Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel believes that she is being made a “scapegoat” for the war in Ukraine due to her position at the NATO summit in 2008, when she blocked Kyiv’s path to a Membership Action Plan.
NS2 was build by Angela Merkel, alone? Of course not. Even if she would have build it by her own hands (alone) - she was elected by voters, you can not deny there were so many people involved.
What about Gerhard Schröder? Why not blame him? Or Daniela Schwesig? Again, the voters decided to put these people into power.
But I totally agree with you, that the reaction of europe politicans to russian imperialism was weak. There should have been much more attention and much more consequences (since the 90s).
Where did I say Merkel built NS2 with her own hands? What does this even mean?
We are discussing Merkel, no? You think my opinion of Schroder or Steinmeier is much better than Merkel?
Merkel had the option of using NS2 as leverage against russia. Merkel had the option of applying real sanctions against the russia (not meaningless BS the explicitly targeted some low level goons/orgs directly involved in annexed Crimea). Did she do any of this?
Let me go on a tangent for second. If I am wrong, and Merkel is not a support de facto supporter of russian genocidal imperialism (she may nominally oppose it even in a genuine manner, but I am talking about outcomes and actions), then the following should be easy to answer.
[1] What does “peace through trade” (in context of Merkel) refer to? If this is not a shallow BS slogan to enable russian imperialism, it has to mean something. What peace? For who? When? Where? What does this mean?
[2] Any strategy is based on some cause-effect drivers, right? Otherwise it’s not a strategy, but just some BS. What were these driver for the “peace through trade” policy in these two buckets:
russia internal (rule of law, competitive elections, corruption)
russia foreign (europe-specific, global)
What about russia’s actions/trends in the last 30 years served as a driver for Merkel’s strategy? Did putin decide to liberalize municipal elections while maintaining control over parliamentary and presidential election so the goal was to try and provide incentives to maybe get him to allow open regional elections? What sort of good faith actions has russia done in foriegn policy in the last 30 years? Can you provide clear and specific examples?
[3] Any strategy has to have a final desirable state outcome. You need an end goal to strive for and evaluate the performance of the strategy, otherwise it is not a real strategy. So based on the points raised in [2] (those points exist and were defined, right? 🤣), what was Merkel’s desirable state outcome? She wanted German engagement with russia to eventually result in open elections for governors, russia reengaging in good faith around the occupation of Moldova. Just some examples.
What was her goal? Surely, this is not an unreasonable ask.
@Skiluros
NS2 was build by Angela Merkel, alone? Of course not. Even if she would have build it by her own hands (alone) - she was elected by voters, you can not deny there were so many people involved.
What about Gerhard Schröder? Why not blame him? Or Daniela Schwesig? Again, the voters decided to put these people into power.
But I totally agree with you, that the reaction of europe politicans to russian imperialism was weak. There should have been much more attention and much more consequences (since the 90s).
Where did I say Merkel built NS2 with her own hands? What does this even mean?
We are discussing Merkel, no? You think my opinion of Schroder or Steinmeier is much better than Merkel?
Merkel had the option of using NS2 as leverage against russia. Merkel had the option of applying real sanctions against the russia (not meaningless BS the explicitly targeted some low level goons/orgs directly involved in annexed Crimea). Did she do any of this?
Let me go on a tangent for second. If I am wrong, and Merkel is not a support de facto supporter of russian genocidal imperialism (she may nominally oppose it even in a genuine manner, but I am talking about outcomes and actions), then the following should be easy to answer.
[1] What does “peace through trade” (in context of Merkel) refer to? If this is not a shallow BS slogan to enable russian imperialism, it has to mean something. What peace? For who? When? Where? What does this mean?
[2] Any strategy is based on some cause-effect drivers, right? Otherwise it’s not a strategy, but just some BS. What were these driver for the “peace through trade” policy in these two buckets:
What about russia’s actions/trends in the last 30 years served as a driver for Merkel’s strategy? Did putin decide to liberalize municipal elections while maintaining control over parliamentary and presidential election so the goal was to try and provide incentives to maybe get him to allow open regional elections? What sort of good faith actions has russia done in foriegn policy in the last 30 years? Can you provide clear and specific examples?
[3] Any strategy has to have a final desirable state outcome. You need an end goal to strive for and evaluate the performance of the strategy, otherwise it is not a real strategy. So based on the points raised in [2] (those points exist and were defined, right? 🤣), what was Merkel’s desirable state outcome? She wanted German engagement with russia to eventually result in open elections for governors, russia reengaging in good faith around the occupation of Moldova. Just some examples.
What was her goal? Surely, this is not an unreasonable ask.
Thank you!