Russia home to the world's biggest
natural gas reserves the gas is needed
especially in Europe and the end of the
Cold War ushered in an era of
conflicting energy dependencies and
concern in the west you're giving Soviet
Union hard currency and they're using
that to build up their military and this
is going to come back to haunt us
meanwhile the 1980s marked the beginning
of one man's extraordinary
career as a case officer you have to be
able to manipulate people there is no
such a s as for a KB guy gas is one of
his two main tools for coercion for
leverage for
influence Soviet Traditions
continue gas oil and gas dependencies as
a political weapon was part for the
course in the Warsaw
Pact one of the world's most powerful
men has strategically wielded what's
probably his most effective Ive weapon
with the help of gazprom Vladimir Putin
has implemented policies designed to
strike fear into the wider world the
whole purpose of nordstream was to be
able to pressurize Central and Eastern
Europe northstream one was a project
aimed at allowing Russians to play hard
ball against
[Music]
us
the yamal peninsula in Western Siberia
the Region's indigenous people maintain
thousand-year-old traditions on the
tundra
here the Nets are reindeer herders and M
cetto is their
leader he's responsible for this group
of about 40
Nets they're on the Move every
day it's going pretty well now it's much
more difficult in
Autumn the Nets migrate to keep their
animals fed but their root has become
increasingly difficult in recent years
the once untouched nature of the yamal
peninsula is no
[Music]
more the hardest Crossing is still ahead
of us ban and kovo it's a long stretch
with a wide river in concrete
roads rete roads bict the tundra to
provide access to one of Russia's
largest natural gas deposits the bovan
and kovo gas field operated by gazprom
the biggest extraction company in the
world the business of blue gold has been
about politics money and above all power
for
decades the people who are explorers in
the energy industry you're always
looking for a
giant
they're looking for a large field which
has low unit cost which will provide you
with Supply over 30 years and there are
very few Giants left in the world that
we know about one country has benefited
disproportionately for Germany the
Russian hydrocarbon base the gas base is
enormous so for large supply low unit
cost you can't do better on a pure
economic basis than more cheap Supply
from Russia
Jurgen hre LED BF the world's largest
chemical company for eight
years gas means three things for
BASF firstly and most importantly it's a
raw material chemistry begins with the
carbon atom secondly we need a lot of
heat and thirdly we also need
electricity to run our plants we need
natural
gas B basf's Gas strategy has always
focused on one thing risk
minimization that means access to oil
and gas which is why we wanted to Source
up to 50% of our carbon needs
ourselves that was the driving force
behind everything we
did BASF Eon and gazprom signed a
contract for the construction of a
pipeline through the Baltic Sea just
before the 2005 German parliamentary
[Music]
elections we joined the joy venture to
develop a new gas field in Western
Siberia in
2003 then we said okay let's bring the
cheap gas to Central
Europe the idea was to connect Germany
via this pipeline to our gas
Fields h NRE
one Chancellor ghard shuder had been a
key Ally of BASF for
years I have to represent German
interests especially when it comes to
energy security with the German
economy former NATO analyst Richard
Anderson outlined in 2006 how natural
gas could threaten Europe's
security it's pretty typical for
military analysts to look at energy and
how it can often be a source of conflict
Russia's energy dominance is an area of
concern that that NATO analysts have
certainly been looking at for the past
several
decades natural gas gets used for
producing electricity gets used for
heating it's the basic element that gets
used to make Plastics to make
fertilizers it's the lifeblood of a lot
of industrial economies so this is an
old Soviet Union map here in the center
you can see some major natural gas and
oil fields that were developed during
Soviet times in the case of Russia I
think it's been pretty clear especially
of late that energy often can be the
precursor to a war is tendered by
President Kennedy to West Germany's
chief of
state in 1963 the Kennedy administration
tried to prevent the construction of the
Duba pipeline from the Soviet Union to
Eastern Europe Manis man was providing
the pipes and other equipment the US
government the K Administration told
them to stop doing it which they
did West German Chancellor villy Brun
then ushered in the country's new OST
politic thawing relations deant and
trade contracts were signed for the
construction of gas
[Music]
pipelines
work began in 1970 on a pipeline that
would finally connect Siberia with
Germany Nikolai or Nikolai orev minister
of the Soviet gas industry celebrates a
deal worth billions together with his
German Partners gas from the Soviet
Union arrives at the transfer station
for the first
time get go for
launch economy minister and his Soviet
guests hailed the gas launch as the
result of normalization of relations for
the Russians the deal was basically
about hard currency that they needed
because their economy was faltering and
