Germany, your hour zero?

The political class of any country is constantly confronted with problems that they were put in office to solve in the interest of the country. That is their job. Political Germany has been making decisions against the interests of its own people for a long time and is not fulfilling its basic responsibilities. Analysis

René Zittlau

Introduction

The term “zero hour” describes the situation in Germany immediately after the end of the war in 1945. Not only was the country destroyed, but so were the people. Indoctrinated by an ideology that had poisoned their minds for half a generation, people in East and West were looking for a new beginning. Everything was to be different, better and, above all, without war.

Is the country facing another brutal new beginning?

Germany in the year 2024: the state, politics and society are in a phase reminiscent of the Hollywood-style dystopian end-of-the-world fantasies that have been flooding cinemas for years, offering solutions only in the form of violence, strength and ruthlessness. The big difference – today is not a movie, it is our reality.

The parallels with the country’s history, which is supposed to have been dealt with long ago, are striking. As was the case several times in the 20th century, politicians are not only failing to find answers to the problems at hand, the magnitude of which is almost impossible to comprehend. As was the case “back then,” the government is also responsible for their creation. What’s more, those in power did little or nothing to protect society from these foreseeable and widely predicted problems. And they are still doing nothing to get the country and society out of the impasse into which they have both led them.

To see American interests given tunnel vision priority is frightening and bitter.

And it is even more frightening and bitter to see how governments and parliaments, unprecedentedly free from knowledge of basic historical facts, free from basic economic knowledge, free from questions of diplomatic and even human decency, and completely devoid of any responsibility for German national interests, have brought and continue to bring the country into a situation whose prospects for a peaceful, civil solution are dwindling by the day.

Germany is once again approaching (its) zero hour at an alarming pace, which would once again help the brutal historical certainties to break through.

It is high time to recognize the extent of the political game of chance that now encompasses all areas of social life.

The provision of state-organized infrastructure – an essential part of the principle of the welfare state

The Federal Republic of Germany defines itself as a “social constitutional state” in Article 28 of the Grundgesetz (Basic Law). As a result of the first Cold War, the bar was set very high, particularly with regard to state social welfare provision, which led people to believe that they had some kind of entitlement to the level once achieved. However, unlike the term “constitutional state”, the term “social” was not explained in detail, at least not in the Basic Law.

Thus, the legislator is free to define what is or should be “social”, even if numerous treatises have attempted to close this gap, as here:

“Public services of general interest include water and energy supply, sewage disposal and waste disposal, public transportation and education, as well as health and medical care and the provision of corresponding infrastructure.”

(Dahme/Wohlfahrt 2011; Klenk/Reiter 2012).

Anyone with a clear-eyed view of today’s public spaces will find cause for concern everywhere. The quality of infrastructure, the visible face of public administration and an essential part of public services, is in free fall.

Germany’s transport infrastructure was once a flagship

The fundamental restoration of traffic infrastructure is now the exception. For years, however, the rule has been to repair the worst damage. Over time, this results in a nasty patchwork on the most frequently used roads.

If you are waiting for a train, you are often lucky if it leaves at all. It is not uncommon for trains to be canceled without notice and without replacement. If you have to meet important deadlines, using Deutsche Bahn becomes a career risk. That’s why Deutsche Bahn management has more than 3,500 company cars, because they want to be on time.

Here, too, reality is the logical result of a “development” that has been going on for years. RBB, the public broadcaster for Berlin and Brandenburg, wrote on 12.07.2023:

“Deutsche Bahn is in a bad state – it no longer even denies this itself. Today’s problems are the result of a misguided public transport policy.”

The article goes on to summarize Deutsche Bahn’s problems in 10 areas. Eight of them can be traced back to management decisions:

• Outdated infrastructure, overloaded network, large gaps in the area, construction work and building sites, the corporate structure, lack of and controversial investments, staff shortages, signal disruptions and technical problems.

The other two: Weather-related disruptions and labor disputes.

This list is reminiscent of an old GDR joke: Who are the 5 enemies of socialism? Spring, summer, fall and winter… and the weather.

The state-controlled Deutsche Bahn Group itself summarizes the year 2023 in the annual press conference as follows:

“The Deutsche Bahn Group (DB) is back in the black. Despite the negative impact of the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and a sharp rise in inflation on the rail business, the DB Group closed the fiscal year 2022 with a significant operating profit. The operating result (EBIT adjusted) improved by around €2.8 billion to just under €1.3 billion compared to the coronavirus year 2021. Group revenues (adjusted) increased by 19.1% year-on-year to around EUR 56.3 billion in 2022 – a new record. In 2020 and 2021, DB had still incurred billion-dollar losses due to the pandemic.”

A passenger on another canceled train is inclined to ask in which parallel universe the authors of such reports live. The fact that the Deutsche Bahn problem is systemic is shown by the interview that the head of the train drivers’ union, Claus Weselsky, gave to the Swiss newspaper “Blick” a few days ago. Among other things, the reader will find this dialog:

Blick: “Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz jokingly asked Swiss President Viola Amherd whether Switzerland would like to take over Deutsche Bahn. Would that be a solution?
If Switzerland were given the instruments of power to throw out or tame Deutsche Bahn’s management, which has gone wild, that would be a clever approach. However, this is an oath of disclosure! The Federal Chancellor and his government are incapable of showing the Deutsche Bahn management the limits.”

The European Football Championship, which has just ended, also showed the world quite openly how run-down the Deutsche Bahn system has become. The comparison with yesterday is all the more stark as there is a direct 1:1 comparison with the 2006 World Cup in Germany.

