February 12, 2024 - 10:00am
The cat is out of the bag. After months of denial, it is now conventional wisdom that Germany — and Europe more generally — faces deindustrialisation due to the end of cheap Russian piped gas. “Germany’s Days as an Industrial Superpower Are Coming to an End,” reads a headline on Bloomberg.
In Germany everyone is pointing fingers. The nation’s climate agenda is “more dogmatic than any other country I know,” Siegfried Russwurm, head of Germany’s main industry association, told the Financial Times. This talking point has started circulating widely in America and has spread to Europe via Right-wing commentators on social media. But it is a distraction — the Americans are becoming increasingly savvy at using culture-war issues to cover up negligence towards their European allies.
Really, the US told Germany and the rest of Europe that they would be able to substitute cheap Russian gas for American liquefied natural gas (LNG). While LNG would start out selling at a 40% premium to Russian piped gas, the Europeans were assured that costs would come down as investment in the sector increased.
This was always a fantasy. But to add insult to injury, in late January President Joe Biden paused new LNG export projects to appease green activists within the Democratic Party. If the Germans thought that foreign policy and support for core allies is more important to American politicians than frivolous party politics, they are now learning a hard lesson about how Washington operates.
If he is elected, Donald Trump will doubtless reverse this order. But by the time he does, the projects will already have fallen a year behind. Regardless, there is no chance that even enormous amounts of investment can render LNG more competitive than piped gas. LNG must undergo an expensive process of being compressed into a liquefied state and then transported on ships, and will always be substantially more expensive than simply pumping gas through a pipeline.
From London to Berlin, Western governments do not have a serious economic growth plan. Media outlets have started to admit this grim reality because there is no longer any point in denying it.
Privately, Americans shrug their shoulders and hint that this means they will no longer face competition from Europe. But watching the economy of your most dependable ally — not to mention a key trade partner — implode is not cynical Machiavellian statecraft: it is folly. American leaders talk about creating a new economic bloc which only includes “democratic” nations, only to dismiss the destruction of the European economy. It is obvious to everyone except the truest of the true believers: America has no strategy either.
The crisis in Germany is leading to a radical shakeup in electoral politics. The Right-wing Alternative für Deutschland has been extremely critical of the decision to stop buying cheap Russian gas and is currently second in the polls with around 20% of the vote. The newly launched Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht, which is critical of the decision from a Left-wing perspective, is already polling at around 8%.
America’s negligence of its core ally will likely lead to electoral tremors across the continent in the coming years. There is every chance that Europe will drift away from American influence and start to build pragmatic relationships with other countries. The big question is where this leaves Britain, which has much closer ties with the United States than the rest of the continent. It is a question that British leaders will have to ask themselves seriously moving forward.
Philip Pilkington is a macroeconomist and investment professional, and the author of The Reformation in Economics
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SubscribeThe LNG Export Pause is Irrelevant
Already-approved projects will add 28 bcf/d of capacity even if all pending decisions are canceled. That almost doubles existing U.S. export capacity
https://www.artberman.com/blog/the-lng-export-pause-is-irrelevant/
This much was obvious from … ermm … Nord Stream.
Europe/UK could also resume onshore gas exploration. In the UK we banned it in 2019, if we hadn’t it would be coming onstream now…
Germany’s problems are largely of its own making. And some are unavoidable (the demographics). Trying to pin the blame on the US is frankly childish.
Germany’s demographics blew up the NS pipelines?
Germany’s foolish choice to move to all green energy and be dependent on a Russian oligarch for their gas is what did them in.
That, and their unwillingness to provide for their own defense.
The Europeans have been slitting their own throats for at least two decades. They were living in some fantasy world.
Now the EU wants to kill their ability to produce food.
You cannot fix stupid and it is not the US’s job to do it for them or to continuously bail them out of their mistakes. We have enough to do keeping our left wing morons from driving us into poverty and starvation.
