Different Approaches to Russia: The German–American–Russian Strategic Triangle

Abstract

Russia has been both a divisive and a unifying force in the German–American relationship. It has been the focal point in this relationship since the end of World War II. During the cold war, the Soviet threat held Washington and Bonn together despite some important divergences in interests and policies. During the 1950s Adenauer's ‘policy of strength’ emphasised western solidarity and a strong military approach based on NATO and the European Community (EC), reinforced by the stationing of over 200,000 American military personnel in West Germany and West Berlin. Adenauer believed this policy of western solidarity would allow West Germany to draw East Germany (DDR) toward unification through the magnetism of western economic success combined with its military resolve. A corollary to this was the Hallstein Doctrine which barred the Federal Republic from having diplomatic relations with any country which recognised the DDR.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Stephen F. Szabo was formerly Director of the Transatlantic Academy (TA), and is currently a Senior Fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies at Johns Hopkins University. Prior to the founding of the TA, Dr Szabo had been with the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, where he served as Academic and Interim Dean as well as Professor of European Studies. He has also served as Professor of National Security Affairs at the National Defense University and Chairman of West European Studies at the Foreign Service Institute, US Department of State. He has written on German foreign and security policies, generational politics in Europe, and transatlantic security and political relations. His publications include The Changing Politics of German Security, The Diplomacy of German Unification, Parting Ways: The Crisis in the German –American Relationship and Germany, Russia and the Rise of Geo-Economics.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 For good overviews of West German foreign policy during this period, see Wolfram Hanrieder, Germany, America, Europe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989); Helga Haftendorn, Deutsche Aussenpolitik zwischen Selbstbeschränkung und Selbstbehauptung (Munich: Deutsche Verlags Anstalt, 2001) or the English version, Coming of Age: German Foreign Policy Since 1945 (Oxford: Rowman and Littlefield, 2008); also Christian Hacke, Die Aussenpolitik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: von Konrad Adenauer bis Gerhard Schröder (Frankfurt: Ullstein, 2003)

2 See Stephen F. Szabo, The Diplomacy of German Unification (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992); Philip Zelikow and Condoleezza Rice, Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995); Horst Teltschik, 329 Tage: Innenansichten der Einigung (Munich: Siedler, 1991); Derek Chollet and James Goldgeier, America Between the Wars: From 11/9 to 9/11, The Misunderstood Years Between the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the Start of the War on Terror (New York: Public Affairs, 2008). On NATO enlargement see Angela E. Stent, Russia and Germany Reborn: Unification, The Soviet Collapse and the New Europe (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999), pp.212–35.

3 See Stephen F. Szabo, Parting Ways: The Crisis in German–American Relations (Washington, DC: Brookings Press, 2004); and Philip Gordon and Jeremy Shapiro, Allies at War: America, Europe and the Crisis over Iraq (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2004); for an account from the German side see Günther Joetze, Der Irak als deutsches Problem (Baden Baden: Nomos 2010). For the French role see Frederik Bozo, A History of the Iraq Crisis: France, the United States and Iraq, 1991–2003 (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2016).

4 See Angela E. Stent, The Limits of Partnership: U.S.–Russian Relations in the Twenty First Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014), pp.165–8; Erik Kirschbaum and Hans Edzard Bussemann, ‘Germany Dismisses Suggestions It’s Soft on Russia’, Reuters, 28 March 2014, available from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-nato-germany-idUSBREA2R17520140328 (accessed 12 June 2017); Alexander Motyl, ‘Why are so Many German Leaders Soft on Putin's Aggression?’, Newsweek, 23 June 2016, available from http://www.newsweek.com/why-are-so-many-german-leaders-soft-putin-aggression-472882 (accessed 12 June 2017).

5 John J. Mearsheimer, ‘Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War’, International Security 15/1 (1990), pp.5–56; Hans Peter Schwarz, Die Zentralmacht Europas: Deutschlands Rückkehr auf die Weltbühne (Munich: Siedler, 1998); for an excellent short treatment of this discussion see Hans Kundnani, The Paradox of German Power (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015); for a collection of contemporary reactions to German unification see Harold James and Marla Stone (eds), When The Wall Came Down: Reactions to German Unification (New York: Routledge, 1992).

