Or it's just another political statement to gain/retain voter support, while everything (US-german collaboration regarding mass surveillance) will go on as before.
Seriously, if Germany wants to make a statement, it can start by banning all NSA listening stations on German soil.
But then where would we get most of our sigint from, if not from the NSA? Its not like we have those capabilities ourselves. But I agree that Germany is starting to look a little.... foolish, but there is no easy way out for us. We need the USA more than they need us.
Apparently, most of the data NSA collects is useless. And even with that data, other intelligence agencies (read: other countries') are often better informed than the Americans.
Having the most amount of data is not the same has having the best intelligence agency. How can data be useful if you don't know what it's for?
German intelligence is likely more sophisticated than American intelligence.[0] Of course, as with most European intelligence agencies, they do have several centuries of advantage. It took CIA quite a while to figure out not see world politics in a pure East vs West picture. You cannot build that amount of experience overnight.
Do you think the KGB outmanoeuvred the CIA at every turn because of a bigger budget or lack of restrictions? Nay, KGB relied heavily on 600 years of espionage experience. Experience that used to mean the life or death of several European states.
Europe may have granted their former colonies independence, but the experience gathered in our years as masters have not been for naught. It is not without reason France knows central Africa like its backhand.
USA may have more data, because they have the technical knowhow and capability. But they still lack the experience. The relationships between European and American intelligence agencies are certainly mutually beneficial.
CIA's best kept secret is how little they know.
[0] Of course, there will often be the occasional embarrassing story that would dispute this claim. But don't let these few stories fool you.
>German intelligence is likely more sophisticated than American intelligence.
Doubtful. German intelligence is probably as effective as Wally from Dilbert. However, shelving TTIP and/or expelling the US ambassador would make a statement.
And of course - in the long run - not sitting on our asses but building and effective intelligence service ourselves.
That's the big guessing game everyone is playing here: is our intelligence community really as clueless and incapable as we Germans tend to assume? Or is that just a masterful deceit?
As Tomte points out, this is largely a guessing game we are playing. How can we really know one way or the other?
But I concede, German intelligence is likely the weaker link in European intelligence agencies (and weaker than American as well), not from lack of skill or knowhow, but a political inability to pursue it. Germany's recent history has left Germans rather on the unfavourable side of intelligence agencies and surveillance. I would even imagine the Allies imposing restrictions on the Germans following the Second World War.
Meta data is not useless. There is a great Ted talk from a german who sued deutsche telekom to release their meta data from him. He won and he reconstructed a perfect movement profile and social profile with the call history from himself. Just like you would see in the movies. The claim that its useless is only made by muppet politicians talking the issue down. He is a private person without 600 years of experience you 'may' 'likely' need. No secret.
>Apparently, most of the data NSA collects is useless. And even with that data, other intelligence agencies (read: other countries') are often better informed than the Americans.
The conspiracy theorist in me tells me that this might be a staged drama by US-German authorities to instill confidence in German citizens. Or may be to deceive Russia.
As a German, I find the German reaction really pathetic.
No, don't ask somebody for assistance who has just proven (again) that you can't trust him on that level.
Do your own investigations, and find out who was involved. If any of the involved people were US diplomats, expel them from the country (and escalate to the UN? dunno if that's done). If not, go the normal route through the justice system.
On a political level, decouple German intelligence agencies stronger from the US ones, and drive out as much US intelligence as possible.
Well, given the alternative and some modest regard for basic human rights (such as, e.g., stated in the German constitution [1]), they are legally bound to do exactly that.
Especially since the reports of spying activities from within the american embassy in berlin. In fact, it would have been necessary at this point already to investigate the embassy itself, and to ban the current american embassador if anything were found.
The reason they don't do it, in spite of nearly everyone [1] distrusting the US gov't, makes me wonder what kind of leverage the US secret services have.
It also lends some credence to the "Germany was never really souvereign" theory.
[1] Just check the comment sections in the major German newspapers.
