A
post war Europe
will be very different
By
Jonathan
Power
March 19, 2003
LONDON - This war, if it happens, won't leave the
world as it found it. And this is true not only for the
Muslim world but for Europe and America too. The
irritations that seem a constant of American-European
relations the last few years have become almost a battle
zone. If the academic studies were not so convincing on
the subject that democracies never go to war with each
other one could perhaps imagine in the foreseeable future
a state of armed hostilities between the rival
camps.
Certainly the common mood all over Western Europe is
that we don't want to be part of the great transatlantic
alliance anymore, if it means that every couple of years
we have to follow America to war. In the crucible of the
preparations for war European citizens have forged their
own common foreign policy. Europeans have never been so
aware of their common identity nor so conscious of what
separates them from their old kissing cousins across the
Atlantic - an abhorrence of war, the gun culture, brutal
prison regimes, and capital punishment. Add to that the
two codes of justice, one for the well to do and one for
the poor. Ditto for the health services. Ditto for
education.
All this has taken a long time to come to the surface.
But the roots are deep. They go right back to the Iron
and Steel Community, the precursor of the European Union,
when France and German decided they must never go to war
again and that the way to avoid it was to bind themselves
economically together.
The debate over Iraq has crystallised this mood
of Euro-solidarity, which if it had been left to
mature on its own without outside stimulus might have
taken a few more decades to solidify. And if the war goes
wrong, triggering off great instability in the Middle
East and adding new muscle to the depredations of Al
Qaeda the fault lines will deepen even further, and even
more so if the U.S., confronting a chemical or biological
attack, decides, as it has said it would, to use its
nuclear weapons. Indeed, resentment of American prowess
now runs so deep that one can well imagine that a
terrorist attack on Europe will unleash more
anti-American feeling than anti-Arab. Not for nothing are
polls showing all over Europe that the United States is
regarded as the real rogue of our times.
Washington is sitting too comfortable with these
developments. From the eye of the White House it looks as
if "old" Europe is nicely divided with Britain and Spain
on its side and out there is "new" Europe to the east
more pro American than ever. But this is to assume the
most optimistic scenario imaginable- that the war will go
so smoothly that
the kaleidoscope of Europe won't be re-shaken. The
chances are the war will cause great upheavals and one
senses that this is part of the fine calculations being
made in the Kremlin by Vladimir Putin. It is only last
year that observers were admiring the geo-political
athleticism of President George Bush as he appeared to
leap over Europe's head and embrace Putin. Europe seemed
marginalised and a Russo-American condominium all too
capable of calling the biggest shots. But it has not
turned out this way. Contrary to expectations and in the
face of last minute blandishments by Washington to set in
motion a number of matters that favour Russia, Putin has
turned towards the Franco-German axis, where many
influential Russians from Mikhail Gorbachev on, with his
talk of building "a common European house", have always
felt Russia's interests lay.
What this means for the East Europeans who have
rallied to Washington's cause is becoming clearer by the
day. They may resent President Jacques Chirac's threat to
stall their membership of the European Union, but it is a
serious threat and neither Washington, London nor Madrid
can help them out of this hole they have dug for
themselves. They have made a serious tactical mistake and
one that could have deeper ramifications if prime
ministers Jose Maria Aznar and Tony Blair lose their
crowns in the days ahead.
Although public opinion in Spain is even more anti war
than it is in Britain it is Tony Blair who is the more
vulnerable of the two. If the war goes wrong he will lose
his premiership, whilst Aznar will just slide away as
planned at the next election. In both countries whoever
takes over will be far less pro American and also more
amenable to a common identity in European foreign policy.
(And one that includes Russia more often than not.) The
process of creating a powerful single unified voice of
Europe capable of speaking with great authority to the
outside world, now in obeyance because of the current
splits, will take a great leap forward. One can expect to
see European encouragement to the American urge to wind
down many of their bases in Western Europe, but also
forestalling the simplistic American desire to move their
bases into Eastern Europe.
The question is will Americans of influence, rather
than ribbing Europe with accusations of playing Venus to
America's Mars, realize that Europe is tough and strong
enough to have its own valid point of view and it has
come to these opinions out of strength not of weakness,
out of perception, not ignorance?
I can be reached by phone +44
7785 351172 and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
Copyright © 2003 By
JONATHAN POWER
Follow this
link to read about - and order - Jonathan Power's book
written for the
40th Anniversary of
Amnesty International
"Like
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