With only two months in office, German Chancellor Olaf Schultz will try today and tomorrow to calm the winds of war blowing hard on the Russia-Ukraine border, and perhaps even prevent what the Americans define as an “approaching invasion at any moment” later this week. After visiting Washington last week and hosting the President of France and the leaders of the Baltic states in Berlin, Schultz flew in second to the Ukrainian capital Kiev. In the current hot period, he will be received for his first state visit to Moscow, where he will meet with the man who is concentrating global attention – Russian President Vladimir Putin.
According to the US intelligence agencies, who have updated their partners on the subject across the Atlantic, the tide has already fallen. The Spiegel and other media outlets reported that Wednesday was chosen as the date of commencement of operations in Ukraine. The reason for the invasion is likely to be a provocation or declaration of the need to protect Russian citizens (who became such after Moscow provided them with passports, AA) in enclaves in eastern Ukraine. Nearly a hundred Russian battalions have been deployed on almost all sides, ready to enter the pro-Russian enclaves of Luhansk and Donetsk, as they prepare for the conquest of Kiev. US President Joe Biden has warned that the frozen ground will become a paved road for Russian tanks.
Against this background, Schultz, who took the reins in Germany last December after four consecutive tenures of Angela Merkel, is on a difficult mission in Moscow. The visit was planned in advance, and it is no coincidence that the Americans estimated that an attack, if it began, would take place after it. Germany is Russia’s largest trading partner in the EU ,. It imports about half of its natural gas from the country, and has extensive business ties. It is also the one that has been reaching out to the East since the 1960s, initially with the Ostopolitics and in recent years as part of Angela Merkel’s pro-Russian policy, which has avoided significant sanctions on Moscow and nurtured energy relations.
The wizard of dialogue in “Battle of Braking” to prevent war
Schultz’s personal history (63) may play a role in his attempt to prevent a new war on European soil. Schultz is a labor lawyer who has rubbed shoulders for years in rounds of negotiations between workers ‘organizations and employers’ organizations. Even then, when he moved into politics, Schultz was considered the wizard of dialogue. He proved this in a coalition he managed to form, the first since the 1950s in Germany to consist of three parties. This is an achievement that Merkel herself failed to record after the previous election. “I am a skilled negotiator,” he testified.
The German Social Democratic Party (SPD), led by Schultz, is also seen more in Russia as an ally than other governing parties in Europe, and certainly in the United States. In the more modern era, former Social Democrat Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder is considered Putin’s confidant and a sort of European “right-hand man.”
Schroeder led the construction of the Nord-Stream 2 gas pipeline, a strategic project that fortifies ties between the two countries, and last week was also appointed to serve on the board of directors of Gazprom, which is a critical part of the Russian economy.
Schroeder and Schultz are longtime acquaintances, and the chancellor even served as the party’s secretary general when the previous chancellor was in power. He supported him in reforms that threatened to tear the Social Democrats apart. , And called for a freeze on new membership of NATO, as Russia demands.
Russia’s second largest trading partner
This will be Putin and Schultz’s first meeting in Moscow, but relations between the two countries these days are closer than ever. Despite the sanctions imposed after the Crimean annexation, the volume of trade between the countries is about $ 50 billion a year, and beyond natural gas, oil and coal, there are many businesses common to the countries, including in the chemical industry and transportation. Germany is Russia’s second largest trading partner in the world, after China. Germany has a more modest relationship with Ukraine. Although it supports its aspiration to join the Union in the future, Berlin has consistently refused to sell arms to Ukraine for fear of upsetting the Russians. In recent days, Kiev has demanded that Germany prove its loyalty to NATO and the Western bloc by supplying 12,000 anti-tank missiles. Currently, Berlin is refusing.
The big question before the visit is whether Schultz will be able to clarify to the Russian side the extent of the price Moscow will pay for an invasion. So far, the German chancellor has refrained from making a clear statement that “Nord Stream 2” will not act if Russia invades Ukraine, even though he said almost everything else. He spoke of close cooperation, of coordinated steps, and gave the impression that in due course, Germany would not hesitate to suspend the critical pipeline for Russian exports.
So far, foreign policy has not emerged as a special strength of Schultz. If he has been involved in foreign affairs in recent years, it has been on economic issues, such as the trade war with the US or the coordination of global corporate tax reform.
British Defense Secretary: “Fragrances of 1938”
Thus, on the narrow shoulders of the German politician lies a task on a global scale. “There are fragrances of 1938 in the air,” British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on Sunday, referring to the Munich conference and negotiations with Hitler. “The essence of the visit is to repeat the well-known messages about solidarity with Ukraine and warnings about Russia,” the FAZ said.
In Germany, there were those who recalled Putin’s meeting with Merkel in 2007, to which the German-speaking Russian president who was stationed in the country while serving in the KGB brought his black Labrador bitch Connie. Merkel is afraid of dogs after being bitten. “I understand why he did it.” She said after the meeting in a rare moment of sincerity, “to prove he is a man.” 15 years later, the Russian president’s mentality has not changed much.