Download Locations

• Open CRS (User submitted)

Summary

German Chancellor Angela Merkel took office in November 2005 promising a foreign policy anchored in a revitalized transatlantic partnership. Most observers agree that since reaching a low-point in the lead-up to the Iraq war in 2003, relations between the United States and Germany have improved. U.S. officials and many Members of Congress view Germany as a key U.S. ally, have welcomed German leadership in Europe, and voiced expectations for increased U.S.-German cooperation on the international stage. German unification in 1990 and the end of the Cold War represented monumental shifts in the geopolitical realities that had defined German foreign policy. Germany was once again Europes largest country, and the Soviet threat, which had served to unite West Germany with its pro-western neighbors and the United States, was no longer. Since the early 1990s, German leaders have been challenged to exercise a foreign policy grounded in a long-standing commitment to multilateralism and an aversion to military force while simultaneously seeking to assume the more proactive global role many argue is necessary to confront emerging security threats. Until 1994, Germany was constitutionally barred from deploying its armed forces abroad. Today, approximately 7,400 German troops are deployed in peacekeeping, stabilization, and reconstruction missions worldwide. However, as Germanys foreign and security policy continues to evolve, some experts perceive a widening gap between the global ambitions of Germanys political class, and a consistently skeptical German public. Since the end of the Cold War, Germanys relations with the United States have been shaped by several key factors. These include Germanys growing support for a stronger, more capable European Union, and its continued allegiance to NATO as the primary guarantor of European security; Germanys ability and willingness to undertake the defense reforms many argue are necessary for it to meet its commitments within NATO and a burgeoning European Security and Defense Policy; and German popular opinion, especially the influence of strong public opposition to U.S. foreign policies during the George W. Bush Administration on German leaders. President Obamas popularity in Germany suggests that many Germans expect the new U.S. Administration to distance itself from the perceived unilateralism of the Bush Administration. However, some observers caution that public expectations of the new President could be unreasonably high and note that policy differences between the two countries remain. For example, in the face of the global economic slowdown, German leaders on both sides of the political spectrum have resisted calls from the Obama Administration to stimulate economic growth through larger domestic spending measures. In the foreign policy domain, while German officials have welcomed the Obama Administrations strategic review of Afghanistan/Pakistan policy, they have essentially ruled out sending more combat troops or relaxing constraints on those troops currently serving in Afghanistan before German federal elections scheduled for September 2009.

XML