[fschuett]

My prediction is that the US war with Iran will lead to severe oil / gas shortages, which will be devastating for the German industry (think job loss, not necessarily people freezing to death). This year the winter started at 75% gas reserves and we're currently at 20% and we're lucky to have a warm winter. Now, next year Germany wants to exit completely from Russian gas (currently still served via Turkish pipelines) and LNG imports will have even more shortages thanks to the Iran war. So, analysts predicted that we can at most fill our gas reserves to 50% this summer, which will basically make the reserves go to 0% or negative in the next winter period. It's basic physics / geopolitics and there's little that any party can do at this point. Which will repel any industry first this year (even worse job market than last year), and then hit people at home later with energy / food / gasoline prices. Expect official government propaganda to be denying everything until the last second.

The German government fudged the official propaganda numbers on gas statistics now or are straight up lying because it would be bad for elections this year. I'm personally not voting because I consider the situation as hopeless either way, no matter what party you look at it's not a problem that voting can fix.

As it is more likely, "we" (I'm German, sadly) will this/next year go to war with Iran "to defend democracy", so they'll re-introduce the draft in 2027, etc. In any case, I'll have to try to switch countries this year as I'll hopefully have the ability to move abroad this year. If German politicians think they're above physics then I wish them good luck, this is just a heads up comment for other Germans who don't know what's going on.