The end of special relationships
Daniel Korski 3:01pm
Today, two of my colleagues, former senior MoD official Nick Witney and US analyst Jeremy Shapiro, issued a hard-hitting report about transatlantic relationships. Their message is simple. Europe has the US president it wished for, but Barack Obama lacks the strong transatlantic partner he desired.
With EU leaders heading to Washington for their transatlantic summit on 3 November, Shapiro and Witney caution European governments: an unsentimental President Obama has already lost patience with a Europe lacking coherence and purpose. In a post-American world, the United States knows it needs effective partners. And if Europe cannot step up, the US will look for other privileged partners to do business with.
Unfortunately, many Europeans are in denial about how the world is changing. They sense their increasing marginalisation yet “cling to the outdated belief that they remain dependent on the US for their security.” They make a fetish out of the transatlantic relationship, anxiously pursuing harmony for harmony's sake without questioning what it is good for. As Nick Witney puts it:
"Europeans know they should present a more united front to Russia and China. But the very idea of 'ganging up' on the US seems somehow indecent. Seen from Washington, they just look weak and divided."
A large majority of EU states still believe they enjoy a “special relationship” with the US and compete for access and favour. This notion of everyone having some form of “special relationship” with the US fatuous and it is based on a notion that the transatlantic relationship remains Washington’s dominant foreign policy paradigm.
The conclusion: that the US would prefer a more united EU, but expects so little that it cannot bring itself to greatly care. When the EU is hard-headed, as with trade negotiations, the US listens; when it is not, Europeans are asking to be divided and ruled. Thankfully, the authors avoid calling for more summits, forums and dialogues. Europeans fail to understand how annoyed the US is with ongoing 'consultations' rather than actually doing business.
Shapiro and Witney urge Europeans to develop a more assertive approach to the United States - based on the defence of European interests rather than nostalgia. They suggest how this could work in practice:
First, develop a European strategy for Afghanistan. Europe needs to determine exactly what it wants and needs from Afghanistan, not what it thinks the US wants or needs. They should then either scale up their commitment or withdraw. Second, take responsibility for Russia. Europe should not wait to be told what to do by the US, but Europeans themselves should decide whether a higher NATO profile is needed in central and eastern Europe. Finally, Europe should act in the Middle East. European countries have the economic clout to pressurise Iran over its nuclear ambitions. They need to recognise that power and use it.
Previous
Vulture
November 2nd, 2009 3:16pm Report this commentI don't think we need to worry overmuch about what Obama thinks. His term is already one quarter through; he has done absolutely nothing expect spout wind; his policies (such as they are) are stalled or failing; his poll ratings are plunging; and he is about to lose two Gubernatorial and one House of Reps races tomorrow to two Republicans and a Conservative. Obama will be a one term wonder and the worst President since Clinton. He makes Gerald Ford seem like Cicero.
Good luck to the US if it wants to look for new Allies apart from Europe. Where will it find them? Russia? China? The Muslim world?
Yeah, right....
Publius
November 2nd, 2009 3:17pm Report this comment"First, develop a European strategy...Europe needs to determine... They should then either scale up their commitment or withdraw. Second, take responsibility... Europeans themselves should decide... Finally, Europe should act..."
In your dreams, Mr Korski.
Clearly "de Nile" ain't just a river in Egypt.
AndyinBrum
November 2nd, 2009 3:26pm Report this commentVulture, I think you are to harsh on Obama and dont give true credence to the utter disaster that the US economy was when he took over.
Plus the almost mesianic qualities he was given, by people desperate for change, and immediate change at that. Unfortunately that is not how the world works.
I'm willing to give him the benefit of doubt for the next few years at least.
Peter
November 2nd, 2009 3:29pm Report this commentYes, Obama is beginning to look more and more like a one-termer. And I write as one of the few who did NOT see the sun shining out of his arse.