Healthcare – a new service is reminiscent of the patchwork in road construction

Every person with statutory health insurance in Germany knows the problem: the family doctor writes a referral to a specialist, e.g. a dermatologist or ophthalmologist. The subsequent search for a specialist is usually unsuccessful. The patient cannot find a specialist, not during this quarter (the validity period of a referral), not in the next. The author of these lines used this approach to find an appointment with a dermatologist. The search began in May 2024. The friendly nurse at one of them said: “Come at the beginning of next year, then maybe I can help you. For all the others, there was not even this vague hope.

For a long time now, it has been impossible to speak of a stable, functioning healthcare system in Germany that meets the requirements of public services. The problems have been known for years, as have the causes. Health ministers come and go, but the problems not only remain, they get worse from year to year.

Health kiosks are now the latest innovation rocket from the Federal Ministry of Health. Buzzwords such as “low-threshold advice”, “general advice and support services”, “coordination”, “formation of a cross-sector network” do not even raise hopes of solving any of the fundamental, systemic problems. The management of these newly planned facilities – one “kiosk per 80,000 inhabitants” is planned – is to be carried out by “qualified nursing staff” and “in the long term by nursing staff, nurses and geriatric nurses”.

Even the Ärztezeitung, a publication that is more inclined towards the interests of the medical profession than a comprehensive policy that actually serves health, warns against this Lauterbach idea, which is likely to lower the level of patient care to a new all-time low.

The German pension system – no trace of targeted state poverty provision

The pension system in its fragmented nature – practically every higher-earning occupational group in Germany has its own pension fund, which reduces the principle of solidarity to absurdity – should not be missing from this list. None of Germany’s neighboring countries, not in the neighboring Eastern European countries of the Czech Republic or Slovakia, and certainly not in Austria, have a pension policy as lacking in solidarity as that in Germany. Austria had a similar system to Germany, but saw the problems coming and pulled the ripcord. The direct comparison with its southern neighbor brings tears to the eyes of those in Germany with statutory pension insurance.

In Austria, slightly higher pension contributions are paid than in Germany, but by all employees, including civil servants and the self-employed. Everyone pays into one system. The result of this sensible approach is impressive. While the average pension in Germany is around €1500, it is around €800 higher in the Alpine republic. Austrians achieve this pension level with a comparable income and a retirement age of 65. This means that Austrians retire two years earlier and their pensions are also significantly higher.

The result of this German “social policy” is significant and steadily increasing poverty in old age due to the system. This is because a continuous, uninterrupted employment history from the end of education to retirement is now the exception.

However, there are other problems for German retirees.

In theory, every pensioner should be able to cover the necessary expenses of their retirement from their pension. If they actually want to do this, they should not have to go into a nursing or retirement home. The average cost per person in a nursing home is €2,800. They are therefore disproportionate to the average pension.

Infrastructure and social services, as the core of public services of general interest that are not provided in the necessary quality, reflect the state of the country as a whole. Things are no better in other former German flagship sectors either.

Education, culture, media – once upon a time there was a nation of poets and thinkers

Education and culture are the basis for the progress of a society as a whole. They are the currencies for countries with few raw materials to be able to compete with other countries. The harder this currency is, the more a state invests in an actual national education organized, for example, according to the Humboldtian ideal of education, the more successful this state will be in the long term.

Humboldt described this ideal as follows:

“The true purpose of man … is the highest and most proportionate formation of his powers into a whole.”

The aim of this ideal is the harmoniously educated personality, which, according to Humboldt, is unthinkable without freedom:

“Freedom is the first and indispensable condition for this education.”

The discrepancy between this desirable humanistic ideal and the German reality is frightening. And it grows with each passing year.

Children in elementary school throughout Germany are confronted with realities that make a targeted education, if not impossible, then to an extent that would have been unthinkable 20 or 30 years ago. And even then, the conditions were not the best.

Today, overcrowded classes are not only the norm in large cities, and not even the worst thing. To be able to follow what is happening at school at all, you need to be able to speak German. A few years ago, this was still a basic legal requirement for attending school. After all, it is not the teachers’ job to teach the children entrusted to them the language of instruction in the first place. However, this is precisely what teachers are increasingly confronted with and are not at all prepared for. In addition, teachers are confronted with such situations in practically all year groups, as children of all ages from all parts of the world are constantly coming to Germany, very few of them with any knowledge of German.

It is not only in Berlin schools that the proportion of children who do not speak German is often between 50 and 90 percent. The demographic changes that will inevitably result from this in a few years’ time, with all the consequential problems, should only be mentioned here.

In addition to language skills, successful school attendance requires physical and mental development in line with age. Understandably, children from crisis regions and children who have moved to Germany for a variety of reasons are regularly unable to meet these requirements. Nevertheless, they are admitted to schools without the school system being able to cope with this situation, simply because school attendance is compulsory.

If the children usually learn the language more or less well over the years, many of the parents of these children do not speak German, even years later. Communication between the school and these parents is therefore not possible at all or only possible via interpreters.

Another issue is the quality of the teachers. Many of them are now lateral entrants, meaning they do not have the necessary professional and pedagogical training to provide children with the tools they need on their way into life. What was introduced as an emergency solution is now part of everyday life.

The teaching of knowledge under such conditions is either geared towards what is feasible, i.e. the lowest common denominator, or the teacher ignores those who do not keep up in the interests of the majority.

Despite not achieving their learning goals, the weakest pupils are transferred to the next class, as there are no places in the following class for children who would actually have to repeat the class.

