Germany wants to show more presence in the Indo-Pacific, also because of China’s robust presence in the region. An expert classifies Defense Minister Pistorius’ plans.
Munich – When the frigate “Bayern” left its home port of Wilhelmshaven in the summer of 2021 and set course for the Far East, the German Ministry of Defense was still headed by Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer. The Brandenburg-class warship covered around 43,000 nautical miles in the following seven months – on a mission that was officially declared a “training trip”.
Above all, however, the crew of the “Bayern” wanted to show their presence in a region that had been neglected by German politics for years: the 180 crew members sailed via the Horn of Africa and Australia via Japan, South Korea and Vietnam and past to China to Singapore. It was the first time a German warship had been deployed to the Indo-Pacific in nearly two decades.
Now Kramp-Karrenbauer’s successor Boris Pistorius has announced that this historic mission will be continued. In the coming year, another frigate is to be sent to the Indo-Pacific, then accompanied by a supply ship, Pistorius said at the Shangri-La Dialog defense forum in Singapore last weekend. According to the minister, the mission is not directed against a specific state, on the contrary: the two ships “are committed to protecting the rules-based international order that we have all signed and from which we should all benefit – be it in the Mediterranean Sea, in the Bay of Bengal or in the South China Sea”.
Announcement to China: “Committed to Contributing to Peace and Security in the Indo-Pacific”
Pistorius’ announcement was probably intended primarily as an announcement to China, which is becoming increasingly self-confident in the region. Beijing claims almost the entire South China Sea as its own sovereign territory and has had reefs piled up to form islands for years, which it then fortifies militarily. A 2016 ruling by the International Court of Arbitration in The Hague dismissing China’s claims is ignored by Beijing. At the same time, there are repeated clashes with the United States in the region – most recently, according to the US Pacific Command, a Chinese jet approached a US reconnaissance aircraft in an “unnecessarily aggressive” manner. Incidents like this are increasing. And the federal government seems to realize that you can no longer look away.
Germany feels “obligated to contribute to peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region,” said Pistorius in Singapore. With good reason: the world’s most important trade route runs through the South China Sea. It is estimated that a third of the goods traded worldwide pass through the region. A blockade, for example by China, would be a disaster for the export nation Germany.
Above all, the situation in the Taiwan Strait is worrying observers. The strait, which is only 130 kilometers wide at its narrowest point, separates the People’s Republic of China from the democratically governed island state of Taiwan, which Beijing regards as part of its own national territory and wants to unite with the mainland by force if necessary. “Half of all container ships in the world pass through the Taiwan Strait,” said analyst Alexander Görlach IPPEN.MEDIA. Among other things, the China expert is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. “It is therefore of fundamental importance for the export world champion Germany that the passage remains open and Taiwan remains free,” he says. In addition, Germany is dependent on Taiwan’s microchip exports. Görlach is therefore demanding that Germany take a stand on the Taiwan conflict.
“Berlin must show China that an invasion of Taiwan would have drastic consequences”
“The Strait of Taiwan is international waters,” says Görlach. The United States and most Western governments, as well as the Taiwanese themselves, see things similarly. China, on the other hand, regards the Taiwan Strait as its own sovereign waters. Görlach demands that the frigate that Germany intends to send to the region in 2024 should also cross the Taiwan Strait in order to “underline the applicable law”. At the time, the “Bayern” had avoided the strait so as not to provoke Beijing.
Görlach believes that Germany must appear self-confident, even if China is Germany’s largest trading partner. “Berlin needs to show Beijing that the invasion of the peaceful island democracy of Taiwan would have drastic consequences that could collectively break the Communist Party’s rule over the people of China,” he says. Western sanctions could hamper China’s economic growth and thus endanger the power base of state and party leader Xi Jinping.
However, there is still no consensus in the traffic light coalition on how Germany should deal with the increasingly authoritarian China. The long-awaited China strategy is a long time coming. What the SPD, Greens and FDP can agree on: Germany must free itself from its economic dependence on Beijing, keyword “risk minimization”.
China expert: Europeans need “common strategy”
Here, too, the Indo-Pacific region plays a key role. Under the motto “China plus one”, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Economics Minister Robert Habeck in Singapore last year advertised for new partners in the Far East at the Asia-Pacific Conference of German Business. And in India, Boris Pistorius announced this week that he intends to make arms cooperation with the Chinese opponent in Asia much easier. First, a declaration of intent for a joint submarine project worth more than five billion euros was signed.
The federal government, then still under Angela Merkel, had already published “Guidelines on the Indo-Pacific” in 2020. China’s aspirations to become a great power are now forcing Berlin to fill it with life. However, it is completely open how Germany would react if China got serious and actually attacked Taiwan. The USA would probably intervene militarily. However, just under every fourth German thinks that the Federal Republic should get involved in the conflict, how a recent survey commissioned by the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank revealed. 60 percent say Germany must remain neutral. The question is whether it could.
In any case, it is crucial for Alexander Görlach that Germany does not act alone in the region, but in cooperation with its European partners. “To a certain extent, Germany, like France, is fooled by the illusion that it is a kind of medium-sized power that is large and relevant enough to implement its own policies towards China and India. But that’s not the case,” he says. The Europeans could only keep up with the new powers of the Global South “if they agreed on a common strategy”.
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