Obviously, they will be all smiles in the photo. Long, frank handshakes, tight hugs, fiery declarations. On January 22, Emmanuel Macron and Chancellor Olaf Scholz will together celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Elysée Treaty marking the reconciliation between the two countries. However, behind the scenes, the atmosphere is not really looking good. Crises, the Franco-German tandem has experienced in the past. As in 2000, between Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder during the European summit in Nice. But today, the war in Ukraine, which is turning the entire German model upside down, and Emmanuel Macron’s ambitions to build European sovereignty are bringing to light dissensions long passed over in silence. Whether in terms of defence, industrial policy, energy strategy or when it comes to displaying a united front against China or American protectionist excesses, the responses from Paris and Berlin are variable in geometry. When they are not orthogonal. Detailed review of annoying subjects.
Space: a foretaste of the Franco-German divorce
“OK Kourou, we have a problem!” Ariane, pride of European cooperation and darling of the Franco-German couple is no more than a shadow of herself. And not only because last fall, the first launch of Ariane 6, the future European rocket, was once again postponed. No maiden flight before the end of 2023, at best. Nearly ten years that ArianeGroup and the ESA (the European Space Agency) have been working on this new machine, multiplying delays and disappointments. A snail’s tempo against the SpaceX cheetah. On the commercial side, the dive descent of Ariane is spectacular: in 2022, the European carried out only five launches against 60 for its competitor, SpaceX’s Falcon 9. “The Germans are very annoyed by the heaviness of ArianeGroup, the rule of geographical return, the French technological choices which would first benefit the tricolor industry and especially the sums engulfed. The system cracks”, enumerates Xavier Pasco, director of the Foundation for Strategic Research.
Germans who, more and more openly, imagine a future solo in space. Copying the American “New Space” method, three German start-ups have embarked on the design of small launchers. “Germany, a major automotive nation, does not want to miss the boat of the autonomous vehicle. And for that, it must have strategic autonomy in the high-speed Internet provided by the constellations of small communications satellites”, adds Eric-André Martin from the French Institute of International Relations (Ifri). In haste, France followed suit. “But we are two years behind them,” blows the boss of a French start-up.
Energy: the nuclear bone of contention
“The obsession of the Germans for thirty years is the disintegration of EDF.” Stupefaction. We are on December 13, 2022 and before the National Assembly’s commission of inquiry into the reasons for France’s loss of energy sovereignty, Henri Proglio, the former boss of EDF, is shooting Berlin on sight, the Europe and the construction of the European energy market which means that the wholesale price of electricity is indexed to that of gas. “The Germans use gas, the whole process is German and the European regulations are German […] How do you expect this country, which has based its wealth, its efficiency and its credibility on its industry, to accept that France has a competitive tool as powerful as EDF at its doorstep?” continues Proglio.
In fact, two energy strategies oppose each other in Europe. The Germanic vision that madeEnergiewende, the transition to all renewables, coupled with gas, the alpha and omega of its policy. And the French nuclear strategy that Macron wants to further strengthen with new EPRs.
Paradoxically, the war in Ukraine has crystallized resentment. While the French brag about the choice of the atom, the Germans balk. “France is currently in a difficult situation, because its power stations are very old and a good part of them do not work. I remind you that we are net exporters of electricity, thanks to our wind turbines”, specifies at L’Express former Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel. Atmosphere. Behind the atom, another battle is taking shape, that of hydrogen. Berlin would gladly imagine a large network of pipelines connected to North Africa carrying green hydrogen. Emmanuel Macron has been clear, it is “Nein”. France will not be a transit country.
Transatlantic relations: Berlin’s American friend
Three letters for a declaration of war: IRA, for Inflation Reduction Act, a plan voted in the United States last summer and which aims, among other things, to promote the development of green industries on American soil through public subsidies. Unfair competition, alarmed Europeans who see it as an additional risk of relocation to America. The French were the first to step up, Emmanuel Macron brandishing the weapon of a “Buy European Act” intended to favor European companies in calls for tenders. “We do not support this project. We denounce this type of practice, so it is not to use them in our turn”, confides a senior official of the BDI, the very powerful German industrial lobby.
In Berlin, we prefer not to offend the American friend and protector too much and we rather defend a relaxation of the system of state aid. “Problem: there are those who will have the means to help their companies and the others, which introduces a form of divergence within the countries of the zone”, worries Sébastien Maillard, the director of the Jacques Delors Institute. . No big deal, since there are still some 220 billion euros in loans that have not been drawn on the lines of the European recovery plan, retorts Germany. “That will not be enough. For fear of reprisals, naivety or dogmatism, Europe risks playing the small arm”, worries Valérie Hayer, Renew MEP in the European Parliament. In its role of arbiter, the European Commission must give its own response to the American plan at the beginning of February.
Budgetary rules: the German fed up with French laxity
Across the Rhine, it’s almost a rule of public hygiene: the “Schwarze null” which could be transcribed as “zero public deficit”. A rule enacted by the former Minister of Finance Wolfgang Schauble in the aftermath of the great financial crisis of 2008 and which the German government has applied to the letter for years. Still, the Covid, and today the war in Ukraine have left their mark on the accounts of all European states. In France, the public debt is close to 113% of GDP today, according to the latest Eurostat estimates… very far from the 60% ceiling set out in the Maastricht Treaty.
Believing that these famous budgetary criteria were from another age, France has been campaigning for two years for their rewriting. What tense the German leaders. At the beginning of November, the European Commission presented a proposal for reform of the stability and growth pact: at the heart, the notion of sustainability and the writing for each country of a trajectory of continuous debt reduction over a few years. No more cleavers but more made-to-measure… The response was quick to come from Christian Lindner, the very liberal German finance minister: “A single monetary union also needs single budgetary rules. there can be no unilateral relaxation or creation of additional valuation margin.” Suffice to say that the subject has not finished poisoning the life of the Franco-German tandem.
China: no touch on German interests
A betrayal. It is an understatement to say that Olaf Scholz’s whirlwind visit to Beijing at the beginning of November heated the spirits at the Elysée. “Scholz not only surprised Paris but also his own coalition allies,” observes Jacob Ross, a Franco-German expert at the German Institute for Foreign Policy (DGAP). If Berlin pampers its relationship with China, it is because the economic ties between the two countries are very close. German exports to the Middle Kingdom reach 3% of German GDP against barely 1% in France. “When we add the weight of German direct investment in the country, the dependence is even stronger,” said economist Sébastien Jean.
We can better understand the German reluctance to bang on the table in the face of the dumping procedures used and abused by Beijing to flood Europe with its cheap products. The last subject on the table: electric cars made in China whose imports into Europe have multiplied by two and a half in the space of a year. “When we know how much the Chinese state subsidizes this industry, we would be entitled to put in place compensatory measures”, continues Sébastien Jean, professor at Cnam. Otherwise the European automobile industry could well be swept away, as were the manufacturers of solar panels. But Berlin is procrastinating: it must be said that half of these imported electric cars are by German manufacturers based in China…