 Thank you, Michael. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. It's a great pleasure to be back at the Institute. I've been here twice with three times, Jill. I have been, I must also admit, the weird times when I was much, when I could travel to Dublin and Ireland more frequently, when I was a young European editor in the 90s, or even before. The interesting times have brought me, made me travel somewhere else, unfortunately. But, nevertheless, I'm very glad to be here with you this afternoon and share with you a couple of thoughts on my country and how it sees itself in the world and in Europe. Former German Foreign Minister Siegmar Gabriel, who was probably, is probably known to you, said the other day that the new decade will be one of major challenges. To meet them, he added, we'll have to engage, invest, and adjust the goal to remain relevant. Gabriel will not win any peace prize, any Nobel Prize for his obvious political analysis. Nonetheless, he's right. The post-Cold War period is over period. The times ahead of us will be rougher and politically less comfortable than before. Just at the speed of change, technological change in particular is much higher than before. I would like to take Gabriel's comments a step further and proceed in three steps. I will talk a little bit about Germany's domestic landscape, move on to Germany's foreign and international challenges, and place it too in a larger European context, if I may, and see how these trends might affect Europe. A Europe that would struggle to adapt to unpleasant global realities and for us to life after Brexit. Let's start with the evolving political scene and the place of Germany's parties in it. The Merkel era is drawing to a close. Post-Merkel syndrome has set in. It could last until the next election. If the next election is held as scheduled in the fall of 2021, Merkel will have 16 years under her belt, making here the second longest or even the longest serving chancellor in the history of the Federal Republic, depending upon when the new, the next government will eventually be sworn in. I think it's fair to say that Merkel was a dominant figure in European politics for many years. She provided an extraordinary degree of stability and reliability. In the process, though, she became the target sometimes of nasty criticism. The European debt crisis and the refugee crisis of 2015 and the rafter were two particular flashpoints during her term in office. Some saw her as to orthodox, others to liberal and to lenient. She was caught in the crossfire more than once. According to many observers, Merkel has lost some of her influence and authority in recent years. The outcome of the Libya conference in Berlin the other day and the praise for German leadership notwithstanding. Domestically, she's becoming a lame duck at the American scene. Though paradoxically, her approval ratings are up again. Maybe this is an early sign of we will miss you. Who will succeed her in Berlin? The first stop of the transition has, as you know, already been taken. Annegret Kahnbauer, who is also known as AKK, not AK47, but AKK. The former minister president or governor of the small state of Saarland and Merkel's closest collaborator became head of the Christian Democratic Union in December 2018. To further bolster her power base, she became minister for defense last year. For now, her rivals for leadership and there where a few, as you know, have stopped openly challenging her. But this might change as elections approach. AKK does not, I like this word, AKK. This is by way the only abbreviation we allow are at the headline, AKK, because Annegret Kahnbauer, you are second page. AKK does not do well in the polls, does not do well in the polls. Critics within the party blame the new party leader for the CDU's poor showing in state elections. So far, the social democrats, the coalition partner in Berlin, have not missed an opportunity to attack her. Every initiative Kahnbauer has tried, has run into a barrage of criticism. She gives them an opportunity to tarnish a potential competitor while shifting attention away from their own weaknesses and dismal election results. Dismal, they wear indeed in some states. Journalists like myself love it of course. The feuds give them, give us an opportunity to ponder the favorite questions. Will the coalition last the full term? Of course it will. Who would bring it down? No one. Is a minority government a realistic option for Germany, the anchor nation in Europe, in states, in the states? Yes, on the national level. I would say no. As I said, I for one think the coalition will make it to the finishing line. Elections will not be held before the schedule time in September of next year. Well, the social democrats, they are really in trouble. Structurally, historically, politically. And I don't say this was any sense of gratification. It's bad. It's everywhere. In our case, after years of infighting, which members continuously ripped apart the top dog in the party, this seems to be their prime concern to bring it down after they had elected him or her now with a hundred percent. Yes, but they have ushered in new leadership. This time it has elevated two people. Saskia Esken and Norbert Walter Borens. How many people in the room have ever heard of these two? None. I actually, the first woman I have never heard before myself, to the top spot. It's sad, in my judgment, because the couple represents, the couple represents the triumph of political provincialism. That's my gut feeling, political provincialism. It is the abdication of any claim to a strong leadership in and for Germany and in and for Europe. Remember, they have had a, yesterday has a finance minister, her Schultz, who is not popular. I know that, but as a finance minister for Germany, you are doing world politics. They sound like him, they ridiculed him, elected an unknown, completely unknown person from the state of Baden-Württemberg, whose political credentials are that short, beyond my imagination. Yesterday a pillar in post war Germany is about to be relegated to the