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There was a time when right-wingers accused left-wingers of being too close to the Russians rather than the other way round. Indeed, ‘hawkishness’ on Russia was seen as a stereotypically conservative position.
As recently as 2012, Mitt Romney – when he was the Republican Presidential candidate – described Russia as America’s “number one geopolitical foe.” He was criticised and mocked at the time, though not so much since Russia’s annexation of the Crimea, Putin’s intervention in Syria and other demonstrations of Russian military and diplomatic muscle.
And then there’s the home front, where liberals in America and other western countries are worried, some would say paranoid, about Russian interference in the democratic process. The allegations and rumours surrounding Donald Trump and his relationship to the Russians are a particular cause for concern.
But consider this scenario: Trump leaves office and takes up a lucrative position with a majority Russian-owned company – and not just any company, but one responsible for an energy infrastructure project of great geopolitical significance. Can you imagine the reaction that would provoke?
Funnily enough, something very much like it has already happened – except not with a former American President, but a former German Chancellor, i.e. Angela Merkel’s immediate predecessor, Gerhard Schröder.
Not long after leaving office in 2005, Schröder was appointed to the board of Nord Stream AG (whose majority shareholder is Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled gas company). The company was formed to build and operate Nord Stream 1 – an underwater natural gas pipeline that runs from Russia to Germany across the Baltic Sea.
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