During his research, the author was confronted with cases where parents of non-German children have been moving from school to school for years. Some of them have been attending the same grade level for three years, only in different schools and always with the same learning outcome. The purely physical development of the respective children also makes the abstruse nature of these untenable conditions obvious.

Beginning in the first grade, these problems worsen across all grades up to graduation. The level of knowledge taught has been falling rapidly for years, which is well known to all those responsible. One principal reported that pupils in Years 7 and 8 today often do not even know the subject matter of Year 5.

In addition, there are glaring deficiencies in interpersonal behavior: Discipline, politeness, friendliness, once taken for granted in “good manners” are now largely “out of fashion”.

Even the very pro-government “New Social Market Economy Initiative” confirms this extremely negative trend in its “Education Monitor 2023”.

The educational institutions that follow school at company, college, university or university of applied sciences level are confronted with young people and young adults who meet the necessary requirements rather as an exception. They often first have to be brought up to the necessary entry level in order to be able to meet the basic requirements of further education.

There are now websites that describe the dramatic nature of the situation in careful, well-formulated words. For example, the Rheinhessen Chamber of Industry and Commerce (IHK Rheinhessen ) on the German language complex in written and spoken form:

“As a minimum standard, companies require school graduates to be able to clearly formulate and record simple facts orally and in writing. Young people should be able to write simple texts without errors in spelling and grammar and be able to distinguish between different levels of language, such as scene jargon, colloquial language, technical language and sophisticated language.”

There are similar requirements for “simple calculation techniques”, “basic scientific knowledge” and other areas of knowledge, including so-called personal virtues such as reliability, perseverance and a willingness to take responsibility. The Chamber of Industry and Commerce also feels compelled to use drastic language to refer to things that are taken for granted, such as “politeness and friendliness”:

“Companies expect the school to take decisive action against the destruction of polite manners.”

In other, clearer words: today’s school leavers, who are between the ages of 17 and often 20, no longer meet the standards of the school-qualification they present to their future employers with their applications.

These statements conceal a dramatic situation of which those politically responsible in government and society – judging by their actions – are completely unaware.

Countries such as China, Korea, Singapore and others recognized the signs of the times many years ago and are now investing more across the board in the hard currency of knowledge than Germany.

Statements such as those made by the Rheinhessen Chamber of Industry and Commerce on the requirements of school leavers therefore seem more like a declaration of social bankruptcy than an actual wake-up call.

The following video was obviously not filmed in Germany; however, the results of this survey would hardly have been any different in Germany:

For our non-German-speaking readers:

The reporter from Austrian radio asks young people, obviously soccer fans, about the chances of success of the teams from Brazil and Argentina in this year’s European Championship. The interviewees do not even realize that Brazil and Argentina are not part of Europe and are therefore not even taking part in the championship, and believe that they will finish well. However, the young man in the cover picture only gives the South Americans a chance if they activate certain stars, such as Pele and Maradona, both long deceased.

Germany was once … also synonymous with culture in its best sense

Germany is one of the cradles of so-called Western culture. Its contribution to the development of this culture worldwide can hardly be overestimated. This is evidenced by works of music, literature, philosophy, architecture, education and science. Germany is rightly held in high esteem worldwide for this historical cultural heritage.

However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to reconcile the current image of Germany and German culture with the legacy of such outstanding personalities as Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Johann Sebastian Bach, Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Schiller, Lion Feuchtwanger and Thomas Mann.

For culture is not just a reference to the historically indisputable merits of a nation, it refers to much more:

“In the broadest sense,culture refers to all manifestations of human existence that are based on certain values and learned behaviors and which in turn are expressed in the permanent generation and preservation of values”

In this sense, Germany is no longer moving in the tradition of the old masters, but is sorely lacking in fundamental cultural values.

These “manifestations of human existence”, as the above definition states, also include respect, appreciation and esteem for the cultural achievements of other nations and their bearers.

In recent years, abysses have opened up in this respect that were previously unknown even in historical retrospect. The behavior of high-ranking politicians, and surprisingly even of artists of all genres, of representatives of the educated middle classes as a whole, towards Russian culture, for example, towards its representatives such as the singer Anna Netrebko or the conductor Valery Gergiev or theater companies as a whole, no longer has anything at all to do with the historically highly praised level of German culture as defined above.

Or in the sense that the behavior of a society and its members represents and defines a certain level of development in a certain historical epoch.

This also includes the deliberate rewriting of historical literary works, the canceling of culture in the sense of a new ideology, as happened, for example, with Astrid Lindgren’s “Pippi Longstocking”.

Respect for history – an inseparable part of a good education and an essential prerequisite for understanding today

Another very worrying point is the constant attempts to rewrite history. Driven primarily by the US, these attempts are not only tolerated by Germany and the EU, but are also pushed forward in their own way. For example, Ursula von der Leyen, President of the Council of the EU, deliberately stated on January 26, 2024, on the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp

“On January 27, 1945, the Allies had liberated the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and death camp.”

It was not the Allies, nor was it Ukrainian troops, as others were no less active in prophesizing. They were the soldiers of the 1st Ukrainian Front of the Red Army of the Soviet Union, in which all possible nationalities were represented. The name of this formation did not refer to the origin of the soldiers serving in it, but to the original thrust of the formation in the liberation of the Soviet Union.

Ms. von der Leyen never corrected this deliberate provocation, or rather lie. A behavior that – to refer once again to the definition above – is “based on certain values and learned behavior”, the much-vaunted Western and European values that are carried before them like a standard.