Non-Souvereignty is largely regarded as a wild conspiracy theory. And really, what kind of evidence is there?
Inevitably, signs of "foreign control" turns out to be some form of competition, cooperation, trade or just plain common interests.
What counts more is that Germans are allowed to say anything they want, there is no evidence of tampering in elections, the press is free and extensive, and people can largely do as they please. Nothing is ever perfect, but claiming US sovereignty over Germay is just plain stupid.
Well, first let me state that I am not sure what to make of this Non-sovereignty.
However, here are some of the arguments I find interesting:
- A decent amount of videos about this topic can be found on youtube, most of the feature also Schäuble (Minister of Finance) saying that Germany neither is nor ever was souvereign.
- Untampered elections are necessary but not sufficient for democracy. What if you elect someone and the newly elected just do as they please after the election? (see US or Germany)
- free press: This is my personal opinion but I often find that very interesting things happen worldwide and the German press doesn't care or all major journals have the same opinion (example: EU is good, Russia is bad, Ukraine is Putin's fault)
It is not plain stupid. It's actually a good opportunity to figure out what the Grundgesetzbuch is (yes, it is actually not a valid 'constitution')
Even Scheuble said the sovereignty issues went into 'ad absurdum' since ww2. There is contract after contract after contract. Germany is in so much need of a rewrite of its law books. Everything is corrected by extensions and special rule. The amount of paperwork germans produce is INSANE and should easily push someone to think "Wait there is something f'ed here".
- Say anything they want: Unless you mention the H with the J's... and cough Horst Köhler cough
- No evidence of tampering in elections: mmmmmmh there are always issues in the east and there is always something coming up in small districts or states. They are not major but important nonetheless (Read: Local press)
- The press is free and extensive: LOL!!!!!!!!! Axel Springer and Spiegel dictate the opinion here, everyone else is a jew-baby-eating holocost denier.
- people can largely do as they please: yes, if they can afford a lawyer to help them with the paperwork.
Not getting into this stuff and just accepting everything would be plain stupid.
Non-Souvereignty is largely regarded as a wild conspiracy theory. And really, what kind of evidence is there?
Inevitably, signs of "foreign control" turns out to be some form of competition, cooperation, trade or just plain common interests.
What counts more is that Germans are allowed to say anything they want, there is no evidence of tampering in elections, the press is free and extensive, and people can largely do as they please. Nothing is ever perfect, but claiming US sovereignty over Germay is just plain stupid.
> makes me wonder what kind of leverage the US secret services have.
Don't wonder. Throughout the Cold War it was patriotic to sacrifice some of your nation's sovereignty to secret agreements and relationships to make your country safer from the very real Soviet threat.
Now all those agreements and relationships have been repurposed in the Global War on Terror. So first you have to decide how much sovereignty you, as an insider who took part in those agreements, want, and how much alienation from your voters you can stand.
Comment sections in major newspapers? These are dominated by a strange mixture of right-wing conservatives. They are heavily moderated to exclude hate-speech (enough of it makes it through so, and so does the latent attitude of things "Turks are an underrace"), and display a shocking replication of Russian fairy tales.
I would stubbornly refuse to call this a representative cross section of German opinion.
Comment sections in major newspapers? These are dominated by a strange mixture of right-wing conservatives. They are heavily moderated to exclude hate-speech (enough of it makes it through so, and so does the latent attitude of things "Turks are an underrace"), and display a shocking replication of Russian fairy tales.
I would stubbornly refuse to call this a representative cross section of German opinion.
Well, it was well known in government circles (and beyond) that the US are spying on everyone including their allies, so the fact that they paid a mole in the German secret service shouldn't have been too surprising to the German government.
The fact that he got uncovered and that the whole affair got public is a serious problem for Angela Merkel though: The German public already perceived her as way too soft towards the US during the latest NSA affair, so if she doesn't act this time she will lose a lot of goodwill in the German population. Judging from her recent media appearances, it seems actually likely that she will act in one way or another.