they needed the money from the West to
keep the whole show going helmot Schmidt
Bron successor also turned to Siberian
gas a second pipeline to Europe was
built during Chancellor Schmidt's visit
to Moscow German companies signed a
third such contract valid until the year
2000 Schmidt deflected US President
Jimmy Carter with the words trading
partners don't shoot at each other in
fact President Carter wrote apparently
in his notes that he was really tired of
the US providing the stick and Europeans
competing to provide the carrot to
incentivize uh Soviet Behavior the US
Washington was looking at and this
saying that you're giving Soviet Union
hard currency and they're using that to
build up their military and this is
going to come back to haunt
[Music]
us that was even an argument back then
you're making yourselves dependent on
the Soviet superpower our ideological
opponent how can you as NATO members do
such a
thing the worries on the American side
were about dependence that Russia would
use energy as a political weapon and
that it would put Europe and Germany in
a position where it couldn't stand up to
the Soviet Union and so this was all
seen as part of a overall Soviet
strategy uh to weaken the west and to
break up
NATO the situation in Poland then
reached a boiling
point the government imposed martial law
in 1981 despite protests by the solidos
Trade union and new US President Ronald
Reagan reacted with sanctions to disrupt
Russia's natural gas trade the United
States is taking immediate action to
suspend major elements of our economic
relationships with the Polish government
and we're proposing to our allies the
further restriction of high technology
exports to
Poland the new Soviet pipeline to
Germany was built
anyway the sanctions actually were not
very effective and also it divided the
West Margaret Thatcher uh said that
we're losing jobs because we're not able
to supply equipment for that pipeline
us business wasn't happy about this the
US was also selling components and the
US argument was if we can't sell these
things then you know our competitors in
Europe will sell the equipment so in the
end they did shell the
sanctions it's no secret that our allies
didn't agree with this action but I'm
pleased to announce that the
industrialized democracies reached
substantial agreement on a plan of
action they did work out a compromise in
in the 1980s which put a limit on the
amount of uh Soviet gas that went to
Europe and also ensured that there would
be Norwegian gas coming to Europe so
that there was some
diversification Washington tried to
convince Germany to stop relying on
Russian gas but most continued to come
from
Siberia as young Diplomat as a young
Diplomat I was in the Washington Embassy
and the Ambassador was really proud that
he'd successfully argued against the
American pipeline embargo we were all
inspired by the idea that what we were
doing was part of the policy of
improving relations it made sense to
everybody I really don't remember anyone
at the time saying this is heading in
the wrong
direction but us intelligence Services
weren't happy CIA Chief William Casey
developed a top secret plan with
President Reagan's
blessing
Vienna the Spy capital of the
world I was your typical Black Market
dealer especially mainframe computers
measuring instruments for nuclear
physics really delicate things that less
developed States couldn't make
themselves
I trained with the East German State
security which was where I was recruited
and then of course after a break I
worked in the Soviet
Union the CIA watched me for over a
year until one day when the time was
right they decided to
intervene they said I had a
choice at least 20 years in prison or I
work for
them to up atst films the CIA supplied
the black market specialist with
expensive high-tech Goods who sailed to
the Soviet Union was
banned the Soviet Union reacted as
expected some Gru people suddenly
appeared in the
hotel Two Gentlemen politely asked me to
answer a few
questions that turned into a 6-hour
interrogation because the Tech equipment
had clearly been tampered
with everything was actually compromised
I found out then that the first big
computer i' sold a huge thing made up of
cabinets had caught
fire Reagan and his CIA Chief mainly had
their sight set on the Siberian
Pipelines I'm convinced that a broad
variety of techn was being
delivered there's a famous case of a gas
pipeline that was damaged by a
contaminated unit brought in from the
West the software running one of the
largest gas pipelines in the Soviet
Union went haywire in June
1982 just as the CIA had planned the
result was a huge
explosion the hunt was then on for the
sabator look there's no question if they
caught me I'd be dead it was that simple
I was very very happy I survived
surviving was the greatest Triumph of my
life SLS I
survived a Russian engineer was arrested
on a Moscow Street in
1985 a CIA
spy he was later executed and the
pipeline soon repaired business as usual
Vladimir Putin was at the time being
trained as a KGB agent he was sent to
East Germany in
1985 somebody asked him what did you do
in dresdon and he said you know he was a
KGB case officer and he said I was
working with people and
documents Putin became a regular KGB
presence in Dresden he regularly showed
up at meetings of the East German
Security Service the
