The American Spectator : Europe as Weltmacht

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Europe as Weltmacht

By Doug Bandow on 11.17.09 @ 6:07AM

The plotting grows ever more intense as "Europe" prepares to select its new president and foreign minister.

(Page 2 of 2)

Yet after going to the trouble of ramming through a treaty that polls indicate was opposed by popular majorities in half of the EU member states, EU leaders apparently plan to reject the most impressive candidates for the top jobs. Blair was the early favorite for president, but has faded. The field is dominated by a gaggle of colorless national politicians.

Current candidates include Belgium's Herman Van Rompuy, Denmark's Jan Peter Balkenende, Ireland's Mary Robinson, Latvia's Vaira Vike-Freiberga, Luxembourg's Jean-Claude Juncker, and Sweden's Fredrik Reinfeldt. All of these people are respectable and accomplished in various ways -- Van Rompuy is noted for his haiku writing, for instance -- but none will "stop the traffic" in foreign capitals, as Miliband put it. The lack of international gravitas doesn't mean President Barack Obama won't ever call, but he will phone the British prime minister, French president, German chancellor, and perhaps the leaders of Italy, Poland, and Spain first.

Blair could still reemerge in the EU's "time-honored fashion… the cosy back-room stich-up," in the words of the Times of London. One Eastern European diplomat complained: "Trying to work out who is going to be President of the EU Council is not dissimilar to decoding who was in or out in the Kremlin in the 1970s. It seems strange to many of us that 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall we have to dust off our Kremlinology skills here in Brussels."

However, even choosing Tony Blair or a similar figure likely wouldn't matter much to the EU. As the British think tank Open Europe observed: "the idea for a President is mostly about giving the EU a symbolic, political figurehead to help propel its wild dreams about becoming a world superpower." The so-called European Project remains far from completion.

Europe remains deeply divided over international issues, and those differences won't disappear through attempts by another official, even one as charming and talented as Blair, in Brussels to plaster over the cracks. Nor is adding a foreign minister -- here, too, there are favorites and underdogs in a constantly changing race -- and diplomatic corps enough to create a united foreign policy.

Moreover, as French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner observed: "We must bear in mind, the necessity of supporting our diplomatic efforts with a common defense, a European defense…. Without this European defense our diplomacy lacks strength." Yet no one in Europe is interested in spending more on the military, creating forces which are combat capable, or deploying troops in harm's way. Even Great Britain is likely to retrench militarily in the face of a deep and prolonged recession.

Most Europeans live meaningful lives without great concern over how their continent is viewed in Washington or elsewhere. But Europe's political leadership remains burdened by the old Henry Kissinger insult: what's Europe's phone number? The Lisbon Treaty was drafted in part to provide such a phone number.

However, the EU remains a collection of nation states, not a nation state. Despite the forced passage of Lisbon, the differences among EU members remain great. And the addition of a president and foreign minister won't make anyone more willing to die for Brussels. Until Europeans are more loyal to Europe than their home countries, the European project will remain unfinished and unfulfilled. And the Lisbon Treaty will prove to be costly diversion.

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topics:
European Union

About the Author

Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and the Senior Fellow in International Religious Persecution at the Institute on Religion and Public Policy. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is author of Beyond Good Intentions: A Biblical View of Politics (Crossway).

Letter to the Editor View all comments (20) | Leave a comment

Bydand76| 11.17.09 @ 6:24AM

Is it just me or is G. Orwell starting to look like a prophet?

Alan Brooks| 11.17.09 @ 11:34AM

no.
Huxley.

Bill| 11.17.09 @ 7:15AM

What Hitler tried to achieved in 1939, i.e., a socialist utopia, one Europe, one leader, one currency, looks like it may happen some 70 years later. Wouldn’t this be fantastic? The US military could finally come home. Not only would we not have to protect them from themselves anymore, but just think how much money the American taxpayer would save. No more need for foreign aid.

Alan Brooks| 11.17.09 @ 11:37AM

21st century Fuhrer obtains the latet WMDs, and we are in trouble yet again.

There is always a Hell to go through.