6 See Kundnani, The Paradox of German Power.

7 See Condoleezza Rice's account in her memoir, No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington (New York: Crown, 2011), pp.671–5. See also Stent, The Limits of Partnership, p.261.

8 In 2008 only about 20 per cent of Germans polled had confidence that the US president would do the right thing; That number skyrocketed to 93 per cent in Obama's first year in office and never fell lower than 71 per cent following the revelations of NSA intelligence gathering from German citizens. See Frédéric Bozo et al., Suspicious Minds: U.S.–German Relations in the Trump Era (Washington, DC: Transatlantic Academy, 2017), p.20, available from http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/sites/default/files/publications/Suspicious_Minds_Final_0.pdf (accessed 12 July 2017).

9 Jeffrey Goldberg, ‘The Obama Doctrine’, The Atlantic (April 2016), available from http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/ (accessed 12 July 2017). For a broad overview of the Obama legacy see Derek Chollet, The Long Game: How Obama Defied Washington and Redefined America's Role in the World (New York: Public Affairs, 2016).

10 As he stated in his interview with Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic near the end of his time in office, ‘“Free riders aggravate me,” he told me. Recently, Obama warned that Great Britain would no longer be able to claim a “special relationship” with the United States if it did not commit to spending at least 2 percent of its GDP on defense. “You have to pay your fair share,” Obama told David Cameron, who subsequently met the 2 per cent threshold. “We don't have to always be the ones who are up front,” he told me. “Sometimes we’re going to get what we want precisely because we are sharing in the agenda. The irony is that it was precisely in order to prevent the Europeans and the Arab states from holding our coats while we did all the fighting that we, by design, insisted that they lead during the mission to remove Muammar Qaddafi from power in Libya. It was part of the anti-free rider campaign”’. Goldberg, ‘The Obama Doctrine’.

11 See Peter Rudolf, ‘Amerikanische Russland Politik und europäische Sicherheitsordnung’, in SWP Studie, S17 (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, Sept. 2016), pp.18, 19.

12 ‘Obama's theory here is simple: Ukraine is a core Russian interest but not an American one, so Russia will always be able to maintain escalatory dominance there. “The fact is that Ukraine, which is a non-NATO country, is going to be vulnerable to military domination by Russia no matter what we do,” he said. I asked Obama whether his position on Ukraine was realistic or fatalistic. “It's realistic,” he said. “But this is an example of where we have to be very clear about what our core interests are and what we are willing to go to war for. And at the end of the day, there's always going to be some ambiguity”.’ Goldberg, ‘The Obama Doctrine’.

13 During the height of the Ukraine crisis, between February 2014 and November 2015, Merkel talked with French President François Hollande 38 times (13 one-on-one), and with Obama 15 times (11 one-on-one), and British Prime Minister David Cameron 14 times (8 one-on-one), more than those the American president had with any other leader. She in turn talked with Putin 65 times (35 of those conversations one-on-one) in addition to numerous meetings with Putin. Ulrich Speck, The West's Response to the Ukraine Crisis: A Transatlantic Success Story, 2015–2016 Policy Paper, No.4 (Washington, DC: The Transatlantic Academy, 2016), p.4, available from http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/sites/default/files/publications/Speck_WestResponseUkraine_Apr16_web.pdf (accessed 12 July 2017). These figures came from the German chancellery and the White House, available from http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-2015-angela-merkel-choice/ (accessed 12 July 2017)

14 Stephen F. Szabo, Germany, Russia and the Rise of Geo-economics (London: Bloomsbury, 2015), pp.61–82.

15 Graham stated, ‘At the end of the day, to our European friends, this is not working’, Graham said of Merkel’'s diplomatic efforts. ‘You can go to Moscow until you turn blue in the face. Stand up to what is clearly a lie and a danger.’ McCain added: ‘The Ukrainians are being slaughtered and we’re sending them blankets and meals. Blankets don’'t do well against Russian tanks’. Stephen Brown and Noah Barkin, ‘Merkel Defends Ukraine Arms Stance in Face of U.S. Criticism’, Reuters, 7 Feb. 2015, available from http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-ukraine-crisis-idUKKBN0LA13N20150207 (accessed 12 July 2017).