Ms. von der Leyen and the entire German and European political elite also have nothing against the grinding of monuments in memory of the horrors of war and the discrimination against the Russian language in several EU states, which contradicts all European law. On the contrary, the lady who carried this excess through to the end as prime minister in Estonia was recently appointed EU foreign affairs representative and deputy to the warmonger von der Leyen – Kaja Kallas.

These and other similar behaviors prove in their own way that outstanding cultural achievements created by a nation in the past can be traced back to a certain cultural level at the time these cultural assets were created. They are no guarantee for the future.

The Germany of 2024 is light years away from the high culture that once characterized the “nation of poets and thinkers”. In order to prove ourselves worthy of this historical heritage, to possibly come close to this level again, enormous efforts are required at all levels of society.

The German media – a shadow of its former self

The media are closely related to education and culture. They reflect the intellectual and moral state of a society.

A comprehensive education, in Humboldt’s sense, in turn enables independent observation and assessment of social processes. It provokes questions of its own accord when the picture is obviously not complete and in this sense has a critical and corrective effect on the media.

But what if it is lacking?

The image of life presented to us by the media, and not just since 2022 or 2020, reminds the viewer of one of the special mirrors available in stores. Like these, the opinion-forming media severely and apparently deliberately restrict our view of society.

Not only has this not always been the case, such “semi-secret” journalism contradicts the once defined legal requirements.

Public service broadcasting

The founding of the public broadcasters after 1945 was a milestone in German media history.

ARD, ZDF and the other broadcasters organized in the Interstate Broadcasting Treaty

“must respect and protect human dignity in their services; the moral and religious convictions of the population must be respected. The offers should contribute to strengthening respect for life, freedom and physical integrity, for the beliefs and opinions of others.”

This can be read in §3 of the Interstate Broadcasting Treaty.

Section 10, which deals with the principles of reporting, information broadcasts and opinion polls, stipulates that

“News shall be checked for truth and origin with the care required by the circumstances before it is disseminated.”

In the meantime, the reality of public service media is keeping a considerable distance from the cited and legally prescribed principles.

The model of a good journalist was coined by Hanns-Joachim Friedrichs. Until 1991, he was the presenter of the ARD Tagesthemen, among other things, and defined good journalism as follows:

“You can recognize a good journalist by the fact that he doesn’t make himself common with a cause, not even a good cause.”

Now, not every journalist in pre-1990 West Germany adhered to this principle. Nevertheless, there was a generation of journalists who regarded its definition as the benchmark for their work. After the death of Hanns-Joachim Friedrichs, WDR, the former flagship of ARD, even awarded a journalism prize in his name in 1995 in honor of his memory.

The list of award winners is not just a list of names. It bears witness to a creeping change in the concept of a “good journalist”, a change and partial erosion of the meaning to which this prize was originally dedicated.

Hanns-Joachim Friedrichs himself helped to choose the first winner, Thomas Roth. Thomas Roth, a long-time correspondent for ARD in Moscow, spoke fluent Russian. His interview from 2008 with the then Prime Minister of Russia, Vladimir Putin, on the occasion of the Georgia conflict seems highly topical in retrospect, not 16 years ago and yet as if from another era. It is proof of honest, respectful and yet critical journalism. It shows that journalism in the spirit of Hanns-Joachim Friedrichs helps the public to find their bearings in the apparent chaos of world politics.

The youngest award winner, Ina Ruck, who has also been a correspondent for ARD in Moscow with interruptions since 1995, is a representative of the attitude journalism that is widely practiced today and to which she expressly subscribes.

On ARD, she dismisses Russian President Putin’s meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Orban on July 5, 2024 as a “fuss” and points to the dubiousness of Orban’s actions, as “Putin is wanted on an international arrest warrant” (from minute 2:40). She is concerned with discrediting, not informing.

In other words, she is clearly “making common cause”, as Hanns-Joachim Friedrichs put it, without explaining the cause she represents.

The influence of intellectuals on opinion-forming

Like teachers, professors and intellectuals in general, journalists are important disseminators of knowledge, opinions and beliefs. They sometimes have a great influence on the public and certain population groups. They therefore bear great responsibility for the acquisition of knowledge and the development or non-development of virtues and behaviors.

The synthesis of upbringing, education, culture, understanding of the world and experiences based on this forms the framework for what we call social coexistence.

The deterioration in social coexistence that is visible, experienced and tangible for everyone today, the rampant violence – physical and psychological, direct and indirect – the passing of laws against hate speech and incitement to hatred, which only (intentionally? ), the now systemic lack of understanding and state-sponsored drifting apart of the social “top” and “bottom”, the gutting of the terms “left”, “center” and “right” are the result of a dramatic change in the understanding and content of education, culture and the nationwide loss of socially formerly recognized and unquestioned norms of behaviour.

The continuation of this path will foreseeably and inevitably lead to further social brutalization.

Globally respected economic power – that was once upon a time

The core of the German self-image since the end of the Second World War has been the country’s economic performance. This “We are (again) somebody!” played a paramount role in the restoration of the German social psyche after 1945 and became engraved in the national memory.

The times of economic prosperity are now over for the time being.

It is a fact that German companies as a whole are now facing challenges for which they are not prepared and which have the potential to change this country for the worse in a way that the majority of the population cannot even begin to imagine.

