Europeans Never Learn
By Wayne MerryNovember 13th, 2008One enduring constant of the trans-Atlantic relationship is the condescending attitude among European elites toward every new U.S. administration. This is a very old syndrome. With the possible exception of Nixon, I cannot recall a presidential transition in the past half century when Europeans did not do so.
It is certainly no secret that Europeans pretty much across the board favored an Obama victory — largely because they saw him as the anti-Bush — but how little they really understand the President Elect now begins to emerge, not to mention how little respect he is accorded among the continent’s chattering classes.
First, the Italian prime minister comments on Senator Obama’s “tan,” as if such a blatant bit of racism would go down well in this country on either side of the political aisle. Then the Polish President deliberately puts words into the President Elect’s mouth about potential U.S. missile deployments in his country, forcing the Obama transition office to issue a public corrective it obviously would have liked to avoid. Tuesday’s Financial Times informs us that the British Prime Minister’s “aides now talk excitedly about tutoring the new president in the intricacies of the global financial system,” as if Obama does not have the likes of Paul Volker at his elbow.
Sigh. The underlying European assumption is that the new American leader is charming but in need of their guidance, and he will be policy putty in their hands, in contrast to his predecessor. On this basis, a trans-Atlantic honeymoon will not last long, just until Europeans discover (doubtless to their shock) that Barack Obama is an American, not a European, and a Democrat rather than a Social Democrat.
It is a pity, because a change of U.S. administrations, particularly after one so ill thought of by Europeans as that of President Bush, might be a good time for a fundamental review of the trans-Atlantic relationship. Surely, twenty years after the end of the Cold War is time enough for the kind of basic reform I advocated in a recent article in The Journal of International Security Affairs and in previous pieces in The National Interest and elsewhere.
Sadly, two or three factors militate against such a long overdue reformulation of American-European relations. First is the financial and economic crisis, which doubtless will push other issues aside. Second is the enduring European desire to return this relationship to some supposed Eden (about the time of Eisenhower, Adenauer, De Gaulle and MacMillan). Third is the probable presence in a new U.S. administration of neo-liberal figures of the Clinton years whose attitudes toward Europe mirror those of European elites toward America.
One European commentator, Philip Stevens of the FT, gets it exactly right in his column of November 11th: “Behind the general air of adulation, though, is a profound misconception. This is the belief that the Bush years were an unfortunate interlude and the old Atlantic alliance can be reconstituted much as before. In truth, that possibility ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union. One of the big problems of the past couple of decades has been a failure (on both sides) to recognize that a partnership of necessity has become one of choice. Europe is no longer at the heart of America’s foreign policy interests, and Europe no longer has such a pressing need for the US security umbrella. There are lots of other good reasons to promote a strong alliance. But, to borrow a thought from Mr. Obama, the relationship can work only if both sides understand the change.”
Will it require yet another crisis in the trans-Atlantic relationship, comparable to that surrounding the outbreak of the Iraq war, to shake things up enough so that the two sides will come to grips with new realities? Probably, but even that may not be enough.
