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Germany must be a country which generates political ideas and leadership, which is capable of compromise, which is sovereign and yet knows that it needs its partners on both sides of the Atlantic.

Germany's strength lies largely in the fact that the Federal Republic is a center of industry and that it's an export nation.

Germany is determined to provide substantial help. So are the Netherlands and other states. But a day will come when we have to count on our own resources.

The Russian Federation and the United States of America, the two biggest nuclear powers in the world, but apart from nuclear-wise, we have a lot in common. We have huge territories, natural resources, technologies, science, education, and of course human capital.

Germany is an economic giant but a political midget, and with the end of the Cold War she has started to muscle her presence throughout Europe and the world.

The euro is a vital issue for Germany. There is no other country that derives as much benefit from the common domestic market and the monetary union as Germany.

True, other countries are helping us. Germany is determined to provide substantial help. So are the Netherlands and other states. But a day will come when we have to count on our own resources.

Germany is very free-trade oriented.

It is not in the interest of the German people or in the interest of world peace that Germany should become a pawn or a partner in a military struggle for power between the East and the West.

The thing that I like about Germany is that Germans are so much like us. It's not like going to some other countries, where the differences are overwhelming and you walk around in a fog. Germans are so similar to Americans.