In fact, the gas pipe was the geopolitical issue from the start.
(Photo: Reuters)
This is not without a certain irony: In the end, Nord Stream 2 could possibly still play a meaningful geopolitical role – the Baltic Sea pipeline that ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel always wanted to see understood as a purely private-sector project. Merkel has always had this point of view exclusively in the international political concert. In fact, the gas pipe was the geopolitical issue from the start.
The private-sector project alienated European partners in both West and East, it strained the transatlantic relationship – not only in the Trump presidency, but also in Joe Biden’s – and it strengthened the Putin system: because it brings the country billions in income and because it gave the autocrat a means to blackmail Ukraine.
The final proof of how political a disdainful metal tube can be is now provided by the fact that Nord Stream 2 is being used as a decisive lever to prevent Vladimir Putin from invading Ukraine. The new Olaf Scholz government should make use of it – as absurd and painful as it may seem to put a ten billion project at risk after its completion.
Well worth the price. For Putin, the tube is more than a source of finance. It is a prestige project. Nobody knows whether Putin could be deterred by such a threat. More than that: Nobody knows whether they are seriously considering such an invasion or whether they are just setting off fire. With the annexation of Crimea, however, he has proven that he can be trusted to invade.
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And anyone in Berlin who believes that Russian gas is flowing through the pipeline to Europe while Putin is waging war against Ukraine – this time with official troops – is politically naive. By then at the latest, those responsible in Berlin would have to admit that they are hopelessly lost with Nord Stream.
From the beginning it was a mistake of German foreign policy to tie the gas supply via another Baltic Sea pipeline to a Russia that is acting increasingly autocratically internally and imperialistically externally. Nobody could really understand the Berlin mix of sanctions against Moscow on the one hand and pipeline connection on the other. The signing of the Nord Stream treaties a good year after the illegal annexation of Crimea is one of the biggest foreign policy mistakes of the Merkel era, which ended this Wednesday.
More: Nord Stream 2 puts a strain on the traffic lights – USA warn of “life-threatening” energy crisis in Europe