How Angela Merkel’s great migrant gamble paid off

[sun rise]

The key points in the article are that the assumption of a horrible result did not happen. Most immigrants are peaceful. German intelligence agencies are really efficient. And Germany worked hard to manage and slow down the wave of immigration.

In other words, a decent, rational approach worked.

How Angela Merkel’s great migrant gamble paid off

Five years ago, as more and more refugees crossed into Europe, Germany’s chancellor proclaimed, ‘We’ll manage this.’ Critics said it was her great mistake – but she has been proved right
...
The spectre of jihadist terrorism, which some feared the refugee crisis would usher into the heart of central Europe, has faded from view in recent years. After a spate of seven attacks with an Islamist motive in Germany in 2016, culminating with a truck driven into a Berlin Christmas market that December, the country has seen no further attacks for the last three years.
...
“In hindsight, Isis’s collapse happened quicker than we expected. It’s now clear that what made them so attractive for a while is less their ideology than their success. And when Isis stopped being successful, it stopped being attractive.”

However, Neumann says this was also due to the increasing efficiency of German intelligence agencies....

Last year, crime in Germany sank to an 18-year low.

 

[metis]

But Trump hates Merkel, so how could this be?

 

[Heyo]

But Trump hates Merkel, so how could this be?

He's just jealous. Angela speaks fluent Russian and can converse with his buddy Vladimir.

 

[Heyo]

The key points in the article are that the assumption of a horrible result did not happen. Most immigrants are peaceful. German intelligence agencies are really efficient. And Germany worked hard to manage and slow down the wave of immigration.

In other words, a decent, rational approach worked.

How Angela Merkel’s great migrant gamble paid off

Five years ago, as more and more refugees crossed into Europe, Germany’s chancellor proclaimed, ‘We’ll manage this.’ Critics said it was her great mistake – but she has been proved right
...
The spectre of jihadist terrorism, which some feared the refugee crisis would usher into the heart of central Europe, has faded from view in recent years. After a spate of seven attacks with an Islamist motive in Germany in 2016, culminating with a truck driven into a Berlin Christmas market that December, the country has seen no further attacks for the last three years.
...
“In hindsight, Isis’s collapse happened quicker than we expected. It’s now clear that what made them so attractive for a while is less their ideology than their success. And when Isis stopped being successful, it stopped being attractive.”

However, Neumann says this was also due to the increasing efficiency of German intelligence agencies....

Last year, crime in Germany sank to an 18-year low.

It paid of in that aspect but it failed in an other. Spearheading a migrant solution was meant to be an example for other European countries. Didn't work out as well. Today she even forbids communities (Berlin and Thuringia) to let migrants in and sets on a European solution (that won't come).

 

[Nakosis]

Last year Germany passed a law, which facilitates the deportation of failed asylum seekers and expands related powers of police and immigration authorities.
Germany passes controversial migration law

I suppose that is what they meant by, However, Neumann says this was also due to the increasing efficiency of German intelligence agencies....

Not sure what is meant by a failed asylum seeker though.

 

[Heyo]

Not sure what is meant by a failed asylum seeker though.

Asylum is a constitutional human right if you are unlawfully persecuted in your home country, e.g. an ethnic or religious minority. People who only come for economic reasons don't have that right. Most get exceptions for humanitarian reasons but deportation is always looming.

 

[Yerda]

The key points in the article are that the assumption of a horrible result did not happen. Most immigrants are peaceful. German intelligence agencies are really efficient. And Germany worked hard to manage and slow down the wave of immigration.

In other words, a decent, rational approach worked.

How Angela Merkel’s great migrant gamble paid off

Five years ago, as more and more refugees crossed into Europe, Germany’s chancellor proclaimed, ‘We’ll manage this.’ Critics said it was her great mistake – but she has been proved right
...
The spectre of jihadist terrorism, which some feared the refugee crisis would usher into the heart of central Europe, has faded from view in recent years. After a spate of seven attacks with an Islamist motive in Germany in 2016, culminating with a truck driven into a Berlin Christmas market that December, the country has seen no further attacks for the last three years.
...
“In hindsight, Isis’s collapse happened quicker than we expected. It’s now clear that what made them so attractive for a while is less their ideology than their success. And when Isis stopped being successful, it stopped being attractive.”

