转一篇昨天《金融时报》上的文章
Hours after Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crashed in a field in eastern Ukraine, killing 298 people and igniting a geopolitical crisis, Angela Merkel reacted to the news with the same quality that has characterised much of her political life: caution.
It was “too early” to discuss new sanctions against Moscow, the German chancellor said, even as claims were already surfacing that Russia-backed separatists had shot down the plane.
“These events have once again shown us that what we need is a political solution,” she said, repeating her mantra that there was no alternative but to talk to Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Less than two weeks later, Ms Merkel emerged as the most important backer of sweeping EU sanctions hitting Russia’s defence, energy and financial sectors and deepening the worst rift in the west’s relations with Russia since the cold war.
The shift came after months of pressure, particularly from the Obama administration, which increasingly viewed her as the essential player in the transatlantic debate – even more so than Britain’s David Cameron.
In Berlin, the chancellor’s allies say the MH17 downing was more critical than any pressure from the White House. “The chancellor decided that a clear signal must be sent after the shooting down of the civilian plane,” said Philip Missfelder, parliamentary foreign policy spokesman for Ms Merkel’s CDU party. “We in Germany have the feeling that it made a qualitative difference that civilians were killed.”
Aides and advisers said Mr Putin’s response to the tragedy was particularly influential, accelerating what had been a steady erosion of trust in the Russian leader. “She has no illusions about Putin,” said one senior EU official, who has spoken to the chancellor about the issue. “In the process, he has lied to her several times.”
Ms Merkel had been Mr Putin’s chief western interlocutor throughout the crisis. Having grown up in communist east Germany, she speaks Russian and knows something of the former Soviet world. Mr Putin, meanwhile, is fluent in German, having worked as a KGB officer in East Germany, where Ms Merkel was raised into adulthood. The common threads have not made the two friends but did create some basis for mutual understanding.
As the Ukraine crisis intensified earlier this year, Ms Merkel sought to balance the competing demands of sanctions hawks – led by the US, Poland, and, more recently, the UK – against doves, including Italy and France.
But Ms Merkel’s stance began to toughen, particularly after the March annexation of Crimea. That put her at odds with Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German foreign minister and senior figure in the Social Democratic party, her junior coalition partner.
It also irked German business lobbies and the foreign ministry, where there was pride at a long tradition of working with Moscow. The prevailing view among German diplomats was that the Russians were sometimes tough and often secretive, but they kept their word.
Senior EU diplomats said the divisions were evident during sanctions debates in Brussels. German diplomats in the EU capital, who were receiving their direction from the foreign ministry, would sometimes resist sanctions even as Ms Merkel had begun advocating them in bilateral discussions with other leaders.
“It was strange that I knew the German position better than he did,” one diplomat said of his discussions with Peter Tempel, Berlin’s top EU diplomat.
In late May, both Ms Merkel and her foreign ministry took heart after Petro Poroshenko was elected president of Ukraine in a vote even Moscow has accepted as legitimate. That acceptance came after Ms Merkel warned Mr Putin by phone that wrecking the poll would risk sector-wide sanctions.
There was optimism Moscow might support a German-led initiative for the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the Europe-wide security body, to play a bigger role in attempting to stabilise eastern Ukraine.
But that faded as satellite images and other western intelligence suggested Moscow was continuing to equip the rebels in eastern Ukraine with heavy weapons and fighters – in spite of Mr Putin’s repeated denials.
Yet even as the MH17 tragedy sparked international outrage – amid mounting evidence the separatists had shot the plane down with a Russian-supplied Buk missile launcher – Ms Merkel still argued for giving Mr Putin time.
The disaster could be an opportunity, she believed. After all, there was a precedent – in 2010, the Russian president temporarily embraced Poland after a Polish government aircraft crashed in Russia, killing all on board, including Poland’s president.
German officials said publicly they expected Mr Putin to ensure that the rebels secured the crash site, respected the dead and allowed early access for international investigators.
But it did not happen. “This chance was not taken by the Russian authorities,” said one Berlin observer close to Ms Merkel.
Meanwhile, there has been growing evidence that sanctions were working – even the fairly modest measures enacted before this week badly hurt confidence in the Russian economy.
German exports to Russia fell 14 per cent in the first four months of 2014 but the country has so far withstood the damage: Russia ranks only as Germany’s 11th largest export market, behind Poland.
Having decided to move, the perennially cautious Ms Merkel did so – and more decisively than even Germany’s closest partners expected.
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