A probable "retaliation" could be to cancel the free trade treaty that's currently being negotiated between the US and the EU (and which, like most EU projects, depends heavily on Germany's consent), which would be a huge economic loss for the US (and to th EU as well of course). So, although this move was "business as usual" for the US, it could have pretty serious consequences for them. Makes me really wonder if the return-on-investment of the current US surveillance strategy is actually positive, or if it will result in a huge loss of economic power and trust for them.
LOL, I hope you're not being serious. The only ones TTIP and friends are going to benefit is Big Capital and American producers of chlorine-treated chicken. No thanks, it's enough you fuck up your own country, no need to fuck up Europe too.
Well, according to the E.U. the treaty could generate 100 BN € in revenue and more than 1 million jobs both in US and EU, so even if those numbers should be off by a factor of two it's still pretty big...
Sorry, but I rather lose a million jobs than exposing my country to lawsuits because a democratic decision interfered with the business of some big company.
As a German I don't see this as an issue. Some German politicians have deep connections to enemy states, so why wouldn't the NSA spy on them? It's in our best interest even, because those politicans are a danger to Europe and Germany itself. You can also see the problem with Germany and France not behaving as allies of the USA in the war against Russia.
Russia has infiltrated our political class on multiple fronts. The most visible of course has been former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who works for Gazprom. But there are quite a few people involved in that, both in the SPD but also in the CDU. Nevermind the corporations involved, like Wintershall and E.ON. Other vectors of attack have been The Left, through their old SED roots and connection with the KGB. now FSB. And of course the new right-populist AfD party, who are pushing Russia's agenda in Europe.
As a German I don't see this as an issue. Some German politicians have deep connections to enemy states, so why wouldn't the NSA spy on them? It's in our best interest even, because those politicans are a danger to Europe and Germany itself.
As a German I very much see that as an issue. If there indeed are polititions having "deep connections to enemy states" (who do you mean?), I want the democratic process to handle that, not the intelligance agency of another state. What do we need a parliament for, anyway, if you think a practically unregulated third party is the right way to handle domestic discourse?
We are back to cold war levels, even further than that. And it's a mistake, the USA guarantees our security right now, since the EU states reduced their military to a point that they are unable to deal with an aggressor. Nor is there the political will to deal with it.
A single nuke is sufficient to deal with any reasonable aggressor and nonreasonable aggressors are rarely if ever a serious threat to any country. As such, it is quite perfectly senseless to spend billions on tanks and fighters when your next-door neighbour is happy sharing their nukes with you.
It's precisely the other way arround. This sketch is a humorous but precise assessment of this strategic issue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX_d_vMKswE Relying on nuclear deterrent against modern hybrid warfare means you will lose.
Yet even with a huge conventional army, the US were unable to secure the territorial integrity of the Ukraine as originally agreed upon in 199x in return for giving up their nuclear weapons.
Hence, neither a conventional army nor human-operated nuclear weapons (an actual real life example rather than a sketchy sketch of this would have been the Falkland War, btw) provide a sufficient deterrent, making an automatic Doomsday device à la Dr. Strangelove the only logical choice.
Incorrect. Thanks to the ability of the US to project conventional force, they have deployed troops in Eastern Europe, the Baltic and the Black seas, thus stopping any further Russian aggression. This could only be done through a show of force that displays the ability and willingness to engage Russian forces should they try their tactics on a NATO state.
Furthemore, the US are keeping their side of the agreement. They are providing Ukraine with military equipment and intelligence and leading the way in destabilizing Putin's regime through sanctions. Thanks to that multi-levelled support and offensive Russia is right now losing the war in Ukraine and is on the brink of a Revolution itself.
All of this with barely any help from central Europe, which has its head up its ass and has succumbed to Russian influence and propaganda.
