[A-List] Germany: capitulation to US

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

On September 5 I wrote:

It has been impressed upon me by others who know, in great detail, that one
should not read too much into the pronouncements of Schröder, however
welcome they might appear. Schröder is a consummate election campaigner and
will do whatever it takes to defeat Stoiber. While he may be preferable to
Stoiber, there is a longer term agenda running through the German political
class which is the more vigorous assertion of specifically German interests
internationally. Schröder has broken a number of taboos (insisting on a
German to head the IMF, deployment of troops in the Balkans and Afghanistan,
tinkering with pension reform) and can be expected to continue to do so
should he win later this month. Also, it would be very easy for Schröder to
reverse his apparent position should the UN give its imprimatur to an attack
against Iraq.

See http://archives.econ.utah.edu/archives/a-list/2002w36/msg00103.htm

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Schröder makes u-turn on Iraq

Chancellor will allow US to use German bases in event of war

Jeevan Vasagar in Berlin
Thursday November 28, 2002
The Guardian

Germany will guarantee US military forces unrestricted overflights and use
of their bases on its soil in the event of a war with Iraq, Gerhard Schröder
said yesterday in his most concerted effort yet to heal relations with
Washington.

The chancellor also confirmed that Germany will provide Israel with Patriot
air defence missile systems to defend against the threat of Iraqi Scud
missile attacks.

Mr Schröder was flanked by his foreign minister, Joschka Fischer, and
defence minister, Peter Struck, who told a press conference in Berlin that
Germany could send two Patriot batteries.

The German leadership's show of good faith came as international arms
monitors searched a military missile-testing range and a possible nuclear
site outside Baghdad, starting a new round of inspections that could
determine the prospects for war.

Mr Schröder, who angered the US but delighted voters with his firm anti-war
stand during his re-election campaign, said it remained "clear as glass"
that Germany would stay out of a conflict in Iraq.

The gesture towards Israel both pleases the US and guards the weakest spot
in Mr Schröder's anti-war stance; the threat of a lethal attack on the
Jewish state which Germany did nothing to prevent.

Germany has "moral and historic reasons" to stand by Israel and Patriot
missiles are "purely defensive systems", Mr Schröder said.

The chancellor's strategy to woo back the US has been to make it clear that
Germany will back the war on terror in other ways, such as extending
peacekeeping troop commitments, without breaking its election promise.

But when news leaked out in the German press at the weekend of the missile
offer to Israel - reportedly under pressure from Washington - Mr Schröder
was accused of making secret deals to escape his sticky predicament.

The liberal Süddeutsche Zeitung, which reflects opinion among Mr Schröder's
middle-class voters, said in its editorial yesterday the government was
being "evasive".

"If the government meets the US request [to help protect Israel], the
categorical 'no' to Iraq war from the election campaign will collapse and
the government will snub its voters. If it does not, it will snub the US.
There is no in-between."

Mr Schröder said Israel also expressed interest in German armoured personnel
carriers of the type stationed in Kuwait, but said it had not specified how
many of the vehicles it wanted or in what circumstances.

"In principle, we have no objection to providing them," he said.

Mr Schröder's guarantees about German bases and airspace came in response to
the US asking what support it could give to a military campaign against
Iraq.

The Bush administration has sent similar requests to about 50 other
countries as it marshals the planet for war.

However, Mr Schröder said that his government would not allow a German army
unit stationed in Kuwait that specialises in detecting nuclear, poison-gas
and germ warfare to be deployed outside its mandate of aiding in the war on
terrorism.

Germany says a war with Iraq falls outside that mandate. "They are available
in the context of (Operation) Enduring Freedom, not for anything else," Mr
Schröder said.