Germany ignored east europe’s and us’ warnings about too much reliance on a single source of gas and oil and that ignorance is biting back. Perhaps it should have listened more carefully to its allies, but arrogance often blinds rationale. Germany is heading in towards a rude awakening.
Eastern Europe and the US aren’t and weren’t prophetic. Yes, it made total sense to secure alternative energy sources, but nobody predicted this war, unless you want to call those that were always saying that Russia will attack X,Y,Z prophetic. It was foreseeable that there would be tensions and limited conflicts, but not even Ukraine itself was expecting a full-scale invasion until the last moment.
Additionally, there was no real scenario under which the EU would be attacked by Russia. Eastern Europe and the Baltics are in NATO.
Germany and the EU are heading for a rude awakening. The block is very interconnected and if the German economy is badly damaged, it will take the whole EU with it.
The EU did too little before the war and then they did too much too fast.
A quieter or stagnating germany would make room for the rest of the eu to grow. East Europe is Germany’s largest economic contributor by means of exports. It should have leveraged that and should have played the game of sanctions that germany so loves to play against its own allies, just so that the obvious risks wouldn't be mocked as “prophecies”.
The EU should indeed head for a rude awakening. How did it end up with a corrupt politician such as ursula at its helm? What went wrong and how can we prevent it from happening again? Hint: a more equal and democratic club.
I feel we’re very much all in for a rude awakening, and must all reckon with corrupt politicians, and the immediate outcome will probably not be a good one.
Corruption is not as much an issue as it was, but i appreciate the attempt. Lets entertain the idea a bit.
Dolfie thought the same when he invaded east europe and it didnt work out well and ended up with east europe splitting germany in two and dominating history for half a century until just 30 years ago, all while being orders of magnitude more corrupt than today.
And it wasnt western europe that made the corrupt eastern block collapse it was the us and the abject failed political and economic model communism imposed. East europe is on a different level in terms of geopolitics and what happens there affects everyone everywhere. Take russia, a corrupt east european country. It is now creating issues that germany can barely handle and frankly poses existential threats to the mighty german industrial base while there are literally entire countries at risk of famine. All because of a corrupt leader’s wet dreams of glory.
Corruption doesnt mean lack of power, quite the contrary, it makes it easier to manipulate masses against perceived foes.
And the current war has exposed some rather nasty views in germany. Views that dont sit well with east europeans. Feed that narrative to folks and there will be issues for germany that no amount of shitting on them on forums will solve.
All i am doing is raising alarm bells that if the most developed country in europe doesnt listen to its allies, and keeps walking the arrogance path, there will be a bad time for everyone. Current events and the sentiment around it in east europe prove me right. South europe faded away but east europe is a whole different beast. As the saying goes, “he who controls eastern europe controls the heartland”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Geographical_Pivot_of_Hist...
Germany and EE (which btw does not include Russia) are economical allies first and foremost, but have different geopolitical concerns and goals.
Although here we have to differentiate, because Romania and Bulgaria seem to mind their own business, the Baltics are terrified of Russia, but seem incapable of driving any kind of policy, Hungary’s interested in what’s best for them and Poland’s the same but additionally also partly hostile towards Germany.
> Germany and EE (which btw does not include Russia) are economical allies first and foremost, but have different geopolitical concerns and goals.
Is it that germany’s geopolitical concerns are different because turning a blind eye would weaken east europe, thus making it perpetually dependent on the former? Or because Poland, Ukraine and Romania with a combined population of 100 mil, and 1.4 trillion USD economy would pose serious opposition to both germany and russia in east europe? I imagine the voting power within the eu and the economic bargaining power would pose quite the issue. I am confused as to why a would be ally and a would be moral high ground country would suddenly be less interested in events happening in its own backyard.
Also, Romania is pretty active in the area, but less vocal. Likely on stand by for an invasion of Moldavia, but its most certainly helping ukraine a great deal. Just because its not making news headlines it doesnt mean its not helping and under no circumstances is it a friend of russia. Unlike poland, it already had a proxy war with it in the 90s over transnistria. Cautious politics and statements are wise.
Again, an interesting comment, this time pairing romania with bulgaria as if the two are identical.
It is? So far it seems that Russia has suffered more from trying to deliver less gas to Germany than Germany has suffered from receiving less. Which was, AIUI, the German assessment.
Those warnings sounded a great deal like Colin Powell's assessments of Iraqi weaponry.
