The new Transatlantic Stalemate

* DAVID P CALLEO | Friday August 1, 2008 00:00

While Obama would likely restore civility and politeness to transatlantic discourse, the sources of friction are more profound. The geo-political interests of Europe and America have been drawing apart, and may well continue to do so, no matter who is president.

Halting this progressive alienation will require major changes in outlook and policy on both sides of the Atlantic. The United States will have to stop defining its transatlantic interests in terms of its hegemonic mindset, and Europe will have to take fuller charge of its own region.

To call interests 'geopolitical' underscores the influence of geography in shaping those interests. As Charles de Gaulle and Winston Churchill once famously agreed: 'When all is said and done, Great Britain is an island, France the cape of a continent; America another world.' Both understood that for centuries the English Channel has been a formidable geopolitical barrier to a durable sharing of interests between Britain and France. If the Channel has been such a barrier, durable bonds across the Atlantic seem implausible.

In other words, from this perspective, the world's two richest and most powerful economic spaces, the European Union and the US, are bound to be rivals, even when they are allies.

A shared enemy did underpin America's alliance with parts of Europe over much of the twentieth century. That enemy, however, was also European - first Germany, then Russia. In effect, the shared transatlantic geopolitical interest was between the US and one part of Europe against another.

With the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, the transatlantic alliance confronted new realities. The interests of both the EU and the US were expansively redefined. With no massive Soviet army in the middle of Germany, Europe was no longer firmly divided into Western and Eastern hemispheres. Mitteleuropa revived and Germany reunified. Western Europe evolved from a 'Community' to a 'Union,' and its states became less firmly bound to American protection.

The Soviet demise encouraged US political elites to construct a 'unipolar' view of America's global position and interest. This trend accelerated as the current Bush administration attempted to construct unilateral global hegemony out of the 'War on Terror,' which provoked growing disquiet in 'Old Europe.'

While America's invasion of Afghanistan was widely seen as justified, the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq produced an open break between the US and its two major continental allies, France and Germany, which were supported by Russia and China. A great Eurasian bloc suddenly appeared in opposition to America's hegemonic global pretensions, prefiguring a new fluidity in geopolitical relationships, if not a tectonic shift in alignments.

The effectiveness of Franco-German resistance to American hegemony was qualified, though, by the reactions of other European states. The United Kingdom's Prime Minister Tony Blair did his best to resurrect Churchill's special relationship, and Britain was joined by Italy and Spain, together with nearly all the states of New Europe. The Franco-German couple could no longer claim to speak for the EU as a whole. European plans for a Common Foreign and Security Policy and for closer defense cooperation seemed brutally discredited.

Slowly, however, Europe has seemed to grow more cohesive in its opposition to American unipolar policies and pretensions. And, after his re-election in 2004, Bush grew more conciliatory. Blair's departure left Bush increasingly isolated diplomatically, with changes of government in Berlin and Paris bringing only superficial improvements. Deteriorating economic conditions at home implied stricter limits on American intervention abroad.

It is difficult to know where this uneasy transatlantic detente of 2008 will lead. It is now clear that European and American geopolitical interests are not automatically in harmony. Europeans do not accept the Bush administration's strategic vision, and the US is unable to pursue that vision without European support.

The reasons for Europe's defection are eminently geopolitical. To Europe's east lies Russia, to its south the Muslim world. Europe needs good relations with both in order to penetrate growing markets, tap sources for raw materials and energy, and ensure its own domestic stability, whereas many Europeans believe that US policies alienate these regions. In these circumstances, the transatlantic alliance survives less from genuinely shared interests than from inertia.

Can anything restore the old transatlantic harmony? A forceful revival of Russian imperialism, or a war of civilizations with the Muslim world, might provide a threat so overbearing that a frightened Europe would resume its Cold War dependency on America. But Europe will not be eager to embrace such a future. It may be careful not to alienate America, but it will struggle to build a collaborative relationship with its regional neighbors.

Of course, America's definitions of its role in the world may change. America's unipolar expectations have not been ratified by events. Indeed, there is now considerable opposition to that vision in the US itself.

Yet today too much power is agglomerated in Washington to be contained successfully within a purely national constitutional structure. Checks and balances at home require a correlative balance of power abroad. Constructing such a balanced state system for itself on a regional scale has been postwar Europe's great achievement.

Implementing that system has depended heavily on a supportive America. Perhaps it is time for Europe to return the favor. Balancing, it seems, is always necessary, even among friends. And among friends balancing is also more likely to be successful. That Europe can find the will, the means, and the confidence to play that role cannot be taken for granted. What does seem clear is that a cohesive and strong Europe on good terms with its neighbors will not fit easily into a close transatlantic alliance with an America actively pursuing global hegemony.

* David P. Calleo is the Dean Acheson Professor and Director of European Studies at Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies.
Copyright: Project Syndicate/Europe's World, 2008.