A cowboy in Brussels: President Bush's trip and the great reckoning with Europe

National Review, March 14, 2005 by John O'Sullivan

MY Washington taxi driver had heard the president's speech in Brussels over the radio. He thought it had handled the Europeans well: Bush had set out to assure them of America's goodwill, but had not made any substantial concessions on policy. It seemed to have succeeded--maybe because the Europeans themselves were less united than they sometimes appear. The enlargement of the European Union had brought in member states from eastern and central Europe; these wanted the economic benefits of EU membership, but also the security of the Atlantic alliance. They would therefore be reluctant to root all their foreign-policy decisions within the EU, preferring to keep the NATO link with the U.S. It was a complex situation, but that was useful in itself--since it gave Bush room to maneuver against the Franco-German axis.

Well, okay, the taxi driver was a Nigerian student with a master's degree in international relations. Still, his analysis was more sophisticated than any on offer from the establishment media; I drew on it substantially in a TV appearance. Even so, it understated the real significance of Bush's speech and his European trip--namely, that for the first time there are signs that the U.S. is beginning to respond intelligently and subtly but forcefully to the threat to American interests posed by the EU.

This stiffening of the U.S. stance is likely to be obscured, perhaps deliberately, by the general agreement that the Bush trip is an exercise in charm and reconciliation. It is such an exercise, of course, and none the worse for that. Everyone from Jacques Chirac to Richard Perle accepts that such reconciliation was needed after the ill-natured disputes over the Iraq war. But different Europeans have different motives for seeking it.

America's friends in Europe--and a majority of both NATO and the EU supported the Iraq war--want transatlantic reconciliation for its own sake but also because that would help heal the splits dividing Europe. Those who want the EU to be a rival or counterweight to the U.S., on the other hand, seek reconciliation as a way of soothing Washington into going along with their project. Whenever the Americans get riled up over some hostile move by the EU--for instance, its intention to lift the arms embargo on China--there is a stampede of eminent Europeans rushing to assure the U.S. that the transatlantic relationship is sacred and inviolable. These assurances, however, often turn out to be extremely temporary. The reconciliation provided by this trip is, inter alia, another dose of NyQuil.

TAKING BUSH SERIOUSLY

On this occasion, there was a further reason for reconciliation that most Europeans would prefer not to mention, i.e., their suspicion that George W. Bush is a far more substantial political leader than they had thought even a few months ago. That suspicion goes well beyond accepting that he will be leading America for the next four years or even that his reelection showed a majority constituency for his policies. It is the suspicion that he may be proving right (or at least less wrong) over Iraq, the wider democracy project, and foreign policy in general. The Iraq elections were plainly a catalyst for this feeling, but it is beginning to extend into other questions. In fact, when Europeans look at the range of international problems facing the Atlantic alliance, they struggle to suppress the sinking feeling that the U.S. is handling its crises rather better than the Europeans are handling theirs. Consider:

Iraq. A long struggle is ahead, but most Iraqis have warmly embraced a democratic future. As William Rees-Mogg pointed out in the London Times, although terrorism often succeeds against a foreign colonial power, it never defeats a domestic democratic majority.

Israel/Palestine. Washington's contention that serious progress towards peace was dependent upon the removal of Yasser Arafat has been confirmed with almost comic speed. The EU's long and passionate embrace of the old terrorist now looks counterproductive as well as disgraceful.

Syria/Lebanon. Europe, especially France, long ago withdrew its protection from Lebanon, where a partial democracy had existed for 30 years. It has also turned a blind eye to Syria's support for Iraqi terrorism. But the murder of the former Lebanese premier has aroused both the international community and the Lebanese people. While Bush was speaking in Brussels, an anti-Syrian pro-democracy demonstration that invoked his name was taking place in Beirut. From this position of unexpected strength, Bush generously suggested that the U.S. and France were united in their support for Lebanese democracy. He thus acted on a wise man's words: "Love your enemies; they'll hate it."

Iran. This is the Middle East crisis the Europeans have selected as a demonstration of what their diplomacy can achieve. Thus far, it has allowed the Iranian mullahs to significantly advance their nuclear reprocessing program.

In the face of these contrasts, it is hard to maintain that Europe represents skilled diplomacy and the U.S. heavy-handed militarism. Rather the Europeans are instinctively averse to change, shrink from dealing with crises, cling to what Bush in his Brussels speech called the "false stability" of dictatorships (or other existing political structures), and take refuge in diplomatic displacement activities like Kyoto. The U.S. (with its superpower responsibilities), on the other hand, knows it will have to deal with the crises eventually, seeks to do so sooner rather than later, tries to identify and assist countervailing local movements that would reduce or remove the threat at its source, and does not needlessly disavow the use of force as a last resort (since the threat of force is itself a diplomatic tool). For the moment at least, the U.S. approach seems to be working better.