Be nice if Europe could actually be a strong partner. Ya know, one that can be more of a support than a burden so we could focus on the Pacific and on our own energy and industrial challenges. Suck it up boys and girls, work harder, work longer, pony up more men and women for your military, increase your military spending and scrap Net Zero. Build factories and nuclear power plants. Stop shutting down your ship building and steel making. Be something more than a tourist destination for the rest of the world.
I think a majority of UK citizens would endorse that point of view, but still we vote for those who take us in the opposite direction.
If the Rand paper is genuine, then installing a clutch of clowns and dunces in Germany’s government was all part of the plan.
“We have enough to do keeping our left wing morons from driving us into poverty and starvation.” Absolutely and totally true. Those leftists could take a page from the Russian experience with / rejection of communism, because of where that leads: “He clearly distinguished authentic, real, people’s Russia from the totalitarian system that plunged millions of people into sufferings and hard trials” … Vladimir Putin speaking at an unveiling of a monument to Alexander Solzhenitsyn in 2018. Other than that, if the US could refrain from blowing up North Africa and the Middle East, and sending jihadists from those areas into Bosnia and then kicking the Serbs out of Kosovo to get at Russia, creating an extension of Turkey and Albania into the European underbelly (Bondsteel don’t help), driving millions of economic and potentially political enemies into Europe that the leftists think are their Kumbaya responsibility … well, that might help.
Well, if Europe had its own robust defense and could provide for itself, then the US would not need to be involved in Europe at all. We could pull out our bases and the money we spend to lease space on Europe’s bases, and bring our troops home. Save us a bundle.
Sure, we could stay in NATO and leave some propositioned equipment there in case, but we could massively cut down our spending. And if Europe had the muscle it could stand up and deal with European issues without us, but they lack that muscle and because we provide it we get to call the shots. Don’t like it? Step up, take charge, build the military to deal with your problems. But be prepared for mandatory military service. Be prepared for cuts to social services. Be prepared for people to ask what Europe is going to do about the latest hot spot on the globe. Cuz let me tell you, everyone gripes about us when we do stuff and then they gripe when we do not do stuff they wanted us to do, but once Europe has the same kind of military strength the closer that hot spot is to Europe and not the US, people are gonna be asking the same things of Europe. Europe can provide fleets in the Pacific and the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic. Your gonna need about a dozen super carriers and their support ships. Your also gonna need thousands of multi-million dollar fighter and bomber aircraft, thousands of multimillion dollar tanks, missiles and lots of artillery. Your going to need a standing army of about 300,000 and another half million reservists, plus sailors and airmen. Your going to need many more attack submarines and probably a dozen ballistic missile submarines at a cost of billions each. Toss in space defense and cyber defense as well. You can plan on spending about $900 Billion a year and that does not count the cost of caring for veterans. So whatever your collective national budgets are, subtract that number from social services.
As for refugees fleeing to Europe from the Middle East. Sorry, that is on you. You opened your doors rather than pointing guns at them or putting up fences. Thank Merkel for that. But either way, Europe owns it.
Noise.
What, the sound of high explosives?
Drill baby drill is about as close to an economic strategy that you will get from any western democracy. The US has been an awful ally to Europe, but Europe is responsible for its own actions. Net zero is a degrowth policy at its very core. Any political leader who thinks otherwise is either incompetent or lying.
The EU was a US-backed project from the start; Jean Monet had CIA funding.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/04/27/the-european-union-always-was-a-cia-project-as-brexiteers-discov/
Why? Because it’s a lot easier to buy/blackmail the politicians running a single bloc than 30+ individual countries.
Europe’s “leaders”† are compradors, who have sold out “their” people for personal gain; regardless of what happens to Europe’s economies, Charles Michel, Ursula von der Leyen et al will prosper if they continue to obey their various Anglo-American string pullers. And those string pullers want Russia to be crippled economically, even if it means crippling Europe in the process.
†unlike other countries’ leaders, who of course are selfless, altruistic souls dedicated to the well-being of their people
When in doubt, blame America first?
In this case he did provide evidence even if it was only a single newspaper article. However, one can start from there and explore the links in the article further.
