EUROPEAN DIVISIONS DON'T HELP AMERICA

 Artículo de Reginald Dale  en  “The International Herald Tribune” del 22/06/2004

Por su interés y relevancia, he seleccionado el artículo que sigue para incluirlo en este sitio web. (L. B.-B.)

Old and new Europe

WASHINGTON Washington will be tempted to rejoice at the outcome last week of the acrimonious European Union summit meeting in Brussels, the script of which might almost have been written by Bush administration officials. Having spent more than a year lambasting Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for his provocative quip about the contrast between troublesome "old" Europe and the rest, EU leaders did their best to prove him right.

Although the summit meeting finally approved a first European constitution, intended to increase EU influence around the world, it also revealed deep divisions between two broad groups of member governments: those that want deeper European integration and oppose U.S. foreign policy, and those that want less integration and a stronger alliance with the United States.

The groups fit roughly into the two categories that Rumsfeld was widely understood to be seeking to define. By "old" Europe, he meant France, Germany and a few acolytes that oppose the war in Iraq and want a more integrated European Union as a counterweight to the United States. "New" Europe was taken to denote the Atlanticist countries led by Britain and the eight new members from Central and Eastern Europe that joined the Union in May.

Since Rumsfeld made his off-the-cuff remark in January 2003, his distinction has seemed to blur. Spain's new socialist government, elected after the March 11 terrorist attack in Madrid, immediately shifted the country from "new" to "old" Europe. Worse, in the eyes of Washington, Britain began wavering as Prime Minister Tony Blair sought to infiltrate himself into the French-German partnership to form a leadership triumvirate for the new 25-nation EU.

In Brussels, however, Blair clashed with France and Germany - and particularly sharply with President Jacques Chirac of France - over both the constitution and a new president for the European Commission. At least for the moment, Britain looked to be veering back toward "new" Europe.

Blair and Chirac dislike each other, not least because Blair refuses to accord Chirac the "elder statesman" status he covets. But personal antipathy merely aggravates vastly differing world views. Britain sees a loosely integrated, free-market European Union as a partner for the United States in an American-led "unipolar" world; Chirac wants a more regimented, French-led Europe to counterbalance U.S. power as one pole of a "multipolar" world.

Blair won several victories in Brussels. Especially vital was his success in maintaining the national veto on tax policy, meaning that "new" Europe cannot be forced to raise taxes to relieve pressure for much-needed fiscal and economic reforms in "old" Europe. Also importantly for the United States, he kept a veto in foreign and defense policies, and prevented Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt of Belgium, an "old European," from becoming president of the European Commission.

Best of all was the devastatingly clear statement by a Blair official that "We are operating in a Europe of 25 - not a Europe of six. Or two. Or one." The six was the original European Community, from which Britain was twice excluded by French vetoes, the two the French-German partnership and the one, of course, France. The remark encapsulated the determination of the other countries no longer to accept diktats from Paris and Berlin without prior consultation.

But the comment cut even deeper. No country is more threatened by the European Union's expansion than France, which sees its traditional control over the Union endangered by an influx of generally pro-American countries that owe no special allegiance to Paris. If Paris no longer controls the European Union, how can it create a multipolar world in which one of the poles is a French-led Europe?

That fear lies behind France's hostility toward the new members, its efforts to strengthen the French-German partnership and its toleration of Britain's junior membership in the triumvirate, at least for foreign and defense policies, the main area in which Paris hopes to woo London away from Washington.

The Bush administration prefers a Europe of nation states, from which it can "cherry pick" allies, to a Europe integrated under French-German leadership. A more far-sighted policy, however, would be to encourage the development of a united Europe as a partner in the dangerous conflicts of the 21st century. That can best be done by welcoming a now seemingly repentant Germany back into the Atlantic fold and depriving France of the support it needs to dominate Europe. Chirac's France may be a lost cause, but, if isolated, it will be much weaker than in the past.

Europe's disarray may cause some temporary, unappealing glee in Washington. In the longer term, however, a divided Europe is not in America's interest. Washington should try to make itself an attractive ally to all Europeans, both old and new.

Reginald Dale is editor of the policy quarterly European Affairs and a media fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.