A war provoked by the US and NATO began in 2022 as a result of multiple US-organized coups in Kiev (“Orange Revolution” in 2004 and the coup known as the Maidan or “Revolution of Dignity” in 2013-14). The US and the EU then imposed long-planned sanctions against Russia, which marked the beginning of the end of German economic power. Today, Germany pays four to seven times higher energy prices than before 2022 and “voluntarily” withdrew from the profitable Russian sales market under pressure from the US.

The loss of cheap Russian energy and other raw material supplies – which for decades were a prerequisite for profitable industrial production in Germany, a country with high wages and high taxes – will inevitably lead to a turning point in the German economy.

As a result, many of the companies producing in Germany lost their competitiveness, particularly the raw material and energy-intensive sectors, primarily the steel, chemical and automotive industries.

BASF goes to China

What previously seemed unimaginable has been prepared since 2022 and is now being implemented: BASF is leaving Germany with significant capacities and moving to China.

In September 2022, for example, BASF opened a production plant in China, built at a cost of around 10 billion euros.

The generous expansion of BASF capacities in China corresponds to an unprecedented decline in production in Germany. Chemieproduktion-online.de headlines on August 25, 2023: “Half-year balance sheet: deep red figures in the chemical industry”.

The portal quotes Bernd Vogler, Managing Director of the Rhineland-Palatinate chemical associations, as follows

“The Rhineland-Palatinate chemical industry is in the red in terms of sales, production and orders. The decline in orders of almost 40 percent is particularly drastic. Only the number of employees remains stable.”

Rhineland-Palatinate is (still) the headquarters of BASF, the world’s largest chemical company.

It is also reported that the German chemical industry as a whole is experiencing a 20.8 percent drop in production and a 38.7 percent drop in orders.

While the first figure represents current capacity utilization, the order intake looks to the future and does not bode well for either production or employees.

Graphically, the situation in December 2023 looked like this:

The pharmaceutical sector is an important part of the chemical industry. The figures published in Chemieproduktion-online.de are hard to beat in terms of drama:
In the first half of 2023, turnover fell by 54.7 percent compared to the previous year. Production fell by 40 percent and orders by a whopping 63 percent.

Compare these figures with the statements on the economic situation from the responsible Federal Ministry of Economics.

Almost two years have passed since then and the situation has worsened noticeably.

The car industry is moving to China / US

VW is focusing almost entirely on China, even if a small proportion of its investments are going to North America:
In 2023, VW set up an investment program. 180 billion euros are to be invested in electromobility over the next five years, five billion of which will go to North America and almost all of the rest to China.

The core of the VW program for China is: “In China for China”.

This complete focus on China – and thus not only the neglect, but also the de facto abandonment of Germany as a location – has its roots in economic reality. China promotes certain research and production activities on a massive scale. However, only companies that fulfill certain conditions are eligible, which turns the participating VW-China company into a virtually Chinese company, with the corresponding consequences for VW Germany and Germany as an industrial location. Even in its platform policy, VW follows the Chinese guidelines. The higher degree of localization of production demanded by the Chinese support programs inevitably leads to a reduction in capacities elsewhere, certainly also in Germany.

According to Ralf Brandstätter, the head of VW China, VW is investing 2.5 billion euros in research in China, whereas the sum for VW in Wolfsburg is only 800 million. This sum is being invested in a new development center and is intended to make “Campus Sandkamp” the world’s most modern car development center.

In view of the enormous differences in the investment sums and the innovative strength and speed of innovation in China in this area, doubts about the significance of Campus Sandkamp are obvious.

As is well known, the German government recently imposed punitive tariffs on e-cars from China. Everyone should be aware that this type of economic policy will also affect the “German” company VW China. Due to its economic structure and economic power, China will find ways and means to counter this unfriendly policy. Germany too?

A few days ago, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce invited car manufacturers to discuss the possible introduction of EU import duties on Chinese electric cars. In the process, China discussed a counter-tariff on petrol-powered trucks manufactured in the EU. The Chinese leadership had previously indicated that an increase in taxes on European premium cars was also being discussed. These possible Chinese countermeasures would affect Germany before any other EU country.

According to Chinese customs data, the value of exports of vehicles with an engine capacity of over 2.5 liters was 1.2 billion dollars.

The de facto loss of the chemical and automotive industries means the loss of the core of German industry. It will inevitably lead to massive changes at the major suppliers in Germany. Either they will follow VW & Co abroad or they will go under.

The consequence will be the death of the many small suppliers in Germany who are unwilling or unable to go abroad.

In the following video, Thomas Knott from the non-partisan Mittelstandsinitiative Brandenburg describes how SMEs perceive the economic situation:

A short summary of the video for our non-German-speaking readers:

Referring to the upcoming regional elections, specifically Brandenburg, entrepreneur Thomas Knott points out, among other things, the dramatic changes in the economy, the departure of giants such as BASF and VW. Since January 2024, 200,000 jobs have been lost in Germany and a further 150,000 people are expected to be unemployed by the end of the year. This will have huge consequences across the country.

The words of the CEO of Deutsche Börse, Theodor Weimer, confirm the German economic reality in a brutal way that has probably never been seen since 1945:

Here, too, is a brief summary for our non-German-speaking readers:

He describes the meetings with German Economics Minister Habeck as a “sheer disaster” due to the minister’s lack of understanding for the problems of the economy. He held many talks with politicians and business representatives from all over the world and sums up with disillusionment:

“Our reputation in the world has never been so poor. … Investors are just shaking their heads: where have the German virtues gone? We no longer know how to read you in Germany. Discussions with investors have a fatalistic character. … Fundamentally, they say: what you’re doing is just crazy…. Economically speaking, we are on the way to becoming a developing country. … We have destroyed the automotive industry. … We have deliberately allowed our business model to be destroyed. … What we are doing is madness. … Our focus on doing good is not shared anywhere. … German companies only make a fraction of their turnover in Germany, … but they make a much, much smaller fraction of their profits here. … We are at the bottom of all rankings, and the trend is heading further south.”