And perhaps the US might just begin to realise that "Europe" is not a nation. It is a group of nations which all still retain a vestige of national policy-making. he US should treat Europe as its component parts and forge the links with its oldest allies.
Austin Barry
November 2nd, 2009 3:33pm Report this comment"an unsentimental President Obama has already lost patience with a Europe lacking coherence and purpose."
As he gazes lovingly at his reflection in the shaving-mirror President Barack Narcissus will see the epitome of incoherence and lack of purpose.
John W
November 2nd, 2009 3:34pm Report this commentVulture - I totally agree with your analysis.
Verity
November 2nd, 2009 3:49pm Report this commentSarah Palin is going to kick his self-regarding arse in 2012.
Chris lancashire
November 2nd, 2009 3:50pm Report this commentThere seems to be a couple of parallels between Obama and Blair. Both elected on a tide of popular fervour and hope which neither could satisfy. Both involved with unpopular foreign wars.
Hoever, I doubt whether Obama will disappoint his electorate as deeply as Blair did.
As to the transatlantic "special relationship"; this is strictly a one way street. It's about time that Europe kept its own counsel as the authors of this report suggest and determine what we want, not what Washington wants.
And finally, on a personal note, having just visited Washington, I can say that Americans, whilst pleasant and hospitable hold views which are far, far from ours and our non English speaking close Continental neighbours.
porkbelly
November 2nd, 2009 3:55pm Report this commentObama, as is now clear, holds America's traditional allies in contempt - after all, if they wanted to be associated with the "old" America what do they have in common with his "new and improved" version?
If Europe wants to get the benefit of Obama's affection it must immediately install an anti-American thug egomaniac as its president. I nominate Ken Livingstone.
Dorothy Wilson
November 2nd, 2009 3:57pm Report this comment"First, develop a European strategy for Afghanistan. "
And they are considering appointing the little Milipede - with a budget of 50 billion euros and staff of 7,000 - to do it! Now come on! Last week they couldn't even agree a common position on the forthcoming climate change meeting.
TomTom
November 2nd, 2009 4:02pm Report this commentObama is irrelevant at best. He has no coherent foreign policy and a domestic policy which consists of sucking up to Goldman Sachs because his chief of staff is an alum.
The simple fact is that the EU (not "Europe") will build closer links to Russia and North Africa. Russia because it is Germany's historical goal to harness Russian resources to German industrial ambitions and has been for 6 centuries. North Africa because France and most of the Mediterranean EU members see oil and immigration as two key factors for their foreign objectives.
Britain is the only lapdog the USA can count on or could count on because of institutional links which transcend politicians, but these too can weaken and might well do so.
Obama has not understood that Bush was an isolationist when elected and dragged by Bin Laden into being a global interventionist -itself more a Democrat trait than a Republican one. That is why Obama is stymied.
He has paid off the UAW at GM and paid off Goldman at AIG and is preparing to run spectacular deficits to satisfy Nancy Pelosi; but he has no idea how to limit Chinese expansionism and the implicit threat this poses to India and Japan.
Obama has no great foreign policy thinkers, a third-rate Treasury Secretary and is surfing on froth whipped up by a compliant media divorced from the reality of the voting public.
James Murphy
November 2nd, 2009 4:29pm Report this commentBluster! Who cares what Obama thinks or doesn't think! These are the sunset hours of the American Empire. It continues to exist solely by virtue of Chinese and Saudi loans. When these are finally called in, as they will be in the next couple of decades, the States will become what it in reality already is - a beggar at the table. The idea that a bankrupt socialist state (welcome to america, folks) can continue to dictate realpolitik terms over the coming century is credible only for those with no understanding of economic reality whatsoever.
old fogey
November 2nd, 2009 4:31pm Report this commentWho is Daniel Korski and why is he always barking up the wrong tree.
Verity
November 2nd, 2009 4:52pm Report this commentOnce Sarah Palin's in, she'll get drilling and pipeline deals with Alberta and she'll address Western dependency on oil by encouraging the development of other fuels.
