Just symbolic politics, as our Foreign Minister himself stated:
"He said the move was largely symbolic since the agreement had not been invoked since the end of the Cold War[...]"
So, as there are upcoming elections, I believe, that they try to appear doing something at least/at all, while not ping off the Americans, or the Brits.
> the agreement had not been invoked since the end of the Cold War
And now it can't be invoked in the future either, which is great.
It doesn't matter to me if it was unused anyway. A large part of what makes me nervous about these sorts of agreements is their potential for future abuse. Same reason the UK pornwall is unnerving. Not for what it did yesterday or does today, but for what it might do tomorrow.
This is the loudest "fuck you" Germany has given the US in half a century.
I doubt it. Surely, the refusal to go along with the phony reasoning to invade the Iraq[0] was more significant? That one resulted in that hilarious old/new Europe thing and Freedom Fries. As was the recent abstention regarding bombing Libya. I'm sure there are many economic conflicts that have been more serious as well.
And I suppose someone with some diplomatic background knowledge may be laughing at all of this because the real divisive issues are not discussed as publicly.
>This is the loudest "fuck you" Germany has given the US in half a century.
From the article:
>and would have no impact on current intelligence cooperation between Germany and its NATO allies.
No offense, but that's one pathetic "fuck you". "We're going to cancel an unsused cold war administrative policy while maintaining the current status quo on intelligence cooperation with our deep alliance".
"Bundesbank to Repatriate 674 Tons of Gold to Germany by 2020"
374 tons from France, and 300 from New York by 2020 apparently.
The Bundesbank is negotiating auditing rights with its partner central banks. Thiele said he visited all storage locations last year and the returning gold will be examined.
IIRC, A German court issued an order to the Bundesbank that Germany's gold bullion (including those held in foreign vaults) be audited. The access granted to the German auditors by they FRBNY wasn't satisfactory to the German authorities, and as a result the Germans decided to begin repatriation of a large portion of their gold (~300 tonnes, I think). A deal was struck to return the gold in batches over the next 7 years. I don't think there has been any conclusive proof of shady things, but of course there is a lot of speculation regarding the motives and facts surrounding the issue.
For anybody reading this, research gold leasing by bullion banks. In essence it's fractional reserve banking... and the issue is if nations demand their gold back, what if it's not there?
> This is the loudest "fuck you" Germany has given the US in half a century.
Yea, and im pretty sure that in this very moment, the German administration is using each and every trusted channel to apologise for that symbolic act. And hope that they still get their share of sweet, sweet unconstitutional intel.
"He said the move was largely symbolic since the agreement had not been invoked since the end of the Cold War[...]"
So, as there are upcoming elections, I believe, that they try to appear doing something at least/at all, while not ping off the Americans, or the Brits.