Is Germany Still a Reliable U.S. Ally?

As Russia threatens Ukraine, Trump continues to casts a shadow over relations between Berlin and Washington

- By Tom O'Connor. Photographs by Elika and Getty

AS COMMENTATORS IN THE United States criticize Germany for its hesitance to send weapons to Ukraine in the midst of a potentially explosive crisis with Russia, lingering doubts about Washington's commitments live on in Berlin and other European capitals after their tumultuous experience with former President Donald Trump.

The previous U.S. administration's constant criticism of Berlin, its decision to withdraw troops from Germany and to broadly disparage the nature of the transatlantic relationship has evoked concerns that, while President Joe Biden has taken a different approach, future White House leadership could again express skepticism toward NATO. Biden is set to meet with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Washington, D.C., on February 7.

When you sit in the U.S. the question is ‘Is Germany a reliable ally?' The question over in Europe is 'Is America going to be a reliable ally?” Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, vice president of the U.S. German Marshall Fund, tells Newsweek.

Kleine-Brockhoff, who served as an adviser to former German President Joachim Gauck, recently arrived in Washington from Kyiv, where he participated in a tour in which officials, lawmakers and journalists of various nationalities met with government and civil society figures in Ukraine to discuss the present situation.

He describes the atmosphere as “calm”—potentially to a fault, he argues, as it was not clear t o him that Ukraine was seriously prepared” for even the possibility of an attack launched by the tens of thousands of Russian troops just across the border

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his top security chief Oleksiy Danilov have repeatedly urged the country not to panic despite the flight of Western diplomatic family members and an uptick in militia recruitment and arms sales.