Transcripts For DW To The Point 20240712

Thanks very much for joining me here on to the point coming to you from berlin and my guests here in the studio are cast in vest far from the German Institute for international and Security Affairs who says north stream 2 has serious political implications but the Collateral Damage of u. S. Sanctions is far reaching also with us is michelles 2 month Foreign Policy experts with the berlin base we can need to cite he argues that europes quarrel on north string too is the biggest failure in german Foreign Policy in more than a decade and it will most consume to eric rohmer author and journalist who writes for the Los Angeles Times and eric believes that the u. S. And many other countries have long warned germany about the perils of north stream to those warnings were however ignoble it will thank you all 3 once again for being here in berlin today with me because in. I would like to begin with you as an Energy Expert to tell us what makes north stream to so important and so very controversial. I thought i would say the political. The political context attached to it and at the end of the day its an economic pressure checked with with an economic basis linking the big the russian produced so with its made to market in europe but of course it has the project has high political implications and well this has been used by many as this is a symbol saying. Her because from for a long time this story has been sort of on the back burner now it appears to be boiling over why whats going on well in germany has been on the back burner germanys been ignoring this for a long time president obama warned about this trump warned about it congress has been talking about this is not just about an economic approach and i was aware that i was ready with germany to make a 3rd party quote thats eco marker called that but its obviously a political project when the west has your sanctions against ukraines and russia since the ukraine problem 2014 so it is a political issue germany can call it what it wants but its not just germany versus us its also ukraine and against germany its a lot of Eastern European kind of poland is upset about this france was upset about this its basically a project to shaft the ukraine and keep all the oil and gas going away from ukraine so germany has just been ignoring the complaints and the noise out there for 5 or 6 years now and then nobody should be surprised that its coming to a boil now this was this is an accident waiting to happen and they should have known is going to come coming to a boil 3 u. S. Sentences have told german citizens and others to quote see sanctity supporting the construction of the pipeline all face potentially fatal measures that is very aggressive language these are 3 senators from Gas Producing areas so its very aggressive language to an ally. Absolutely these are senators these are only senators so i dont think you need to get too worked up about that but congress was a very Strong Majority in voting for these sanctions so the germans are making a mistake to think its only trump versus germany and trump may be gone no trump maybe gone but the next president is going is probably going to be singing the same 2 issues too much the german side have been saying theyve been talking about this these comments or the letter from the senator as neo imperialist a declaration of economic war its not all whole terrible its not meant seriously no i think theres of course neo imperialism is very symbolically laden word but i think theres cons census and merging in the german elite. Directed against the kind of what they see as an American Intervention interference in german Sovereign Affairs i think both this pipeline has been German Foreign Foreign Policy failure and so far as germany was not able to unite europe but on the other hand it has opened read it has opened the floor for donald trump to attacked me on that and what i see now is that this bipartisan approach in america fadia from the american side to understand whats happening in germany and that theyre actually weakening those who are criticizing the pipeline within germany and the lots of people who criticize this pipeline including the. Custom can you just explain for us because they will be difficult for some to grasp what basis can Free Congress men from the United States insist that something happens or doesnt happen in a german port. Well. Basically the nature of extraterritorial sanctions applying u. S. Law to to to another state and this is exactly why this is how. Well the response in germany the reaction is. So huge because this is very d. C. M. S. And attempts who were into suffering in the face and at the end of the day its also is certainly undermining Regulatory Affairs it is illegal ross is it legal or illegal and im not a lawyer but my understanding is that this is going much too far both in legal terms but also in political terms because in germany the background and the reading is that this is sanctioned this letter but there is a wide range of sanctions and its not its no longer clear with all the list of sanctions coming out of the u. S. What are the motivations behind and what is really that the context rallies they should or are even also the the conditions behind and all the to the lift so this is something and then it is really seen as part of geo economic drive over the playing out with. Eric i just wonder i mean one leading commentary here in germany said nobody likes to be blackmailed the suggestion is that the germans are going to push back will the americans be werent. I dont know i mean the United States is trying to keep the sanctions up against russia russia depends heavily on these gas exports the russian treasury gets a lot of money from germany from these gas exports and the United States as as mentioned is interested in selling liquefied natural gas to europe a lot of americans why ask themselves why are we spending so much money on defense of europe when when germany goes and spends billions of dollars a year on a natural gas from from germany from from russia so all these things come into play from the accusation to show that to germany is making itself a hostage of russia moscows mercy that this is a russian trojan horse and also a greek trojan holes well see there was the pipeline old stream 115 years ago when this pipeline was build my major criticism was that germany might become dependent on russian gas since then more then when t. Terminals for liquid to fight natural gas have been build in europe they have plenty of opportunities to get gas from all directions this pipeline is not dangerous in so far as we need this gas no we dont need it it is in additional off so and that is why i think its simply beyond the point and missing the point that this is a politically explosive project but economically if you have the pipeline there wouldnt be a major problem not even for ukraine which has just concluded its treaty with russia on the continuation of gas deliveries. Until 2024 and you can be sure that they will be an additional there will be an additional agreement after that also and so rational but of the same time you