U.S. President Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

 
Image courtesy Reuters
The first meeting of German Chancellor Angela Merkel with President Trump in the United States is causing tension in Berlin and Washington to rise to a fever pitch. Will there merely be a polite conversation and a (perhaps slightly too long) handshake, to sighs of relief all round? Or will there be (cue diplomatic shudders) an open confrontation, fodder for yet another instantly immortal “Saturday Night Live” edition?

The battle lines, at any rate, have been drawn. During his campaign, Trump skewered Merkel’s open-door refugee policy repeatedly — a critique known to be held with even greater fervor by his chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon. Peter Navarro,head of the new National Trade Council, recently suggested thatGermany usesa “grossly undervalued” euro to “exploit” the United States and other European countries. The president has criticized Germany for not spending enough on defense. He has characterized NATO asobsoleteand the European Union as dispensable. The German chancellor has so far remained silent on these remarkable accusations — but it was all the more notable that her offer of cooperation after Trump’s electionadded the barbed reservation, “on the basis of these [shared] values.”
Indeed, Friday’s encounter between Trump and Merkel will be a through-the-looking-glass moment, as it marks an unprecedented reversal of leadership roles between the United States and Germany. The host is an American president with an unusually dystopian view of his own country, sympathies for authoritarian leaders, and a dislike of globalization, multilateral organizations and immigration. His guest grew up in East Germany with an idealized vision of America as a defender of liberty around the world. A holder of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, she has expressed deep gratitude for Washington’s support for German reunification in 1990. In her 12 years as chancellor, she has let nothing come between her and her commitment to transatlantic relations — not even revelations about the U.S. National Security Agency wiretapping her cellphone, or asurprise back rubby then-President George W. Bush.