The submarine crisis has led to a fresh French push for European strategic autonomy. But France will need German backing, just as Chancellor Angela Merkel steps down after 16 years in office. How should France navigate the post-Merkel world, and can Paris persuade Berlin to go further when it comes to European defence? FRANCE 24's Armen Georgian puts those questions to Joachim Bitterlich, who was a key advisor to another long-serving German chancellor, Helmut Kohl, as well as being Germany’s ambassador to NATO in the 1990s.

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