Ahead of the G7 summit in early June, the media revealed that the U.S. government had long collaborated with Danish intelligence to illegally monitor and eavesdrop on germany, a key NATO ally. This undoubtedly cast a new shadow over the subsequent summit and even the Biden administration's rebuilding of allies and the international credibility of the United States. The massive illegal U.S. surveillance of Germany was first disclosed in the Prism Gate incident by edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency (NSA) employee. A 2010 document declassified by Snowden shows that the United States has long been engaged in illegal surveillance in European countries, from senior EU officials to ordinary people, of which targets in Germany have been identified as an important focus of wiretapping, and the eavesdropping campaign against the current chancellor Angela Merkel herself has also begun in 2002, when she was the leader of Germany's main opposition party and considered a rising political star.
This article mainly discusses the potential reasons why the United States, regardless of its own international image and NATO allies, should carry out illegal surveillance activities for such a long time, with such a wide range of goals and such a great intensity against Germany, which belongs to the same ideological Western camp and has broad common interests in economy and security, and analyze the potential impact of the US surveillance on Germany.
Surveillance of Germany: U.S. Allies 'Estranged from Each Other'
President John F. Kennedy's statement in his inaugural address that "national interest is more powerful than ideology" undermines the essence of contemporary international relations. Alliances between nations are based on common national interests. However, no two countries in the world have exactly the same interests. Even between the United States and its allies, there are many differences on economic and security issues. Since national interests are the center of foreign policy, even if they are allies with the same ideology and have broad common interests, as long as there are differences in interests, in order to grasp the dynamics of the other party in time to occupy a favorable position in the game, it is entirely possible to secretly spy on each other. The divergence of interests between the United States and Germany will be highlighted below.
At the same time, there are also close and estranged within America's Western allies. Five Eyes, an intelligence-sharing coalition of five English-speaking countries in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, is the closest security cooperation and intelligence-sharing mechanism among them, and theoretically, the five countries will not spy on each other. However, as an ally of the United States and not the Five Eyes Alliance in the Western world, it is difficult to avoid being spied on by the United States. Moreover, Nazi Germany during World War II and East German regimes during the Cold War were enemies of the United States, and the history of hostility determined that the United States had an innate distrust of Germany, which continues to this day.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="9" > the historical and cultural reasons behind German listening</h1>
Continuing from the above, the US surveillance of Germany has a lot to do with the history of Germany and even the Cold War. As we all know, after the end of the Second World War and the fall of the Cold War's Iron Curtain, the whole of Germany and Berlin were split in two. Geographically, Germany naturally became the front line of the US-Soviet struggle for hegemony, and it also became the forefront of large-scale espionage activities between the United States and the Soviet Union. During this period, Berlin was known as the "European Capital of Espionage". In the 1950s, American operatives even dug tunnels from West Berlin into the underground of East Berlin and installed eavesdropping equipment on telephone lines at important facilities. The monitoring center of the US and British intelligence services for broadcasting frequencies in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe was also set up in West Berlin. It can be seen from this that the United States has a long history of spying in Germany, and sufficient personnel and necessary equipment are readily available, providing a material basis for continuing espionage work in Germany after the Cold War. The gap between the intelligence services of the United States and Germany sowed the seeds at that time: on the one hand, the West German intelligence services were reluctant to share all the information with the CIA; on the other hand, the CIA had long suspected that the West German intelligence services had been seriously infiltrated by East Germany and the Soviet Union, and had many reservations about intelligence sharing, and was more willing to personally experience intelligence gathering; and for the intelligence provided by West German allies, in the words of President Reagan, most of them were "trust and confirmation." Verify) attitude.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="44" > the US surveillance of Germany reflects the different national interests of the two countries: take the Middle East, Russia, and China as an example</h1>
The more important reason is that although Germany's foreign policy and guiding ideology are many different from those of the United States as an ally of the United States and a member of NATO, it is a direct reflection of the different security and economic interests of the two countries. Since the end of the Cold War, Germany has spoken out against U.S. independence on many international issues: in the Middle East, Germany was one of the countries that explicitly opposed the United States' war in Iraq. And unlike many NATO members, nato also has a negative attitude toward NATO's armed intervention in the Libyan civil war. In the 10 years since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, Germany, while condemning the Assad regime like other Western countries and expressing its verbal support for the cruise missile attacks launched by the United States and its allies against the Syrian government in 2017 and 2018, the German government has made it clear that Germany will not participate in military intervention. In addition, the Withdrawal of the United States from the Iran nuclear deal, the maximum pressure on Iran, and the Unprincipled support of Israel in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are all opposed. In terms of policy toward Russia, post-Cold War German-Russian relations were relatively good and moderate. Former German Chancellor Gehard Schröder had a close personal friendship with Russian President Vladimir Putin and even chaired the supervisory board of a Russian energy company after leaving office; although Germany participated in economic sanctions against Russia after Russia annexed Crimea, Germany even risked retaliation from the United States to approve the project's advance on the recent construction of the Nord Stream 2 Russian gas pipeline. In terms of China policy, although Germany and the European Union basically hold the same anti-China views as other Western countries on Huawei, Hong Kong-related Xinjiang-related issues, etc., the actual actions taken by the legislative and administrative branches of the German government are relatively slow and lagging behind those of the United States and Britain.
