Gerhard Schröder, who is paid almost $1 million a year by Russian-controlled energy companies, has become a pariah. But he is also a symbol of Germany’s Russia policy.
Tanks treads ripped up the toxic soil, bulldozers carved trenches and bunkers, and soldiers spent a month camped in — and dug into — a radioactive forest.
Dangerously dependent on Russian gas, Germany is still refusing to cut off President Putin, whose war it is effectively subsidizing to the tune of some $220 million a day.