Opposition nuzzles up to U.S.

Leading foreign policy voices from Germany’s conservative opposition yesterday vowed to repair Berlin’s tattered ties with Washington if they oust Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder in elections widely expected in September.

But they acknowledged that U.S. policies in Iraq and elsewhere remain deeply unpopular in Germany and could pose a campaign problem for conservative candidate Angela Merkel.

Improved U.S.-German ties “won’t be the central element of our campaign,” said Christian Schmidt, defense policy spokesman for the conservative bloc in Germany’s parliament, linking the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Socialist Union (CSU).

“But the alliance with the United States is very important to us. We would not act tactically against the United States” for political gain, he said.

Mr. Schroeder infuriated the Bush White House during his 2002 re-election campaign, attacking U.S. “adventures” in Iraq and vowing German troops would never participate in military action there.

After months of hedging, Mrs. Merkel, head of the CDU, last week told German newspapers she also opposes sending German troops to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, instead backing the government’s more limited training program for Iraqi security forces in the United Arab Emirates.

“We would not have [sent troops to Iraq in 2003] and we will not do that now,” she told the daily Berliner Zeitung.

Mr. Schmidt said Mr. Schroeder’s Social Democratic Party is trying again to exploit the Iraq issue, asserting in its party manifesto that “German troops would now be in Baghdad” if the CDU/CSU alliance had won in 2002.

With growth anemic and unemployment at 11.3 percent, polls give Mrs. Merkel and the conservative opposition a double-digit lead over the Social Democrats.

CSU international spokesman Reinhold Bocklet, who spoke with Mr. Schmidt at a Washington luncheon yesterday, said domestic issues would likely dominate the coming campaign.

But he said Mr. Schroeder was vulnerable both on the plunging relations with the United States and the disarray within the European Union, where reforms have ground to a halt with the rejection by French and Dutch voters of an ambitious EU constitution.

“We are convinced that German foreign policy errors of the past two years have hurt the country,” Mr. Bocklet said, speaking through a translator.

Mr. Schmidt said a Merkel government would be closer to the United States on a number of issues. The CDU/CSU alliance opposes an effort backed by Mr. Schroeder to lift the EU arms embargo on China, an effort that the Bush administration opposed.

Mr. Schmidt backed the joint effort by Germany, Britain and France to curb Iran’s nuclear weapons programs, but said he favored “close cooperation” with the United States as the program went forward.