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> because of political and ideological priorities over pragmatism

FWIW, depending on cheap Russian gas was very pragmatical and it worked well for the economy.




Yep...

But I still don't understand how the people (and opposition politicians, businesses, etc.) don't get mad with the government about the nordstream issue.... the destruction caused a lot of damage to the german economy, ecologically it was a huge disaster, and somehow there is no blame game, no consequences, no nothing... some fingerpointing, some "we don't know", some "yeah maybe it was..", and quiet. It's like a local kebab store burned down, "we don't know exactly what happened, but we won't use too many resources to find out, because it's not worth it"... except that it's literally billions of damage in this case, and 'noone cares'.


Germans have very weird relationship with russia. That we, east of germany and west of russia dont quite understand. They always think, that russia will be better this time. Quite naive. And dont want to anger it.


My feeling is that Germans just don't care about Eastern Europe somehow. Germans are generally comfortable knowing that the money they spend on Russian hydrocarbons will be used to attack and destabilise their "allies" to their East. As long as it doesn't directly impact them they don't care.


And what if it turns out that Germany is currently sending billions of euro to the country that blew it up? I don't think anyone in the government wants to answer this question


I wouldn't be surprised if ALL German politicians were getting kickbacks for Russian gas. All politicians in power are very corrupt.


But not very strategic.


It wasn't, but also Germany's strategic options are limited. US, being its strategic ally, is also its economic rival, and will not hesitate using its advantage of having own energy source. Self-sufficiency solely on renewables is also not an option, at least short and middle term.


Germany had a reliable energy source with many sources of fuel.

And then turned it off for no good reason at all. (Lots of bad reasons).


Leaving nuclear energy aside, European countries have massive reserves of shale gas. They decided not to exploit them and to be dependent on foreign powers instead. We read about Russia but now Germany imports from the US (shale gas!) and Qatar. The US have won the jackpot with the war in Ukraine: split Russia and Germany, and reaps the dollars as well.


They could start fracking... now their industry is going down, energy is going up and they cant even see US.




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