Germany in the 21st Century.

TLO Anonymous Staff.

Germany has an extraordinary national participation in the 21st century European community! Since the turn of the century, the European Union has created a body economic and politik that has grown from only the major and leading economic powerhouses, such as the UK, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, France, to later include Northern and Eastern Europe and potentially even Ukraine! Today's Germany is a large contributor to both the food and defense industries of all of Europe, and is a NATO member as well as participatory in important economic and climate changes agreements throughout the many European nations. 

During the early 2000's, Germany, along with many Western European EC founders, helped lead Europe in prosperity plans and EU planning and governance. The international trade that passed through Europe had largely been positively affected by the Schengen Agreement, signed in 1985 in Luxembourg, which permitted free travel through around 29 European Community countries without strong border controls and limited visa requirements in order to expedite travel, tourism and trade relations all throughout the new EU economy. Germany's participation allowed for increased market and trade opportunities within, and set the course for new national constructions and progressive architectural renovations of buildings in major cities such as Berlin, Frankfurt and Munich. Among them, smaller German cities were added to and developed by extra nationals, increasing local interest in Germany's already existing and native population diversity, and adding some increasing amounts of national political depth to the country, as new immigration to Germany from the Middle East and North Africa increased at the turn of the century. 

As that immigration situation developed, some German nationals took stock of what was happening inside of the country. Public and private situations that were affecting Germany's once-recognizable majority political opinions were conflicting with strong multi-religious influences originating from outside of Germany that contradicted traditional old world German post-Nazi, post unification values (East-West Germany). And the results were a growing set of right-wing immigration platform political parties that have gained in national popularity since the end of former German Chancellor Angela Merkel's Administration. 

The German economy prospered remarkably during Merkel's Administration. Exports from Germany grew at a substantial rate, greatly increasing their national GDP over the entire course of her 16 years of national leadership. When pressed to accommodate refugees fleeing from Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria around 2015, Merkel's slogan was "We can do it!" At that time, war was still raging in those countries involving mainly US forces operating in the Middle East post "9/11", and after the collapse and restructuring of the Iraqi and Afghanistan leaderships, with help also from the US and many UN support nations. 

After Merkel's term ended, Olaf Sholz, the newly elected German Chancellor and a national unifier, attempted to bring competing German political parties to the table to cooperate with each other in helping to manage Germany's developing refugee crisis and deal with the situation involving the potential breaking away of the UK from the European Union. Both countries were strongly contributory and economically dependent upon the EC construct and Euro currency valuations would become a major issue if the UK proceeded with "BREXIT", the EU name for "England's Exit" from the European Community. In 2018, BREXIT was made into law and in 2020, BREXIT was finalized, affecting countries all throughout Europe.

Unfortunately that event coincided with the COVID pandemic of 2020, which lasted for 2 years. And to add even greater misfortune, in 2021, during this international medical crisis, Russia, a country which sat at the other end of the Nord Stream 2 oil pipeline established under Merkel in 2015 which joined Russian oil harvesting together with delivery to Germany, militarily invaded Ukraine. The whole world condemned this action, and sanctions against Russia affected pipeline output as well, and in 2022, in the midst of the new "Ukraine War", the Nord Stream pipelines were sabotaged by undersea explosions,  rendering them inoperable. Of course, this event, coupled with Covid-related government and business shutdowns all around the world, greatly and adversely affected the German economy, leading to national anti-government protests due to Covid responses and business shutdowns due to the ill-timed coincidences of plague and warfare involving Europe.

In the United States, a country strongly aligned with modern Germany, a new US President by the name of Donald Trump, was elected in 2016. By the time the Russians invaded Ukraine, Trump's international "punitive tariff" policies and anti-immigration and inflammatory rhetoric regarding asylum seeking internationals fleeing from US wars in the Middle East were making serious impressions upon German nationals, and the creation of right-wing anti-immigration political parties started forming. Several of these parties gained widespread adherents throughout Germany during Sholz's Chancellorship, and in 2022, Frederick Merz, a Christian Democrat, narrowly defeated a candidate from the German Green Party, Annalena Baerbock. The Afd (Alternative for Deutschland) party, a well-known right wing extremist group also seeking representative power in German government, mysteriously lost 6 of their candidates.....to untimely deaths.....all at around the same time as the Parliamentary votes. Despite numerous conspiracy theories, their deaths remain mostly seen as "a coincidence".

During the developing Ukraine War involving the Russian invasion, Europe as a whole supported Ukrainian defense missions and sanctioned Russia, along with help from the US and assorted UN nations. Europeans in Ukraine suffered under evacuation orders as Ukrainian civilians were called upon to fight against Russia for defense of Ukraine under martial law imposed by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky. The economic effects of this new war were deeply felt all throughout Europe, as the European Community involving NATO operations decided to help send arms and munitions to Ukraine to repel the 300,000 troops-strong invading Russian military forces. International economies including those of their US partners were reeling from the increased military contribution operations and billions of dollars were spent by the new US President Biden to orchestrate the overall defense of Ukraine while sparing direct attacks against Russian targets as a condition of helping supply Ukraine with military weapons assistance. As Covid vaccines were developed and distributed worldwide, and people began returning to work during the early 2020's, Germany became less of an international force within Europe, opting to strengthen their northern borders against potential Russian attacks and increase national defense spending all throughout the country. This was to become a time for national introspection and inward accounting as to where Germany stood in light of the most recent global situations affecting not only the national economy, but internal business and immigration policies as well.

In 2026, after two major ceasefire attempts coordinated under the new US Administration run by a re-elected US President Trump to end the War in Ukraine failed, Russian bombers and fighter jets have been increasingly intercepted flying close to European borders, over the Baltic Sea. 

Russia and Belarus's next-door proximity to NATO nations in Northern Europe are a strong cause for concern. Both Poland and Finland are within easy reach of Russian weapons and still, US President Trump has recently tried to adapt to the current global oil crises caused by Gulf Region warfare- that was initiated by Trump's bombings of Iran, ironically- by undoing sanctions against the purchase of Russian oil by Europeans. Because of the Nord Stream pipeline sabotages, this possibility seems rather remote, but there is still the question of why Russia is experiencing a fuel shortage currently. The war against Ukraine could be using up Russian national food and oil supplies at unprecedented rates and also making oil processing in Russia more difficult as Ukraine targets Russian ships operating in Crimea and Russian energy sector targets in Russia. Russia seems more likely to pressure their own people to endure these events, which means that food and fuel rationing can be expected to continue in Russia in the immediate future as their war against Ukraine rages on. The effects upon Europe if Russia decides to attack any of several potential NATO targets out of spite, perhaps, would result in similar reactions throughout Northern Europe, predictably. European leaders have discussed this possibility and have also met with US leaders about what to do in case of any such devastating developments.

So why can't the Nord Stream pipelines be repaired? Maybe because they are deep undersea pipelines and would require submersibles and heavy machinery equipment to fix, and during a war. And the pipelines run mostly through the cold, cold Baltic Sea, where defense operations involving both NATO and the Russian Federation make even commercial travel in the area extraordinarily risky! And, also, any resulting new massive flow of oil from Russia to Germany would predictably create an economic and political instability in Russia, creating potentially crippling and highly political deals, and serious compromises involving their occupations of Ukraine and Crimea, which are being bombed by both Russia and Ukraine at the time of this writing.

This is an ongoing commentary and news report.

Under edit.

(Frankfurt, Germany photo courtesy Adobe© stock images, free photographic source materials 2026).

Author note: History reference information used in this commentary about recent German national developments were gleaned in part from independent TLO research and AI assistance.