German-Russian relations at freezing point

For many years, Germany and Russia had a perfect partnership.

Russia supplied cheap energy, which helped German industry succeed in exporting its goods worldwide. This partnership began in the early 2000s. On the German side was Chancellor Gerhard Schröder from the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), followed later by Chancellor Angela Merkel of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Their counterpart was Vladimir Putin .

Even when Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea in 2014, business continued as usual. It was then that the agreement to build Nord Stream 2 , a direct gas pipeline between Russia and Germany designed to bypass Ukraine was signed. At the time, other European countries and the US warned that the pipeline would provide Russia with powerful leverage.

The warnings proved to be correct. On February 24, 2022, Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine . German hopes for a stable European order, the democratization of Russia, and the continuation of its lucrative business model were shattered.

How could so many German politicians be so wrong?

"Shortly before the invasion, the widespread view was that there were no rational grounds for an attack on Ukraine, because the economic, military, and political costs to Russia of starting a war would be far too high," Russia expert Mario Baumann of the German Council on Foreign Relations told DW. "People [in Germany] had projected their own rationality onto Russia. They underestimated the regime's imperialist and revisionist ambitions."

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