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CDU chairman Friedrich Merz
Photo: Michael Kappeler / dpa
The CDU chairman Friedrich Merz laments years of mistakes in German government policy in dealing with Russia.
"Since the invasion of eastern Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea eight years ago at the latest, it should have been clear to all of us, across all parties, what is happening in this country," Merz writes in a guest article for Die Zeit.
"In Germany, the series of misjudgments and the resulting series of errors is particularly long," writes Merz.
The peace dividend after reunification was nowhere as generous as in Germany.
"The price is a largely dysfunctional army."
The phasing out of nuclear energy followed an event that "had nothing to do with the safety of our power plants."
"In return, an ever-increasing dependency on Russian gas for power generation was accepted."
The construction of Nord Stream 2 was never a “purely private project”.
The CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel once described the pipeline as such, and Olaf Scholz also called the pipeline that for a long time.
Schröder loses “the last bit of decency”
In his guest article, Merz comes to the conclusion that one has to “admit that we were wrong”.
Putin "led us astray and by the nose for years, accompanied by a network of German entrepreneurs and politicians who have given their minds second to making money, right down to a former German chancellor who is losing the last remnant of his decency these days. «
Merz is obviously alluding to Gerhard Schröder, who has long been criticized for his closeness to Vladimir Putin.
Among other things, he is the head of the supervisory board at the Russian state energy company Rosneft.
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It was a grave mistake to turn down Ukraine's request to join NATO.
Out of sheer fear of Putin and his threats, Germany and France in particular did not want to provoke him, writes Merz.
"Deterrence is and will remain the most important defense instrument in the future." If necessary, one must also fight - "against the threat from outside, but also against the destructive power of disinformation and the denial of facts from within".
The way out of energy dependence on Russia will also be difficult.
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