Merkel doesn't care that much and she --even though I hate to say it-- is right that we shouldn't. This spying case isn't a big deal. It doesn't hurt Germany. Also the spying on her phone last year. She didn't really care all that much. After all, USA is the biggest partner of the EU/Germany. Germany can't afford a dent in the relationship with the US. It's the US who's providing security to most of the western world. Who's supposed to protect us from Putin? The NATO?
The biggest fear for Merkel is twofold:
- Industry espionage. This would attack Germany at what they're best at and be huge problem. USA has been lucky to not be caught about that (in Germany).
- The much bigger problem for Merkel is however the growing Anti-Americanism in Germany. There has always been a good amount of it. But mostly, Germans see the US as a partner. There is in huge decline and it's a growing problem. Germans are much more serious about their privacy than Americans and the spying scandal didn't help America. Merkel also knows that she has to listen much more to the German public than for instance Obama has to listen to Americans. Germany has a very well functioning Democracy and any pressure from the public will quickly result in resignations or losing the next election. Germany has done this before: Kohl's affair got his party out. The FDP got thrown out of the parliament last year. You can quickly go from 40% to under 20% in Germany.
Due to the many US scandals in the last 2 years, Germans see America very very skeptic these days. Der Spiegel yesterday's issue has some numbers: Who should Germany work together with? USA: 56%. Russia: 53%.
If you read many of the forums in Germany you'll see the growing dissatisfaction with the US as a partner. And more and more understanding for Putin these days.
My point of this post is: What this means it that if USA continues to bully the German people, then Merkel will be forced to take action and do something that she doesn't actually want to. She knows very well that America is extremely important and without a good relationship things will get much tougher in Europe/Germany. After all Germany is benefiting from the huge security the US provides to us. But Germans don't think that far ahead and only see the bully in America these days. I hope it doesn't get this far that Merkel is forced (by the German people/media) into getting distance from America since it would hurt both, Germany and the US.
I'm very certain that Obama know that Merkel will always be his friend. But I'm not so sure if he realizes that the German people can make Merkel do something that she otherwise wouldn't do.
America: Watch out how far you take the bullying. It might just happen that the next generation of Westerners will end up hating you in 10-20 years down the road. And then, you will have no friends left but only enemies. What Obama and America's government does can be very dangerous for America in the future.
>After all, USA is the biggest partner of the EU/Germany.
The US is not just Germanys' biggest partner - it controls Germanys' sovereignty. The German intelligence services are all run from Washington. When Merkel says 'it does not matter', its because its really not relevant that America is spying on Germany: its allowed to. Germany lost WW2, and has not had a restoration of the sovereignty of its intelligence services in its constitution. That part is still held by the occupying power.
So what you are actually saying is, yes, Germany has full sovereignty.
Please don’t spread this bullshit. There is (mostly) mutually beneficial strong cooperation with a power-differential. That’s all. Stop spinning your dumb conspiracy theories.
Germany does not have full sovereignty and won't, ever, until a Peace Treaty is signed and ratified. America won't allow that to happen because then it'd have to pull out all of its troops - and in case you didn't know, Germany is full of American troops and other military-industrial resources.
Germany is, at most, a puppet state - a model for what America had hoped to pull off in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and so on ..
Not fully valid until a Peace Treaty is signed (thus ending the war). The US is intentionally not allowing Germany to pursue such things so that it can maintain its bases on Germany without fuss. Also, I reiterate: the US runs Germanys' intelligence services.
wondering why your comment is down-voted. The reaction of German politicians (CDU and SPD) underlines your point: Since the Snowden leaks they keep quite and hope it passes, because they know they cannot do anything against it (they are in the same boat) ... If Germany were a partner to US, it would make a fuzz about it.
Another hint about the sovereignty: there are still army bases on German ground, from which drones are controlled and people are killed ...
As a German I'm really glad about that. Germany is still not capable to act on its own. We're lucky the US are willing to hold us up while taking all the PR flak.
She could use the situation as a leverage to push on privacy issues with US companies. Which may be obsolete with TTIP in future. So it wouldn't be a huge loss.