Once, many years ago, I remember an American ex-military telling me that the Netherlands was a testing ground for U.S. social engineering projects. He may have been a total crack-pot conspiracy theorist or maybe he was telling me the complete truth. After having lived there for many many years, however, I have to admit I don’t find his theory wholly unfeasible. There is something a little ‘programmed’ about Dutch behavior, particularly with regard to attitudes related to social issues.
‘Once, many years ago, I remember an American ex-military telling me that the Netherlands was a testing ground for U.S. social engineering projects.’
Are you sure he didn’t mean Ireland!
I thought America was a test ground for US social engineering projects. It certainly seems that way, as failed experiment after failed experiment has brought the US to the edge of social and political meltdown. The US determines very little in the greater scheme of things despite what it likes to think, from time immemorial all countries react to ‘events dear boy, events’.
The original ‘European project’ was largely a well thought out effort to avoid the frequent wars that beset the continent for generations.
That’s a pretty silly analysis. The world is a complicated place, but if the US did prefer a more unified European bloc, it certainly ought to have repented of it. Idiotic to set up a rival power with a potentially larger economy. And the EU has in practice often been anything but friendly to US business interests.
All that’s happening is the rubber is finally hitting the road.
A friend in the car trade says they believe the electric car push will hit the buffers. There’s no 2nd hand market for knackered batteries wrapped in car shaped lining.
Nobody in the car trade, here, Europe, or the USA expects it to continue, but nobody will say anything.
And the lid will blow at Wolfsburg, Stuttgart et al. over the proposed penalty fines for missing EV production *targets*, and at that point, economically, within and across the EU all bets are off.
That’s besides the general problems the German manufacturing and pharma sectors are facing generally from high energy prices.
Tesla is a higher market cap than the entire European car industry, and if the EU and European governments continue placing all chips on ‘EV’, BYD will soon be in a similar position.
The Mittlestand Motor sector supply chain is an Internal Combustion Engine supply chain and the EV supply chain isn’t in Stuttgart, Wolfsburg, outside Paris, or anywhere else; it’s in China.
The whole Net Zero thing has been an omni shambles of short-sightedness, complacency and hubris as big as almost any other one can think of throughout history, certainly modern history, maybe outside the blundering into the 2nd world war.
We don’t need to blame the US for German politicians own short-sighted ideologically driven self-harm policies. The US didn’t require them to row back on their nuclear energy program and increasingly rely on gas from Russia. Indeed, the despised US President Trump warned against excessive reliance on Russian energy. The Germans have shot themselves in the foot just as our own politicians are obsessed demonstrating their eco and climate credentials instead of ensuring continued prosperity for the population of the UK.
There is plenty of blame to go around, but there is a disturbing pattern here. Remember that Biden, on his very first day in office, denied the key permit needed for the Keystone XL Pipeline. The Biden administration, like the Obama administration before it, treats friends worse than enemies. Canada and Germany get stabbed in the back. Iran, meanwhile, gets plane loads of cash.
Biden’s messed us around as well. He’s incapable, and his horribly wokey ‘team’ seem to be making it up by committee and as they go along.
Yes, but he’s very open about his anti-British animus. It’s remarkable how he doesn’t even pretend to like GB.
If you give away your ‘friendship’ for nothing, then the recipient will not value it. The recipient will take the ‘friendship’ for granted and use its resources where they can make additional gains.
Canada and Germany have over decades been the major beneficiaries of US financed military protection. It’s not surprising that the US occasionally lashes out in spite.
No, Germany is driving Germany’s de-industrialisation. The Americans are *not* Europe’s babysitters. How about Europe takes responsibility for itself: it’s own security, energy policy, technology and so on, instead of grandstanding on industrial quantities of guff, as the EU is so fond of doing?
Germany, and the EU in general:
(1) Take a big shotgun called “Green Policies”, aim it at your foot, and shoot. Then complain the *Americans* are responsible for your industrial demise.
(2) Find the most capricious mafiosi despots out there (Putin and Xi please take a bow), and create a direct dependence on them, and then complain the *Americans* stiffed you when your relationships with Russia and China go south.