[Music]
stazi stazzy agents often photographed
[Music]
Putin as a case officer you have to be
able to manipulate people you have to
understand people's weaknesses um as
well as their strengths uh and add to
that the fact that he was a judo
Champion you try and sense even if your
opponent is physically stronger than you
what are their other weaknesses how can
you distract them so I think if you put
those two things together um he probably
has been quite good at manipulating
people making them feel that they're
very important um and appealing to their
own vanity stazi officer Matias vanik
was also active in dresen he' previously
spied in the west I had a close
colleague in Berlin at the time I was in
Moscow and he had access to the shazi
files and discovered that veg had indeed
been with the
[Music]
shazi we were interviewing uh people who
knew both of them them and they were
able to place them in Dresden in the
late 80s and said that they were working
together what we were able to ascertain
was that the KGB was actually trying to
recruit stazzy agents in
Dresden a stazi ID became part of
Putin's disguise and by 1989 he was
looking beyond the preservation of
Communism it was very very important for
establishing the business careers of a
lot of different people and also
probably allowing the cas B to preserve
a lot of its Network he had met stazi
Chief erish milka just a year
earlier Putin represented a powerful
state that was keeping East Germany
afloat with its cheap oil and gas
natural gas was very closely related to
Quality of Life to warmth to the
provision of you know Services allowing
schools to function hospitals to
function and I have used the word
[Music]
glue you could describe that the cheap
energy that the Soviet Union was
providing to its eastern European
satellites basically is a subsidy to
keep their economies going and to keep
them tight in the Soviet
orbit Russia was then using oil and gas
as a disciplinary measure within the
Warsaw PCT Whenever there was conflict
I'm thinking of the uprisings in Hungary
and 68 in
Czechoslovakia Moscow sent tank to
Czechoslovakia and supplied less oil and
[Music]
gas oil and gas using oil and gas
dependencies as a political weapon was
par for the course in the warsa pack
they would offer very favorable oil and
gas contracts and in return they of
course expected loyalty to Soviet
interests exploiting these dependencies
in foreign insecurity policy has a long
precedent
in 1989 East Germany was on the brink of
collapse but the Soviet Union continued
to demand high prices for oil and gas
which the country could barely pay it
slid deeper into
crisis the Soviets were getting all this
money from Europeans and they were
seeing what the real price of energy in
Europe was and they thought well our
economy isn't doing great why are we
giving away our energy to these
people agents like Vladimir Putin and
Matias vanish had to
adapt the system they worked under was
ending vanik landed on his feet moments
after the Berlin Wall
[Music]
crumbled it's fascinating how for
example how quickly vanik was was hired
by drna bank I mean they identified him
very very early on as someone who would
be extremely useful for for building up
their business in Eastern Europe and in
Russia former agent Vladimir Putin
repositioned himself as the statue of
the kgb's founder was torn down in
Moscow Putin has described that very
well in interviews how he came back from
Dresden and he didn't know what to do
and he was he was moonight liting as a
taxi driver on the streets of St
Petersburg he finally landed up in the
me office in St Petersburg with mayor
subjack now subjack was a reformer but
he was also corrupt so you had a period
there where Putin was in charge of
foreign economic contacts and that's I
think when he be began to make money
violence followed the collapse of the
Soviet
Union the 1990s was a terrible time it
was just people trying to
[Music]
survive well the key thing was
protection what the Russians call Kisha
which is rof sometimes roof can be
someone in a criminal organization
sometimes it's uh someone in the
government in the '90s often that person
was the same person former stazi agent
vanck established contacts in St
Petersburg for drner bankk both in local
government and at a new company gazprom
they needed someone in the St Petersburg
government who could look after them and
open doors for them that was why the the
sort of Putin vanik connection was so
interesting because essentially Putin
was Van's Kisha he was his roof Putin
became more and more influential over
the years receiving dignitaries and
growing his
Network meanwhile the remnants of the
Soviet Union were being Bartered away
claims were being
staked
it was a sort of time of No Holds bar
wild capitalism it was the wild East
essentially Russian natural resources
was passed to a small cery of oligarchs
or sort of extremely rich individuals in
highly dubious privatization
auctions it was a really really rough
ride for Western investors but the
potential rewards were just so P that
they just kept their hand in the
game while the Russian people scoured
empty supermarkets for food and lived
through freezing Winters International
investors were ringing up cheap Russian
companies especially those in raw
materials one object of speculation was
the former gas Ministry renamed gas prom
