German exporters are pushing back against economic sanctions on Russia

DIPLOMATS wonder if Germany will ever back harsh consequences for Russia over its invasion of Crimea. Second-world-war history weighs on German decision-making. But economics does too. Germany gets about a third of its oil and gas from Russia. It also sends a lot of its exports of manufactured goods there. Germany alone accounts for almost a third of the EU’s total exports to Russia. And Russia is Germany’s 11th-biggest export market, worth €36 billion ($48 billion) last year.

The biggest export industry is cars and motor parts. Daimler, BMW and Volkswagen have all been pushing into Russia: though Germany’s overall exports to the country fell by 5% last year, the motor industry’s sales rose by 22%. VW is the leader, selling more than 200,000 cars there last year. In public, the car-industry bosses are guarded, but it is a fair bet that they have been lobbying their government contacts.

Anton Börner of the Federation of German Wholesale, Foreign Trade and Services, another industry group, says that whereas a shutdown in trade would be “painful” for Germany, it would be “existentially threatening” for Russia, which would feel the impact “immediately”. German gas-reserve tanks are full with several months’ supply.

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