(3) Take a big shotgun called “demographics”, and this time aim it directly at your nads, and shoot. Then complain the *Americans* are responsible for the fact that you have not enough young people, not enough babies, and a rapidly ageing population which is no longer innovating.
Well, the Americans either carried out the pipeline explosions or know who did. And we now have a halt to LNG exports. It’s not like the Germans’ issues are completely self-inflicted, and at least two of your three points could apply to the US, specifically the green boondoggle and the domestic birth rate. As to #2, we’ve decided to be the third mafia outfit in the brewing conflict, because conflict is good for certain interests.
For the love of God.
Who cares who blew up the Russian pipeline?
The point is that Europe put itself at risk by being dependent on that foreign pipeline in the first place. Russia is NOT your buddy. Trump told you that. It was so obviously dumb.
And you are not wrong about the US issues with China and population, but outside of Africa, population growth is an issue across the globe.
But the US has not gone nearly as far down the rabbit hole as Europe yet and a lot of us are watching Europe and seeing a canary in the coal mine and doing all we can to fight the insanity off.
But, all that aside, we still have the ability to defend ourselves militarily, we CAN produce enough energy for ourselves, and we CAN produce enough food for ourselves and we CAN rebuild our manufacturing base given time. Europe could do those things as well, it simply CHOOSES to keep making itself vulnerable and dependent with stupid policies.
From an American point of view, we would love nothing more than for Europe to get its head out of its backside, produce all the energy it can by whatever means it can, build a military strength comparable to our own so we can focus elsewhere, and rebuild its manufacturing base. That way Europe can help carry the burden beyond just giving speeches at the UN.
On the money.
Good points but the pipeline wasn’t anybody else’s to blow up. It’s an act of economic war against Germany. If they chose to get gas from Russia that’s their business.
Well said, Daniel P. Europe should stop being stupid and Get Smart. 2%+ of GDP on military, quit freeloading off the US, produce energy using a smart mix of renewables and non-renewables, stop exporting your heavy industry to China, encourage your young people to Get Married and Have Kids (instead of importing millions of Muslim Arabs to take their place), and support family-oriented policies. Quit with the heavy hand of government and let people be free to prosper.
The US politicos talk a good game in public about green tech, but US energy use and greenhouse outputs are still going up. With politicians, watch the hands, not the mouth. As for US demographics, they are way healthier than Germany, not least because they are nicking the best and the brightest young people from around the world.
We’re importing millions that are anything but the best and brightest. It’s not a sustainable strategy, unless your goal is to undermine a society and create chaos.
We’re not importing the best people. The Americans and Canadians are. The Americans are also importing big numbers of less highly skilled people from central and south America, and a mix from Mexico.
“As for US demographics, they are way healthier than Germany”.
Not in the Greens view. But, of course, they dont consider supporting the pyramid scheme that is Germany’s and other Western nations’ welfare schemes in their analysis.
Actually, CO2 emissions in the US has been steadily dropping since natural gas has replaced coal as the primary energy source for power plants.
They could, but what’s that got to with it? Germany’s ludicrous anti nuclear stance has diddly squat to do with the US.
Just wondering if there’s any neuronal firings going on between Kotak’s ears at all.
Sad, so sad – when one thinks what might have been – if he weren’t so brainwashed by CIA/State Dept propaganda.
I’ve outsourced all my neuronal firings to GPT-4 🙂
Spot on.
You seem to think this is a bug – no, it is a feature. Anglo-centric neocon certainty has for more than a century been to prevent any chance of a link-up between Germany and Russia.
The initial hope was that Project Ukraine would destroy Russia. But Plan B – destroying Germany – will do just as well.
This success of their plan of course raises the question of how Europe will now be able to afford to buy all those weapons the US MIC needs to sell. But the hallmark of neocons has been their ideological monomania, not their ability to think strategically or at all.
Indeed. As Ismay himself remarked, NATO is all about keeping Germany down, Russia out, and America in.
Bingo.