16 Ivo Daalder et al., Preserving Ukraine's Independence, Resisting Russian Aggression: What the United States and NATO Must Do (Washington, DC: The Atlantic Council of the United States, 2015, available from https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/UkraineReport_February2015_FINAL.pdf (accessed 26 June 2017).

17 For more on the Clinton–Obama relationship on foreign policy see Mark Landler, Alter Egos: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and the Twilight Struggle Over American Power (New York: Random House, 2016).

18 Statement by Senator John McCain on the Obama–Merkel Press Conference on Ukraine’, 9 Feb. 2015 available from http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=92836DC1-6730-4FBB-A218-B0E3CB2F1494 (accessed 26 June 2017).

19 White Paper2016: On German Security Policy and the Future of the Bundeswehr (Berlin: Federal Ministry of Defence, 2016), p.31, available from https://www.bmvg.de/resource/resource/MzEzNTM4MmUzMzMyMmUzMTM1MzMyZTM2MzIzMDMwMzAzMDMwMzAzMDY5NzE3MzM1MzEzOTMyNmUyMDIwMjAyMDIw/2016%20White%20Paper.pdf (accessed 26 June 2017) (hereafter referred to as the 2016 White Book).

20 2016 Defence White Book, p.32. A June 2016 Pew poll found that 58 per cent of Germans believe having a strong economic relationship with Russia is more important than being tough with Russia on foreign policy disputes (35 per cent); Pew Research Center, Europeans Face the World Divided (Washington, DC, June 2016), p.19.

21 Hannes Adomeit, Germany's Russia Policy: From Sanctions to Nord Stream 2?, Policy Paper No. 3 (Washington, DC: Transatlantic Academy, March 2016), available from http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/sites/default/files/publications/Adomeit%20-%20web.pdf (accessed 12 July 2017).

22 For more on the ambivalence of the Obama legacy on German–US relations see Bozo et al., Suspicious Minds, pp.6–13.

23 For an examination of the German–French–US triangle see Helga Haftendorn et al. (eds), The Strategic Triangle: France, Germany and the United States in the Shaping of the New Europe (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2007).

24 Pew Research Center, Global Attitudes and Trends, Germany and the United States: Reliable Allies (Washington, DC: Pew Research Center: 7 May 2015), available from http://www.pewglobal.org/2015/05/07/germany-and-the-united-states-reliable-allies/ (accessed 26 June 2017).

25 Art Swift, ‘Americans See Russia Less Negatively, as Less of a Threat’, Gallup Poll Social Series, 18 Feb. 2016, available from http://www.gallup.com/poll/189284/americans-russia-less-negatively-less-threat.aspx (accessed 26 June 2017).

26 David Weigel, ‘Trump Not Alone in GOP with his Praise for Putin’, The Washington Post, 10 Sept. 2017, p.A1. For Putin's use of religion see Alicja Curanovic, ‘The Guardians of Traditional Values: Russia and the Russian Orthodox Church in the Quest for Status’, in Michael Barnett et al. (eds), Faith, Freedom and Foreign Policy: Challenges for the Transatlantic Community (Washington, DC: Transatlantic Academy, 2015), pp.191–212.

27 Secretary of State Tillerson asked his European counterparts why American taxpayers should care about Ukraine and Trump confidant Newt Gingrich referred to Tallinn as a suburb of St Petersburg. ‘Tillerson Asks why U.S. Taxpayers Should Care About Ukraine’, Bloomberg News, 11 April 2017, available from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-11/tillerson-asks-why-u-s-taxpayers-should-care-about-ukraine (accessed 12 July 2017); Andrew Stuttaford, ‘Estonia, Newt Gingrich and Strategery’, The National Review, 23 July 2016, available from http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/438260/estonia-newt-gingrich-and-strategery (accessed 12 July 2017).