I wish you were right, but russia appears to be marching on, the ruble is not that low, and there is no sign of regime change. It would appear that it all backfired on germany and by extension the eu, just as the prophecy has foretold. Anyway i dont want to delve too much into arm chair politics as i dont think this forum is the right place for it. What i want is for germany and other eu countries to acknowledge mistakes - albeit the situation points to deliberate action - and for the eu to sort out this mess. And most important for the war in ukraine to end so that ukraine will finally join the eu and develop as much as other east eu countries.
Keep your eyes on the prize and don't fall for Putin's lies.
The sanctions weren't intended to affect the ruble's value in any particular way or to effect regime change. I mean it's IMO nice if they were to effect regime change, but it wasn't a design goal. The people who designed them didn't say "oh, if Russia withdraws from Ukraine but Putin remains president that's bad, so let's try to avoid that".
They were intended to damage Russia's ability to wage war (and do some other things, which I'll ignore now, I think, because I want to use one concrete example and focus on that). So are they effective at that? Well, you've read that Russia has lost a lot of tanks. Take that as an example. Have you read that Russia is increasing production of its latest tank to compensate, or that it's repairing modern but damaged tanks? You haven't. You've read that Russia is fetching 50-60 year old tanks from storage and sending those to the front. I posit that Russia is doing that because it can't repair modern tanks or make more of the latest model, and that it can't because of the sanctions. That indicates that the sanctions are effective at that part of that stated goal.
Putin would love to make people in the west think that the sanctions are ineffective by confusing them about their goals and effectiveness. Don't let him do that.
As per my previous comment i genuinely hope you are right. I also read a lot about russias issues but tend to err on the side of caution.
Just to be clear for russian readers: despite my wish for a russian setback i do not wish ill on russian folks. Like germans in nazi germany, and citizens of any dictatorship, they are the first to have fallen victim.
One concern of mine is that even an old tank can cause damage. And as the west is slowing down in supplying weapons to ukraine, the russian army can just keep on sending old crap because in high numbers they will cause massive destruction - as it does in east ukraine. Even one dead ukrainian is too many. And if we dont move fast enough, russia knows that yet again winter will come to its aid. Just that this time it wont be on its land but in our homes. If a push back is not successful this summer there will be even greater damage to our economies. We dont need to hide these facts as russia’s strategists already know it. At the same time that russia is not increasing weapons production neither is the west - how could eu countries since we depend on their resources anyway?
While we figure out how to become better allies ukranians and russians are getting murdered by a bloody regime. Heck we are one US election away from total disaster.
This will change when Germany starts running out of gas. Then we'll have to start rationing and it'll send us into a deep recession. I don't think you understand the issue.
Last time the Russians cut output, it took them more than a decade to recover, and oil/gas provides a very large share of the state's income. How much of a recession do you expect, compared to that? I do think I understand the issue.
The question isn't how badly Russia will be affected. It's how badly Germany will be affected. The relative size of the effects are utterly irrelevant. Germany going into a deep recession would be very bad for German citizens and the EU.
Germany and the EU are on a collision course with reality.
In the minds of EU politicians, it’s a moral imperative to punish Russia, but they apparently didn’t stop to consider that Russia can punish back. Nor did they actually form a plan for securing alternate energy sources and gradually wean themselves from Russian gas and oil and instead pressed the pedal to the metal.
Germany and France got nothing but flak for trying to moderate the sanctions exactly for the reasons you stated. I feel like you are misplacing that particular blame.
The illusion was that everyone agrees on infinite growth being the primary goal for every society, and that peace would be ensured assuming that the trade is kept up.
The warning flags were ignored because nobody wanted to accept they were real.
Not watching a lot of politics here in germany where I live, but im still impressed with how some of our politicians seem to lack basic highschool education or common sense sometimes. :(
I would like to see Germany step up and shut down that gas pipeline.
Today
It might be hard, but they will have time to sort something out before winter comes.
Appeasing Putin in the short term while hoping that it will be resolved before the winter is a losing game. We will get to the winter and Putin will have very much more leverage over them. If he is still alive and in control of the country, he will be threatening to cut them off as soon as it starts to get cold.
Putin has already cut back on supplies, simply to ensure that they don't have sufficient reserves when that time comes.
They do not have time. Only realistic alternative is nukes (takes many years to build) or an LNG import terminal (started already, takes years to build). All the alternatives to depending on Russian imports require enormously complex construction projects.