Frankly, I wouldn't put it past her to annex Saudi Arabia. She will be a revolutionary president.
Irene
November 2nd, 2009 5:17pm Report this commentI read somewhere that Obama will only serve one term because America will have done it's duty in having the first and last black President.
Liz Brown
November 2nd, 2009 5:21pm Report this commentObama can wish all he likes but he is one term president and sadly for us we are stuck with Europe, unless Mr Cameron can negotiate us into a Free Trading partnership which is what the majority (84%) of us want
Take you eurofanatasim elsewhere Mr Korski
Percy
November 2nd, 2009 6:25pm Report this commentVerity, the pills are wearing off. You need a good sit down.
Frank P
November 2nd, 2009 6:26pm Report this commentVerity
Have you a pre-publication of Sarah's book? You deserve one! Good pick, soldier. I hope you're right, but she has some formidable enemies.
She needs a really top class mentor to guide her through the the Stygian labyrinths of Washington politics. Just as Obama is discovering. I don't think Dick Morris has the clout any longer.
But unfortunately there is more than one lesson to be learned from Blair's egregious regime. He won three elections and in the end had to be ousted by his own party by means of the shoo-in of the barmy bastard who usurped him. The disease of modified Marxism is a virulent one; once it takes hold, the system is deeply damaged and it's almost impossible to eradicate without both surgery and radio therapy. I fear it may be terminal on both sides of the Atlantic, the way things are shaping. But hope springs eternal ...
Btw I hope you have noted that our unesteemed editor appears to have reneged on his second Neather-neather promise?
logdon
November 2nd, 2009 7:02pm Report this commentOne of Obama's first acts of diplomacy towards Britain was to return Churchill's bust.
Last week he backed Anita Dunn's speech in a school in which she stated that Mau Tse Tung was one of her favourite philosophers.
Says it all, really.
Melanie, never afraid to swim against a tide of wrongness was on to him from the moment he began his 'The One Tour'.
And where is that pesky Birth Certificate? The doubters are revilled as 'Birthers', but why?
He is POTUS, for Gods sake.
logdon
November 2nd, 2009 7:06pm Report this commentGlen Beck right now is playing a blinder. If you Google his site then subscribe, an update arrives every day.
NIN
November 2nd, 2009 7:13pm Report this commentAnother piece worthy of the New Statesman.
Ronnie
November 2nd, 2009 7:39pm Report this commentY'know, a part of me hopes that Sarah Palin does kick Obama's arse in 2012.
I'll be a few years older, perhaps old enough to give less of a shit. I could sit back and simply have a right good laugh as the most powerful nation the world has ever seen chooses another brainless, self-absorbed half-wit to lead it round in circles.
2trueblue
November 2nd, 2009 7:55pm Report this commentSpecial relationships. Who is not pulling their weight in Afghanistan?
Moraymint
November 2nd, 2009 8:33pm Report this commentMr Korski, before all that guff in your last paragraph, may I suggest a new "First" recommendation?
I suggest that "First", the nations of Europe get together and figure out how we replace an unelected and fantastically costly bureaucracy with, er, a democracy, ideally starting here at home.
For as long as I feel that I'm being ruled and supressed through the imposition of laws emanating from a mountain of bureaucrats in Brussels - laws which are barely if at all scrutinised in my own parliament - I have no interest whatsoever in a US wish list of desired European behaviours.
We seem to be getting our priorities wrong here. Here in the UK I no longer live in a robust democracy; I live in a soft-totalitarian state imposed upon me by a bunch of Marxist nutters who spun their way into power 12 years ago.
So, before we get too carried away talking about Europe fixing Afghanistan and Iran and Russia, I want somebody to fix my own damned country.
In2minds
November 2nd, 2009 9:12pm Report this commentThe special relationship between the UK and the US is a bit like a comedians ongoing gag. I stopped laughing years ago watching Blair poodling up to Bush.