second or even third division in politics. It pains me to say so. I must say, as per days an important party for the country has been and is now, as I said, relegated to minor league. The Greens, however, in contrary, are flying high. They just celebrated their 40th anniversary and they have the zeitgeist on their sides or so it seems. They have jettisoned some ideological baggage. The leadership team of Annalena Baerbock and Robert Habeck is competitive, yes it is, and politically attractive. There's no doubt about that. The ascent has taken the party so high that people are even seriously talking about a member of the Greens moving not just into government again, but all the way into the chancellery. Imagine, Germany has been unable to escape a force that has swept through many countries in Europe, right being populism. We once assumed that we would be an exception. We love to be exceptions actually. You think always we are the exception to some other global trans, but none? We are not. No more. The hot-ride alternative for Germany is the biggest opposition group in the Bundestag. Imagine this, the biggest opposition group in the Bundestag, almost a hundred members. In election in several eastern German states, Lender, as we say last year, he told in more than 20% of the vote in some districts more than 50 in the east. And this group is here to stay. It's toxic cocktail of anti-elite resentment, anti-immigration, climate change denial, and a general protest mood will continue to intoxicate its voters. While this feeling, this cultural economic resentment might be stronger in eastern Germany, the phenomenon is nevertheless national. The party's rise is also a clear indication of how Germany's big 10 parties, CDU and SPD, are already alluded to it, have fallen. Maybe a word on the economy. The German economy has seen a long stretch of good or even very good years. Unemployment is down. Employment is at record level. People cannot find new staff to fulfill vacant places. But the clouds have appeared at the horizon. Trade disputes have hurt German business. The main worry, however, extends well beyond such export-related issues. The big concern involves something larger. The question regarding whether the German manufacturing sector, which is still the backdrop of our economy, much more than any mature economies, will be able to pull off a technology-driven transformation. The auto industry, the heart and soul of Germany's economy, and particularly, for example, the state of Baden-Bürttemberg, the powerhouse of the country, is the source of many questions. The list of problems business community faces is easy to sum up, whether they're all difficult to answer. Potential shortcomings in artificial intelligence, energy transformation, shortage of skilled labor, adaptation to climate change. And again, fundamental technology-driven structural changes. All of these factors will apply enormous pressure to the economy. But only to say this, if the German economy fails to successfully transit into the digital age, other economies closely intertwined with us may suffer too. For a very good reason, Angela Merkel's mantra is competitiveness, competitiveness. Essentially, Germany is struggling to maintain its stride as it enters the new decade. Its influence and cloud are considerable, but they may have ebbed in recent years. This is particularly important since the new decade will be dominated by big power conflicts and more robust ways to pursue one's own interest. And people realize that rapid technological and economic change will fundamentally affect the way they work, live, and organize society. Fundamental rapid change is becoming something that people start to talk over dinner. And politics is becoming more complicated and more fragmented too. The forces that were instrumental for Germany's revival and stability are eroding. In terms of security and the conflict between the advocates of the old culture of restraint, so is the ambassador who would serve in the old days. They know what I mean when I speak of culture of restraint. This was our gospel at the time and we believed in it and think it was great. It was coming down directly from the heavens and the prospects of a sharper international profile, advocates of a sharper international profile, including military deployments. This dilemma still haunts policymakers. The concept of the old federal public of keeping your head down while at the same time occupying the moral high ground still flourishes in some quarters. At a time when many expect strong leadership from Germany, the government is sandwiched between what it thinks is necessary and domestic politics. Its authority and sense of power are hardly commensurate with the multitude of tasks ahead of us. We're in the process of a changing of the guard and also we have somewhat weakened ourselves domestically, i.e. the refugee crisis, and we have come under attack from forces beyond our control. Pundits say our golden age is over and since I get older and get more pessimistic, I start to believe that. The external attacker in chief is no other than the American president. We are confronted with the revisionist Russia, an increasingly assertive and powerful China in geopolitics and geoeconomics and a disruptive United States. For us, the task of coming to grips with an America that is trampling over old beliefs is probably the most difficult task of all. Since Donald Trump took office, the list of controversies has grown and grown. Some bilateral agreements, yes, this is true, have a long history. Some complaints are legitimate, which is also correct, but they are now being raised with the new kind of vindictiveness against the level of German defense spending, for example, that the horizon will not reach the NATO 2% goal. That's clear, we won't reach it, not in 2030, maybe never. The list of disputes includes the gas pipeline, Nord Stream 2 from Russia to northeastern Germany, German trade surpluses with the United States, tariffs on auto exports, of course not, of the table, another dinner table issue, by the way. And