After all, USA is the biggest partner of the EU/Germany.
Germany can't afford a dent in the relationship with the
US.
The problem with "They're assholes but we'll let them do what they like because we need them" is America isn't the only country Germany needs. Germany also imports a lot of oil and natural gas from Russia, for example. And lots of electronics and manufactured goods from China.
The thing is that Russia and China are not heavily spying on Germany, despite the fact, that they don't even have such close relationships as US and Germany [before]
Lol. Of course they are, but German people are not very smart. They're upset their allies spy on them for their own protection, but if their enemies do that it's normal and not even a reason to cool relationships!
Despite? :) Americans can freely spy in Germany because of the close relationship. In fact, thanks to our close relationship, we hand our data over for free in many cases (SWIFT, zomg!).
Right, because if Germany decides to cut off ties with the US, the CIC is going to start a nice little tour in Europe, just like how the US blew up France after De Gaulle came to power.
Most of the western world and the US have extremely aligned interests when it comes to security. And most of it revolves around making sure that trade routes stay open, and also making sure that instability doesn't end up messing with trade.
> America: Watch out how far you take the bullying
America has enough power and influence to shut down any possible discontent - both within the country and of their minion states in Europe. It's been ruling over EU for many decades now and knows well how to handle "unpopular opinions".
Sorry, I meant /this/ spying incident. The minster of the interior already said that the documents didn't really have anything important in it. The guys received ~$25k for the documents. It's not a huge deal actually. It was very very stupid of the American to do this and if I were Obama I'd be mad at the NSA. Why? Because the risk was big but the reward was tiny. You didn't gain much from the documents, yet you now have another huge dent in your relations (again!) and it's starting to piss of German politians & Germans.
America doesn't realize it fully yet, but it's making itself very unpopular in the last 5 years and this will be a huge problem in the future when all that's left is UK, Mexico & Canada (Maybe India) as your friends.
> It's the US who's providing security to most of the western world. Who's supposed to protect us from Putin? The NATO?
Are you sure Europe couldn't manage its security by itself?
I mean, while keeping strong relations and cooperation directly with the US and inside NATO I don't understand why European countries wouldn't be able to defend themselves especially if we started thinking about a stronger cooperation between our defence systems or even a unique European army instead of keeping one for every country.
There are no European security interests in invading mid-eastern or latin-american countries, propping up dictators and toppling democratic governments in these regions and creating/financing the next wave of "terrorists", so that tab is all yours.
Furthermore, there is no "on your behalf" for the troops stationed in Europe. While some would argue that these are occupying forces in all but name, it's really in many cases just a convenient staging area for operations in the middle east.
In addition, and this tends to be forgotten, the nuclear shield is not a sign of generosity, but simply a tool to maintain US nuclear supremacy, by trading protection under the shield for a guarantee that those nuclear-capable countries under the shield don't, in fact, go nuclear.
US troops are stationed in those countries as assurance, human shields so to speak: if those countries are hit with nuclear strikes, US troops will die, ensuring a US retaliatory response.
The Americentrism on Hacker news is just insane.
Europe doesn't need America to protect Europe from Russia.
The reason why Europeans dislike the USA has pretty much stayed the same since long:
The aggressive foreign politic and parts of the culture (you'll find a translation of american conditions as a set expression in almost all languages here).
Nothing much changed.
The Baltic States would like to disagree with you. France is selling Mistral warships to Russia, and a large part of Europe depends on Russia's natural gas. The local population on the border with Russia, including Poland, does not feel that Europe alone can protect them.
How much time you wasted reading spiegel... i can't imagine. You go back to the cold war era as if nothing happend the last 20 years and blather about meaningless surveys and feel gooderies. Very long message without any content.
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[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 140 ms ] threadSeriously, if Germany wants to make a statement, it can start by banning all NSA listening stations on German soil.
