Merkel's Migration Mess Has Knocked Germany Off Its High Horse

Tens of Thousands at anti-immigration rally in Dresden

Germany's political stability and economic sway have, until recently, earned Chancellor Angela Merkel unprecedented global influence and power.

Postwar Germany has become the financial powerhouse of Europe and a model nation. Give credit to German hard work and competency for the country's continuing economic miracle.

Less appreciated is how Germany also brilliantly exploited the lucrative in-house trade framework of the European Union market — along with nearly seven decades of subsidized defense from an American-led NATO.

The result is that Germany alone now determines the fiscal future of the nearly insolvent southern European Union nations on the Mediterranean.

Germany was also the self-appointed broker between Vladimir Putin and the apprehensive EU. Merkel supposedly has watered down Putin's military ambitions by seducing Russia with lucrative German trade.

In addition, Germany positioned itself as the moral voice of Europe. In penance for an aggressive past that had nearly wrecked Europe on three occasions, it became the loudest critic of supposed U.S. imperialism.

By the 21st century, German media, politicians and intellectuals had superseded their French counterparts as America's most vocal European critics — from the Iraq war to eavesdropping by American intelligence agencies.

In terms of tough leadership, Germany's Iron Lady, Merkel, had trumped even the reputation of Britain's late former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. In world opinion, Merkel was deemed just as decisive as Thatcher, but with a far stronger global hand to play and with a more popular embrace of social justice.

In sum, the new post-Cold War Germany was evolving into the leader of the West, especially during the American recessional from world affairs orchestrated by President Barack Obama.

No more. In just the last six months, Germany in general, and Merkel in particular, have imploded. Merkel's disastrous decision to open the borders of Germany — and with them, Europe's as well — is proving both selfish and suicidal.

Hordes of migrants are swarming into Europe. Merkel's naivete cannot be dressed up in her professed humanitarianism, given that many of the migrants are young, single men from the Middle East who pour into Europe not as political refuges, but as opportunists eager for European social largesse.

Read the rest of this Victor Davis Hanson op-ed HERE and follow links to related stories below:

Germany strains under weight of migrant crisis

Europe’s Migrant Crisis Puts Open Borders at Risk

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