"Merkel hesitates"

"Merkel hesitates"

That would be a smart move by Chancellor Angela Merkel, according to DW editor Miodrag Soric.

Merkel would not be Merkel if she did not hesitate. Whatever she decides, Germany and Russia will somehow have to live with each other. So far, the energy deal between the two countries has survived all the political turbulence.

Since the 1970s, when Germany procured Russian gas, Americans have been agitated by it. They ask how Germany can be so short-sighted and supply foreign currency to the enemy? At the end of that decade, Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and US President Jimmy Carter had a serious quarrel over Germany's energy cooperation with the East. And the next US President, Ronald Reagan, having no hair on his tongue, criticized the Germans at the G7 summit in Ottawa in 1981. Just like Donald Trump today.

For decades, the White House's arguments have been essentially the same: any dependence on Moscow only contributes to the West getting weaker. Helmut Schmidt responded to that with a famous sentence: "Those who trade with each other, do not shoot each other".

However, this argument is practically irrelevant today. Even the greatest pessimists cannot imagine a military conflict between NATO and Russia. Proponents of Nord Stream 2, a nearly completed second pipeline that would directly connect Russia and Germany, are pushing for business to be separated from politics, even if that policy is based on moral values.

Germany had managed to keep up with that kind of logic so far. Whether Moscow threatened the West with atomic bombs, imprisoned dissidents in gulags, marched on Afghanistan or declared the law of war in Poland - gas was flowing all the time.

Moscow has reminded us of that commitment to the agreements these days. A cynic would say that the Kremlin hopes that even the persecution of political opponents cannot shake the gas business. Whoever agrees to such a calculation in the West becomes Putin's ally.

Moscow does not seem to be trying to credibly deny the assassination of opposition politician Alexei Navalny, who is being treated in Berlin. The Russian regime seems to be sure that Germany, as many times before, will only threaten the consequences, but will not do anything.

The Kremlin believes they have to play that risky game. In the far east of Russia, there are demonstrations, just like in Belarus, the living standard of the population is declining. There are fears that there could be mass protests in the middle of Moscow. That is why the regime is increasingly persecuting oppositionists who may threaten it. Alexei Navalny is the most important, but he is only one of many.

However, it is possible that the Kremlin recalculated. Gone are the days when Germany was sent only for gas from Siberia. Europe's future belongs to alternative energy sources. Until then, many countries are standing in line to sell gas to Germany - we live in a time of abundant energy, when supply surpasses demand.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said that she "does not exclude" the stopping of Nord Stream 2, but in these economically difficult times, she would earn a lot of political capital if she stopped the gas pipeline immediately. The Poles, the French, the Baltic countries and others would immediately be much more cooperative in various key issues in the EU, if Germany finally distanced itself from Russia.

In the last chancellor's year, Merkel could once again write history - to improve Europe and show a red card to a regime that has no future anyway. Russia, after all, is not a really important trading partner. Without energy revenues, the country is going bankrupt.

Stopping Nord Stream 2 would send a signal bigger than this project: the German economy would withdraw even more from the Russian market. Putin's attempt to modernize the country with the help of the West would thus finally fail.