Mr John Bruton's nomination as the next European Union ambassador to the United States is based on a fundamental political reappraisal of the transatlantic relationship in Brussels.
Irrespective of who is elected as the next US president in November and which party controls the US Congress there is a pressing need for a senior politician to represent the EU in Washington. Many US leaders have been slow to recognise the new political face of a more integrated Europe and suspect it is pitched against them. It is a tribute to Ireland's close involvement with the US as well as an honour for Mr Bruton, that he has been selected to represent the EU, communicate its concerns and seek to influence US decision-making at such a sensitive time.
Although he is not the first senior politician to have held this position, Mr Bruton certainly has a demanding role to play over the next four years. He will take up the job after an election hinging in good part on how best to assert US leadership in world affairs after the Iraq war. Large majorities of citizens in EU member-states support a more independent foreign policy stance compared to the close and dependent relationship with the US during the Cold War years. New structures, including the appointment of an EU foreign minister, will supplement strong and diverse bilateral ties between the US and the EU-25. The agenda involves converging and diverging attitudes on foreign policy and defence issues and how they relate to the United Nations; on trade, investment and the world economy; on global warming and the world environment; and on issues around security and terrorism.
Mr Bruton's distinguished career in Irish and European politics gives him valuable experience for this role - as a former taoiseach, an English speaker, and a man who enjoys political communication, argument and new ideas. Successive Irish governments have built up real influence in Washington through cultivating Congressional as well as executive contacts and using the Irish-American networks to good effect. It is an access envied by other EU governments. Mr Bruton has made a convincing case for this appointment on the substantive issues involved. His work on the executive of the Convention on the Future of Europe gives him a real political purchase to explain the new constitutional and political realities to an American audience. So does his work as a vice-president of the European People's Party.
The transatlantic relationship remains the most important axis in today's world, economically and politically, irrespective of who wins the US election. The tension it faces arises from adjusting to greater equality between a more united Europe and a US whose military power is ill-matched to its waning political influence and growing unpopularity around the world. Mr Bruton is passionately interested in this subject and committed to restoring trust and purpose to the ties between the two. It is a good appointment at a crucial juncture in an important relationship in world politics.