Having the most amount of data is not the same has having the best intelligence agency. How can data be useful if you don't know what it's for?
German intelligence is likely more sophisticated than American intelligence.[0] Of course, as with most European intelligence agencies, they do have several centuries of advantage. It took CIA quite a while to figure out not see world politics in a pure East vs West picture. You cannot build that amount of experience overnight.
Do you think the KGB outmanoeuvred the CIA at every turn because of a bigger budget or lack of restrictions? Nay, KGB relied heavily on 600 years of espionage experience. Experience that used to mean the life or death of several European states.
Europe may have granted their former colonies independence, but the experience gathered in our years as masters have not been for naught. It is not without reason France knows central Africa like its backhand.
USA may have more data, because they have the technical knowhow and capability. But they still lack the experience. The relationships between European and American intelligence agencies are certainly mutually beneficial.
CIA's best kept secret is how little they know.
[0] Of course, there will often be the occasional embarrassing story that would dispute this claim. But don't let these few stories fool you.
Doubtful. German intelligence is probably as effective as Wally from Dilbert. However, shelving TTIP and/or expelling the US ambassador would make a statement.
And of course - in the long run - not sitting on our asses but building and effective intelligence service ourselves.
But I concede, German intelligence is likely the weaker link in European intelligence agencies (and weaker than American as well), not from lack of skill or knowhow, but a political inability to pursue it. Germany's recent history has left Germans rather on the unfavourable side of intelligence agencies and surveillance. I would even imagine the Allies imposing restrictions on the Germans following the Second World War.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAR-Lupe
Germany has the synthetic aperture radar birds and France runs optical satellites.
I'd love to know who they spend most time watching.
Do you have any sources for these claims?
Although what I experienced there was... laughable.
No, don't ask somebody for assistance who has just proven (again) that you can't trust him on that level.
Do your own investigations, and find out who was involved. If any of the involved people were US diplomats, expel them from the country (and escalate to the UN? dunno if that's done). If not, go the normal route through the justice system.
On a political level, decouple German intelligence agencies stronger from the US ones, and drive out as much US intelligence as possible.
in fact lets expel their embassy too!
[1] http://dejure.org/gesetze/GG/10.html
That this wasn't done was illegal.
Also, if making an enemy seems to be the only option to retain sovereignty and protect human rights, it's an option that must be considered, at least.
It also lends some credence to the "Germany was never really souvereign" theory.
[1] Just check the comment sections in the major German newspapers.
Inevitably, signs of "foreign control" turns out to be some form of competition, cooperation, trade or just plain common interests.
What counts more is that Germans are allowed to say anything they want, there is no evidence of tampering in elections, the press is free and extensive, and people can largely do as they please. Nothing is ever perfect, but claiming US sovereignty over Germay is just plain stupid.
However, here are some of the arguments I find interesting:
- A decent amount of videos about this topic can be found on youtube, most of the feature also Schäuble (Minister of Finance) saying that Germany neither is nor ever was souvereign.
- Untampered elections are necessary but not sufficient for democracy. What if you elect someone and the newly elected just do as they please after the election? (see US or Germany)
- free press: This is my personal opinion but I often find that very interesting things happen worldwide and the German press doesn't care or all major journals have the same opinion (example: EU is good, Russia is bad, Ukraine is Putin's fault)
- Say anything they want: Unless you mention the H with the J's... and cough Horst Köhler cough
- No evidence of tampering in elections: mmmmmmh there are always issues in the east and there is always something coming up in small districts or states. They are not major but important nonetheless (Read: Local press)
- The press is free and extensive: LOL!!!!!!!!! Axel Springer and Spiegel dictate the opinion here, everyone else is a jew-baby-eating holocost denier.
- people can largely do as they please: yes, if they can afford a lawyer to help them with the paperwork.
Not getting into this stuff and just accepting everything would be plain stupid.
Inevitably, signs of "foreign control" turns out to be some form of competition, cooperation, trade or just plain common interests.
