A few days ago, the newly appointed German Chancellor Scholz flew to Washington and held talks with US President Biden at the White House. The outside world believes that with Merkel's end of her term, the United States seems to see hope of drawing Germany against Russia. Because Scholz took the initiative to fly to Washington to meet with Biden, it shows that the new German government attaches great importance to German-American relations.
So since this is the case, the future of the Nord Stream-2 natural gas project left by Merkel has become a topic of widespread discussion.
In a sense, "Nord Stream No. 2" is not only a people's livelihood project, but also a bellwether for the direction of relations between European countries and Russia, with obvious and strong political implications. If Nord Stream II is completely terminated in the hands of the new German government, it will mean that Russia's goal of active integration into Europe has completely failed, and Putin may lead Russia to completely "look east".
Interestingly, at the same time as Scholts and Biden met, Putin had arrived in Beijing, not only to watch the opening ceremony, but also to interact closely with the Chinese high-level. Across the Pacific Ocean, two political events that take place almost simultaneously are likely to affect the future world political landscape and energy landscape.
First, from an energy perspective. Germany is probably the most hungry country in Europe for Russian gas. Because Germany has the largest industrial system in Europe, it needs a large number of high-quality and cheap energy to support its industrial and people's livelihood needs. Moreover, as the majority shareholder of the Nord Stream 2 natural gas project, Germany can not only obtain a large amount of energy with this pipeline and the Nord Stream 1 pipeline that has been built before, but also sell Russia's cheap natural gas to other European countries as an energy wholesaler, not only to make a difference, but also to make another profit by contracting the natural gas pipeline construction project. I have to say that this deal is a guarantee of profit for the Germans.
So if you calculate the economic account, Merkel's efforts to keep the Nord Stream II project can be said to be a big gift to the Scholz government.
Second, from a geopolitical point of view, the United States does not want nord Stream II to succeed, because it means that Russia has the lifeblood of European energy and will expand its influence on the Political Situation in Europe. If Europe and Russia reach a settlement, then the value of the United States and NATO's existence will be greatly weakened, how can the United States confront Russia from the european direction?
So no matter what Biden and Scholtz say in this White House meeting, they will inevitably focus on the Nord Stream II project. Relevant domestic experts also believe that the future prospects of Nord Stream-2 are worrying, and the United States is exerting its influence to fully obstruct Germany's cooperation with Russia.
The newly elected German foreign minister, Berberk, also shouted that Nord Stream II could not be approved. With pressure from the United States on the outside and obstruction by the Greens and other right-wing forces on the inside, scholz's pressure is indeed not small, and it is likely that it may temporarily stop Nord Stream II or make a symbolic gesture to alleviate the pressure.
In this regard, Putin seems to have expected that this is not that he expected things to be like gods, but that after two or three decades of contact, he has long been very familiar with and disappointed with the Western party set. So he did not put all the hopes of Russian energy exports on Germany, but has already begun to carry out deep cooperation with China. With the commissioning of the "Siberian Power" natural gas project of Sino-Russian cooperation in 2020, this large-scale project with a total length of 4,000 kilometers has delivered more than 20 billion cubic meters of high-quality natural gas to China in one year. A few days ago, the two sides signed 15 large orders again, one of which is to increase the annual gas transmission volume by 10 billion cubic meters to 38 billion cubic meters, and the future will reach a stable level of 50 billion cubic meters per year, which is almost russia's gas supply to the whole of Europe.
China has replaced Europe as Russia's largest energy partner, which has made Europe feel very troubled. While they exclaimed that China and Russia could form an energy alliance, they were suppressing Russia and undermining the basis of bilateral cooperation. Such an approach will not do any good to ease bilateral relations and improve regional contradictions, which can only push Russia further toward China. Contrary to the road, it can only be said that the opportunity is in front of us, but Europe has given the wrong choice!