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For the first time, the authors portray all the key figures in the affair and uncover the Kremlin's secret machinations. For years, the state government of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania fought for the construction of the Russian Baltic Sea pipeline and put itself at Putin's service. Undisturbed, Gazprom built a corrupt network in Germany. Steffen Dobbert and Ulrich Thiele reveal alarming connections: Why did 200 million euros flow from Moscow to the German Baltic coast? Why did a German authority pass secret NATO data to Gazprom? Why did the federal government ignore Ukrainian warnings of a war escalation? They expose the strategies with which Putin divides the EU, weakens Ukraine, and manipulates decision-making processes in democracies.

Incriminating chat logs, deleted evidence, more than 200,000 euros in cash in the bank vault of an SPD power broker: there are plenty of irregularities in the tax scandal surrounding the Hamburg Warburg Bank. And right in the middle of it: Olaf Scholz, at the time mayor of the Hanseatic city. No other affair is as dangerous for today's chancellor. And none reveals as much about him. Oliver Schröm's and Oliver Hollenstein's award-winning research on the topic led to the establishment of a parliamentary inquiry committee and made international headlines for the chancellor in summer 2022. In this book, they recount the tricks and deceptions used to obscure Scholz's role in the Warburg case to this day. And they reveal the person behind the image that Scholz carefully cultivated throughout his career — the image that carried him all the way to the Chancellery.

It is the biggest tax heist in history: for years, banks and wealthy investors had taxes refunded by tax authorities that they had never paid, with the help of unscrupulous lawyers. In other words, they stole everyone's money. In Germany alone, the tax damage from Cum-Ex and similar schemes amounts to roughly 36 billion euros; across eleven European countries and the USA, the total is approximately 150 billion euros. Oliver Schröm exposed the dirty investments of financial jugglers like Carsten Maschmeyer, revealed Olaf Scholz's entanglement in the Cum-Ex affair at Germany's largest private bank, and founded the international investigative cooperation 'CumEx-Files'. Here he tells exclusively of his often adventurous research, during which he himself became the hunted. A business thriller and a portrait of society in equal measure.