The Axis of the Hardliners

The Axis of the Hardliners

By Theo Sommer

[This article originally published in: DIE ZEIT, 10/2002 is translated from the German on the World Wide Web, http://www.zeit.de/2002/10/Politik/print_200210_transatlantik.html. Theo Sommer is an editor of DIE ZEIT in Hamburg.]

America has had enough and seeks its allies as the need arises. Europe must clarify its own interests

A divergent opinion is not a revolution, American president Bush recently wrote the Chinese. As a European, one can only agree while adding for the transatlantic community: a European opinion differing from America’s dominant philosophy of state is not rebellion, betrayal of the alliance or insult of the superpower.

Is this anti-Americanism? Rubbish! This was only a spin-off or secondary phenomena. 160 years ago Tocqueville remarked that Americans can not endure criticism of foreigners. Grudgingly they allow nitpicking their “city on the hill”, the New Jerusalem. Who should speak up if not America’s friends? Anti-Americanism doesn’t underlie that as anti-Europeanism is hardly behind the American fault-finding.

After the attacks of September 11, the confession “We are all Americans” was heard everywhere in Europe. A reservation was added to the declarations of “unrestricted sovereignty”: adventures were not included. The allies depend on the level-headedness and circumspection of the American president. They expected an abrupt inner shift from the marked unilateralism of his first eight months in office to the positive multilateralism of a new coalition age. No single-handed efforts any more. No longer giving the cold shoulder to the United Nations. Taking seriously other international organizations. Not canceling international law treaties on account of supposed insignificance. Trusting cooperation with allies and partners.

With Bible and Revolver

The Europeans were wrong. George W. Bush has not changed from Saul to Paul. The Afghanistan campaign quickly thrived to the triumph of the unilateral strong man act. The war goal in the battle against terrorism was constantly expanded: first Osama bin Laden’s capture and shattering his Al-Qaida, then overthrow of the Taliban regime and all those who gave shelter to terrorists; smoking out the nests in Yemen, Somalia and the Philippians, finally victory over the “axis of evil”, an absurdly thrown together group of states, Iraq, Iran and North Korea – each of them offers reason for watchfulness but they are everything but an “axis”.

The warfare was exclusively in the hands of the Americans, not only the definition of the war goals. For the first time in 52 years, NATO declared the alliance case but afterwards was pushed completely out of the game. Even if the Europeans could have served with greater military capacities, the Pentagon didn’t want them to come. From the beginning, they were only consulted fragmentarily and irregularly. The Americans don’t want constant interruption or interference as three years ago in the Kosovo war. The superpower insists on its freedom of action. What good is an alliance if it is simply pushed aside in the alliance case?

Bush in the end is the Texan

Freedom of action is the key term in the world-political and geo-political thinking of the US president. Different tracks of American tradition and argumentation are connected.

In first place is the end-time idea described by William Pfaff: “We face the absolute evil. If we don’t conquer here (in Vietnam, Nicaragua et cetera), our protective walls against disorder and evil will collapse everywhere.” Eisenhower’s “domino theory” from 1954 provides a good example. “When you line up a series of dominos and then knock down the first, the last will quickly topple over!” Better clear away obstacles once for all, make the world safe for democracy (Wilson), overpower the evil empire (Reagan) and eradicate terrorism root and branch (Rumsfeld).

In addition, there is the American mission pressure. “The cause of America is the cause of all mankind.” Thus President McKinley fell on his knees and followed God’s direction in annexing, educating and christianizing the Philippines. Wars arising from the real-political necessities of its national interest are elevated into “crusades” – against the emperor, against Hitler and against bin Laden. Thus America seeks to convert the world according to its likeness, “the Bible in one hand and the revolver in the other”, as Jacques Delors once bitterly remarked. Crusade thinking opposes all compromise and allows no shadings or differentiation. Whoever isn’t for us is against us, said the cold warrior John Foster Dulles. Bush junior doesn’t say it any differently today.

Finally a shot of isolationism is always added to American thinking. Isolation never means turning away from the world. Washington and Jefferson who warned their young country of “entangling alliances” and suffocating alliances with Europe sought to avoid commitments or obligations and preserve their own freedom of action. Therefore in 1951, the historian Arthur Schlesinger and the journalist Richard Rovere warned of the ambitious plans of General MacArthur dismissed by President Truman who coined the term “unilateralism”. “Unilateralism is the new isolationism. We act in single-handed efforts; maximum counter-powers act against strength. There is no substitute for victory. Don’t worry about consequences…” This is the creed of the new faith creating men with a world vision or with messianic tendencies. – “We do it all by our little selves” was Ronald Reagan’s plain translation of the term unilateralism.

Something else is added to George Bush. Two souls fight in his breast, the Yale graduate and the Texan. The Yale-man said in the 2000 election campaign: “If we are an arrogant nation, people will see us. If we are a humble nation, people will respect us.” Since September 11, the President acts the Texan.