Nord Stream natural gas pipeline project roadmap
Schroeder's close friendship with Putin
All in all, Germany has adopted an independent foreign policy on the hot issues of the Middle East, Russia, and China, and is mostly more moderate than that of the United States. This reflects Germany's own security and economic interests: Europe is geographically closer to the Middle East than the United States, and once new turmoil and conflict break out in the Middle East, Europe will inevitably be affected, as exemplified by the refugee crisis that began in 2015; Germany's dependence on Russian natural gas makes it impossible for Germany to adopt a radical and hostile strategy like the United States; and China has become Germany's most important trading partner for five consecutive years, and economic and trade cooperation far exceeds the ideological differences between the two countries. Therefore, out of consideration for its own interests, the German government has relatively left room for policy in the Middle East, Russia, and China. However, for the United States, these actions of allies show that they are not always "reliable" in international affairs, and IT is natural for US intelligence services to judge in advance the possible movements of the German government through mass surveillance and take targeted measures so that the United States can occupy a favorable position in negotiations or pressure.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="45" > Refugees and garrisons: other possible causes of surveillance in Germany</h1>
Germany's refugee problem is also one of the possible factors in the US surveillance of Germany. The more than 1 million refugees Germany has received since 2015 do pose some national security risks. For example, the perpetrator of a truck collision at a Christmas market in Berlin in December 2016 was a refugee seeking asylum. And according to statistics, the German police have foiled more than a dozen similar attack attempts. Then, it is also reasonable to believe that the US surveillance of Germany also covers these asylum seekers, one is to help allies detect potential terrorist threats, and the other is to provide guidance and reference for their own refugee policies and domestic and foreign counter-terrorism struggles.
Finally, it is worth mentioning that Germany is also the European country with the largest number of US troops, with as many as 35,000 active duty US soldiers deployed in Germany. The day-to-day operation of such a large military presence also includes the collection of massive amounts of military and civilian intelligence, and surveillance is an important means of intelligence gathering. Their country will naturally be an important target for surveillance.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="46" > potential impact: allies, folk, and elections</h1>
In fact, the German government has already taken steps to counter U.S. surveillance: after Snowden first disclosed the existence of the surveillance program against Germany, the German government ended an intelligence exchange agreement with U.S. and British intelligence agencies in August 2013, and in 2014, Germany expelled an intelligence officer at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin suspected of participating in the surveillance program. However, these countermeasures are difficult to really stop the US surveillance of Germany. And because the broad political, economic, and security common interests of the two countries are now far more important than the potential damage these eavesdropping programs can cause to NATO allies, it is also likely that the disputes brought about by surveillance will eventually stop at differences within the camp without substantially wavering the alliance.
The surveillance behavior of the United States may bring new rifts to the people-to-people relations between the two countries. Historically, the German public has suffered from large-scale illegal surveillance. From the Gestapo of Nazi Germany to the Stasi of East Germany during the Cold War, the totalitarian government used the control of the people to consolidate its rule, and strangled all rebellious ideas and speeches in the cradle, which also made the people endanger themselves and the social atmosphere suppressed terror. And today, thirty-one years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and german reunification, it is entirely possible that a new round of mass surveillance will awaken painful memories of the older generation of Germans and cause resentment, panic and even anger among the younger generation. Only this time, the side of the surveillance is no longer its own totalitarian government, but Germany's biggest ally, the United States. This is likely to fuel anti-American sentiment among Germans and create a rift in the relations between the two peoples.
