Angela Merkel’s Moment of Truth

Feb 25, 2015 Joschka Fischer

In the last two weeks, Germany and its chancellor, Angela Merkel, were at the heart of efforts to achieve a diplomatic resolution to the two crises confronting Europe – in Ukraine and Greece. This is a new role for Germany, and the country is not yet accustomed to it.

BERLIN – In the last two weeks, the two crises confronting Europe – in Ukraine and Greece – both escalated. In each case, Germany and its chancellor, Angela Merkel, were at the heart of efforts to achieve a diplomatic resolution. This is a new role for Germany, and the country is not yet accustomed to it.

The latest attempt to halt the war in eastern Ukraine by diplomatic means had an even shorter shelf life than the first attempt last September. The new accord – concluded, like the previous one, in Minsk – de facto recognized that Ukraine has been split by military means. But just where the dividing line is remains unclear, because Russian President Vladimir Putin may yet attempt to capture the strategic port of Mariupol on the Sea of Azov, thereby enabling the Kremlin to create a land bridge between Russia and the Crimea peninsula. Moreover, capturing Mariupol would keep open the option of conquering southern Ukraine, including Odessa, and extending Russian control all the way to Transnistria, Russia's illegal enclave in Moldova.

Through the continued use of military force, Putin has achieved the main aim of Russia's policy: control over eastern Ukraine and ongoing destabilization of the country as a whole. Indeed, Minsk II is merely a reflection of facts on the ground.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 12 in all 12 Comments on this article

Roger Merritt Mar 2, 2015

"Yet if Greece is to be saved from bankruptcy, it will have only foreign taxpayers' money to thank for it. " OK, this is where I stopped reading. To say that the Greek people have not contributed to financial recovery by suffering a 25% drop in GDP, a 25% unemployment rate, cuts to public services including health care, and draconian tax increases (more effective collection) is NOT realistic.
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Stamatis Kavvadias Feb 27, 2015

"Europe's monetary union is not working because one country's democratically legitimized sovereignty has run up against other countries' democratically legitimized sovereignty."

Mr Fischer, Merkel, Holand, etc, are not up to the task of keeping EZ together. Tsipras less so.

To make it work, this kind of "observations" must be overcome. Politicians must start putting in their mind citizens in other countries. They must put forward the view that EZ is about all citizens interests and not only domestic audiences, resulting in superficial contradictions that do not, in fact, represent the electorates.

EU, ECB and IMF approach, to handling the banking system crisis, has been to move the problem of banks' balance sheets to taxpayers. Doing this on the grounds of debt and not on the grounds of joined institutions, backing the problematic banking system, has created the ground for nationalists to see interests in dismantling EZ.

EZ policy can no longer be based on false institutions. If the discussion on correcting the institutions is not raised, it is very likely that Grexit will come. High levels of debt, concentrated in some members, make monetary policy transmission mechanism not work. Paying for banking system profligacy, lack of full reserves and inadequate supervision, by impoverishing workers in all Europe and the middle class in southern Europe is not a clash of cultures; it is plain stupidity.

The single-central bank approach, to uniting Europe, will not work, unless the shortcomings of a banking system without reserves are addressed. Countries taking sides --with the banking system, or with social Europe-- makes the lack of federal institutions the point of collapse. If the lack of institutions is not replaced by political action (and speech) to jointly bridge the missing regulation and away from supposed conflicting national interests and cultures, the end of EZ will come, one way or another.
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Andrey Belov Feb 27, 2015

The author look at the card. HOW capture of Mariupol will create a corridor between Russia and the Crimea????
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j. von Hettlingen Feb 26, 2015

So, what is exactly Angela Merkel's "moment of truth"? Does Joschka Fischer mean, her "efforts to achieve a diplomatic resolution" in resolving the conflict between Russia and Ukraine were not adequate? And the "new accord" - the Minsk II may soon be shelved, because Vladimir Putin doesn't believe in a "diplomatic resolution" but more in military might?
By observing the pro-Russian separatists' moves, Fischer believes they are gearing up for more land grab, with the strategic port of Mariupol as their next target. ,Indeed this would allow Putin to kill two birds with one stone - "to create a land bridge" leading to Crimea and to have easier access to "Odessa, and extending Russian control all the way to Transnistria, Russia's illegal enclave in Moldova".
Merkel's and Hollande's coordinated effort in resolving the crisis resonated well with Washington. The two leaders were trying to dissuade the US from arming Ukraine, fearing this would escalate the conflict. Yet given Putin's deep disdain for Europe, and its "meager political clout", Fischer suggests the US should "conduct the negotiations" with Russia, because muscle-flexing seems to be the only language Putin "takes seriously".
Another crisis in Europe has "confirmed the indispensability of Franco-German cooperation" - Greece! Fischer urges the two leaders to "seize the initiative once again and finally put the eurozone on a sound footing". He suggests, "Germany's changed role within the EU" should be "to loosen its beloved purse strings". More austerity measures would only enable the rise of left- and right-wing "nationalists", while jeopardising the "European integration project".
A "Grexit" would only expose Europe's weakness, from which Russia may emerge as the "only geopolitical winner". Angela Merkel knows it and hopes to win the Bundestag vote on Friday to back an extension of financial help for Greece. As Europe's pay master, Germany's approval is crucial. Although the parliamentarians are expected to vote in favour of the extension of a bailout for Greece, the support is grudging. They have a hard time to put up with the cheek and hubris of Greece's leaders. Does Fischer mean, Merkel would face a "moment of truth", in her balancing act between preventing a "Grexit" and finding a way "to revise the failed austerity policy imposed on Greece"?
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Peter Schneider Feb 26, 2015

