» Die unkritische Haltung der Deutschen zu Putin

By Norman at 9:46 AM

verwundert manchen ausländischen Kommentator. Während die deutschen Facebook-User den russischen Freunden mit ihrer Putin-Propaganda auf den Leim gehen, importiert Deutschland russischen Filz, Korporativismus und Antiamerikanismus. Über die merkwürdige Russlandliebe ist EDWARD LUCAS vom Standpoint-Magazine verwundert:

Germany's relationship with Vladimir Putin's Russia is the most puzzling and troubling feature of modern European politics. Not only is Germany Russia's biggest trading partner, it is also her biggest ally. It is Germany that has derailed Nato expansion. Germany reversed the EU's initially tough line on Russia after the invasion of Georgia. Germany prevents the Council of Europe scrutinising Russia's flawed elections. Germany forces the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to channel money to companies run by Kremlin cronies. Germany keeps Europe's energy market rigged in favour of Russian gas imports. ...

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The problem is that the semi-colonial relationship that Germany seems to want with Russia is in fact a two-way street. As other imperial countries know well, you may start off exporting your values and outlook, but you end up importing theirs. German business was already surprisingly corrupt even before the great push eastwards that followed the collapse of communism. Dealing with Russia has accentuated that. Germany's commitment to the Atlantic alliance was looking wobbly from the 1980s onwards; now it is frayed and rotten. Rather than exporting German virtues to Russia, the danger now is that Germans are importing Russian sleaze, corporatism and anti-Americanism.