in 1989 and a corporation since
1992 gas fromom was the most undervalued
company in Russia at the time the reason
it was so inexpensive was that everybody
assumed every last cubic meter of gas
was being stolen out of the company a
lot of assets were being siphoned off
and given to friends and relatives of
CIA management this did not deter German
companies one of the biggest
shareholders of gas from outside the the
government of Russia was Roar gas the
German company had already sold C
natural gas in Germany during the Soviet
era but other investors criticized the
conditions at gas
prom every year we would run a candidate
for the board of gas prom which was one
of our people who highlight the
corruption they sat on the board didn't
of course vote for our candidate and
didn't say a word they wanted the gas to
flow and they were absolutely unwilling
to say a word about criminality rur gas
dominated the European market thanks to
Siberian gas this did not sit well with
B ASF its largest customer
19 BF was essentially blackmailed in
1993 by R gas through prices that were
so high we saw our ludvig's hoffen
complex at
risk we decided we needed an
alternative we set up a joint venture
with gas prom to build the necessary
infrastructure in
Germany we built a large Network
alongside the existing one including a
large storage facility the biggest in
Germany it was a big deal it was
ultimately co-financed by gas
prom the German government under Helmut
Cole favored such projects partly
because they propped up beler Russian
president Boris yelson
the the idea of a partnership with a
Russia that had made German
reunification possible was that the
heart of German foreign policy be it
left right or
Center and for large stretches of the
1990s there was nothing wrong with
that the other objective was not to
leave Russia behind as a sort of failing
State and you didn't want a nuclear
power sort of going off on its own in
some other
world Cole forgave the debts of yelton's
Russia and the natural gas flowed Putin
noticed Putin drew the conclusion very
early on that Russia's greatness was
based on its
extraordinary oil and gas wealth and
that needed to be deployed strategically
in order to enhance Russia's great power
status Putin wrote a doctoral thesis in
1997 on energy dependencies and how they
could be instrument ized in foreign
policy from the very beginning he had
developed a strong personal interest in
the issue I myself had talks with German
intelligence officials who had also read
it we talked about what it actually
meant if German intelligence knew the
Chancellor's office did too the domestic
political Trends were relatively clear
more State control of the energy
industry managed directly by the
Kremlin
such policy has its routs thousands of
kilometers away at the ban in kovo
gasfield in Western Siberia an
invaluable
resource reindeer herder M sereto has
led his herd through the tundra for 25
years like generations of Nets before
him but since the development of the gas
field gas prom's infrastructure has made
life difficult for these indigenous as
people M's herd is moving to the Cara
sea in the north that's how it's always
been but the closer they get to the gas
field the more pensive these Tundra
Nomads
[Music]
become look at the roads that's a dead
end they also built a
railroad
soon we won't have any land
left and what happens if they close this
Crossing
too we won't be able to get to the other
side we'll have to spend the summer
somewhere
here we've already had a bad three years
in a row the snow cover was too
thick the reindeer was so weakened but
half of them
died
they extract lots of
[Music]
gas and sell it abroad for big money
what about
us the fate of the Nets has always been
a side issue for gazprom while a single
man in 2000 reached a level of power no
one
[Music]
expected Vladimir Putin became president
of Russia in the first year of the New
Millennium he had already served as
prime minister and director of The
Secret Service the FSB he had
connections throughout the
state there were major things that Putin
had to do one was to solidify the power
that the Russian government had over
these industries and it wasn't just in
in natural gas and oil it was across the
board Putin went out of his way to put
his cronies into these companies Putin
also took power economically Company by
company position by position then you
really saw the rise of the sil ke the
strong men the guys from the security
services who then began to occupy key
positions in U Putin's
Administration Putin also set his sights
on gazprom at the time still a massive
and unmanageable
company then at the annual general
meeting Putin stepped into the fry and
he fired vakarev who is the CEO of gas
prom who was doing all the stealing
along with his six or seven compatriots
and he replaced him with a new guy whose
job it was not to do any stealing his
name was Lexi
Miller he was a guy that Putin knew from
St Petersburg I remember what saying to
somebody in gas prom and a little bit
irritated who is this guy what does he
know about anything God you know these
the only people that can run gazprom
people from St Petersburg and the answer
was no these are the the only people
that Putin trusts but Alexi Miller was
not the true gazprom
boss 9 of course not he couldn't decide
alone he could decide for gas prom but