A couple of years ago, there was a document claiming that the RAND Corporation in the US wanted to weaken Germany: https://disk.yandex.com/d/jxD85BQemPfz1A
It’s hard to say for certain if the document was real or a rather elaborate ruse, but the events that have followed it make the question worthwhile. The pipeline blast clearly impacted the Germans. As this article notes, Team Biden has put a halt to LNG exports in a move that also is a shot across Texas’ bow since those ingrates dare to complain about the border being overrun.
Yandex is a Russian resource. There’s a lot of conspiracy information there.
In general, it should be borne in mind that no one can destroy Germany faster and more effectively than the Germans.This applies to the UK and the US too.
There has been no halt to US nat gas exports, only a likely temporary block of permits to build new liquefied bat gas terminals. Where do you get such bogus information?
A nation that literally sits on the richest shale gas deposits and could supply all of Europe blames America for its economic problems. I do not even mention their idiotic decision to close the remaining nuclear power plants no matter what.
The author has the right to think that America is guilty (as usual), we still have freedom of speech, but why does he consider us idiots when telling this fascinating story?
PS. Of course Biden is an idiot, but nothing more than the German politicians.
Got coal?
Yep, no shortage of lignite across Europe. And some of the Scandinavians plus the UK still have access to large quantities of off shore oil. And the UK has no shortage of shale, precisely the reason the US and Canada are now completely energy independent. And there is always nuclear.
What is needed is the will to get past the interest groups, and use the energy that you have to hand. Alternatively, grandstand on your ‘principles’ and drive your citizens into penury.
What a crock.
Nobody told the European’s to go haywire on green energy but their own politicians.
It was not the US that told the Europeans to cut back on nuclear and try to get by on solar and wind and be dependent on a Russian oligarch for the rest. In fact I am pretty sure Trump warned Germany and Europe generally that was a really bad idea.
Europe HAS access to energy, it is just unwilling to tap it. Do not blame the US for that.
Biden is a fool. The progressive left is an anchor around the neck of the country. Yes, Biden’s move was to protect his left flank politically because he is dealing with the same kind of idiots that got Europe into the mess it is in.
Even then, his actions were more symbolic than real. LNG will continue to flow and the volumes will continue to grow. The new facilities may or may not get delayed but I am guessing that if they do it will be for a few months at most.
And exactly WHERE is Europe going to turn for these new “pragmatic relationships”? China? Russia? Some middle eastern bloc? India?
Bottom line, Europe is not now and is not likely to be a major power. It cannot defend itself. It is dependent on the US for its defense, dependent on China for production, dependent on the US, Africa and the middle east for its energy. The only thing Europe can produce enough of for itself is food and the EU is doing its damnedest to squash that too.
Do not blame the US for not taking even more care of you. It is not our job, particularly when you are unwilling to do what you can to take care of yourselves. You slit your own throats on energy. You refuse to pay for your own defense and would lose your minds if you had to. Until Europe has energy independence and can credibly provide for its own defense it is going to be dependent on external powers and that dependence comes with a loss of freedom of choice. But Europe, for its own political reasons, is unwilling to do either of those things.
Perfect summary. It’s a question of leadership, and we elect the fools making these choices.
What is REALLY driving German problems is loss of control in energy sourcing. Specifically, the German choice to listen to the stupidest people in any political arena – the Green Morons – is destroying Germany. Removing the nuclear plants – beyond stupid. Nuclear is actually a Green solution, but the Greens are too stupid to see even this. Add to that the continent-wide destruction of farmers and farming in some insanely stupid reduction in greenhouse gases.
It’s continental suicide.
Merkel already planted the seed of Germany’s current economic woes years ago with her “Energie Wende”, believing that Germany could exist with wind and solar power alone, supported by cheap gas from Russia. Ever since Fukushima, she also accelerated the date of switching off all nuclear plants, bowing to the Green Party’s opposition to all nuclear power, because of its toxic waste. So far this was all home made and had nothing to do with America until the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the new German government decided with its allies to heavily sanction Russia. This meant no more cheap Russian gas for its energy intensive industry.
