Merkel’s side of the story never made much sense to me.
Uncharitably you can say she didn’t give a shit about Ukraine/anybody else and knowingly let Russia do as they like, so long as Germany got their gas deliveries.
It was particularly annoying how she’d dismiss the UK/Poland/others as being misguided or Russophobic when they warned about Russia. As if Russia hadn’t invaded Ukraine in 2014 and used chemical weapons in the UK to assassinate someone.
Charitably you can say she was living in a fantasy land where she believed being nice to Russia, trying to integrate them into the west, and give them a platform would be an effective way to transform them into a progressive, democratic society. I can accept that in the 90s, but by the late 2000s it was clear that wasn’t happening.
For me it’s hard to have a positive view of her. The more I learn about the past, the more my jaw drops at how fucking ignorant our leaders were. Russia has been at war since inception till today almost nonstop, with only a few years of non aggression.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Russia
A quick cherry picked list that should’ve been more than enough reason to NOT SEND BILLIONS OF EUROS TO RUSSIA!!!
1991 War in Georgia
1992 War in Transnistria (I didn’t realize it’s that old jesus…)
1994 The first Chechen war.
1999 Re-invasion of Chechnya.
This one lasted until 2009, aka, started before and ended in the middle of Merkels career.
Not counting the wars in cental Asia and the middle east as the west clearly doesn’t give a shit.
There’s a lot of shit that Russia did before the 2014 invasion. The fact that these people did and continue to defend their business with Russia is fucking repulsive.
Thank you for writing this. You help me focus my own thoughts about her. I’ve been angry at her for 10 years now - since her official reaction to the invasion of Ukraine.
Merkel’s side of the story never made much sense to me.
Uncharitably you can say she didn’t give a shit about Ukraine/anybody else and knowingly let Russia do as they like, so long as Germany got their gas deliveries.
It was particularly annoying how she’d dismiss the UK/Poland/others as being misguided or Russophobic when they warned about Russia. As if Russia hadn’t invaded Ukraine in 2014 and used chemical weapons in the UK to assassinate someone.
Charitably you can say she was living in a fantasy land where she believed being nice to Russia, trying to integrate them into the west, and give them a platform would be an effective way to transform them into a progressive, democratic society. I can accept that in the 90s, but by the late 2000s it was clear that wasn’t happening.
Neither of those are a good look.
For me it’s hard to have a positive view of her. The more I learn about the past, the more my jaw drops at how fucking ignorant our leaders were. Russia has been at war since inception till today almost nonstop, with only a few years of non aggression. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Russia
A quick cherry picked list that should’ve been more than enough reason to NOT SEND BILLIONS OF EUROS TO RUSSIA!!!
1991 War in Georgia 1992 War in Transnistria (I didn’t realize it’s that old jesus…) 1994 The first Chechen war. 1999 Re-invasion of Chechnya. This one lasted until 2009, aka, started before and ended in the middle of Merkels career. Not counting the wars in cental Asia and the middle east as the west clearly doesn’t give a shit.
There’s a lot of shit that Russia did before the 2014 invasion. The fact that these people did and continue to defend their business with Russia is fucking repulsive.
Thank you for writing this. You help me focus my own thoughts about her. I’ve been angry at her for 10 years now - since her official reaction to the invasion of Ukraine.