What counts more is that Germans are allowed to say anything they want, there is no evidence of tampering in elections, the press is free and extensive, and people can largely do as they please. Nothing is ever perfect, but claiming US sovereignty over Germay is just plain stupid.
Don't wonder. Throughout the Cold War it was patriotic to sacrifice some of your nation's sovereignty to secret agreements and relationships to make your country safer from the very real Soviet threat.
Now all those agreements and relationships have been repurposed in the Global War on Terror. So first you have to decide how much sovereignty you, as an insider who took part in those agreements, want, and how much alienation from your voters you can stand.
Considering the comments I see on websites like the Guardian, I don't know why I'd trust the comments section on any German newspaper.
Maybe the Germans like that the US is footing the bill for most of the intelligence gathering in the world.
You bet we aren't outspending the US.
I would stubbornly refuse to call this a representative cross section of German opinion.
I would stubbornly refuse to call this a representative cross section of German opinion.
Angela Merkel eyes place for Germany in US intelligence club - http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e2492a3a-3d7a-11e3-9928-00144...
US lawmakers push for German entrance to Five Eyes spy alliance - http://www.dw.de/us-lawmakers-push-for-german-entrance-to-fi...
The fact that he got uncovered and that the whole affair got public is a serious problem for Angela Merkel though: The German public already perceived her as way too soft towards the US during the latest NSA affair, so if she doesn't act this time she will lose a lot of goodwill in the German population. Judging from her recent media appearances, it seems actually likely that she will act in one way or another.
A probable "retaliation" could be to cancel the free trade treaty that's currently being negotiated between the US and the EU (and which, like most EU projects, depends heavily on Germany's consent), which would be a huge economic loss for the US (and to th EU as well of course). So, although this move was "business as usual" for the US, it could have pretty serious consequences for them. Makes me really wonder if the return-on-investment of the current US surveillance strategy is actually positive, or if it will result in a huge loss of economic power and trust for them.
LOL, I hope you're not being serious. The only ones TTIP and friends are going to benefit is Big Capital and American producers of chlorine-treated chicken. No thanks, it's enough you fuck up your own country, no need to fuck up Europe too.
http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/
As a German I very much see that as an issue. If there indeed are polititions having "deep connections to enemy states" (who do you mean?), I want the democratic process to handle that, not the intelligance agency of another state. What do we need a parliament for, anyway, if you think a practically unregulated third party is the right way to handle domestic discourse?
* given the recent news, I do not really consider the USA as an ally. (I'm french)
Hence, neither a conventional army nor human-operated nuclear weapons (an actual real life example rather than a sketchy sketch of this would have been the Falkland War, btw) provide a sufficient deterrent, making an automatic Doomsday device à la Dr. Strangelove the only logical choice.
Is that what you’re saying?
Furthemore, the US are keeping their side of the agreement. They are providing Ukraine with military equipment and intelligence and leading the way in destabilizing Putin's regime through sanctions. Thanks to that multi-levelled support and offensive Russia is right now losing the war in Ukraine and is on the brink of a Revolution itself.
All of this with barely any help from central Europe, which has its head up its ass and has succumbed to Russian influence and propaganda.
The point is that it can also means everyone lose.
The biggest fear for Merkel is twofold:
- Industry espionage. This would attack Germany at what they're best at and be huge problem. USA has been lucky to not be caught about that (in Germany).
- The much bigger problem for Merkel is however the growing Anti-Americanism in Germany. There has always been a good amount of it. But mostly, Germans see the US as a partner. There is in huge decline and it's a growing problem. Germans are much more serious about their privacy than Americans and the spying scandal didn't help America. Merkel also knows that she has to listen much more to the German public than for instance Obama has to listen to Americans. Germany has a very well functioning Democracy and any pressure from the public will quickly result in resignations or losing the next election. Germany has done this before: Kohl's affair got his party out. The FDP got thrown out of the parliament last year. You can quickly go from 40% to under 20% in Germany. Due to the many US scandals in the last 2 years, Germans see America very very skeptic these days. Der Spiegel yesterday's issue has some numbers: Who should Germany work together with? USA: 56%. Russia: 53%.
