To celebrate his first year in office, Chancellor Olaf Scholz made a playful nod to his “traffic light” coalition, a nickname that refers to the constituent parties’ three colors: He passed out chocolates shaped like the “Ampelmann,” the iconic figure on German pedestrian crossing signals.
But the flavor he picked for those chocolates was bittersweet.
The choice was symbolic. Mr. Scholz’s first 12 months as chancellor have been among the most tumultuous of Germany’s postwar history. It was not what he, or nearly anyone in Europe, had expected.
“Tonight, a difficult year comes to an end,” Mr. Scholz was to acknowledge in the chancellor’s traditional New Year’s Eve speech, text of which was released for publication ahead of the broadcast of his address on Saturday evening. “Putin is waging an imperialist war of aggression in the middle of Europe,” Mr. Scholz added, referring the President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and his war in Ukraine. “This watershed moment is also a tough test for us and our country.”
Entering office with a progressive agenda, while offering Germans an air of stability similar to that of his predecessor, Angela Merkel, Mr. Scholz has instead been thrust into the role of a crisis chancellor. It has transformed what both Germany and Europe anticipated from him, with considerably divergent views of his performance.
In the opinion of many Germans, Mr. Scholz’s government so far has been a qualified success under trying circumstances.
Germany has weaned itself off its dependence on Russian gas, which once comprised more than 55 percent of its supply. It has built a liquefied natural gas terminal that would normally take years to complete in only 10 months — a coup for a nation fretting over economic stagnation and the possibility of a frigid winter. Two other terminals are due to be completed soon.
“The story of this year, 2022, is not just about war, suffering and sorrow,” Mr. Scholz said in the year-end address, according to the text. It is also, he argued, a test that showed that the European Union and NATO allies could remain united, that Ukraine could withstand Russian attack — and that Germany would not collapse without Moscow’s gas.
“That, too, dear fellow citizens, is the story of 2022 for me,” the text said he noted. “It is about cohesion and strength — and yes, also about confidence.”
Yet in Europe, where the departure of Ms. Merkel after 16 years in power has left many feeling bereft, the growing pains this year of Mr. Scholz’s government — almost half of whose ministers had no prior executive experience — are still felt acutely.
Mr. Scholz’s leadership has gotten mixed reviews among allies anxious that Europe’s most powerful democracy is turning inward as the continent faces one of its biggest crises in decades with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Mr. Scholz received widespread praise in February, days after the invasion began, when he called for a “Zeitenwende,” or “turning point” — a pivot to a more assertive Germany in foreign and military policy. Nearly a year later, however, a clear vision from the chancellor about what that means remains incomplete.
Before this past year, Germans embraced a pacifist ideal when it came to foreign affairs, a reaction to its legacy of violence in World War II.
The Scholz coalition, containing progressive Greens, liberal Free Democrats and center-left Social Democrats, has started to break that taboo. It has set up a special fund of 100 billion euros, about $106 billion, to revitalize and rearm the military.
And according to the chancellery, Germany is one of the top suppliers of weapons to Ukraine, delivering weapons like Howitzers, portable Stinger missile launchers, and Gepard tanklike vehicles. Berlin even gave the new IRIS-T air defense system to Ukraine before receiving its own.
“For our historical legacy, it was outstanding,” Claudia Major, of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs think tank, said, referring to Germany’s overall progress with the Zeitenwende. “But,” she noted, “the question is: Do you measure what Germany is doing with the past? Or do you measure it based on the challenges ahead?”
“Compared to what we need — to confront China, to stop a revanchist Russia, to enable Ukraine to get its territory back — it’s just not enough,” she added.
Germany’s handling of the war in Ukraine has been criticized by European partners, too. Berlin has had tense relations with the Ukrainian government, which has complained repeatedly, like many others across the continent, that Germany should be playing more of a leading role.