28 Alicia M. Cohn, ‘Romney Calls Russia “Our No. 1 Geopolitical Foe”’, The Hill, 26 March 2012, available from http://thehill.com/video/campaign/218201-romney-calls-russia-our-no-1-geopolitical-foe (accessed 17 July 2017).

29 Scott Clement, ‘Russia's Popularity among Americans Sinks to Thirty Year Low, New Poll Finds’, The Washington Post, 21 Dec. 2016, available from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/12/21/russias-popularity-hits-30-year-low-in-u-s-new-poll-finds/?utm_term=.d1b11282cdbc (accessed 12 July 2017).

30 Gallup, ‘Russia’.

31 See Greg Miller, Ellen Nakashima and Adam Entous, ‘Hacking Democracy: Obama's Secret Struggle to Retaliate Against Putin's Election Assault’, The Washington Post, 25 June 2017, p.A1.

32 Rob Suls, Share of Democrats Calling Russia ‘Greatest Danger’ to U.S is at its Highest since the End of the Cold War (Washington, DC: Pew Research Center, 20 April 2017), available from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/20/share-of-democrats-calling-russia-greatest-danger-to-u-s-at-its-highest-since-end-of-cold-war/ (accessed 12 July 2017). ‘The new survey is the latest indication of growing concern among Democrats, in particular, about Russia in the wake of reports that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. A January survey found that Democrats were far more likely than Republicans to say that Russia was behind the hacks of the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. That survey also found that 38 per cent of Democrats viewed Russia as an “adversary,” compared with 20 per cent of Republicans.’

33 Bertelsmann Stiftung, Frayed Partnership: German Public Opinion on Russia (Gutersloh: April 2016), available from https://www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de/fileadmin/files/user_upload/EZ_Frayed_Partnership_2016_ENG.pdf (accessed 26 June 2017). ‘Our survey shows that the phenomenon of consistent “Russland-Versteher” has a relatively small representation within the society at large. This can be demonstrated by looking at the percentage of Germans who consistently responded to the questions in a pro-Russian way. Thus, the percentage of those who at the same time believe that Putin's Russia is a credible international partner for Germany, do not see Russia as a military threat, and would like the sanctions to be eased is only 13 per cent. If we take into account those who positively view Putin's intervention in Syria, the number of thus defined “Russland-Versteher” shrinks to 8 per cent of Germans’ (p.15).

34 See Josef Joffe, ‘Die bizarre Russland-Apologetik der Linken’, Die Zeit, 19 March 2014, available from http://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2014-03/sahra-wagenknecht-krim-russland (accessed 26 June 2017); Sahra Wagenknecht, ‘Rot–Rot–Grün: Politik- statt Personalwechsel’, Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik 2 (2015), pp.73–81; cited in Andreas Heinemann-Grüder, ‘Kalter Krieg Oder Neue Ostpolitik? Ansätze deutscher Russlandpolitik’, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 21–22 (2017), p.5.

35 ARD Deutschland Trends polls conducted by Infratest Dimap and cited in Bozo et al., Suspicious Minds, p.20; Richard Wike et al., U.S. Image Suffers as Publics Around World Question Trump's Leadership (Washington, DC: Pew Global Research, 26 June 2017), available from http://www.pewglobal.org/2017/06/26/u-s-image-suffers-as-publics-around-world-question-trumps-leadership/ (accessed 3 July 2017).

36 H.R. McMaster and Gary D. Cohn, ‘America First Does Not Mean America Alone’, The Wall Street Journal, 30 May 2017; available from https://www.wsj.com/articles/america-first-doesnt-mean-america-alone-1496187426 (accessed 26 June 2017).

37 Edward Luce, ‘The New World Disorder’, The Financial Times, 24/25 June 2017, FT Weekend, p.18. See also Yascha Mounk, Wake Up Berlin: To Save the Transatlantic Alliance German Foreign Policy Needs to Change Radically, Policy Paper No.4 (Washington, DC: Transatlantic Academy 2017), available from http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/sites/default/files/publications/Mounk%20-%20Wake%20Up%20Berlin.pdf (accessed 3 July 2017).

