The Two Roads of Europe and America

[Guest]

The reasons behind an enduring division

The United States and Great Britain took the Iraqi question back to the United Nations in order not to have to bear the cost of stabilizing and reconstructing Iraq on their own. Thanks to the resolution approved by the Security Council, with the votes of France, Germany, Russia, and China, which had opposed the war, Washington and London gave up some their maneuvering room in exchange for the cooperation of the international community in managing the crisis. But this does not sanction optimism either for a return of the United States to multilateralism, or for a rapprochement with old Europe. There are still too many issues dividing Americans and Europeans.

As Timothy Garton Ash has written, September 11 was one of those historic moments that define the nature of certain circumstances, and the identity of the actors involved: Europe did not permit itself be defined. The Herald Tribune had already said, "What Europeans don't understand is how much America was changed by September 11" and the point was reaffirmed by N.A.T.O. Secretary General George Robertson: "If we are to ensure that the United States moves neither towards unilateralism nor isolationism, all European countries must show a new willingness to develop effective crisis management capabilities." But even after the approval of the new resolution at the United Nations, the coolness of French President Jacques Chirac toward possible N.A.T.O. involvement in Iraq appears to confirm the view of U.S. senator Richard Lugar that despite its undeniable past successes, the Atlantic alliance remains on the sidelines with respect to the new issues on the international agenda.

Regarding unilateralism, there is a truly naive conviction in many European circles, including the Italian left, that the United States will only return to multilateralism if the Democrat John F. Kerry returns to the White House, and the neocon eggheads who advised Mr. Bush so poorly are removed. American unilateralism has long-established roots, and currently relevant motives. Its roots are sunk in the United States' inability - from its rejection of the Society of Nations in the distant past to more recent refusals of the International Court of Justice and the Kyoto Protocol on the environment - to reconcile a vocation to promote international rules and institutions with a willingness to be included in those rules and institutions. Current motives concern the belief, held by President Clinton before Mr. Bush, that after the breakup of the Soviet Union, the international order is more hegemonic than multilateral in nature. As Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said, "the mission must determine the coalition, the coalition must not determine the mission."

And here we come to another reason for the split. On the one hand, we have a European inclination to construct shared, supranational institutions, and on the other the jealous defense by the Americans of their own sovereignty, and a distrust of any institutions that restrict or limit it. In any case, and according to Michael E. Cox this is another reason for division, "a) the gap in capabilities is growing, not narrowing; and b) as the gap grows it means that the Europeans will not only have decreased leverage over the United States, but that the U.S. will take Europe less seriously."

Piero Ostellino http://www.corriere.it

[coriolis]

That's an interesting analysis. No doubt there are significant differences between Europe and the US in terms of world outlook and how to achieve security. A large part of that is geographic. Europe is a crossroad of the world, while the US is geographically isolated. Europe is the product of millenia of sucessive conquests, and cross fertilization, while the US was self-made. Isolationism has a real resonance here, because we came here to get away from Europe and all the old problems.