However, Neumann says this was also due to the increasing efficiency of German intelligence agencies....

Last year, crime in Germany sank to an 18-year low.

I read that this morning.

So after all the hysterics it turns out the people fleeing war weren't a column of infiltrating terrorists moving into Europe to create terror, rape all the women and install Sharia law.

The sad part is that hysteria played a massive role in winning the UK EU-referendum for Leave. Or in other words: The UK made a massive decision regarding its role in the world that will affect our lives for years to come on the basis of tabloid-laundered nazi propaganda.

Woo.

 

[sun rise]

Last year Germany passed a law, which facilitates the deportation of failed asylum seekers and expands related powers of police and immigration authorities.
Germany passes controversial migration law

I suppose that is what they meant by, However, Neumann says this was also due to the increasing efficiency of German intelligence agencies....

Not sure what is meant by a failed asylum seeker though.

There were a number of terrorist plots which they stopped.

 

[Tambourine]

Not sure what is meant by a failed asylum seeker though.

It means people whose claims to political or humanitarian asylum are denied in court.

 

[Tambourine]

Asylum is a constitutional human right if you are unlawfully persecuted in your home country, e.g. an ethnic or religious minority. People who only come for economic reasons don't have that right. Most get exceptions for humanitarian reasons but deportation is always looming.

I've always found that argument iffy.
People from the DDR didn't migrate to the West only because they were personally persecuted by state authorities (although some definitely were), but to a large part because life in the DDR was pretty miserable compared to life in the West.

In my experience with actual migrants, people never just migrate for one singular reason, so making it out like there is no political or humanitarian component to "economic" migration, and no economic component to the flight of "humanitarian" or "political" asylum seekers, misses the real life complexity of migration.

 

[Heyo]

I've always found that argument iffy.
People from the DDR didn't migrate to the West only because they were personally persecuted by state authorities (although some definitely were), but to a large part because life in the DDR was pretty miserable compared to life in the West.

People from the DDR and people from Russia with ex German parents are a special case. They were seen as Germans, so they didn't immigrate, they came home.
There also was always a geopolitical component to migration. People from communist countries were treated special. Enemy of my enemy.

In my experience with actual migrants, people never just migrate for one singular reason, so making it out like there is no political or humanitarian component to "economic" migration, and no economic component to the flight of "humanitarian" or "political" asylum seekers, misses the real life complexity of migration.

That's why asylum seekers can contest a decision of the office for migration before court. Then a judge has to deal with the complexities.

 

[Tambourine]

People from the DDR and people from Russia with ex German parents are a special case. They were seen as Germans, so they didn't immigrate, they came home.

That attitude changed very quickly, once these people actually came home for real, however, as Germany subsequently tightened its requirements for immigration in general, and Volksdeutsche in particular. The Russian Germans who were welcomed with open arms in 1990 wouldn't be allowed to immigrate under current German immigration laws.

There also was always a geopolitical component to migration. People from communist countries were treated special. Enemy of my enemy.

Yes, there was a political will to treat these people like human beings, a political will which has largely disappeared these days sadly.

That's why asylum seekers can contest a decision of the office for migration before court. Then a judge has to deal with the complexities.

In Austria, we had cases where asylum seekers were deported from the country while they were still going through the appeals process. Whether that was an accidential oversight or an "accidential" "oversight", I do not know, but it happened.

I do know that during the brief era of the right-wing coalition, immigration offices were ordered to reject asylum claims outright, which produced some bizarre cases (such as a homosexual man from Afghanistan who was denied asylum because he "didn't look gay enough" for the bureaucrat in question, and therefore, presumably, couldn't have been persecuted).

 

[Heyo]

Yes, there was a political will to treat these people like human beings, a political will which has largely disappeared these days sadly.

In Germany that is partly because of the right-wing AfD who draws its votes from the xenophobic part of the public. To stifle further success the Merkel administration pays only lip service to immigration while hiding behind the Dublin Treaty. Taking in a few dozen of extreme humanitarian cases every now and then rounds the picture of being the positive example without doing much.