Bush’s popularity curve has risen to stratospheric heights between 80 and 90 percent. He has a free hand. It is again an election year. In November, a third of the Senate and the whole House of Representatives face the voters. In no case will Bush repeat the mistake of his father in 1992 and lose the following of the right, the Christian majority, the new cold warriors who see in terrorism the adversary of fear without which America obviously cannot manage. Therefore Bush appeals to that “touchy patriotism” underlined by Tocqueville. There is nothing more annoying in the American way of life. An armament mania results unrelated to the actual challenge of terrorism. The US defense budget will be increased $48 billion this year (Scharping’s whole defense budget is not half as large). By 2003, America will spend a billion dollars a day for its military. For the same reason, America gives a cold shoulder or completely ignores the NATO allies and slanders the European elite as “weak in the knees”. The Washington Post quotes the president: “Sometime or other we could be on our own. This is right. We are America.”

The axis of the hardliners in Washington thinks this way: Vice-President Cheney in his hiding place, Donald Runsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle in the Pentagon. Even Colin Powell, the reflective Secretary of State, has changed to the hard course. At the World Economic Forum in New York, he declared frankly, America will consult and coordinate the alliance but will act on its own initiative “when the multilateral community doesn’t agree with us”. Powell’s chief of planning Richard Haass formulated the message even more crassly: “When there is no consensus with NATO, Washington frames `coalitions of the willing’. If this isn’t realized, Washington decides and acts alone.” Haass calls this “multilateralism a la carte”. This is the exact opposite of what German chancellor Schroder, Javier Solana and the French foreign minister advocated at the forum: collective action on the basis of collective decisions, binding of the United Nations, no exclusive fixation on the military instrument.

How should Europe react to this resurgence of an attitude that the late Senator William Fulbright denounced 30 years ago as “arrogance of power”?

The answer must be: with self-confidence, composure and steadfastness, with the confidence from experience that the cycles of American politics change. For the mean time, Europeans should hold to several clear principles.

First, sulking is just as little a policy as knuckling under. The EU (European Union) may be credited with many things. Its expansion to the East is an extraordinary piece of common shared foreign policy. In its role as stabilizer of the Balkans, the EU is irreplaceable. Its continuing integration in all areas even if it is only just managing is unparalleled. The Brussels Union has serious military deficits that must be equalized to avert complete dependence on America in view of the new threats. In the meantime, it must resist the American imposition, shriveling world policy to the military aspect. Military power is important but doesn’t mean everything. American rearmament is not a model for us. We don’t need to wage four wars simultaneously.

Second, according to its innermost nature, the European Union must rely on patient diplomacy, multilateral solutions, strengthening the United Nations and strenuous peace work. The British EU foreign commissar Patten recently reminded Americans of the old Churchill saying “jaw-jaw, not war-war”. The day may come when Europe must resist, perhaps preventively. More rigorous evidence than the rhetorical figure of “axis of evil” must be offered. The expanded concept of security that has prevailed since September 11 authorizes Europeans to emphasize again and again that 40 percent of all military expenditures in the world are chargeable to America’s account while 55 percent of all international economic aid to developing countries come from their treasuries. This is an enormously important contribution to fighting poverty and drying up the swamp in which terrorism thrives.

Third, the old NATO is dead. The goals and structures of the alliance must be redefined. The Pentagon strives for a fundamental reform of the western security alliance. It will immediately prepare for worldwide deployments, actions without a UN mandate. Senator Lugar makes the battle against terrorism into the main task of the alliance. Otherwise it will be “irrelevant”. In the White House and the State Department, officials play with the idea that America wages war while Europe does and finances the clearing and rebuilding work. This would be the wrong division of labor. Europe will have to define how far its regional interests extend. Where does the “Euro-Atlantic area” end? Europeans will in no case be made the worldwide auxiliary temporary sheriff of the Americans. When Washington complains that Europe’s armament and education resources lag behind the state of technology, why does Washington resist so vigorously against the – paid! – transfer of its own technology to the allies?

Whoever acts alone quickly strays off the straight and narrow

In the United States, the voices of admonishers have in no way grown silent. For example, Joseph Nye, diplomat, secret service inspector, acting Secretary of Defense and today dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University – published a book: The Paradox of American Power. Why the Only Superpower Cannot Go It Alone. The treatise pleads for considering friends and allies – for that “decent respect for the opinions of mankind” once demanded by the American Declaration of Independence. At the same time, the book is a clear rejection of all who raise America’s hegemony to the skies. Twelve years ago, Nye wrote a book “Bound to Lead” in which he analyzed and affirmed the leadership role of the United States. Now he writes: “America must lead but must also cooperate.” It should not “over-militarize” its policy. America must guard itself from the hubris. The costs of multilateralism were frequently compensated by the advantages. Limits are set to American power. “Desiring to do everything single-handedly will weaken us at the end.”

Joe Nye is an old friend. I agree completely with him. Am I therefore an anti-American?