"Coming clean" with the German public would automatically end the Euro experiment as it has been the survival condition for the whole project since the very beginning to not tell the people the truth. The middle classes of Europe, Germans, French, Greeks, should unite to sweep away people like Mr. Fischer who - from their radical-left background and covered with strategic blah-blah - aim at destroying the European nations. Because that is the ultimate truth. It is all about the destruction of France, Germany, Greece and all other European nations with their language, their culture and their tradition. Ultimately, it is about uprooting, expatriation, the abolition of national languages, of bourgeoisie, of homeland, of national characteristics - concepts that Mr. Fischer detests. That's why I personally consider communists like Mr. Fischer as extremely dangerous and why my hope is on the European patriots (Mr. Fischer defames them as nationalists) that they will be able to rebuild the European project from the ruins (the ruins is what Mr. Fischer calls "six decades of success").
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Bernhard Kopp Feb 26, 2015

On Ukraine, Mr. Fischer seems to ignore, that the USA are not just the elephant in the room when negotiating with Putin, but that they have also been the elephant in the European-Russian chinaware store for over 20 years. Ideally they would have pulled Georgia, with then Shakashvili, and Ulkraine, with Jushenko, into NATO and the Black Sea would have been a predominatly NATO/US domaine. It is not difficult to understand that this nightmare was worse for Russia than Soviet missiles and navy-bases not only in Cuba, but all over the Caribean, and possibly in Mexico too. Putin does not feel materially different than Kennedy did more than 50 years ago.
On Greece, Mr. Fischer talks about the mess he has personally helped to create in the first place. He is correvt to observe that ruthless political souvereignity of nation states, and a currency union without watertight rules that are actuelly preserved will not work. He was also very personally involved in destroying the previously intended order.
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Armin Huebner Feb 26, 2015

I think, In that case it would be called an exclave (it's russia's illigal exclave..)
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Fernando Fuster-Fabra Feb 26, 2015

It is sad to see that a former German top-notch diplomacy boss speaks of Germany and France as separate entities of the European Union and its offical representative bodies when describing international negotiations in world affairs. After almost 7 decades since the Treaty of Rome (embrion of the actual EU) was signed, we still have top politcians thingking as indivu¡idual members states and not one single Union. Quo vadis Europa?
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Petey Bee Feb 26, 2015

They'll figure it out. Vis-a-vis Russia, Merkel plays the part of the "good cop", with the US secretary of state being the "bad cop". In the case of Greece, it's the other way around.
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Curtis Carpenter Feb 25, 2015

In the long run, the West's core values will be most secure if all of the states of the transatlantic partnership can demonstrate the ability to work together. The Merkel/Hollande initiative -- whether it stops the separatists in eastern Ukraine or not -- has been an important step in that direction. It's too early to write it off, especially in the context of the long game.

Otherwise, I've seen nothing from my very isolated vantage point to believe that President Putin would have taken a U.S. initiative any more seriously than one coming from Germany and France.

To my view, it would have been smarter for the U.S. to show more public support to the European initiative, and more willingness to engage the Ukraine problem through the Merkel/Hollande effort. It's not too late for that to happen.
- John Brian Shannon Feb 25, 2015
  
  Well said, Curtis Carpenter.
  
  Especially: "To my view, it would have been smarter for the U.S. to show more public support to the European initiative, and more willingness to engage the Ukraine problem through the Merkel/Hollande effort. It's not too late for that to happen."
  
  Cheers, JBS
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Paul Daley Feb 25, 2015

Good article. While it's not the first time someone has invoked an external enemy -- real or imagined -- to justify internal reforms, the reforms Fischer recommends are long passed due and should have been included in the original Eurozone agreement. Bagnai's article below makes clear how irresponsible the IMF and ECB were in attempting to load the full cost of the banking crisis in Greece on Greece, while sparing the banks. If the ECB is going to take on a sovereign's role in banking affairs in the Eurozone, then it should also be prepared to take on a sovereign's responsibility to bear and/or distribute fairly the cost of failure. It's time to grow up, for ECB in particular, but also for the Eurozone and the EU more generally.
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