then when your mother-in-law asks you about tariffs to be imposed by the United States president, your mother-in-law, then, you know, that something is going on. Migration, the nuclear deal with Iran that Trump abandoned, that Germany and principle with European partners wants to preserve the Palestinian issue and climate change, and the list goes on and on. Trump's attacks have also an institutional dimension, at the repeatedly trained his guns at NATO and the EU. The two institutions are the backdrop of our security and prosperity. And then he doesn't care much for multilateralism and chooses disruption over global order, some of our core principles are at stake. We in the United States, the longtime guarantor of European security, are on diverging trajectories. A German expert for transatlantic relations, Thomas Kleiner Brokow, recently wrote that the United States finally stopped playing mother to Germany, as ended der Bemutterung, as he called it. This may be both healthy and inevitable, but as we all know, growing up is not a painless process. The consequences, ladies and gentlemen, are obvious. Polls show that Germans trust the US president much less, repeat much less, than they trust Russians president Putin or Chinese leader Xi Jinping. So do see Donald Trump favorably our supporters of the heart wide, like in Italy, like in France. A big majority agrees that Germany and the United States are moving father and father apart. The old German anti-Americanism that existed on the right and on the left has been reinforced. When it comes to security, a large majority is willing now to place its bets on the EU rather than the United States. No less worrisome. Many Germans think Germany should simply stay out of this way, when the United States becomes locked in a clinch with China or Russia. Those like myself, I can say who believe the partnership with the United States is indeed indispensable, find it increasingly difficult to make the case. As I said, the old model is falling apart, and maybe we need a new compact. A word on China. China is among the top three trade partners of Germany. For years, German companies worked to become China's supplier of choice and contributed to its rise. They ignored all warnings about the oddity of tying our economic prospects to the economic fortunes of a communist dictatorship. That's what Beijing still is. Again, this is how it is. This ignorance has given way to a more realistic view, not least because of Chinese heavy-handedness in pursuing its political and economic interests and as it wants to maintain control over foreign companies. Even the business community now sees China either as a systemic competitor or a systemic rival that acts in ways that are not at all benign. This new realism is going to face a test. Will the Chinese company be allowed to help build Germany's 5G network, and if so, to what extent? This test case is replicated in the UK and France and Italy and elsewhere, I know. The uncomfortable sandwich position in which the US-Chinese trade conflict left Germany and Europe is a stark reminder that the time when we could avoid hard choices is over. No matter that the Chancellor the other day in Davos said she doesn't like the concept of a new Cold War, we may already be in the midst of this Cold New War. The EU enters the new decade of ever-growing unpredictability and big-power rivalry with new management, but also with smaller membership. The loss of the UK of the United Kingdom may be welcomed by diehard federalists who have seen the UK, sometimes quite correctly, at the greatest obstacle to further integration. In my country though, the business leaders are far from the only ones who are mourning the UK's pending exit. They will miss a country that is open to the world, cherishes the principle of economic competition, and commands a military that is much stronger than most other European militaries, though the British military has seen a drawdown as well. And of course we will miss a net contributor to EU finances, which will mean that Germany will have to dig deeper into its pockets. This, however, is an issue the German government would rather not touch than any German government I would think would. In any case, with the UK out, even more eyes are on Germany, and I should add, on Franco-German collaboration. I'm sure, ladies and gentlemen, that you will have a lot to say about the wisdom of the Brexit, as it affects your country more than anyone else. The new commission headed by Ursula von der Leyen has declared climate change its top priority. That is fine. It's also a good sign that the commission wants to become more geopolitical in outlook and approach. After all, her predecessor Jean-Claude Juncker once lamented about the EU's lack of ability to act like a world power. He said, spoke in Munich in 2018, about Weltmachtfähigkeit, Weltmachtfähigkeit, which of course we were lacking. von der Leyen herself was silent on the first days of the new year when the United States and Iran appeared to be at the brink of war. In any case, the New Hike representative, Joseph Borell, found a full plate waiting on him when he took office. Quote, I am hopping from crisis to crisis, and quote, he was quoted as saying after a recent commission meeting in Brussels. Iran and Iraq, Syria and Libya, sub-Saharan Africa, ISIS, you name it. These are all big issues, each of which deserves our full attention. Commitment and adequate resources. So far, we are struggling to rise to the occasion. You may recall what French President Macron told the Economist a couple of weeks ago. He said, NATO was brain dead, brain dead. Turning his attention to Europe, he said the following, and I quote, With America turning its back, China rising and authoritarian leaders on the EU's doorstep. The result is the exceptional fragility of Europe, which, if you can't think of itself as a global power, will disappear. End of quote. This is a sober warning by a French president who thinks that Europe is on the brink of extinction in political terms. He has been calling for European sovereignty