38 See the comprehensive study of Nordstream 2, Kai-Olaf Lang and Kirsten Westphal, ‘Nord Stream 2-Versuch einer politischen und wirtschaftlichen Einordung’, in SWP Studien, S21 (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, December 2016), available from http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/EN/Aussenpolitik/Laender/Laenderinfos/01-Nodes/RussischeFoederation_node.html (accessed 3 July 2017).

39 US Census Bureau, available from https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c4621.html#2016 (accessed 3 July 2017).

40 Source: German Foreign Office, available from http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/EN/Aussenpolitik/Laender/Laenderinfos/01-Nodes/RussischeFoederation_node.html (accessed 3 July 2017).

41 Andrew E. Kramer and Clifford Kraus, ‘Rex Tillerson's Company, Exxon, Has Billions at Stake Over Sanctions on Russia’, The New York Times, 12 Dec. 2016, available from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/12/world/europe/rex-tillersons-company-exxon-has-billions-at-stake-over-russia-sanctions.html?action=click&contentCollection=Energy%20%26%20Environment%20&module=RelatedCoverage&region=Marginalia&pgtype=article; https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/21/business/energy-environment/treasury-exxon-mobil-sanctions-waiver.html?_r=0 (accessed 3 July 2017).

42 See Szabo, Germany, Russia and the Rise of Geo-Economics, chapter 4; and Tom Dyson, ‘Energy Security and Germany's Response to Russian Revisionism: The Dangers of Civilian Power’, German Politics 25/4 (2016), pp.500–581.

43 Christian Krug and Kalina Oroschakoff, ‘Germany and Russia Warn U.S. Over Expanded Russia Sanctions’, Politico Europe, 15 June 2017, available from http://www.politico.eu/article/germany-and-austria-warn-u-s-over-expanded-russia-sanctions/ (accessed 3 July 2017); Karoun Dimirjian, ‘Senate Overwhelmingly Passes New Russia and Iran Sanctions’, The Washington Post, 15 June 2017, available from https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/senate-overwhelmingly-passes-new-russia-and-iran-sanctions/2017/06/15/df9afc2a-51d8-11e7-91eb-9611861a988f_story.html?utm_term=.040879077d80 (accessed 3 July 2017). The Austrian–German statement is misleading as Europe is deeply divided over the NS 2 project with many eastern European states and Italy bitterly opposed to the project.

44 Michael Birnbaum and Rick Noack, ‘Following Trump's Trip Merkel Says Europe Can't Rely on “Others”. She Means the U.S.’, The Washington Post, 28 May 2017, available from https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/following-trumps-trip-merkel-says-europe-cant-rely-on-us-anymore/2017/05/28/4c6b92cc-43c1-11e7-8de1-cec59a9bf4b1_story.html?utm_term=.0f66c0b2ad22 (accessed 3 July 2017).

45 For the impact of the Iraq war on German politics see Stephen F. Szabo, Parting Ways: The Crisis in German–American Relations (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2004).

46 Wike et al., U.S. Image Suffers.

47 Rudolf, ‘Amerikanische Russland Politik und europäische Sicherheitsordnung’, p.23; and Ulrich Kühn and Tristan Volpe, ‘Keine Atombombe, Bitte’, Foreign Affairs 96/4 (July/Aug. 2017), pp.103–12.

48 Heinemann-Grüder, ‘Kalter Krieg Oder Neue Ostpolitik?’

49 ‘John Foster Dulles – An Agonizing Reappraisal’, The Harvard Crimson, 22 May 1956, available from http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1956/5/22/john-foster-dulles-an-agonizing-reappraisal-pfor/ (accessed 3 July 2017).

50 Luce, ‘The New World Disorder’, p.19.

51 For the range of options facing German foreign policy see the papers listed on http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/ (accessed 3 July 2017).

52 See Gideon Rachman, Multilateralism in One Country: The Isolation of Merkel's Germany, Policy Paper No.6 (Washington, DC: Transatlantic Academy, 2017), available from http://www.transatlanticacademy.org/sites/default/files/publications/Rachman%20-%20Multilateralism%20in%20One%20Country.pdf (accessed 3 July 2017).