WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th February, 2022) Canceling the Nord Stream 2 pipeline will only cost Russia money but will really hurt Germany and US Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) cannot make up the shortfall, analysts told Sputnik.
On Monday, US President Joe Biden, during a joint press conference in Washington with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, said his administration was looking into developing alternative energy supplies for Europe to make up for the potential loss of LNG from Russia due to possible sanctions imposed by the West over the Ukraine situation.
Biden said the US could make up "a significant portion" that would be lost.
"Canceling Nord Stream will only cost Russia money - and it has plenty of that - but it will really hurt Germany and US LNG cannot make up the shortfall," former Canadian diplomat Patrick Armstrong told Sputnik.
Germany was caught between intense US pressure to join in on imposing new economic sanctions on Russia and its own natural interest in having good relations with Moscow and importing much needed energy, Armstrong pointed out.
"Germany in particular and Europe in general are being forced to face a problem that they don't want to face. And that is that subservience to Washington will be their ruin. Russia's ultimatum has pushed them to this choice," he said.
For three quarters of a century, Germany had practiced subservience to the demands of the United States, and that attitude of deference was so deeply ingrained that leaders in Berlin appeared to be incapable of defying it, Armstrong observed.
"I know where their best interest lies but I don't know what they will do - obedience to Washington is hard-wired into Germany's structures," he said.
Germany had been forced into its energy dilemma because US leaders consistently misread Russia's leaders and policies, Armstrong noted.
"Russia is not going to 'invade Ukraine' if for no other reason than it doesn't want to be stuck with the bill," Armstrong said.
However, he added, Russia will "smash" Ukrainian forces if they invade the self-declared republics of Donetsk and Luhansk.
Such a limited response would pose more complicated questions for Germany's leaders, Armstrong continued.
Historian and noted military, retired US Army Colonel Doug Macgregor advised that Scholz was unlikely to risk damaging Germany's warm diplomatic and trade ties with Russia.
"It seems unlikely that Chancellor Scholz would put Nord Stream 2 at risk given Germany's long standing positive economic relationship with Moscow and the harm such action would do to German interests in reducing its dependence on nuclear power," he said.
However, the chancellor had just entered office and might be more fearful of defying the Biden administration, Macgregor suggested.
"Scholz is new in his job. He may regard doing nothing in response to events in Ukraine as putting Berlin's relationship with Washington at risk," he said.