In fact, Germany has always been a country with strong anti-American sentiment in Europe. A Pew poll found that as of 2019, 64 percent of Germans believe that relations between Germany and the United States are not good, and only 34 percent think that relations are good. That number may improve with the Biden administration's efforts to rebuild its alliance, but the recent spate of new surveillance will cast a new shadow over the relationship.
The people of the United States and Germany have diametrically opposed views on bilateral relations
On September 26, 2021, Germany will hold elections for the Bundestag, and a new Federal Chancellor will be elected. Unlike the presidential system in the United States, Germany's form of government is a parliamentary republic, and the de facto supreme leader, the Federal Chancellor, is usually the leader of the majority party in the Bundestag (Der Deutsche Bundestag). Although German-American relations are an important part of foreign affairs that can affect the German election, and the German people are dissatisfied with the surveillance, I am afraid that this incident will not really affect the outcome of the German election.
Recent polls by political parties in the German general election, Merkel's Union Party leads (CDU/CSU)
Merkel and four U.S. presidents
According to a survey by the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies, relations with the United States are an important part of foreign affairs that may affect the German election, and popular concerns include whether Germany's contribution to NATO's defense spending should rise, whether to continue to implement nuclear weapons sharing within NATO, and whether to require the United States to withdraw its nuclear weapons deployed in Germany and join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. At the heart of these issues is the extent to which Germany can rely on or be independent of U.S. influence, which once again reflects Germany's own different security interests from that of the United States, and explains the German government's adherence to a relatively independent diplomatic approach and a certain public opinion base. Then, for the sake of electoral interests, German political parties will condemn the SURVEILLANCE OF THE UNITED STATES. Merkel's Coalition party, which is composed of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Bavarian Christian Social Union ("CSU"), is currently the highest poll in Germany, and if the leader of this party continues to be the chancellor, it is expected that Germany will continue its policy toward the United States in the Merkel era, and the new German government will also introduce new countermeasures against US surveillance without harming the alliance between the two countries.
Although, as mentioned above, many Germans do not have a good impression of the United States, as of now, the monitoring of Germany by the United States and even the entire German-American relationship is not the core concern of voters in this election. German voters are primarily concerned with issues such as climate change, environmental protection, economics and employment, and transportation; external issues play a very limited role in German elections, and usually only in the context of specific international events will have a real impact on elections (examples of such international events include the Iraq War, and the impact on elections, such as the rise in polls by former Chancellor Schroeder because of his anti-war stance).
Therefore, the views and opinions of various parties on issues such as the US-Germany surveillance will not be a decisive factor influencing the decisions of German voters.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="47" > summary</h1>
U.S. surveillance of allies is not the only one now, nor is it directed at Germany, nor does it show any signs of stopping in the short term. Constrained by the gap in national strength between the two countries and objectively widespread common interests, it is difficult for the German government to solve this problem alone. Because in contemporary German electoral politics, domestic issues are far more important than external issues, although the negative impact of US surveillance on the relations between the two countries is concentrated at the civilian level, this negative impact is difficult to be directly reflected in the results of the German election. We will soon find answers to what new changes will take in German public opinion in the future, what measures the new German government will take to continue to monitor the United States, and how all this will affect the cooperation between NATO allies.
Original title:
Eavesdropping Storm: Why was Germany injured?
Author of this article:
Jin Zhilin, Research Assistant, Haiguo Tuzhi Research Institute
Review:
Guo Lei Ge Jianhao
This article is selected from "American Political Tracking", please indicate the source when reprinting
"American Political Tracking" is an American research journal exclusively launched by the Haiguo Tuzhi Institute after the revision of the "Daily Express of Sino-US Relations" in December 2018, which maintains continuous attention to the internal affairs of the United States by sorting out and following up on the internal dynamics of the White House, the trend of partisan competition, the situation in various states in the United States and the development trend of Sino-US relations, and cooperates with the future election forecast.
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