it still had to be voted on and that's
why certain deals took longer we're
talking about a state-owned
company gas prom followed Putin's orders
and bought a critical television station
NTV and brought it into
line we're asking everyone both NTV
journalists and all those who incite
them to stop putting up
hurdles critical journalists were
dismissed protests
ignored I just wonder how our people
could elect a president like that it's
horrible gas prom still owns its own
glitzy broadcasters 20 years later a
dominant Force in Russian
media a dedicated line leads from the
station boss directly to the Kremlin and
Putin through gazprom also controls
private radio stations like echo of
Moscow When Vladimir Putin came to power
in 20 000 he wanted to get control of
Independent Media he started with
television of course but also one of our
shareholders with a majority stake
Vladimir guzinski had his share seized
in order to take out a loan from gazprom
that's why I always say that Miller
isn't our shareholder Putin is gazprom
isn't our shareholder the presidential
Administration
is the station was banned from operating
in March
2022 just over 20 years earlier Vladimir
Putin had shown a very different face on
a visit to Berlin many German
politicians saw him as a symbol of
Hope today we must declare firmly and
definitively the Cold War is
[Applause]
Over objective problems aside beneath
everything beats the strong living heart
of Russia which is open to full-fledged
cooperation and
partnership thank you
[Applause]
done when I saw the response to that
speech back then I thought it was a bit
naive how people were so uncritical of a
man who had been in the KGB for
years Putin won the unconditional
support of German Chancellor Gad
shter this supposed opportunity for
democratization didn't really exist but
that didn't change the fact that Russia
was the second most powerful nuclear
power on Earth then and now whether you
like it or not you have to live with
Russia my attitude at the time was that
we had to try to somehow integrate them
on an international level but you didn't
need to have any Illusions about
Vladimir Putin's
character back in Russia Putin was
having the first offices and houses of
the oligarch searched a new power
struggle was
emerging it was very humiliating for
Putin and all the KGB guys um to watch a
bunch of nobody's in their minds people
who weren't part of the system become so
spectacularly wealthy all these KGB guys
were basically you know paid $50,000 a
year by these oligarchs to go and arrest
you know enemies and to drum up fake
criminal cases against business
competitors and so they had been
diminished to paid servants for the
oligarchs Putin summoned the oligarchs
in 2003 questioning them on live TV one
was singled out that frustration and
that bitterness came through very very
strongly in the campaign against kovski
that was where it really crystallized
because you
saw you know the sort of the strong men
in the Kremlin and in the government
really Target someone who for them
symbolized this oligarch class someone
who had come from virtually nowhere to
amass staggering wealth and to take over
one of the biggest oil companies in the
country M kovski was then head of the
oil company yukos the market number two
behind gazprom kovski was regarded as a
Putin critic with suspicions of State
corruption Putin's reaction was to have
cordovi arrested yukos was accused of
tax
evasion you could see in in the kind of
the campaign to destroy kovski there was
real there was a sort of Vengeance there
for all the humiliations that they had
suffered uh with the collapse of the
Soviet
Union kovski was publicly tried we were
at the time following this process
extremely closely because it was really
the first big attack by Putin's Kremlin
on private business he was sentenced in
May of 2005 to 9 years in a penal
Camp yukos was seized and auctioned off
for less than its
value Putin's associ IES took over the
oil company an expropriation in all but
name with the expropriation you have to
ask how did certain people get their
hands on these resources in the first
place you could say they might have had
something that didn't belong to them at
all kovski was taken to a siberian
prison camp in Russia's Far East near
the border with China criticism from
abroad fell on deaf
ears
and German Chancellor Gard shuder picked
a
[Music]
side these reforms ladies and gentlemen
have put Russia on a path of stable
economic growth there's not the
slightest reason to engage in debates
which would shake that confidence based
on this or that
event German energy companies were in
difficult negotiations with Russia in
2004 over access to its gas reserves
just as Putin was desperate to build a
pipeline to
Germany so Western technology and
Partnerships were very important in
terms of bringing Russia to the point
where it once again became really a an
energy
superpower Putin needed technical help
from Germany Russia's pipeline network
was in
disrepair they had discovered enormous
fields in places like Western Siberia
but they couldn't develop them because
they didn't have the capital but German
Chemical Company BASF
did we' already converted the first
power plant from oil to natural gas in
1997 because the Kyoto Protocol pointed
very clearly towards CO2
reduction in Kyoto Japan the
International Community reached its
