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| Schroeder and Steinmeier |
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Yesterday evening, the leadership of the German Social-Democratic Party announced the list of its candidates for the ministerial positions in the future coalition government. The candidate for the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs is Frank Walter Steinmeier. This man is thought to be a "gray eminence" of the German Government. All the German special services are subordinate to him. He is a real conductor of "special relations" with Russia; he does not like the USA; he resurrects the "Great Germany"…
A Man of the "Hanover Mafia"
Since November 1998, Frank Walter Steinmeier occupies a number of key positions in the German leadership. He is the Chief of Staff in Germany's Federal Chancellery (Chef des Bundeskanzleramtes), the official of the German Government for Special Assignments in the rank of a minister (Bundesminister für besondere Aufgaben), and also the member of Germany's Security Council, members in which are the Chancellor himself, the Minister of Interior, and the Minister of Defense. Thus, the decisions and the deeds of this man define Germany's destiny. He, however, avoids the press, and therefore his name is in fact unknown for the public. "Frank Walter Who?" – was the question that the German and foreign correspondents posed yesterday, after it became clear that he is the SPD candidate for the position of the Foreign Minister.
Frank Walter Steinmeier is a typical representative of the young generation of the German politicians, born after the World War II. He was born on January 5, 1956, in the city of Detmold, in the land of Nordrhein-Westfalen. Starting from 1976, he had been studying at the law faculty of Justus-Liebig University in Gießen, Hessens land. In 1991, Steinmeier received a Doctor of Law academic degree, and was recruited as a law consultant for the mass media, in the office of Governor of Lower Saxony (niedersächsische Staatskanzlei), in Hanover. The Governor was then Gerhard Schroeder, future German Chancellor. Steinmeier appeared to be a highly talented official, a "workaholic", and in addition he was very devoted to Schroeder. Therefore, the close working and friendly ties were quickly created between the two men. Under Schroeder's supervision, in five years Steinmeier made his way to the post of the Head of the Governor's of Lower Saxony Office. He and his chief were surrounded by a core of the like-minded persons that were also connected by their membership in the Social -Democratic Party, and got a title of the "Hanover mafia". When, in November 1998, after the SPD won the parliamentary elections, Schroeder moved to the Chancellor's office, Steinmeier, being a member of this "mafia", moved together with him. Some time later, he occupied the post of Chief of Staff in Germany's Federal Chancellery, in charge of coordination and control over the special services' activity. As it was mentioned above, he has been serving at this position until now, waiting for a moment, when Schroeder is replaced in his office by its new landlady, Angela Merkel.
Engineer of "special relations" with Russia
Those, who are well acquainted with the work of Schroeder's Chancellery, assume that it is Steinmeier, who is the author of the numerous strategic projects, published by it, as for example the project of Pension and Taxation System Reform (2002). Not less important was his influence in the sphere of foreign policy. Steinmeier's entourage is well aware of his geopolitical views, including the augmentation of Germany's status on the international scene, and in the UN. Since the end of the 1990s, Steinmeier was the one, who was giving a lead in Germany's position concerning the USA and Russia. "We are of such a different mentality," – was his permanent answer to reproaches of the American diplomats, and of the White House representatives, concerning the obstinacy of the official Berlin in the key issues of global policy. It was him, and not Schroeder, who was negotiating with the Americans over Iraq in 2002. It was him, who then coldly told the American Ambassador in Berlin, Daniel R. Coats that the Germans' negative position concerning the US military operation in Iraq stays the same. In the same period, to spite the White House, Steinmeier carried out contacts with the son of the Libyan leader, Saif al-Islam Qaddafi. After September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the USA, the FBI representatives were complaining to the author that it was extremely hard for them to work with their German counterparts. It particular is could be explained by Steinmeier's unwillingness to share information with the Americans.
It should be mentioned that in Steinmeier's time, positions of the German special services, and political weight of the official Berlin in the Middle East, were strengthened by such an extent, that the Germans were able to carry out operations there, inaccessible even to the Americans. Thus, at the end of 2003, Steinmeier's subsidiary Ernst Uhrlau, federal security coordinator (Geheimdienstkoordinator der Bundesregierung) organized the release of the Israeli hostage Elkhanan Tenenbaum from the hands of Hezbollah organization , as well as the return to Israel of the bodies of the three Israeli soldiers. According to the sources in Schroeder's Chancellery, every Tuesday Uhrlau and Steinmeier held consultations with representatives of the German intelligence organizations about the situation in the Muslim countries (Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan, etc.).
Against the background of chilling of the relations with the USA, Schroeder and Steinmeier actively developed relations with Russia. In Putin's regime they saw Germany's reliable economic partner, capable of providing stable deliveries of energy resources, necessary to the German economy. The partnership with Russia started in 1992, in the period when Steinmeier and his chief were ruling in Low Saxony. It was then, when the so-called "yearly cooperation programs" started with the Russian Tumen Area, in such fields as oil and gas extraction, and agriculture. In the second half of 2004, Frank Steinmeier actively participated in contacts with the Russian side on the issue of laying the gas pipeline on the Baltic Sea bottom. First publications about this project appeared in April 2005, and the agreement on laying the pipeline was finally signed during President Putin's visit to Germany, at the beginning of September, 2005. The source in Steinmeier's entourage told AIA that at the end of 2004, after the German counterintelligence (BfV) disclosed the activity of the Russian Military Intelligence (GRU) officer in Germany, the Head of Chancellor's office insisted upon the BfV Chief Heinz Fromm's personal visit to Moscow, in order to ask the directorship of the Russian Military intelligence to call off their officer. Steinmeier did not want the counterintelligence's activity to be an obstacle for his economic and geopolitical plans. It is also interesting to mention that Steinmeier himself went to Moscow at the end of August, 2005, in order to prepare Putin's visit to Berlin, during which the agreement on pipeline construction was to be signed.
Future Minister of Foreign Affairs?
Frank Steinmeier's nomination as the SPD candidate to head the Foreign Ministry was quite unexpected for many Germans. Before the recent parliamentary elections , there were talks that this position was supposed to be given to the CDU/CSU coalition member, Edmund Stoiber, or the member of the Liberal Party, Wolfgang Gerhardt . After the elections, when it became clear that the Christian Democrats would not avoid creating the "broad coalition", the present Minister of Interior, Otto Schily was called the most probable candidate to head the Foreign Ministry. However, as the gossips say, the Christian Democrats refused to see Schily as the person, who would define Germany's foreign policy. Moreover, financial circles, interested in continuation of the German-Russian gas project, insist on appointing such Foreign Minister that will be able to prevent a sharp change of course in foreign policy. Such person, in Social-Democrats point of view, is Frank Steinmeier. Yesterday, there were talks in the SPD's ruling circles that one of Schroeder's conditions for leaving the Chancellor's chair was Merkel's agreement to appoint Steinmeier as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. The following days will show the extent, to which this claim is true.
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