‘THE US cannot confront challenges alone but Europe cannot confront them without America.” Barack Obama’s message to his European allies yesterday was direct, comprehensive and compelling in its delivery. Meeting French and German leaders ahead of having dinner with Nato leaders on the alliance’s 60th anniversary, and in his open remarks to a group of students in Strasbourg, he made a strong case to renew the transatlantic relationship in a new spirit of partnership.
This is an honest and eloquent effort to create a fresh commitment to common values and interests, based on a genuine affection for Europe and a respect for its recognition of cultural and other differences. Together with Mr Obama’s similar expression of a multilateral perspective at the Group of 20 summit in London, and just as well communicated, it demands a fair and considered response from leaders and citizens alike on the European side. They must decide whether there is indeed such a real convergence and if so how that should be harnessed in a world fast coming to terms with the rise of new powers in Asia and Latin America.
Mr Obama covered a huge amount of ground in a hectic day of speechmaking and bilateral meetings. Accepting that the US must take the blame for policy errors and a dismissive or derisive tone in its dealings with Europeans, he was then willing to put forward some daring proposals for change. Among these is his vision of a world free of nuclear weapons and his readiness to engage constructively with Russia on that question, which he linked to another warning about the danger that Iran might acquire such weapons. Insisting that al-Qaeda terrorism poses as much of a threat to Europeans as to Americans he called for a common effort to confront its terrorism in Afghanistan and elsewhere. He is willing to accept compromises on the deployment of more Nato troops there in deference to German sensibilities, but only so long as there is a commitment to that common effort.
Nato, too, requires re-examination on its 60th anniversary. Traditionally geared to US strategic dominance, it is in many respects ill-prepared for a more equal transatlantic relationship. President Sarkozy’s decision to bring France back into the alliance’s strategic command is intended to reduce US suspicions of a stronger defence profile for the European Union, which Mr Obama yesterday said he supports. But it remains a very open question how that is going to be achieved within a Nato context – assuming it is what the EU anyway wants to do.
The convergence Mr Obama talks about is not so easily achieved as his remarkable communications skills assume. Economic crisis, differing strategic interests, greater fragmentation of EU policymaking compared to that of the US national federal system, and contrasting or competing foreign policy interests in the Middle East and elsewhere will generate tensions as well as co-operation in coming years. That is a natural condition of a changing world. It should not be beyond the wit and skill of European leaders to take advantage of this new US opening to our continent.