At a Berlin ceremony marking the 75th anniversary of the reestablishment of West Germany’s Foreign Ministry, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul voiced sharp criticism of recent US and Israeli attacks on Iran.
Steinmeier, speaking in his largely ceremonial but outspoken role, called the strikes a “politically fateful mistake” and said they amounted to a breach of international law. He questioned the assertion that the attacks were justified by an imminent threat to the United States, suggesting that justification “does not hold water” and pointing to apparent dissent within US agencies, including the recent resignation of President Trump’s counterterrorism chief, Joe Kent.
Wadephul, a conservative CDU politician, acknowledged the United States’ decisive historical role in defeating Nazi Germany, helping to rebuild West Germany after World War II and supporting reunification after the Cold War. At the same time he warned that transatlantic ties now confront “new epochal challenges” as he described US foreign policy under Trump as increasingly erratic. He cautioned that Europe may face greater security risks than in the past 75 years, citing an aggressive Russia and mounting tensions with the United States.
Both officials highlighted that Europe is dealing with two wars on its borders: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the conflict spreading in the Middle East and Gulf. Despite his criticisms, Wadephul urged Germans not to forget the broader American contribution to postwar stability and security, noting the US role in liberating Germany and helping shape the early Federal Republic.
Steinmeier argued that failing to name breaches of international law undermines foreign policy credibility and described the current conflict as avoidable and unnecessary if its aim was to halt Iran’s alleged nuclear ambitions. He said other diplomatic avenues might have been more effective and recalled his involvement 11 years ago as one of the foreign ministers who helped negotiate the JCPOA nuclear deal with Iran, from which the United States later withdrew under President Trump.
The ceremony marked March 15, 1951, when the occupying powers permitted Chancellor Konrad Adenauer’s government to re-create a Foreign Ministry in Bonn, allowing West Germany to resume formal foreign relations. The ministry’s founding was seen as a symbolic step in rehabilitating German politics and restoring autonomy after the war. Adenauer initially held both the chancellorship and the foreign minister portfolio, underscoring the new ministry’s importance. Its Bonn headquarters opened in the mid-1950s and, after reunification and the capital’s return to Berlin, the Foreign Ministry’s seat moved east.
Edited by Wesley Dockery.