time and again. Putting military capabilities aside for a moment, which of course is a major issue, I know that. He is conceptually right. We simply cannot ignore our lack of strategic relevance. At times, this lack of strategic relevance is downright humiliating. When the United States killed the most senior Iranian military commander in early January, Europeans learned about the attack, and I mean European leaders learned about the attack, and this includes Boris Johnson, by turning to television and to the internet. The only thing that policymakers in Berlin, Brussels and elsewhere could do was to urge the United States and Iran to avoid making the situation worse. European pleas to keep the nuclear deal with Iran are falling on deaf ears in Washington and are increasingly ignored in Tehran. Indeed, the abrogation of international agreements by the Trump administration creates a serious problem for the EU and its members. A deal and a principle in which we strongly believe are rejected by their most important non-EU partner. Put it in a different way, we are caught in a dilemma. Natalie Taci from the Italian Institute for International Affairs has simply suggested that we should break with the United States, at least when it comes to the Middle East. Politically, I don't think her proposal will fly, even though it has a certain logic. European nations may dislike President Trump. There may be furious about the weaponization of trade, but at the end of the day, many, if not most, will side with the US. After all, the United States provides the ultimate security guarantee for Europe. It is hard for me to imagine that Europe may choose the Islamic Republic of Iran over its old ally, patron and partner, the US. Trump may love to antagonize Europeans, maybe with the exception of the British Prime Minister. I do not see the same desire on our side. Libya is another conflict where Europe has mostly been on the receiving end. In the past efforts to stabilize the country and prevent it from fracturing basically went nowhere. In any case, our prime motive when it comes to Libya has been to stop the flow of refugees into southern Europe. Now, a coalition of the willing has stepped up to the plate, France, the UK, Germany and Italy. The participation of the UK can be a template for future collaboration after the Brexit. But maybe it was Russia and Turkey that made a difference and that eventually led to the Berlin Conference. This is not to deny the role that the German government has played. Chancellor Merkel has invested considerable energy in Libya and in Africa in general. It is high on her priority list. As I said, the Berlin Conference was basically her initiative. And the agreement reached may pull Libya back from the abyss. So, seen positively, a Europe that is marginalized, helpless, powerless, is not written in stone. The lesson to be drawn? Do not wait until others have established facts on the ground, then you cannot change. Which only change at great cost. For the EU to regain relevance, it must adopt a realistic view of the world. A view that does not start with the institutional propositions nor with grandiose visions like a European army. Out of its own self-interest, it is largely up to Europe to provide some kind of order to its neighborhood. If it does not, nobody else will or other powers will step in on their own terms. We have to look no farther than Russia's intervention in Europe to see what I mean. Europe is the life insurance for Germany. Angela Merkel told the Financial Times a few days ago. If this is the case, and I think it is true, then it will have to invest more in Europe, in political and other terms. German policymakers should not automatically, and not only policymakers, also people from the chattering classes, which is of course my exception. German policymakers should not automatically brush aside ideas that they do not like or go against German preferences or against German orthodoxies. Generally speaking, Germany cannot shirk the responsibilities that come with economic power, size and political influence. I know that many Germans are still attracted to the idea of being a big Switzerland. Many politicians on the left and on the right cling to the culture of restraints, think a big Switzerland is a perfect place to be. Actually, we have come a long way since the days of the Old Trappler, and speaking ahead of this, the formal part of this event I just mentioned. Imagine if we had been told 20 years ago that Germany still had the thousand troops in Afghanistan, a thousand in Mali, where most people have not heard of the word Mali in the first place, that they could identify it on the map. It's still astonishing, but still we need to do more diplomatically, maybe militarily, certainly military, just as Merkel has suggested. The growing willingness among the public to support increased military spending may be more an expression of collective shame than anything else, but it's nevertheless a sign of a more realistic view of the world. Let me come to the conclusion. You may remember what Merkel said two and a half years ago after she had a few encounters with Donald Trump in his early days in office. At times, when we could fully rely on others, are somewhat over. We Europeans really have to take our destiny in our own hands. It's certainly a good idea. It could be a catchy-like motif to guide us, but it's still waiting to be implemented, and this waiting has to end. If we continue to allow events and others to sideline us, then Macron's doomsday scenario will become a reality. It falls not the least to Germany, hopefully together with France and others, to provide the necessary political will and the resources. The world will not wait until we have concluded our domestic transit to a new political era. My country cannot let down in its engagement for a strong and coherent Europe, despite the fragmentation of its domestic politics. And I think it will not do. At the same time, there is no drop in expectations of Germany, as I said to the contrary. Thank you very much for your attention.