“When we stop asking questions we will disappear as humans. We will be cyborgs!” – Mihai Pâlșu, 10 december 2014
Dr. Federico Bordonaro via INS Zurich presents the hideous face of the geopolitical mélange in which Romania pays the broken pots
The International Relations and Security Network – ISN is a platform maintained by the Center for Security Studies (CSS) from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich). So, ISN is a name in the world of international security and it is considered one of the most important open access information services in the world, both for professionals and for the students who focus on international relations and security studies.
The Battle for power in the High European Society
Well, on October 4, 2006, the Italian Dr. Federico Bordonaro, expert in international and geopolitical relations, specialized in the new structure of the international system that emerged after the Cold War, in the process of European integration and on the problems of security and defense and political realism, published on the INS platform an analysis regarding EADS. Bordonaro presents the true reasons that determined the Russians to penetrate EADS and, through the largest state bank, VneshtorgBank, to become the greatest foreign investor outside EU in the European aerospace giant.
The Italian expert, Dr. Federico Bordonaro, begins his analysis “Russia’s stakes in EADS” by presenting the “EADS battlefield”
VneshtorgBank, the giant state bank, acquired 5.02% of EADS shares for the Russian state in the summer of 2005, in a moment when the shares of the European aerospace and security giant were moving without talent on the stock exchange! Namely, they were diving after the crisis caused by the delay in delivering the Airbus A-380 aircrafts. And Putin’s Russians didn’t miss the opportunity to penetrate an EU entity in an extremely important area for security. Obviously, “Katushas’ target” concerned, besides a number of shares which would offer the Russians the power to block certain strategic decisions taken by the leading binomial France-Germany, also a place in the EADS board.
In turn, probably the EADS shareholders wouldn’t have been willing to give the Russians such an important role in the European giant. The EADS shareholders had on their side even the statute of the space giant which expressly provided that any place of the Board couldn’t be occupied without the permission of the main shareholders: DaimlerChrysler, Lagardere, Sepi and Sogeade.
Among the main EADS shareholders, the French seemed the most nervous. They had a strategic reason: EADS held 46% of another top defense French group, Dassault.
But also the Germans had a nail against the Russians. DaimlerChrysler had just announced it would reduce its shares in EADS from 22.5% to 15%. Immediately after the announcement of DaimlerChrysler, the new German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced she would take over the 7.2% released on the market by DaimlerChrysler, in order to preserve parity with France that held 22.5% of EADS at that time. In other words, Merkel “sponsored” DaimlerChrysler with 7.2% in order to rebalance the forces in EADS, both financially and politically.
Colonel Christopher Langton issues points of view
After presenting the battle zone, the Italian expert Dr. Federico Bordonaro said that “the interests of Russia in deepening the industrial cooperation with EADS are easy to understand”. And the arguments of Bordonaro are “strong”:
Colonel Christopher Langton, head of the Defense Analysis Department of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) declared that “taking into account the growth of the aerospace industry in Russia, Russia will need high technologies and EADS represents a huge opportunity for Moscow”.
According to Langton, Vneshtorgbank didn’t miss the opportunity to buy EADS shares in the summer of 2005, when their value dropped after the crisis caused by the delay in delivering Airbus A-380 aircrafts.
“The whole question has to be addressed in the larger context of the strategic relations between Russia and Europe, which involves not only EADS and defense, but also the security of energy and the security of any other kind of supplies (…). Mr. President Putin knows that Europeans are extremely sensitive to energy issues, after the gas crisis in Ukraine last year and, thereby, they consider that a great business between Moscow and its homologues from Western Europe would be welcomed by Paris and Berlin”, pointed out colonel Langton.
As better suits an expert, Bordonaro reveals a side of the context that is invisible to the general public: In mid-September, the EADS co-presidents Arnaud Lagardère and Manfred Bischoff said that the acquisition of 5% shares by VneshtorgBank wouldn’t bring automatically a place in the Board for the Russians, since “it wouldn’t be in the interest of the society”! Obviously, the official statement of the EADS leaders, Lagardère & Bischoff, had a less belligerent tone: “We welcome any investment in our business as a manifestation of trust and confidence in the long term success of the company EADS. But, nevertheless, we remind that all the rights held by the major shareholders cannot be eluded by individual ownership positions within free float of EADS”!
However, the Colonel Langton gets over the statements of the EADS officials, because “in case VneshtorgBank acquires more than 10% of shares, it won’t be any way to keep the Russians apart from a place in the EADS board (…) I consider that sooner or later the Russians will try to raise their participation share in EADS. Because we have to take into account the fact that Russia aims a place in the EADS board, as part of a politico-strategic resort, not as simple consumer market”!
The Argument of Jean-Pierre Maulny
Jean-Pierre Maulny, European defense specialist in the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IRIS) from Paris, declared that “the EADS rules protect the company and the shareholders of sudden maneuvers”.
In Maulny’s vision, “the strategic shareholders of EADS are interested in a stronger partnership with the Russian aeronautical industry, but they wouldn’t let Moscow to take over the leadership”.
In addition, Maulny declared: “The French-German-Russian cooperation will continue on a very pragmatic basis. It isn’t place for a strategically consolidated structural cooperation, as someone predicted during the Iraq crisis in 2003 that Paris, Berlin and Moscow would align diplomatically against the Iraq war led by USA. The partnership will be limited to specific aspects of industrial and technological sectors”.
The assurances of Tsar Putin
“Before, during and after the September meeting in Paris with the French President Jacques Chirac and the German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Tsar Putin tried to reassure his western partners that the interest of Russia in EADS had no aggressive intention”, notes Dr. Federico Bordonaro.
But Bordonaro also observes down stream that the explanations of president Putin are contradicted by the statements expressed in September by Serghei Prikhodko, the Tsar’s councilor on foreign policy: “If we ever are in an opposite position, then we will insist at least on a lock package, according to our economical interests (…). But if we consider that in economic terms it is in our interest to have a closer relationship with EADS, I refer to the interests of the Russian aeronautical industry, then the state should have the possibility to take the decisions, and decisions are made when you have the power to block an action depending on the stake”.
As one can easily conclude, the statement of Prikhodko has caused concern among the management and shareholders of EADS, as well as among Western governments.
EADS has sensitive defense contracts in many countries around the world – see Romania and Bulgaria -, and the French and Germans don’t want that Russians have a say in this matter. Moreover, the western governments understand that Russia already uses the giant Gazprom as a political blackmail towards its customers which are former Soviet satellites.
Maybe that is why the Tsar Putin tried to calm the West and to declare that the acquisition of 5% of EADS by VneshtorgBank was just an opportunity appeared in the financial markets game and the bank wouldn’t try to change anything in the statute of EADS. Moreover, the Tsar Putin proposed to form a “working group with France and Germany regarding the role of Russia in EADS”.
As you see, the games in EADS are at the highest level in Europe. And the fact that a dozen of Romanian, German and French crooks understood they could steal 400 million EUR from our state without being punished show the magnitude of the protection granted to these trans-borders crooks.
Material published by Mihai Pâlşu in the online newspaper SECUNDA – www.secundatv.ro – on the 8th of December 2015 – Translation by M. T.
