The story goes back to early 2000’s when German’s then Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder decided to develop strategic relations between Berlin and Moscow. He went so far as to offer partnership to Russia in EADS, a multinational European defense and aerospace powerhouse. In November 2004, Schroeder called Russian President Vladimir Putin a “flawless democrat.” Unsurprisingly, in 2004, Schroeder hailed Turkey’s Islamist autocrat, then prime minister (now president) Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as a “great reformer.”