first binding agreement to limit
greenhouse gas
emissions we adopt this text it's so
decided the and gas has an advantage
with gas you can run a combined heat and
power
plant in other words you can exploit the
resource much much better compared to
Pure oil or coal
burning Putin was directly involved in
negotiations between Russia and BASF
each side needed the
other
he was always very well prepared for
meetings some go into talks without
preparing I never saw that with
Putin so many Western Executives who
dealt with Putin felt they were dealing
not only with the president of Russia
but the CEO of Russian energy because of
his knowledge his detailed knowledge and
interest and focus on energy so he's I
mean he's an energy guy as well as a
political guy I've actually met Putin 16
times what impressed me at most of those
Gatherings was his knowledge of all the
statistics he doesn't have to turn to
any of his assistant and ask them so he
really loves energy this guy knows about
energy in a way that leaders of most
countries have have no idea he was more
the CEO of gas prom than he was
President Putin was driven by one thing
above
all we're pleased to have reached an
agreement with the Paris Club and
especially with our German Partners on
an early repayment of part of this debt
to the Paris
Club was the German government present
at negotiations with gas prom and
Moscow no representatives of the German
government were not there it was really
negotiated between gas prom and BASF and
other partners it also took quite a long
time but Matias vck the exi agent
working for Dresner bankk was always
present these were former guu people and
on the German side in for as stazy
people and that seemed very strange and
very suspicious it confirmed us in a
negative uh Instinct about this thing
Andre KV boss of Ukraine's oil and gas
company knew gas prom better than
anyone I was born in USSR and I clearly
St that a company of such importance can
never be just a simple company this is
part of the state I was member of
Delegation from NAFTA gas that went to
Moscow to negotiate a new gas Transit
contract the person who was hosting us
was gaspro middle manager who after
having couple of shots of vka he
revealed himself as a former uh special
agent of uh Soviet intelligence service
when I was kind of talking to myself
like Andre you have to be very
careful most people around here they are
not business people they are not gas
people these people were uh taught and
developed to spy and to steal data if
you talk to top level Russian officials
from the very very top they will tell
you there's no such a thing as former
KGB
guy
the British news magazine The Economist
wrote in 2005 that Putin had two means
at his disposal to restore Russia's
former influence nuclear weapons and
gas I think those still are the two
major levers that Putin has he's quite
shrewd and he did realize that gas is
one of his two main tools tools for
coercion for leverage for
influence then NATO analyst Richard
Anderson
wrote realistically without serious
concerted efforts on the part of the EU
States Russia will have the upper hand
in this relationship quite simply demand
will remain constant almost without
regard to price given the choice of a
cold dark home or paying exorbitant
prices Europeans will do the
latter
construction began on a Baltic Sea
pipeline at the end of 2005 the project
was eventually christened
nordstream an event like that is always
done for show but it was still
important today we're beginning the
North European gas pipeline
project noram 1 is a big deal no
question about it I don't regret it one
bit either I don't have a problem with
it at all it was the right thing to do
it was right for BASF and it was right
for Europe we should reserve gas from
Western Siberia for Europe whenever
possible
vce Alexi Miller introduced Gard truder
as a new head of nordstream shareholder
committee on a cold day in December just
17 days after he left Germany's
chancellory
did you know he would do it no I didn't
I talked with Angela merel
directly and told her schroer had taken
the job I told her that was the
intention what did she say she didn't
make any other
comment angco became Chancellor in 2005
the appointment of her predecessor by a
Russian controlled company raised
eyebrows when he took that job I mean
there was considerable I think surprise
in the United States because and in in
other countries because it really was
very unseemly for a chancellor who had
negotiated the deal then when he's
defeated in in an election to
immediately take a job and profit very
handsomely from from it so I think that
was certainly uh it was received very
negatively in the United States and uh
you know a lot of Suspicion about it the
sentiment in Germany was similar
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of course it was something I would have
preferred to have resolved differently
the more political a situation is the
more conflicts arise and I didn't want
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that I don't think it's right to have a
leadership role with gas problem when an
exi major is chairman of the
board
in Germany's own interests Gad has taken
over the supervision of a project that's
in our own interests in terms of
energy shudder did not become a gas prom
lobbyist on his own his nomination was
