Ahmedabad Over Beijing: How Merz's India Visit Repositions Germany's Asia Strategy

By Shibhankita Pradhan

When German Chancellor Friedrich Merz arrived at Ahmedabad on 12th of January for his first official visit to Asia, the choice of destination by the newly elected German government spoke louder than any other official statement could. Not Beijing, not Tokyo, not Seoul but India’s commercial hub in Gujarat, Ahmedabad. He was accompanied by a 23 member CEO delegation which further signalled serious economic intent. For a German Chancellor whose predecessor Olaf Scholz had prioritised China in his Asia engagement, Merz’s choice represented more than mere itinerary logistics rather it reflected an evolving strategic orientation enabled by conservative pragmatism reshaping Germany’s eastward engagement.

A comparison to Scholz’s foreign policy choices helps shed some light on this change of course. Scholz’s visit to China in November 2022 was a representation of his coalition’s measured approach towards German foreign policy, as the visit attracted widespread domestic criticism and a wider European unease over Beijing’s partnership with Moscow following the Russia-Ukraine war.

However, the newly elected government led by the Christian Democrats showcases a different approach to these strategic engagements. The decision to make India his first destination during his Asia visit appears less improvised than a calculated move by the German Chancellor. This shift in emphasis manifests in discernible policy signals. While Scholz’s China engagement is rooted in economic interdependence, Merz has more explicitly emphasised de-risking from Germany’s €300 billion annual trade exposure to Beijing. His decision to visit India first seems to indicate an acknowledgement that such dependence increasingly constitutes vulnerability rather than just an economic opportunity.

On defence cooperation, where Scholz’s Zeitenwende rhetoric encountered implementation challenges owing to the coalition politics, Merz’s visit provided a political momentum to the long running Project 75I submarine negotiations, including discussion of a framework understanding as the formal contract remains in the final stages of negotiation.

On trade, though structural EU-level constraints remain unchanged, Merz’s call to “urgently conclude” the India-EU Free Trade Agreement is far more explicitly stated when compared to Scholz.

The timing of Merz’s visit to India acquires added significance against the backdrop of wider geopolitical uncertainty. The United States imposed 50 percent tariffs on Indian goods in August 2025, combining reciprocal measures with penalties linked to Russian oil purchase. Germany itself faces renewed trade and tariff unpredictability under Trump’s second term. Yet rather than viewing India’s strategic autonomy on Russian energy as an obstacle, Merz appears to be more pragmatic and accepting of partners maintaining divergent positions on specific issues. It seems to have a better compatible structure for Modi’s policy of multi-alignment than Scholz’s value-centred perspective, even as both governments ultimately support deepening India-Germany ties.

Most importantly, India and Germany are also aligned through their shared membership in the G4 grouping, along with Brazil and Japan as aspirants for permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council. On September 2024 G4 meetings, the foreign ministers of the member nations reiterated that comprehensive reform in the current UNSC structure remains essential in restoring the Council’s equitable representativeness across the world. Seen in this light, Merz’s decision to prefer India over China also stems from the fact that China, being a P5 member has always shown little incentive to advance this structural reform. This can also be perceived as a strategic choice to build partnerships with fellow aspirants. This underscores how common ambition of UNSC reform may prioritise coalition building among like-minded states over reliance on slow-moving institutional processes.

However, more often this partnership remains overshadowed by structural constraints that the theory of realism acknowledges. Divergent threat perceptions persist as Russia looms largest for Germany and China for India. Along with this, neither side can replace U.S. security guarantees, and India-U.S. cooperation continues across counterterrorism, military exercises and strategic dialogue despite tariff tensions. Consequently, the relationship between both countries in not a strategic realignment rather it aims at preserving flexibility and enhancing leverage through multi-directional engagement.

As of now, the nineteen agreements concluded during Merz’s visit which included defence, semiconductors, critical minerals, renewable energy and skills migration illustrate this convergence in practice. The semiconductor ecosystem partnership addresses shared concerns over Chinese supply chain dominance with India’s emerging manufacturing base complementing German design expertise. Cooperation on critical minerals which is also essential for EVs, batteries, defence systems, and renewable technologies, helps hedge against China’s estimated 60 percent control over global processing capacity. Also, Green hydrogen agreements position India as a potential future clean energy supplier to Europe, thereby, contributing to Germany’s diversification away from Russian dependence. Apart from this, healthcare workforce mobility initiatives also create opportunities for India’s skilled professionals, reinforcing long-term demographic complementarity between the two countries.

Internal patterns of political shift from Scholz’s compromises in his coalition policies to Merz’s conservatism, can potentially speed up foreign policy shifts that were hitherto slowed down by ideological discrepancies or partnerships of governance. Destination diplomacy matters because leaders’ choices of destinations of their official foreign visits send twin signals, both symbolic priorities and substantive strategic intent to international partners and domestic audiences.

Taken together, the defence, supply chain, energy, and mobility agreements concluded during the visit help explain why Germany increasingly views India not merely as one among many partners but as a central pillar of its own Indo-Pacific strategy, which encapsulates in Berlin’s effort to integrate trade, manufacturing, supply chain resilience and energy security across the Indian Ocean and East Asia to reduce overdependence over China. India offers what China potentially cannot, a democratic partner with massive manufacturing scale and a shared interest of reform in global governance. Prioritising Ahmedabad over Beijing thus reflects a strategic reorientation shaped by pragmatism. With this reconfiguration, India is increasingly recognised as a potential anchor for Germany’s Indo-Pacific engagement, a partial manufacturing alternative to China and a coalition partner in efforts toward UNSC reform.

As both countries pursue permanent Security Council seats while managing complex ties with the United States, China, and Russia, their partnership offers a test of whether emerging powers can reshape aspects of global order through strategic coalitions rather than waiting for great power consensus. Whether this conservative convergence translates into sustained implementation remains uncertain. Even so, Merz’s arrival in India sent a clear signal that Germany’s new conservative government increasingly frames India not merely as an alternative to China, but as a priority partner in the twenty first century geopolitics. Whether symbolic or transformative, Ahmedabad before Beijing sent an unmistakable signal about Germany’s evolving priorities in Asia.

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This is an Original Article Contribution to the SIS Blog.

Shibankita Pradhan is a Ph.D. Candidate at the Centre for European Studies, School of International Studies, JNU. Her academic pursuits are centred around research and writing on pressing political issues and global dynamics and transitions.