"..Schmidt, too, was observing how even well-educated Russians didn’t seem to understand that the West operated by the rule of law '..that made the West look weak in Putin’s eyes. He despises us completely.'
Indeed, even as Germany’s government was trying to maintain a working relationship with the Kremlin — many say for the sake of German business —people like Müller, Gärtner and Schmidt realised that a train crash was inevitable. But in Berlin, politicians were assisted by advisers with little experience in Russia and often with scant command of the language. Christoph Heusgen, who was Angela Merkel’s key foreign policy adviser, is an EU specialist. The UK has no accidental cadre of experts on Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, nor do France, the United States or any other Western country. I asked Müller, Gärtner and Schmidt whether anyone from the German government had ever contacted them. Never, they told me, nor have they heard of any of their fellow graduates being contacted. ‘I would like to tell the politicians, “you’re welcome to ask us about Russia!’” Müller said. ‘We know both sides. We can read between the lines. Sure, we can’t establish world peace, but we can help German decision makers understand how Russia works. That way, they’d be equipped to make better-informed decisions. Where are the Russia specialists in the German diplomatic service? They don’t exist. As a result of such lack of expertise, we’ve had a complete failure in our Russia policy. And now ordinary people are suffering.'
Currently, the only Russian subject on Western governments’ agendas is helping Ukraine in the war. But one day it will end, and Western governments will once again face the question of how to handle Russia..’''..the Soviet university degrees turned out to be more useful than they might have seemed when the Soviet Union collapsed, because the 1990s made ex-Soviet republics extremely desirable business destinations. Entire economies had to be reformed. Companies in sectors ranging from mining to agriculture needed new equipment. Western businesses saw limitless opportunities — and German ones had the singular fortune of having at their disposal thousands of ex-East Germans who not only spoke Russian but knew the former Soviet republics from the inside. Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan became the life for many of these former East German students. Müller and Gärtner have spent their entire careers shuttling back and forth between Germany and Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, with Kazakhstan occasionally part of their work too.
After graduating in 1995, Schmidt got a job setting up a German firm’s Russian operations. That meant moving to Moscow, and he remained in the Russian capital even when the excitement of the early years began to dissipate. ‘The first years of Putin…well, he did a lot,’ he told me. ‘He lowered the taxes, he streamlined the taxation system, he made it easy to pay taxes. But by 2010, it had become a hugely corrupt system.’ Especially after Russia’s annexation of Crimea, the propaganda masquerading as news became increasingly pervasive. Schmidt watched German news, too, but he wondered what his fellow Moscow residents made of it all.
Even in the world of industrial machinery, something was changing. In the noughties and 2010s, Gärtner said, ‘we were still getting lots of contracts, but we were noticing that Russian firms were increasingly able to build machinery at the same level. I had a client who told me, “we buy spare parts from you, then we send them to Omsk, where there’s a factory that reverse-engineers it”. We slowly realised they wanted to build up their own thing and import less.’ Schmidt, too, was observing how even well-educated Russians didn’t seem to understand that the West operated by the rule of law. ‘I remember when BP’s Moscow office was raided in 2011 on very spurious ground, and friends of mine said, “why on earth doesn’t the UK respond?” They suggested the government should go to, say, Roman Abramovich’s office in London and tell the people there that they were violating the rules for the lighting at the desk of Abramovich’s secretary or some such, and they were going to close down his company. I told them, “we’re democracies, we can’t just punish people like that”. But the Russians can do such things to us. They can close down Western companies in Russia just because they want to. That’s something that our politicians simply didn’t really understand, and that made the West look weak in Putin’s eyes. He despises us completely.’ In December 2021, Schmidt concluded that remaining in Moscow was untenable and he returned to Germany.
Indeed, even as Germany’s government was trying to maintain a working relationship with the Kremlin — many say for the sake of German business —people like Müller, Gärtner and Schmidt realised that a train crash was inevitable. But in Berlin, politicians were assisted by advisers with little experience in Russia and often with scant command of the language. Christoph Heusgen, who was Angela Merkel’s key foreign policy adviser, is an EU specialist. The UK has no accidental cadre of experts on Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, nor do France, the United States or any other Western country. I asked Müller, Gärtner and Schmidt whether anyone from the German government had ever contacted them. Never, they told me, nor have they heard of any of their fellow graduates being contacted. ‘I would like to tell the politicians, “you’re welcome to ask us about Russia!’” Müller said. ‘We know both sides. We can read between the lines. Sure, we can’t establish world peace, but we can help German decision makers understand how Russia works. That way, they’d be equipped to make better-informed decisions. Where are the Russia specialists in the German diplomatic service? They don’t exist. As a result of such lack of expertise, we’ve had a complete failure in our Russia policy. And now ordinary people are suffering.’
Currently, the only Russian subject on Western governments’ agendas is helping Ukraine in the war. But one day it will end, and Western governments will once again face the question of how to handle Russia. Germany’s accidental Russia experts will not be able to present a complete strategy, but it stands to reason that their advice would outclass the advice German governments have received over the past years. ‘When the war is over, maybe that’s when they’ll ask our advice,’ Müller reflected. ‘I don’t want to believe that 30 years of experience with Russian-speaking countries, and with ordinary people in Russia and Belarus, can dissolve into thin air.’
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It’s time Germany brought its Russia experts in from the cold, April 29, 2022
Context'..successfully defend Ukraine, but also work on its postwar reconstruction..'The Russian president is a prisoner of his own delusions – and the similarities with Hitler are hard to ignore(Russia's war of brutality) - 'There's little denying at this point that Russia's invasion of Ukraine has been an unmitigated military and economical disaster..'(Cult of the dead) - The problem: [the] imperial structure of Russia and .. its imperialist mindset(Embargo on Russian oil and gas) - Full embargo on oil could stop war - ex-Putin aide