approved it should be someone who can
represent European economic interests
well but also has a rational approach
towards the majority shareholder at the
time Sher embodied both those elements
even the new chancellor who in public
was cooler towards Putin did not
distance herself from sher's new
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job I think Angela merel actively
supported and endorsed it I don't
remember marle ever speaking out against
it quite the opposite as far as I
remember she frequently made use of the
channels that went through G Shuda I
think it also provides a sense of you
know the important people are important
countries so it must be something
important that they're doing on behalf
of Russia so it does work to both
neutralize any concerns uh that citizens
would have uh and it also seems that
they're collecting uh this very
prestigious crowd to do their business
so again it is not just uh Mr schroer
who has fallen tra into this although
he's become such a a poster child for
exactly what this looks
like there was no opposition from
Germany's conservatives on this issue
why not because the entire German
economy and especially the energy
industry wanted
it there were many supporters not just
schroer social
Democrats I can't recall any significant
voices saying it was a bad
idea in Ukraine we clearly realized that
northstream won from the very stud was a
project aimed at allowing Russians to
play hard ball against
us this is urad in Ukraine one of
Europe's most important gas hubs in
Putin's mind these pipelines were not
something that Ukraine had built they
were something that the Soviet Union had
built and it drove Russia crazy that
Ukraine control these pipelines which
was the way that its gas moved to the
West Russia tried at one point going to
take control of the gas transit system
going through Ukraine uh but Ukraine
resisted it and when that fell apart
they they basically decided that the
only solution to this situation was to
go around Ukraine I mean it was a very
clear concerted strategy rational from
Russia's point of view to build
pipelines that uh reduced its dependence
and ultimately eliminate its dependence
on Ukraine which Russia really regarded
or at least Putin and people around
Putin did not regard as a legitimate
State the gas pipelines run either
through Poland or Ukraine a huge network
has evolved since
1970 the gas pipeline is not just one
pipeline together they have the capacity
to transport more gas than Russia
produces for the European market the new
pipeline appears to have been designed
to take Ukraine and Poland out of the
picture as Transit countries while still
guaranteeing Germany's gas supply
the whole purpose of nordstream was to
be able to pressurize Central and
Eastern Europe there isn't a single
Ukrainian who is not a Russian Ally who
thinks that nordstream was anything
other than a catastrophic and very
thinly veiled attempt to by bypass
Ukraine two weeks after construction
began on
nordstream they have sought this
conflict from the very beginning their
policy has always been to illicitly
divert gas or to put it more simply to
steal it from European
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consumers I hereby limit gas supplies to
Ukraine the flow of gas to Ukraine and
Europe stopped the 2006 conflict was
very very important as a starting point
the consequence of a relatively short
cut off of Russian gas were much greater
than anyone expected we never thought
this could happen look it's happened an
emergency EU meeting was
convened we should discuss what has
happened during those 24 hours and
happened for the first time in over 40
years of constant and reliable Russian
gas
supply by turning off the gas Putin was
continuing a Soviet tradition in 1991
even former Soviet president M Gorbachev
hailed as a reformer had used gas as a
weapon against St moving to leave the
Soviet
Union at the time the former Soviet
embassador to Germany Valentine Fallin
developed the falling Doctrine it named
seven instruments Russia could use to
enforce its foreign policy in the future
and the most important instrument was
the exploitation of energy
dependencies in the early 1990s when
there was the whole issue of how to
divide the black Fleet located in Crimea
you had these very heated discussions
about what is going to happen with this
Fleet how is it going to be divided
Russia threatened Ukraine with a gas
boycott if this cap is put in place then
we'll certainly be forced to curtail
power
generation you have this perfect
situation for that kind of pressure to
be exerted there they certainly were
using energy as a weapon
then different parts of Ukraine's
natural gas debt Visa Russia were
cancelled in exchange for different
percentages of that Black Sea Fleet
given to
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Russia mission
accomplished a 2006 publication by a
Swedish colleague LaRon looked back at
the 1990s saying in more than 50 cases
Russia had exploited these exact kinds
of energy dependencies for foreign
policy purposes effectively politically
blackmailing other
states
that's what many Europeans heavily
missed they simply did not want to
accept harsh reality that they're facing
new way of Russia of impacting European
union and the Western
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world