You could see Putin’s smirk on his face as he told TC, that the US basically robbed Germany of its cheap energy supply by sabotaging North Stream’s pipe lines. But he also explained, that there are still lots of other pipes available ready to open up the gas stream to Germany, if they’ll drop their sanctions.
So now the Germans will have to decide to stick with their allies or dropping all the sanctions…
Yep. It is obvious. But from the US side as you see in comments here, only denial. The former Australian PM leapt in to please America over China-bashing, China being by far Australia’s greatest trading partner, and America instantly took 90% of the trade Australia lost. The Australian PM called this outcome “disappointing.” Our leaders are children.
This is a by far underachieving article by the standards I know and expect from UnHerd.
The starting point is superficial in its incompleteness and the conclusions are therefore incomplete at best, yet misleading for sure.
“Germany faces deindustrialisation due to the end of cheap Russian piped gas” – only if you turn a blind eye at the closure and at least attempted destruction of state of the art nuclear power plants, at the refusal to drill German natural gas of which there is enough for the next decades, and finally at the fact that e.g. Austria, without interruption and reduction, continues to pipe Russian gas and can do so as a EU member.
Yes, Germany does face deintrustrialisation, but due to her own policy decisions, not only in no longer buying Russian piped gas, but in its entire energy policy.
“Germany´s ruling parties are driving Germany´s deindustrialisation” would be the correct headline. And these ruling parties do not deny it, they stand by their policies and its consequences as justified.
America and other countries might take advantage of these German policy decisions, they might even support or contribute to them. But the political responsibility fully lies with German politicians who decidedly do not follow the energy policies of most other European and most EU countries which save these countries from deindustrialisation.
A final note: What is the point in an analysis that the criticism of these policies has spread in “Right-wing commentators on social media”? Is this of any relevance to the fact of Germany´s deindustrialisation and of its causes?
Hans, yes and something more could have been said. But the US initiative, which is hand-in-glove with a consistent covert strategy of locking Russia out of her seamless re-integration with Western Europe since 1991 – the US’s worst strategic nightmare on so many levels – was simply a knockout event for a weakened economy. With no consideration of the real interests of Germany. None. Now that is shocking. Germany needs her own foreign policy, in the interests of her people, which she has not had since 1945.
Shocking that the USA didn’t consider Germany’s interests. SMH
The key thing to abide by in life is: “Never forget, never forgive.” That and “dig two graves.”
Maybe Europe could start reversing their restrictions on oil and gas drilling, especially shale gas fracking. Then they won’t have to whine and blame everyone else for their lack of access to reliable energy. There is un-tapped shale fracking potential under Continental Europe and GB.
But Global Warming, I mean Global Cooling, no Climate Change!
The ‘green’ ideology is destroying Europe, not the USA.
Not yet.
Eh?! Lots of good analysis here, but why is the United States primarily responsible for Germany’s ludicrous self sabotage climate and energy policies? Ok, America has some of its own, but is certainly not responsible for example for Germany’s anti nuclear insanity.
I don’t think political and economic isolation is possible or even sensible, but the failure to ensure the basic resource, energy and military security of a state is an absolute abrogation of most of its purpose.
Strange there’s no mention of Germany’s entirely self-conceived and orchestrated closure of its nuclear plants, or of the fact that Germany’s industrial seppuku at the alter of “Paris” and “Green”was well underway prior to Putin invading Ukraine.
Germans are learning the hard way that the American empire is not their friend. We learned that in 1956.
Agreed! Europe should stop being stupid and Get Smart. 2%+ of GDP on military, quit freeloading off the US, produce energy using a smart mix of renewables and non-renewables, stop exporting your heavy industry to China, encourage your young people to Get Married and Have Kids (instead of importing millions of Muslim Arabs to take their place), and support family-oriented policies. Quit with the heavy hand of government and let people be free to prosper.
Nonsense. The greens and the net zero fanatics are at fault.
Perhaps Germany and the rest of Europe should consider drilling for oil and gas in the prospective shale stratigraphy that underlies much of GB and Continental Europe, instead of relying on shale oil and gas from the US and whining when the supply doesn’t meet their needs.