The German military – in the wake of American hegemonic policy and in the tradition of the Wehrmacht

The situation in the leadership of the German military is no different from that of the country’s political leadership. In Germany, there is traditionally a close relationship between politics and the military. Situations in which active, high-ranking military personnel explicitly distance themselves from the direction of federal policy are rare. If someone dares to express a discreetly critical stance, as Admiral Kay-Achim Schönbach did on a fleet visit to India, his career is over within days. In the case of Schönbach, the fact that the admiral’s forced resignation was written about and talked about by the so-called “fourth estate”, the media, demonstrates the devastating internal state of the country.

It therefore comes as no surprise when leading active military officers follow similarly abstruse ideas about Russia, which are unfortunately typical of the country’s political leadership.

Lieutenant General André Bodemann, for example, claims on ntv that Germany is “no longer at peace” and is “attacked on a daily basis” (from minute four). He even claims that “Putin has said that he wants to restore the old territory of the Soviet Union” (from minute eight).

This statement by General Bodemann, the National Territorial Commander, is simply a lie, even if he is following in the intellectual wake of Foreign Minister Baerbock.

The Russian President has certainly and repeatedly commented on the Soviet Union, including on the question of its restoration. But like this:

“Anyone who does not regret the fall of the Soviet Union has no heart, and anyone who wants to see the Soviet Union re-established has no brains.”

This is how his press spokesman Peskov quoted him in an interview on February 28, 2023.

The General and his advisors are certainly aware of this. Which leads to the question: Why is one of the highest-ranking Bundeswehr generals lying?

General Bodemann, with his world view that does not correspond to the facts, is responsible for, among other things, an “Operational Plan Germany”, which serves to logistically ensure the deployment and transit of NATO troops through Germany to the east, i.e. towards Russia. This operational plan requires a separate, more detailed examination, as it not only documents who is carrying out which military preparations, it also includes the involvement of all civilian capacities in the deployment planning. This plan makes Germany a mandatory target in a possible military confrontation with Russia.

Other German military leaders have also recently been very open about planning missile attacks on Russian targets (Crimean Bridge), not to mention the current Defense Minister Pistorius’ ranting about the country’s war readiness and that the deployment of long-range American missiles will make Germany safer.

There is not a trace of an assessment of the situation that relies on diplomacy, reconciliation and de-escalation as a means of maintaining peace.

A military structure such as the Bundeswehr also acquires its social significance through the traditions in which it is placed by politics. Accordingly, the “Directive on the publication of supplementary information on the guidelines on the Bundeswehr’s understanding of tradition and the cultivation of tradition” of July 12, 2024, for which the Social Democrat Pistorius is responsible, must be interpreted accordingly.

It was 24 years ago that an exhibition focused on the war crimes demonstrably committed by the Wehrmacht during the Second World War.

Former general staff officers of the Wehrmacht as official role models for Bundeswehr soldiers, a Bundeswehr base in the Baltic States in the immediate vicinity of the Russian border – what’s next?

Who does German politics serve? What goals does it pursue?

Die Politik schafft den gesetzlichen Rahmen für das Funktionieren eines Gemeinwesens.

Politicians in German parliaments and governments often disguise their actions as being born out of political necessity, forced by the force of fact, so to speak. That may well be the case. However, it is astonishingly often the case that the problems complained about by big politics, which are then to be solved at great expense through legislative reforms or completely new laws – these in turn often to the detriment of large sections of the population – would not have arisen in the first place without the activities led by the party interests of parliamentarians and members of government.

Laws and regulations passed by politicians form the framework conditions that have led to the sad results mentioned at the beginning. They, the politicians, also ensure that laws can be complied with, circumvented or reinterpreted in terms of their content and effect. It is precisely the circumvention and reinterpretation, the ignoring of facts, even their deliberate denial, that has reached new political heights in recent years.

To this day, Chancellor Scholz declares, against his better knowledge, that Russia stopped exporting gas to Germany in 2022. An assertion that must make even fellow citizens who only watch ARD and ZDF suspicious. The fact that Germany refused to open the last intact section of Nordstream 2 simply to avoid giving Russia any revenue was virtually celebrated there. Olaf Scholz witnessed the announcement of this most serious attack on Germany’s economic sovereignty since the end of the Second World War by US President Biden.

Federal Economics Minister Habeck does not expect mass insolvencies in view of the permanently worsening framework conditions – meaning the multiplication of energy costs, price increases and inflation – but he can imagine“that certain industries will stop producing.”

Federal Foreign Minister Baerbock has seen herself at war with Russia since January 2023, without ever personally retracting this statement. On the contrary, on various occasions she has repeatedly shown that she has not even begun to understand the content, meaning and purpose of diplomacy.

These stars of German parliamentarianism are increasingly being joined by Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser, who will be discussed below.

Examples that show how the top politicians of the Federal Republic of Germany understand the need to “prevent harm to the German people”, as their oath of office states, and how overwhelmed they are by the office and, above all, the responsibility it entails for millions of citizens.

How does a community function?

A state has a variety of tasks. They are summarized in the constitution, in the case of Germany in the Basic Law. These include domestic tasks, such as the creation and maintenance of infrastructure, education, justice, etc., as well as the protection of the community both internally and externally.

