off alarm bells in capitals across the continent. . . .

And although German leaders have sought in recent weeks to soothe others’ fears in advance of high-level meetings in Brussels on Sunday and in coming days, the tone has sometimes sounded pugilistic.

“The question of who could accept a German model has been settled by the market,” said a spokesman for German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble. “We are really only talking about the details and the extent of the measures, not about their nature.”

At $3 trillion in 2010, Germany’s economy is now half again as large as those of its nearest rivals, Britain and France. Its banks are far less exposed to Greek debt than those in France, insulating it from the effects of a possible Greek default. It has thus far committed $290 billion to a European bailout fund for Greece, Portugal, Ireland and anyone else who needs it — significantly more than any other nation in Europe. . . .

“That’s the predicament of leadership,” said Joschka Fischer, a former foreign minister who has urged Merkel to do more to support the euro. “When Germany acts, there is the fear that Germany will dominate. If Germany doesn’t act, it’s the fear that Germany will withdraw from Europe. . . .”

In Germany, the dissension is raising eyebrows.

“Everybody is calling for leadership,” said the country’s deputy foreign minister, Werner Hoyer, “but no one wants to be led.” (photo: AP)