Historian Heinrich August Winkler urges a comprehensive parliamentary review of Germany’s foreign policy in Eastern Europe. “There are good reasons to convene a parliamentary inquiry or an enquiry commission to examine German Russia‑policy in the Putin era” he told the magazine Focus.
When it comes to aid for Ukraine, Winkler delivers a harsh assessment of former Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD). Scholz’s “turning‑point” speech was “a great step forward” yet Germany fell short of its capabilities and what was required to support Ukraine. The historian predicts that the “judgment of historical scholarship” on Scholz’s actions will likely be “too late and too little”.
Under Lars Klingbeil, the Social Democrats broke with Gerhard Schröder’s Russia‑policy, but “a critical review of the second phase of Ostpolitik and the role of Egon Bahr still remains”. Bahr, who had great influence on the SPD’s Ostpolitik under Willy Brandt, once called the independent Polish trade union Solidarnosc a “threat to world peace”. Winkler also holds the coalition parties accountable for the Merkel era, when Nord Stream 2 was approved and implemented: “Political self‑righteousness gave neither CDU nor CSU any reason”.
Regarding Germany’s internal stability, Winkler’s verdict is mixed. Toward the end of the Weimar Republic there was a “negative majority against democracy”. From that period, and the street battles of 1932, modern Germany is “even further removed”. Yet “no far‑right party has ever attracted as many supporters as the AfD”. The AfD resembles “the German National People’s Party of late Weimar- the party that, in early 1933, had a decisive part in the power transfer to Hitler”.