The results of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s trip to the USA should have been particularly pleasing to her predecessor Gerhard Schröder: The agreement between Berlin and Washington on Nord Stream 2 is good news for the Russian state gas industry and its well-paid ambassador from Hanover.
But for the rest of the German economy, as it now turns out, the trip was a bitter disappointment, even more: the terse announcement by a US press spokeswoman that the entry ban for business travelers from the EU is being upheld is gossip for Merkel. Standing next to US President Joe Biden, the Chancellor was confident that the ban would soon be lifted. Biden was strangely covered – you could already have guessed that Merkel’s trip would be a flop in this regard.
Because the Americans apparently know exactly what they are doing: Companies from Germany are blocked if they want to win new business in the USA. For maintenance purposes, on the other hand, German fitters can enter the country more or less easily. So it can’t be the virus – because is a fitter less contagious than a salesman? In addition, business people from the high incidence country Turkey or Croatia are allowed to enter the country unhindered.
Merkel and her governor in Brussels, Ursula von der Leyen, made the biggest mistake in the increasingly visible trade war even before Merkel’s trip: The EU opened its borders to the Americans in the naive hope that goodwill would become Washington to be mild. But the Americans are not even thinking of doing something to German companies. Fair competition looks different. Even after 16 years you have to say to Merkel: Welcome to Realpolitik!