The diverse system for solving the tasks set by the constitution is politics in all its facets.

In order to keep the community and the political system alive, the community authorizes representatives in the course of elections to perform certain partial tasks derived from the constitution on behalf of the community for a limited period of time. This is a connection that the appointed representatives increasingly no longer seem to be aware of.

The management of a community is not a mundane matter and should be placed in the hands of people who are up to the task, both professionally and personally.

The better these selected individuals fulfill their tasks overall, the greater the satisfaction within the community as a whole. The fulfillment of political tasks on the one hand and the stability, security and satisfaction of the population on the other are two sides of the same coin.

So much for the theory.

The examples described above from various areas of society prove that today’s politics is performing its constitutional tasks to an increasingly poor standard. The resulting dissatisfaction among the population is palpable for everyone.

If you then look at the people entrusted with solving the tasks, the result is not surprising.

No one would entrust a non-expert with the installation of electricity and water in their home, let alone with the management of a company. Yet this is exactly what Germany allows itself to do in the post of Minister of Economic Affairs.

Germany can also afford to appoint someone to the most important post after the chancellor – that of foreign minister – who does not have a proper professional qualification. Germany’s top diplomat has now proven to the world that, in addition to her professional deficits, she lacks the basic virtues necessary to fulfill any leadership role, such as politeness, tact, empathy and even a commanding knowledge of her mother tongue.

These ministers – like all other ministers – were appointed to their respective ministerial seats by their party. The people responsible for this personnel selection – the dual leadership of the Greens – also shine with the absence of even the slightest professional qualification.

Incidentally, both ministers, who do not meet the basic requirements for the office, even laid claim to the chancellorship in the 2021 federal elections.

What hubris. There seems to be a method to this madness.

The path to a leadership position describes one of the main problems in German politics.

In Germany, you can only become a minister, chancellor, president or even a member of parliament with the support of one of the established parties. The people standing for election are determined by the parties without exception. So you have to work your way up. There is no room for lateral thinkers, independent thinkers or non-conformists.

This applies to all political leaders, regardless of party.

Once you have reached the top, you owe this status above all to your reputation and standing in the respective party. Without them, he or she would never have got there and cannot hold their position against them.

Maintaining power is everything – expertise hardly counts

The conduct of elected members of parliament is based on the principle of retaining power. While there may still be outliers here and there at local level, state and federal politics are primarily geared towards remaining in power as a party.

The chosen one therefore makes policy – and he will prioritize the interests of those who paved the way for him. These are the party and its backers. The voters merely fulfill the function of a regulatory transmission belt.

The parties, their representatives and patrons are primarily interested in the forecasts for the next election. It is all about maintaining and expanding the position of power once it has been achieved.

Such an understanding of office naturally hinders the planning and implementation of all projects whose realization requires long-term thinking geared towards the interests of the electorate. Not to mention extraordinary situations such as the flood disaster in the Ahr valley. July 2024 marked the third anniversary of this disaster.

The actions of politicians – from the very bottom to the state and federal governments during and after the flood – were geared towards everything possible, but hardly towards the suffering of those affected.

Manu Dreyer, the responsible Minister President, survived the disaster politically unscathed and is now retiring. Two years before the next state election, she is “passing on” her position to someone else. For years, this has been a popular method throughout Germany for maintaining the power of the respective party without having to ask the sovereign.

When Angela Merkel “seized power”, the way of governing in Germany changed. Angela Merkel did not have the usual domestic power in her party that all her predecessors had been able to rely on. Nevertheless, she was able to get rid of rivals and the uncomfortable.

If a personality more or less left to her own devices was initially able to de facto coerce and marginalize her own party and then, over the course of her 16-year chancellorship, changing coalition partners, then there are not many possible explanations. It must have been very weighty personal arguments, for example, that persuaded CSU leader Edmund Stoiber and later the leader of his own party’s parliamentary group, Friedrich Merz – neither of whom were children of political reticence – to quietly and permanently withdraw from the Chancellor’s circle of influence and federal politics.

As Federal Finance Minister under Merkel, the current Chancellor had the opportunity to study the principle.

Olaf Scholz is notoriously forgetful, but he is not stupid. It was clear to him that he could not copy Merkel’s power system, he simply lacked the stature to do so.

Nevertheless, he perfected the system of retaining power in a way that is likely to keep the country busy for a long time to come.

First, he expanded the work of NGOs in Germany, following Merkel’s example. Millions and millions of taxpayers’ money flow into these “non-governmental organizations” to support the government’s course. There is now a state-funded “pro-government non-governmental organization” for everything and anything, but virtually none that criticize the work of politicians and still receive state funding.

For his original contribution to the system of maintaining power, Olaf Scholz found a federal comrade in spirit and action in Nancy Faeser (SPD).

As Federal Minister of the Interior, Ms. Faeser is the supreme employer of Mr. Haldenwang, the head of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.

It cannot have been a coincidence that the President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution testified about his understanding of democracy and the constitution at a public hearing of the presidents of the federal intelligence services by the Bundestag’s Parliamentary Control Committee on October 17, 2022. It is worth watching and listening to the entire section from minute 57:12 to 1:00:10.

The President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Mr. Haldenwang, develops his view of the world and his agency in public and with shocking openness, at the end of which he says the following word for word:

“There is also a danger … that the opposition will be monitored much more closely, that it is conceivable that vigorous action against members of the opposition, up to and including killing them, could be taken.”

For our non-German-speaking readers: This is the core message of the video excerpt.

