Ayour business Congress in early October, Olaf Scholz, German Chancellor, said he “always” knew that Russia would use its energy resources as a weapon. But in 2016, when he was vice-chancellor and his Social Democrats the junior partner in a coalition led by Angela Merkel, Mr Scholz said it was simply not ‘correct’ to suggest that Nord Stream 2, a second gas pipeline crossing the Baltic Sea, could make Germany too dependent on Russia.
The Chancellor’s memory may be faulty, but since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, his government has radically decoupled Germany from Russian energy supplies, while extending diplomatic, financial and military support to the ‘Ukraine. And there is no evidence that Mr. Scholz was ever an ardent Putinversteher— an apologist for Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. Alas, too many other prominent German politicians, businessmen, academics and even sports stars have actually acted as accomplices of Mr. Putin. Hinting at the depth of Russian penetration, it was revealed on October 17 that Arne Schönbohm, the head of Germany’s cybersecurity agency, was being investigated on suspicion of intelligence links. Russians.
To be fair, Mr. Schönbohm’s ties seem tenuous: Before taking office, he led a professional cybersecurity group, some of whose members appear to have had a shady past. Many cases are clearer. Consider Matthias Warnig, a former officer of the infamous Stasi, East Germany’s secret police. Later, Mr. Warnig used these connections to help German companies gain a foothold in post-Soviet Russia. Warnig did very well, eventually becoming CEO of the $10 billion Nord Stream 2 project. In 2014, shortly after Russia annexed Crimea, prompting a barrage of Western sanctions, Mr Warnig hosted Mr Putin at a lavish party in St Petersburg. The party honored Gerhard Schröder, former Chancellor of Germany, on his 70th birthday. One of Mr. Schröder’s last acts in power was to run the first Nord Stream gas pipeline. In “retirement”, Schröder served on the boards of Russian energy giants Gazprom and Rosneft, in addition to those of Nord Stream 2.
Thanks in part to such high-level influence, by last year Germany had become dependent on Russia for more than half of its gas supply. German companies had also sold infrastructure, such as refineries and storage facilities, to Gazprom and Rosneft. Mr. Scholz’s government has now nationalized those assets, stopped imports of Russian gas and let Nord Stream 2 go bankrupt. But as the tide of Russian influence recedes, what is on display is more than high-profile fixers such as Mr. Schröder or Mr. Warnig. Russian energy companies seem to have built a whole archipelago of influence operations.
In a recent expose on what it calls the Gazprom Lobby, a team of investigators from Correctiv, an online news portal, revealed a web of ties between German politicians, German energy companies and a group of seemingly harmless individuals. NGOs. These groups vigorously sponsored conferences and all-expenses-paid trips to Russia. Conversations among their members tended to paint Western condemnation of the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008 and Crimea in 2014, and assassination attempts against Russian dissidents, as overblown and hypocritical.
Rather than focusing on the center of the German federal government, Russian lobbyists appear to have targeted state-level leaders. Among the members and distinguished guests of such well-funded organizations as the German-Russian Raw Materials Forum, the German-Russian Chamber of Foreign Trade and a short-lived Research Institute for the Dialogue of Civilizations were many alumni and former minister-presidents of the 16 federal states.
In a typical event in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in 2018, more than 800 guests celebrated Russia Day. Manuela Schwesig, minister-president of the state, beaming as a deputy minister in Mr Putin’s government, hailed her state, the terminus of Nord Stream 2, as “a kind of outpost for us in Europe “. Ms Schwesig now admits backing the pipeline was a mistake. His project funded by Gazprom NGO closed. Similar my culpa flowed from business leaders and politicians. Mr. Schröder and Mr. Warnig, the former Stasi spy, have disappeared from the public eye. Several Germans who acted as unofficial observers for a sham independence referendum in Donbass in September were quickly fired.
On the sidelines, Mr. Putin’s investment in influence peddling always pays dividends. The Russian narrative of pursuing a noble struggle against Western hegemony is gaining momentum among the far left and the far right. Some fashionable intellectuals still smell that the West does not “understand” Russia. But between July and September, support for Mr. Scholz’s Ukraine policy fell from 70% to 74%. ■