are arguing in the statement who had at the top of the show that this is the greatest failure in german Foreign Policy. In the last 10 yes indeed because as i said germany didnt manage to bring europe together it didnt manage to integrate the Baltic States the critics of the pipeline and it pushed through and i think this is 1st and foremost something which happened in the aftermath of the refugee crisis in 2015 when nobody in germany paid attention to what the then economy minister gabriele did who was a close friend of but it was equally godly who pushed forward this project and this has been overlooked. And despite the criticism in leave from many observers including eric in looting others including me so i think this is this is something which falls now back on to all feed after 5 years that surprises me all the time germany always acts like the big european in europe. But theyre ignoring Eastern Europe and theyve been ignoring Eastern Europe for years on this crane poland lithuania latvia these countries that know russia well and said dont do this but germany just went ahead and did it anyway i mean that surprises me is that i think there was a certain misreading going in that the ferry point and i think the misreading was that germany itself the south perception was that germany was clearly pursuing a dual strategy of containment the study of russia plus culpo ration so basically the old pattern of the cold war and containment is just its clear because germany in that kind has been instrumented to keep up the consensus on the e. U. Sanctions so this was kind of. Being in the back ground and wife lynn thought the others would accept within the package of call peroration this little stream to a pipeline which was also giving germany a certain leverage. The kremlin and i think ive been misreading the band was theyve dynamics inside. You to go for an energy union and to really drive this and to a certain extent you now if all of the. Rhetoric from berlin around its an economic project the legal and regulatory background was somehow based on the status quo in 2015 and what was ignored was this big push in the if you want to change the regulatory approach to change deal with russia a common view and indeed later on it was not chief to have the consensus but i think to me this word to make him is free beings on the job is going to have to talk about russias role in all this in just a minute lets start 1st of all though in terms of look at the pipeline that is the focus of these rising tensions between the u. S. And germany. North stream 2 is an ambitious European Russian Energy Project once completed the pipeline costing billions of euros will transport gas from russia through the baltic sea to germany it runs largely parallel to the existing pipeline after us sentient announcements in december 2019. Operation now russian ships are ready to complete the last 160 kilometers at the end of july the trumpet ministration further intensified threats supported by the us congress. This action puts investments or other activities that are related to these Russian Energy export pipelines at risk of u. S. Sanctions its a clear warning to companies aiding and abetting russias influence projects be tolerated get out now or risk the consequences americans fear that germany will become unilaterally dependent on russia through nordstrom to germany denies this and wants to proceed with the project the usa many in europe are saying its only interested in their own expensive liquid gas to germany. Will there be a trade between the usa and germany. How explosive. To ridiculous levels but it is a problem and to germany the balls in germanys court now. To see but its really once again its not just trump its the congress the congress forced to do this trump was originally reluctant to do more sanctions against russia but congress overruled him on that veto proof passage of a legislation a few years ago so its a mistake in germany to think its only just because the americans want to. And its a mistake to think its only trump and the problem may take care of itself because its not going to go away. You know the ball is in germanys kosher germany fight sanctions with sanctions. No i think its not and i think it wont because. Then you has no interest in in fighting america economically over this and on top of that it needs e. U. And the e. U. Responds because Foreign Trade is an e. U. Matter so i think theres not a consensus in the u. In the 1st place and 2nd theres not the political will but there is certainly a political will to have a common stance on extraterritorial sanctions and that is where i see a major divergence of u. S. And european Foreign Policy in the future and the u. S. Is losing europe over that over the question of extraterritorial sanction is becoming a question of the into of International Relations and how we deal with each other in International Relations so europe obviously and germany for about specific matter doesnt like to be put in the same basket like iran also we have major differences over the day c. P. O. A dream and with iran on Nuclear Energy were also american extraterritorial sanctions are applied which have leading which have led to the possibility of having iran knew of having Nuclear Weapons in iran in the near future so this is this is i think the major bone of contention we will have in the future and i hope that if you should try and lose these elections that Congress Might rethink the consequences of expert or authority the sanctions in the future constantly want to pick up on that yes if suddenly i think what i would say is its not clear what is the maty they should find in washington states vast range plus its to me its not clear what is the cost and benefit to analyze this because the sanctions do a lot of harm. They go a lot of harm to the Energy Markets where we really see apologize ation going on and then it is also a loss of credibility and to me its also not clear to look at the appropriateness of means because this issue of feeding the beast i would simply say although its much more important to the russian budget what trump did with the tweets to establish this opec plus agreement which weve seen in in may has done much more for the russian bunch of ben and then you guess else would do so i was very important and we dont see moves that so in a sense its a feeding scene in berlin is targeting germany and its part of this german right of us rivalry. That we havent mentioned chancellor merkel so far its interesting that theyre all this is all modeled races but the the focus of the story one of the focus of the stories is her own constituency the island of ruin in northern germany what is going to position on the world as she seems to be sort of looking the other way. And that position has been pretty much the same over the past 5 years and now its a clear stance against this step of the senate. Well if i may have an issue that i think in 2015 merkel was preoccupied with the refugee crisis when the social democrats pushed for this project so you have to see it as initially as a social democratic project now because look the other way and said ok its only an economic