This is what lies ahead for Germany and Europe

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Lerato Khumalo

One thing is obvious: the greater the domestic political conflicts in Germany, the weaker the coming federal government will be in terms of foreign policy. The American “Make America Great Again” movement (MAGA) and the AfD share common perspectives, particularly when it comes to migration policy, but from the perspective of the Trump camp their solidarity is primarily for strategic reasons.

In addition, there will also be content-related conflicts in the transatlantic alliance in the coming years – especially in the area of Business. When dealing with the future US president, Germany has worse conditions than during Trump’s first term in office, primarily due to its current economic weakness.

The German export surplus in trade relations with the USA has traditionally been a thorn in the side of the future US President. In 2023, German foreign trade with the USA achieved a record export surplus of 63.3 billion euros. In general, Trump has already announced that he wants to reintroduce tariffs on imports, and of course these would have particularly harsh consequences for German exports.

Jörg Krämer, chief economist at Commerzbank, told ZDF: “His announced tariff rate of at least ten percent for all imports into the USA would be particularly bad for Germany as an export country.” He assumes that the Republican will at least partially implement his “aggressive tariff plans”. The result would probably be counter-tariffs from the EU.

Trump is relying on de-globalization economically, and exporting nations like Germany are suffering greatly from this. The forecasts are accordingly bleak: Experts expect that the possible tariffs could lead to a loss of up to 180 billion euros for the German economy.

Another point of conflict is this Security policy. Trump has already announced that he is demanding higher defense spending from his NATO partners – five percent of their respective gross domestic product. Many states had to stretch financially to even reach the two percent agreed upon in NATO. Read more about this here.

It is likely that Trump’s five percent push is a maximum demand, but he will at least use the US remaining in NATO and US support for Ukraine as leverage. It will be interesting to see how he deals with countries like Italy, which continue to clearly miss the two percent target. Italy is the third-largest economy in the EU, but Rome hopes that Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s good relations will encourage the future US president to be more lenient towards the country.