The Bundestag defines the term opposition as follows:

“The opposition (Latin ‘opponere’: to oppose, to resist) are the parliamentary groups in parliament which, as a minority, oppose the federal government and the parliamentary groups of the governing majority. The political opposition is an essential element of modern democracies, as it performs parliamentary control tasks vis-à-vis the executive.”

In the name of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the guardian and patron saint of the Basic Law, its head is thus threatening members of the political opposition, who are officially defined “as an essential element of modern democracies”, with vigorous action against them “up to and including killing”.

This statement to the parliamentary committee of the German Bundestag responsible for the activities of the secret services did not provoke any protest, not even a question. One must therefore not only question Mr. Haldenwang’s understanding of his office and democracy, but also that of the Bundestag representatives present and that of Ms. Faeser.

It gets even more absurd.

On February 14, 2024, Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser presented a government plan to protect democracy against right-wing extremism together with the presidents of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Federal Criminal Police Office. In practice and in spirit, the measures listed there seamlessly follow on from what the heads of the intelligence services announced at the hearing before the Bundestag committee on October 17, 2022.

If you look at the short form of the package of measures alone, you get the impression that Germany is actually in a state of war or at least under siege. This is because the defined measures justify pretty much any destructive action against government critics of any stripe.

This impression in no way corresponds to the real situation, but it is extremely helpful for enforcing the package of measures mentioned and for pushing through a defined political agenda.

Reading the package of measures under this premise is thought-provoking.

At this point, it is important to remember the legally defined tasks of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Section 4 of the Federal Constitution Protection Act contains the following legal mandate, among others:

“The free democratic basic order within the meaning of this law includes

…

b) the binding of legislation to the constitutional order and the binding of executive power and jurisdiction to law and justice,

c) the right to form and exercise a parliamentary opposition,

…

f) the exclusion of any rule of force and arbitrary power, and

g) the human rights specified in the Basic Law.”

The Office for the Protection of the Constitution must therefore protect the exercise of an opposition within the sphere of action of the Basic Law, in contradiction to the publicly expressed understanding of the office and democracy of its president.

This closes the circle and brings us back to what was said at the beginning of the “Politics” section:

Above all else, the ruling politicians are concerned with retaining power. This is all the more true when state and federal elections are imminent, the outcome of which could not only call into question the usual majorities, but will do so according to the latest poll results.

Chancellor Merkel gave a foretaste of what Germany could be facing after the state elections in September 2024 in 2020. On February 6, 2020, she “canceled” the lawful formation of a government in Thuringia following the elections by telephone during her visit to South Africa.

Merkel said verbatim at the time:

“The election of this Prime Minister was a unique process that broke with a fundamental conviction for the CDU and also for me, namely that no majorities should be won with the help of the AfD,” she said in Pretoria, South Africa. “As this was foreseeable in the constellation in which the third round of voting took place, it must be said that this process is unforgivable and therefore the result must be reversed.”

The Federal Chancellor violently annulled a democratically made election decision by “ordre du mufti” against all law.

An understanding of politics that has since become part of the self-image of the political ruling circles in federal and state politics, but also in local politics.

Even though the AfD sued and the Federal Constitutional Court ruled two years later that Merkel had broken the law, Merkel had still achieved what she wanted: a state government more in line with federal policy came to power against the law. And Chancellor Merkel was not even punished.

Chancellor Scholz, Federal Minister of the Interior Faeser and the head of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution Haldenwang apparently want to use the package of measures adopted to ensure that undesirable political developments are prevented by “democratic” means, using “legal” force if necessary, and with parliamentary approval, if necessary by “vigorous action against members of the opposition, up to and including killing them”.

The following film sequence shows just how brazenly they are lying. Chancellor Scholz and his Interior Minister Faeser speak on the same day, practically at the same time, on the same topic and contradict each other diametrically in their statements, without this affecting political Germany in any way:

For our non-German speaking readers:

Chancellor Scholz makes his statement in public:

“In recent years, we have significantly reduced illegal migration, incidentally together with the states and local authorities….”.

On the same day, shortly after Olaf Scholz’s appearance, Federal Minister of the Interior Faeser said the following on the same subject:

“Irregular migration continued to dominate the day-to-day work of the Federal Police last year. Record figures were recorded in the area of unauthorized entry and smuggling of migrants.”

Outlook

Germany in 2024 is facing challenges that have not been seen since the Federal Republic of Germany was founded. In this crisis situation, the country is being led by a government that is widely regarded nationally and internationally as the most incompetent since 1949.

In addition, the so-called civil society forces – social organizations, churches, trade unions – are not critically supporting the government’s policies, but are largely uncritically backing the government line. In return, the government gives millions to this “opposition” in a variety of ways.

The upcoming state elections in three eastern German states in September will – if the election forecasts are even close to accurate – create an unprecedented new political reality. This is because in none of the three federal states would the so-called old parties be able to form a majority government – not even together. If the old parties continue to ignore the new political forces, i.e. the Alternative for Germany (AfD) and the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), and thus the will of the voters, there is a risk that some of the federal states will become ungovernable, as Germany, unlike other European countries, has no experience or political tradition of minority governments.

Source of the forecasts: INSA

If the predicted election results even come close to materializing, they will have a noticeable impact on the upcoming state elections in Hamburg next year, but above all on the federal elections in autumn 2025.

Reading the above-mentioned package of measures for the “fight against the right” from this perspective is thought-provoking.

It seems that the chalice of political and social degradation in Germany must be emptied to the brim before majorities can be found that will be able to turn the ship in a different, better direction.