That is reallllly complicated at the moment in Germany. The past month basically consisted of the centrist parties (SPD, Greens, CDU, FDP) trying to A) outdo themselves to get ahead of what they were trying to identify as the public mood, and B) inoculate themselves against an avalanche of external criticism from the collective West. That result tended to be hawkish wrt sanctions and anti-Russian measures. However, as I said in one of my longcat posts of the past, gauging German sentiment is VERY difficult to do. Germans at large simply do not behave the same way as other western electorates when it comes to public display of politics. That whole Nazi/Stasi Combo tends to do that. They are not particularly vocal - individually or as an interest group/block outside of Organized Labor. They don’t tend to demonstrate. They don’t tend to openly discuss controversial matters and the difference between a German speaking outside of the house and a German speaking in the privacy of their own homes is extremely different. And I know this tends to be the case with most people to a degree, but public/private opinion is much more disparate with Germans. This is of course a result of the country’s past and the extra steps taken to publicly appear “open and accepting” wrt to foreigners. And Germans tend to have an implicit understanding that media/politicians are going to say and do things designed to show Germany as a progressive, tolerant place. And so long as they quietly toe the line on putting German interest firsts generally, the press/public statements can write what it wants without much backlash. Basically Germans expect their politicians to ACT in their interest, but they don’t have to SPEAK in such a way, per se. No one is going to ding a pol for misspeaking to the global press.
So, this combination of things makes it really tough to read the tea leaves as to the mood of the country.
But, that said, I think we have entered into a new phase where the electorate has remained largely understanding of the steps that have been taken to date wrt sanctions and generally sympathetic to the Ukrainian people. However, I do feel that is coming to a new phase to some degree.
Scholz came out last week and said “there is no compromise possible” when it comes to an embargo of Russian O&G in the near future. Italy then supported this position. But the rest of Europe is pushing for this and the current German government is very susceptible to this type of pressure, as the SPD and Green identity is one geared towards pan-European integration/solidarity/acceptance. But, the politicians recognize that this is simply not possible for the country. There were studies that came out last week in Germany from the Economics and Finance Ministries and other respected institutions that essentially said that an embargo would result in immediately collapsing the German economy with hundreds of thousands of jobs immediately gone like kraut-fueled farts in the wind. And the people are terrified of this and at least a majority of voters are not going to tolerate such a hasty move just because people in Brussels or Warsaw or Kiev are bitching at the Germans for not being team players.
However, something like an escalation in Ukraine via Russian chemical attack or expansion of the current war plan would put immeasurable pressure on the government, which then might feel compelled to agree to the embargo, at which time, all structural supports within the various political parties would collapse and where the cards would fall electorally would be anyone’s guess. The question of how deep the sympathy of the average German runs for Ukraine is very much up for debate. No one really knows at this point, but I would bet it ends right about the place where German interests start to take any more of a hit.
Right now, the shifts in the weekly polls have been rather benign…the Greens lose a couple of points to the SPD, or vice versa; or the Free Dems lose a couple to their ideological cousins in the CDU, or vice versa, but nothing particularly seismic (notwithstanding a blowout election in the Saarland yesterday where the SPD made major gains, but which was seen as largely local-issue driven). Which is insane given what all has gone on domestically since last September’s elections…but none of the mainline parties are particularly distinct right now - they all kind of blend together - so people are somewhat confused as to differentiation.
So, I guess you could say that we are in somewhat of a holding pattern politically. Although I think anyone who genuinely understands German politics knows that something has to give when push comes to shove, which will likely occur once the fallout comes when the hit to Industry comes, along with a rapidly increasing rate of inflation. It is also worth noting that Germans are much, much less tolerant of inflation. This is a nation of cash hoarders who are obsessive inflation hawks, always tuned into the real inflation rate.
But the other point that is slowly bubbling up is a growing German backlash to being publicly chastised by the East Europeans, specifically the Poles. Poland’s openness to military action has gotten it a lot of good press in the West, but the Germans are drawing a line politically on Polish/Baltic/Ukrainian leveraging of the situation to gain influence on “tangentially-related” Ukrainian war issues. The German government is being careful to support common European political positioning here, but they are not going to allow the current Polish government to be seen as leaders on anything outside of the Ukraine war, as up until the war were seen as complete nut jobs on other issues important to the European project. So the government is essentially drawing a bright line between prior concessions such as weapons transfers/NS2 and future, less-directly related issues like EU membership, special status for Ukraine, etc. I don’t see a lot of coverage of this in English language media, but it is definitely there in German press.
For example, a rush to EU membership for Ukraine. The Poles and the Balts and other former Warsaw Pact countries have been really loud over the last two weeks essentially demanding a "fast track" for Kiev to join the EU, with Zelensky blasting the Germans explicitly a few days ago as being the biggest obstacle for that. This has not gone down well, and even the mainline commenters have said, “Sure, those like the Poles who take take and take from the EU coffers are more than happy to let another net-taker in for more euros sent eastward from GerMoney. But in reality, we cannot and will not allow this.” This has been backed by the Dutch and the Nordics, which means any talk of “fast tracking Ukraine” is likely all for show at this stage. But Zelensky is starting to be seen in a similar light as the Polish leadership, which isn’t good when it comes to influencing Germans in the long run. As I have mentioned in earlier posts, the relationships between the Ukrainian and German governments aren’t good and any positive steps made by the Germans to date have ultimately been made as nods to the US and Brussels, but not to Kiev.
And on this topic, Germany is very united. I think that’s why we have seen a resurgence in stories (there was a fresh one this morning in Welt that was literally entitled "Ukraine Really is This Corrupt") reminding the country of how deeply corrupt Ukraine is. The Government isn’t going to budge on this. There was a discussion on the Anne Will program (big political talk show) over the weekend basically saying, “The foolish acceptance of Greece into the EU with their corruption and cooked books has set back progress in the EU/Eurozone by years, and damn near killed the common currency…we aren’t going to rush to green-light Ukraine out of the same concerns.”
Same goes for refugees…the level of centrist support for temporary, fixed stays (as opposed to open-ended invitations as per 2015 crisis) has been much more subdued than it was with the Syrians in 2015. The Germans are going to accept them and house them until the war stops, but the government and opposition are already pushing out plans to register them and to essentially make it impossible for there to be any form of voluntary relocation within the country from smaller regional centers to more “exciting/interesting” places like Berlin, Munich, and Hamburg, which already struggle to provide housing for their own citizenry. And then, once Ukraine is deemed safe, the benefits will stop immediately. This is a volatile issue that none of the politicians really want to re-open after the clusterfuck of 2015.
So, I guess to answer your question…it isn’t clear yet. Germans are gonna German, so the support isn’t nearly as high as elsewhere in Europe. My own personal impression is that the business and political communities are hunkered down trying to avoid negative PR just hoping this will blow over so they can recalibrate next steps.