Bulgarian political scientist: Merkel made Europe toothless servant of Kremlin

Translating from Faktor an opinion piece of Bulgarian political scientist Ognyan Minchev:

Merkel turned Europe into a toothless servant of the Kremlin's aggressive ambitions

Merkel's position (Poland and the Baltic states are responsible for Putin's war in Ukraine, expressed in an interview with the Hungarian publication Partizaan, editor's note) does not cause surprise. She was the main political figure - along with several successive presidents of France - who ensured and consistently carried out the defeatist policy of a united Europe towards Russia, Putin and his ambitions for geopolitical revenge against the Old Continent. Whatever Merkel's motives for pursuing this policy were, its outlines are clear and categorical. AT ANY COST to ensure a priority partnership between Europe (Germany) and Russia with one main goal - economic and political symbiosis, in which Europe (Germany) provides the Kremlin with leading technologies for the modernization of Russia, and Moscow provides energy resources for the economic development of Europe. 

There would be nothing wrong with this strategy if the two countries maintained equal relations of balanced power and influence towards each other. Unfortunately, the reality was completely different: the priority relations led to complete helplessness of Europe (Germany) in the face of the Kremlin's strategy for geopolitical revenge in the era after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Putin used the strange softness and concessions of Berlin, Paris and Brussels in the first two decades of our century to deploy an aggressive strategy of subjugation of Europe - through blackmail through an energy monopoly (especially in Eastern Europe), through a massive propaganda-operational (hybrid) war against Europe, against its values, institutions and policies, through the control of (Eastern) European public institutions for the purposes of systemic corruption at the top of power in favor of Russian strategic interests.

Merkel's policy towards Moscow was a bizarre continuation of the policy of the German empire towards Russia, carried out for centuries. The main victims of this policy were the countries of central Europe - Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the Baltics... The division of central and eastern Europe was the deep content of the relations between the Habsburgs, Prussia and Russia, and their main victim was Poland. To the south, we must add the Ottomans as rivals for control of Eastern Europe to the three empires. In Berlin, of course, they would be indignant at such an analogy, but we are not obliged to respect anyone's hypocrisy. Merkel is indignant that Poland and the Baltics have prevented her from successfully continuing to sell - to give away - Eastern Europe to Putin in the name of priority German-Russian relations. For their part, Warsaw, Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius know their own history well and did not want to once again go like sheep to the slaughter in favor of German-Russian friendship. That's what it's about - Merkel regrets the missed opportunity in 2021 to once again satisfy the Kremlin's cannibalistic appetite at the expense of the negligible interests of Poland, Ukraine and the Baltics. 

Let us recall here that the cordial relations between Merkel and Putin (sometimes darkened by the appearance in the room of a large Doberman...) affected not only Poland and the Baltics, but all of Eastern Europe. The model of partnership at all costs between Europe (Germany) and the Kremlin created the foundations of the post-communist oligarchic model, which still governs the destinies of the Balkans, Hungary, Slovakia.

On the one hand, Bulgaria was already a member of NATO and the EU, but on the other hand, in the deep layers of the Bulgarian economic and political reality, the key interests of the Russian state, its special services (they have not left since 1944) and the Russian corporate - energy and financial infrastructure - comfortably settled. In Sofia, Merkel's friends ruled, who did the same thing as she did - they talked about European values ​​and obediently carried out Putin's whims, obeyed his arbitrariness. When the rulers from Sofia went to Brussels to vote for what Merkel wanted, European officials flattered them about the high corruption and all other outrages of the government, even wrote profoundly wise reports (Cooperation and verification mechanism). This was a constructive hypocrisy from which we all benefited – Bulgarians got richer from the EU funds, those who manage them got filthy rich (both from the East and the West), and Putin got everything he wanted from Bulgaria, just as he got everything he wanted from Europe (Germany). Only the bad Poland and the Baltics grumbled a little.

Merkel and Sarkozy blocked in 2008 in Bucharest the provision of the MAP – an action plan for Ukraine and Georgia’s membership in NATO, thereby giving Putin carte blanche to open the season of Moscow’s dirty wars against the countries of the post-Soviet space. Thank God, Merkel was not in power in 1997 and 2004 to prevent the NATO membership of the countries of Eastern Europe! After Putin’s invasion of Crimea and Donbas, Merkel and François Hollande directed the “Minsk Agreements”, which were in practice supposed to provide legitimacy to the Kremlin’s invasion. What was the main goal of Minsk-1 and Minsk-2? To ensure constitutional autonomy for the Luhansk and Donetsk separatist republics, so that their criminal elites, on orders from Moscow, could block any legal and political act of the institutions in Kiev that could realize the independence of Ukraine in contradiction to the imperial interests of the Kremlin. This is the kind of “peace” that Merkel and Hollande provided to Ukraine, a country that was a victim of aggression. If Merkel had remained in power until February 2022, she would undoubtedly have organized Minsk-3, 4, 5... Ukraine would have been pressured to part with everything that could serve as the basis for its national independence. Poland and the Baltics are hindering Merkel’s happy partnership with Putin. Ukraine is also hindering... Thank God, Merkel nevertheless parted ways with power in Germany in 2021. The Russian aggression of February 2022 allowed post-Merkelian Europe to wake up from the deep sleep of fear, humiliation, and hypocrisy in the face of Kremlin arrogance. But Merkel’s legacy has not yet been consigned to the history museum.

The metastases of “friendship at all costs” with Putin are swelling in Budapest, in Bratislava, they have crossed the ocean and become part of the new conservative wave, expressed by people like Tucker Carlson, Mearsheimer ... the list goes on. Europe has evolved beyond recognition as a result of the devastation inflicted by the two catastrophes of the 20th century. The very existence of the European Union is a result of this evolution. But the old imperial instincts lie deep within and sometimes manifest themselves in outwardly paradoxical forms of official policy. Whatever Merkel’s motivations for turning Europe into a toothless servant of the Kremlin’s aggressive ambitions, her political legacy must be clearly defined and repudiated as a model of official policy if Europe is to have dignity, respect and a prospect of survival as a significant world power in the turbulent waters of the era in which we live."