Korski tells us - “President Obama has already lost patience with a Europe lacking coherence and purpose”, too bad I say. Anyway I'd already lost patience with Obama before that!
And that is funny, the new gag, Obama is fed up with us but works on the basis we are still head-over-heels smitten by him, oh yeah!
2trueblue
November 2nd, 2009 10:16pm Report this commentRonnie, totally agree. Palin had $150,000 spent getting the look during her campaign. Says it all.
Verity, if you think that the Americans are going to put her in as their token female president, think again. They will still be poor, but not mad.
callingallcomets
November 2nd, 2009 10:38pm Report this commentThe only coherent strategy Obama had was campaigning mode and he is still in it. Are these two yet another of David Brooks NYT mates? There is the stink of Carter from this administration already....I'm afraid foreign policy based on therapy simply does not work. The Russians,Iranians, Chinese and Chavez are having a field day but with Bush they never quite knew how he would react so they tended to hedge their bets. These two are not worth reading if they see "Europe" as an entity....the bottom line is that Germany would not risk a soldier to block a future Russian attempt to bully the Baltic states.
Why oh why must we continue to have to be impressed by all these wonks so beloved by CH?
Dirty Euro
November 2nd, 2009 10:45pm Report this commentObama is right. He is like Eisenhower he sees that a weak divided Europe may be in the USA short term interest but a disaster in the long term for the USA. A weak divided europe can be plucked by China, Russia.
Obama is a geopolitical thinker and knows this. If Eurppe is divided in 20 years time it will be too late it be carved by China and lost, then the USA will fall too.
Geopolitics is too high a level for most UKIP and BNP supporters to understand.
All we ever here about form europskeptics is the EUSSR. When anto democratic forces in Russia and China would love nothing less than a united free democratic Europe.
Doppelganger
November 2nd, 2009 11:39pm Report this commentSorry, I appear to have stumbled onto the wrong website. This keeps happening, but pretty soon I'll not bother even looking.
BOO
November 3rd, 2009 12:12am Report this commentWhen neu aristos like Korskikov deign to speak to plebs like us - "go slumming" - they at least show their hand! For example, we see them ignore the facts that US commies have been pushing us into the euSSR for years, and that the US is itself beset by commie deconstruction.
Still - it'll be lovely for them while it lasts! Just imagine swanning around Washington with all the other snotty swans: who can't lower their gaze to look at what's under their noses. What socio-economic trip that would be!! [They clearly don't need our 55Bn a year: we really should find a way to stop paying for their swannings].
Oh - btw: I don't give two hoots where or how the euSSR postures about: it doesn't represent me or anyone I know, and we are committed to finding every way we can to obstruct it.
Frank P
November 3rd, 2009 9:36am Report this commentJust who is this Kunt Korskikov? He seems to have some very strange plans in his head for this sceptred isle and its once staunch allies. Did he just wander in to Old Queen's Street; or was he deliberately recruited? And we thought we had problems as a result of failing to sus out Burgess, Maclean, Philby, et al.?
Message to the main crew of the commentariat of this blog: you do realise we are now operating behind enemy lines? Shouldn't we be armed - at least with a cyanide pill? My uncle's pitchfork is beginning to feel rather antiquated.
Dirty Euro
November 3rd, 2009 10:25am Report this commentThe EUSSR does not exist. Euroskeptics need to fake communists enemies, as they cannot have a serious argument so spew out stuff about reds under the bed commies bl,a bla, bla. Grow up. How can anyone be taken seriously when they talk of mythical beasts that do not exist.
Avudale
November 3rd, 2009 8:03pm Report this commentAn independent Britain would be a far better partner to the US than any attempt at a "united" Europe.
Britain still has more sway in the world than all of Europe put together, and is far closer to the US in its ideals and politics. Europe is a joke and we would be well advised to exit this dasterdly club of fools post haste.
Back to top