If you read many of the forums in Germany you'll see the growing dissatisfaction with the US as a partner. And more and more understanding for Putin these days.
My point of this post is: What this means it that if USA continues to bully the German people, then Merkel will be forced to take action and do something that she doesn't actually want to. She knows very well that America is extremely important and without a good relationship things will get much tougher in Europe/Germany. After all Germany is benefiting from the huge security the US provides to us. But Germans don't think that far ahead and only see the bully in America these days. I hope it doesn't get this far that Merkel is forced (by the German people/media) into getting distance from America since it would hurt both, Germany and the US. I'm very certain that Obama know that Merkel will always be his friend. But I'm not so sure if he realizes that the German people can make Merkel do something that she otherwise wouldn't do.
America: Watch out how far you take the bullying. It might just happen that the next generation of Westerners will end up hating you in 10-20 years down the road. And then, you will have no friends left but only enemies. What Obama and America's government does can be very dangerous for America in the future.
The US is not just Germanys' biggest partner - it controls Germanys' sovereignty. The German intelligence services are all run from Washington. When Merkel says 'it does not matter', its because its really not relevant that America is spying on Germany: its allowed to. Germany lost WW2, and has not had a restoration of the sovereignty of its intelligence services in its constitution. That part is still held by the occupying power.
Please don’t spread this bullshit. There is (mostly) mutually beneficial strong cooperation with a power-differential. That’s all. Stop spinning your dumb conspiracy theories.
Germany is, at most, a puppet state - a model for what America had hoped to pull off in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and so on ..
Seriously, everyone who works for the NSA has lost all my respect. You're undermining civil rights for everyone including yourself.
Another hint about the sovereignty: there are still army bases on German ground, from which drones are controlled and people are killed ...
If I do what the bully tells me to do, he leaves me alone and attacks other people. That's not security, that's abuse.
Most of the western world and the US have extremely aligned interests when it comes to security. And most of it revolves around making sure that trade routes stay open, and also making sure that instability doesn't end up messing with trade.
America has enough power and influence to shut down any possible discontent - both within the country and of their minion states in Europe. It's been ruling over EU for many decades now and knows well how to handle "unpopular opinions".
America doesn't realize it fully yet, but it's making itself very unpopular in the last 5 years and this will be a huge problem in the future when all that's left is UK, Mexico & Canada (Maybe India) as your friends.
Are you sure Europe couldn't manage its security by itself?
I mean, while keeping strong relations and cooperation directly with the US and inside NATO I don't understand why European countries wouldn't be able to defend themselves especially if we started thinking about a stronger cooperation between our defence systems or even a unique European army instead of keeping one for every country.
Europe isn't financially situated, nor does it seem to have the social stomach for it.
We just don't spend it on an imperial posture and wars of aggression.
There are no European security interests in invading mid-eastern or latin-american countries, propping up dictators and toppling democratic governments in these regions and creating/financing the next wave of "terrorists", so that tab is all yours.
Furthermore, there is no "on your behalf" for the troops stationed in Europe. While some would argue that these are occupying forces in all but name, it's really in many cases just a convenient staging area for operations in the middle east.
In addition, and this tends to be forgotten, the nuclear shield is not a sign of generosity, but simply a tool to maintain US nuclear supremacy, by trading protection under the shield for a guarantee that those nuclear-capable countries under the shield don't, in fact, go nuclear.
US troops are stationed in those countries as assurance, human shields so to speak: if those countries are hit with nuclear strikes, US troops will die, ensuring a US retaliatory response.
Did Merkel work for the Stasi? http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-317907
The past of the current German president may not look much better (IM Larve)
Anyway, should anything of this be true, the top German leader may be tremendously vulnerable for blackmailing.