Alan Brooks| 11.17.09 @ 11:38AM

latest WMDs.

high tech is the In thing, you know

Melvin| 11.17.09 @ 7:47AM

European by nature will never and I mean never be loyal members of a nation state.
The elites who are in charge of the EU already consider the Irish as dumb poor dirt farmers, the English don't trust no one, Germany and France are stroking each other to gain political advantage over each other which both have been doing for centuries, and both are working in concert to keep England isolated across the Channel.
Spain's afraid of its own shadow, and Italy is sitting back trying to figure what the hell is going on in Brussels.
I take sides with the Irish, during the first vote on Lisbon, one intrepid Irishman wasn't afraid to speak his mind with his non-political correct opinion on the then proposed Lisbon Treaty. "Screw, the EU, who needs em anyway."

Richard Baker| 11.17.09 @ 7:51AM

Was stationed in Germany in the early '70s and still can't figure out why we are still there. I believe the spectre of the Third Reich and Stalin have passed. The European Union is the French way to be great again, Napoleon having been the last. Without the French this house of cards would never have been built and pursued. Vive La France!

Le Cracquere| 11.17.09 @ 11:47AM

This only confirms that any POLITICAL European union stands to make the Holy Roman Empire look like a model of cohesion, relevance, and vigor.

(I can't imagine a future context where this particular parallel could occur, but the image of some future Belgian bureaucrat on his knees in the snow outside the Pope's hotel suite has an uncanny charm.)

Dean| 11.17.09 @ 1:57PM

The European Union is the most misbegotten experiment in democratic government in modern history. I am puzzled why any nation would willingly surrender its sovereignty to belong to such a bureaucratic monstrosity.

Christopher Holland| 11.17.09 @ 8:30PM

When you live in a country where a succession of governments has spent years denigrating and destroying everything that holds the country together - its history, the blood spilt defending it in wars, its culture and heritage, the military, the family, the school and education system, the economy and the currency, the authority of the parliament and the courts, the church, the standing of the royal family - then joining a horrible abortion like the EU sounds like a pretty good idea.

That is what the British did to their own country - they trashed and pissed on every institution they could and they have nothing left except the drivel promoted by the EU wankers. The EU is the bad hangover you get when you squander the family fortune on rotgut booze - they didn't even buy decent scotch to kill themselves and their livers! What a bunch of cheap, stupid losers - they destroyed their own country and got nothing for it.

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Curtis| 11.17.09 @ 11:50PM

Best case scenario: It stays, and even grows, as a gigantic bueracratic school yard food fight.

Worst case scenario: A fistful of reformers run in, slash and burn the bureaucracy to great fanfare, everyone cheers, and then wakes up the next day realizing they've woke up in a remake of Nazi Germany, where everyone takes turns playing the Jews.

No good can come of either scenario.

Mandarin Chinese Online| 11.18.09 @ 4:47AM

i will go to Eu next year!!
take my college there!!

Richard Baker| 11.18.09 @ 7:08PM

Le Cracquere;
But that Belgian bureaucrat would have to be barefoot in the snow for three days and in a thin robe as he seeks forgiveness. Nice image on your part, though.

Ron| 11.20.09 @ 7:51AM

I'm afraid this article contains a minor mistake. Jan Peter Balkenende is the colorless prime minister of The Netherlands, not the colorless leader of Denmark. One can (and should) forgive an error like this since there is such a lack of color among European politicians, they all look the same!

crimecraft cash| 11.20.09 @ 8:58AM

I am puzzled why any nation would willingly surrender its sovereignty to belong to such a bureaucratic monstrosity.

Ex-European| 11.21.09 @ 1:54AM

European integration will be slow but will gradually happen – just like US integration. But is that a good thing?

I would argue that union has been detrimental to the US too but Americans were able to compensate for the detrimental effects of homogenization through the vast reserves of freedom upon which the US was founded in 1776 (reserves that have more of less been dwindling ever since).

Do Americans get their money's worth for the 4% of GDP they "invest" in their military? Europe is already on the decline as a world power (dirigistic low growth+shrinking population). For Europe to think that their key to prosperity is to also start spending 4% of their GDP on a Euro-Military is just delusional economics.

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