Mr. Scholz’s critics have also skewered him for prioritizing Germany’s domestic well-being at the cost of the European Union’s broader needs.
Poorer European states say that Berlin has put their economies at a disadvantage by distorting the continent’s common market with a relief package, worth €200 billion, to help Germany weather soaring energy and inflation prices. Bogged down by complicated negotiations among the coalition partners, Berlin failed in September to give advance notice to Brussels or Paris of the deal, adding insult to the injury.
And when Mr. Scholz made his first trip to Beijing this autumn, he took a delegation of German executives instead of traveling with President Emmanuel Macron of France, who had offered to join him. Days earlier, Mr. Scholz defied advice from his ministers and approved a deal that gave the state-backed Chinese firm Cosco a stake in a terminal at Hamburg port, a key artery of trade in Europe.
Such moves have unnerved European allies who fear that Germany has not taken the right lessons on economic dependency from the conflict with Russia and is creating conditions for a similar fallout with China over Taiwan.
Thorsten Benner, the head of the Global Public Policy Institute, a research organization in Berlin, said that Mr. Scholz was taking a softer approach on China to avoid further jolts to the German economy, Europe’s largest, that could send shock waves across the European Union.
“He cannot have a two-front war with Russia and China at the same time economically,” Mr. Benner said, though he noted that he disagreed with Mr. Scholz’s approach. “You can only credibly deter Beijing if you say: ‘Economically and technologically, we’ll cut you off if you upset the status quo.’”
In France, Mr. Scholz has been criticized for having a cooler relationship with Paris than the one fostered by Ms. Merkel, whose office was said to speak with French government officials every day — a symbol of what many described as the Franco-German motor that kept the European Union running.
Mr. Scholz’s advisers argue that such critiques reflect the fact that European leaders are still adjusting to new leadership in Berlin.
“Scholz is not the guy who hugs everybody and gives fist bumps,” said Wolfgang Schmidt, a government minister who is the head of the chancellery. “But he is the guy fellow leaders have really come to appreciate for being serious and dependable.”
But dependability has its cost, too. The government argues that its hesitancy to send more arms to Ukraine stems not from reluctance but from a desire to hold together German consensus.
“We always try to make sure that with all our actions, we can sustain them, and it’s not just a one-off — that we keep our society together and the people behind it,” Mr. Schmidt said.
That is partly why German officials remain locked in debate about whether to send heavier battle tanks, like the Leopard 2, to Ukraine.
Even among Mr. Scholz’s coalition parties, some are urging Washington to force Berlin’s hand by delivering U.S.-made battle tanks to Ukraine first. So far, no Western countries have provided Ukraine with their own models of heavy battle tanks.
Ms. Major, the analyst, said that the urgency many Germans felt after the invasion began seems to have faded, particularly as Russia’s offensive flailed and Ukraine began to claw back some of its territory.
But, she noted, “Zeitenwende means recognizing that military power is back.”
Many observers say that the biggest problem may simply be Mr. Scholz’s communication. Britain, despite providing far less matériel than Germany, has been cheered for its support for Ukraine, largely through better messaging on what it has provided.
Germany’s failure to do the same may reflect anxieties, both inside and outside the chancellery, that its planned progressive agenda — particularly the shift to a carbon-neutral economy — is being forgotten amid the demands of the war in Ukraine.
For months, coalition critics had warned of a winter of discontent or a “hot fall” of protests. But they never materialized. The government managed to keep enough gas in store to keep homes warm, as well as completing the floating liquefied natural gas terminal at record speed.
Those successes, supporters say, provide a foundation for Mr. Scholz to take back the narrative and lay out a more inspiring course for the year to come.
That is exactly the direction in which Mr. Scholz will try to turn Germans for the start of 2023.
“This is Germany at the beginning of this new year,” the text of his year-end remarks stated. “A strong country. A country that is working with energy and speed on a good, secure future.”
“A country that hangs in there,” he added, “especially in difficult times.”
