Germany's 'nightmare' in Trump's victory!

Donald Trumpfile Photo: Reuters

The German government is living through a nightmare. The country had hoped Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris would win and follow in the footsteps of President Joe Biden to uphold the tradition of transatlantic and multilateral aid. But that hope was quickly dashed after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump won the election.

Now the German government is almost unprepared. Henning Hoff of the German Council on Foreign Relations felt that it was a mistake to rely entirely on the Democrats. The special relationship the chancellor developed with President Biden was perhaps a little too one-sided. The fact that there was no communication with the Trump camp will haunt him now.

The memory of Trump's first term as president from 2017 to 2021 is still very vivid in Berlin. At this time, Trump expressed his lack of confidence in NATO and threatened to withdraw US troops from Germany. Trump criticized Germany and other NATO countries for benefiting from US military protection without contributing enough to their own defense.

Henning Hoff believes that the important thing for the German government now is to "get over the failures". "A stronger signal is needed to show that the Europeans, especially the Germans, are really ready to shoulder a greater burden of defense," he said. If we keep bickering and arguing ourselves, we're not going to influence anybody in Washington, certainly not under Trump.'

Trump's past is a bad example for Germany!

One of the most important projects of the German government is 'Climate Action'. Germany wants to become carbon neutral and wants to make the entire economy carbon neutral by restructuring its energy sources. The Biden-Orange administration was a strong ally of Germany on this issue. Trump's election victory is likely to turn the US away from climate action. As a result, it will become more difficult for the German government to apply pressure using internationally binding rules to limit carbon emissions.

Donald Trump has always held up Germany as a bad example. Neither then-Chancellor Angela Merkel's policy of welcoming refugees in 2016, nor the current reliance on renewable energy instead of coal, oil and nuclear power, are Trump's favourites.

The German government now has to contend with a president like Trump on issues like security, trade and climate. "I'm already worried that some of what we've learned from Trump's first presidency will repeat itself," says Henning Hoff. The pressure on Germany, hatred towards Germany, these have not gone away.

It remains to be seen what Trump does in the first transatlantic meetings since taking office in January. During the 2016 election campaign, former German foreign minister and current president Frank-Walter Steinmeier once used the rather undiplomatic term "hate preacher" to refer to Trump. So far, however, Steinmeier has not had to invite Trump to Germany for a state visit.