problem and possibly underestimated then the consequences this will have. But but when it came to the question of sanctions katz sanctions xa territory as sanctions of course then she was pressed into the line and this is the problem now because of the sanctions its so difficult to have a broad controversial discussion in germany about that anymore but there are some signals coming from the German Government here by are americans transatlantic coordinator in the Form Ministry said recently in an interview that maybe we didnt pay enough to the geo political implications of this we should have so there seems to be some reasonable thinking going on in trying to find a way out of this mess that sounds naive to assume that you know that this was always that this was never a policy of this so this line its an economic its an Economic Business projects and its a political issue seems very naive i mean the German Foreign minister told told dont you belive that he will not settle the us to interfere in the way that it has been interfering in this story what kind of clout does the German Foreign minister have when he makes that kind of statement probably not very much. The foreign minister talks a lot but i havent seen the move move the needle anywhere really nice about the 10th German Foreign minister to me laugh rolf in moscow im not sure has a lot of clout there he brought up a lot of issues this week in moscow with the assassination last summer in berlin things like that but i dont think a lot of things have changed so no german and no real German Response time then gathering to the worries of the likes of ukraine and poland. Well i think i was with maz the day before yesterday in moscow and i can say that basically it was the the usual exchange of nice teas and criticism and so i think both countries are stuck and theyre the most important thing is. Germany still is the major organizer of sanctions against russia in the wake of the russian intervention in ukraine and i think 1st of all poland the Baltic States and also the United States of america need to be particularly in up holding these sanctions also in the future so should germany decided to go along what some left as social democrats already leaning these suggest that weve finally. Bandon these sanctions there will be shoot problem in containing russia and i think these sanctions which is why the overlook have actually reduced military tensions in ukraine and have stopped a major russian intervention in 2015 in what they call no vote also the areas in southern ukraine ok because when i come back to you in just a 2nd lets just move move on to the showdown between washington and berlin over than old string to pipeline comes against the backdrop of what almost feels like a breakdown in relations between the 2 sides which has been highlighted by Donald Trumps recent decision to withdraw troops american troops and thousands of them from germany. Spangdahlem is one of 5 u. S. Military bases affected by the troop withdrawal of the american base in the eiffel region had been a major hub for u. S. Operations in africa and the near and middle east a total of 12000 of the 34500 g. I. s stationed in germany are to either return home or be transferred to other european nato bases President Trump has announced that the reason for this is germanys contributions to nato which are far below the minimum requirement to agree to. Regardless of whether or not donald trump is reelected in november germany can probably count on less u. S. Support in the future. This heavenly situation where we are well off doing well financially and growing while the us protects us with their military power and nuclear arms and europe isnt being of the past and it wont be easy to recreate if you. Will nato be weakened by the dispute between partners. On some and thats the question will be weakened by this dispute between germany and the us so how how far will that some weakness go in a yes or no so 1st of all i think on the trunk theres nothing really good at numbers germany now is contribution to the nato budget as much as americas contribution probably meant the German Defense budget with germany is below what it has promised in 2014 and that is a problem i think but here were talking about american troops which will be redistributed and withdrawn from germany which were not. Of nato operation in europe but actually a part of you as operations in the middle east in africa so not directly concerning nato so this is an American Issue it will be an additional burden to the american budget so its not true what trump says its not use is serving the american cause economy but it will be and additional burden however it is a political problem because the of course it just doesnt go without noticing in russia this is direct this against nato so its more a politically politically symbolic problem than a military problem for nato. Yeah indeed i mean i think what is so tricky for berlin is this issue linkage that we see security linking it to an economic if it cannot make issues like like also Energy Issues and and this is not the style of berlin used to deal with the issues it was much more compartmentalized in the end so this is also something were seeing with the north stream to pipeline project and by the way i wanted to say some thing on about ukraine and poland its not to how its said out of washington that. Didnt pay concerns i mean very little of us very much engaged in the trilateral talks in g. Thing this agreement that we see now 5 is that having transit guaranteed through it crime weve seen in germany pushing inside the e. U. For common policy and Energy Projects like the baltic pipe for example which is paid from the european bought it. Poland with with no value to the gas fields so this is part of how its seen in germany you very very very sober way off yeah thats interesting because i was going to say this is you know this all sounds very much on. The sort of the typical rational german approach americans the american of the sable how great is your concern that on both stories were talking about the pipeline in the troop withdrawal well playing into Vladimir Putin one of the tropes in the american democracy yeah absolutely europe divided is good news for putin and putin gets hes happy when nato is fighting amongst themselves United States and germany are having their their problems hopefully theyll overcome them but as far as the 5 year deal for ukraine goes what happens after 5 years thats thats a problem not what happens in 5 years or so but once again the whole nato issue is youre germany wasnt listening american president s been warning for a long time germany and spain were for defense and they didnt do more for defense and thats why theyre in the mess they are now because germany wasnt listening to the signals on this point trying to get dealt its going to probably not going to get finished no id be surprised to see anything thats coming out of that ok you heard it here folks thanks for joining us on to the point here if you dont believe me join the show as much as i have come back next week bye bye. 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