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Leading German historians have condemned Chancellor Olaf Scholz over his party’s stance on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, deepening a dispute over left-wing calls for negotiations with Moscow.
The Social Democratic party’s Russia policy is “arbitrary, erratic and factually wrong”, an open letter to the chancellor signed by five 20th-century historians said. It accuses the party’s leaders of risking a “fatal” error of appeasement over Russia’s “war of aggression against Ukraine”.
The historians include Heinrich August Winkler, one of the country’s most respected academics and an SPD member for more than 60 years. The letter’s four other signatories are also party members.
The party’s equivocal stance towards Moscow, more than two years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, is becoming a problem for Scholz, who has pledged to stand by Kyiv for as long as it takes.
The chancellor has become politically isolated as he tries to balance the views of his party’s powerful pacifist wing with his pledge for a Zeitenwende or turning point in security policy that upends decades of military under-investment and diplomatic compromises with Moscow.
The letter, which was covered in many German newspapers on Thursday, said the SPD was blind to the lessons of history and ignorant of the reality of current events in Russia, despite entreaties from Berlin’s allies such as the US and Poland.
Both Scholz’s coalition partners, the Greens and Free Democrats, have become increasingly critical of the SPD’s dovishness — a tension crystallised by the recent debate over the delivery of Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine.
Germany is the single largest donor of military equipment to Kyiv after the US, but Scholz has resisted calls to send long-range munitions even as the war has tilted back in Russia’s favour.
Last week Rolf Mützenich, the SPD’s parliamentary leader, upped the ante in a speech to the Bundestag that urged consideration of how to bring an end to the war.
The speech drew howls of criticism from the opposition and government coalition partners, with Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, chair of the parliamentary defence committee, calling the SPD’s position “scandalous”.
But MPs on the left of the party — representing about half of its parliamentary caucus — went on to say they “fully supported” Mützenich’s suggestion, and that seeking to negotiate a peaceful outcome with Russia was in the movement’s “genes”.
Michael Roth, one of the SPD’s most prominent foreign policy experts, this week said he was leaving politics because of his party’s attitude to Russia.
Roth, a former foreign office minister, said attending recent SPD party meetings was “like stepping into a refrigerator” because of his outspoken backing of Ukraine and calls for the SPD to support the delivery of more military aid.
Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, Oleksii Makeiev, has also criticised the SPD. “Freezing” the conflict, he said this week, was tantamount to supporting a genocide.
SPD officials have reacted angrily to the growing criticism, although so far there is little sign of the party’s leftwing softening its position.
Former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, whose close ties to Russia have made him a figure of derision in the German press, used the debate to again argue for negotiations with Moscow.
France and Germany should urgently seek to negotiate a truce, he said in an interview with the German Press Agency published on Thursday, offering himself as a potential mediator thanks to his “sensible” relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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