The end of the alliance is not inevitable because the interests that the United States and Europe share do not stem merely from a fortuitous con- fluence of geopolitical circumstances. Rather, they reflect a unique com- monality of culture and values that distinguish the United States and the nations of Europe from much of the rest of the world. By focusing on the Iraq crisis, we have naturally emphasized what divides them, both strate- gically and culturally. Indeed, there are very real differences between the two sides on basic issues such as their attitudes toward force and power, and on their respective understanding of world order and international law. Social issues like gun control, the death penalty, and the role of reli- gion in public life also divide the two sides of the Atlantic. Iraq showed how such divides can matter and how the crisis itself made things worse.
But these differences do not define the relationship. Taking a broader view, the European democracies are certainly closer to the United States, both strategically and culturally, than any other region is or is likely to be anytime soon. Americans and Europeans still broadly share the same democratic, liberal aspirations for their societies and for the rest of the world.
Certainly, a president from Texas and a deeply conservative cabi- net, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and Attorney General John Ashcroft, have little in common with most of their European counterparts. To use Robert Kagan’s terms, the Bush team represents a particularly “American” perspective: On issues like religion, abortion, gun control, missile defense, use of force, multilateralism, and the environment, they are about as far from “European” positions as Americans get. It is thus not surprising that their election was read as a step toward an increasingly “American” America, and that their subsequent policies—given a further boost by the challenge of global terrorism—have crystallized the apparent dif- ferences across the Atlantic.
It is less clear, however, that Bush’s election represented a funda- mental shift in American values, or that these values have gotten more “American” over time, as Europe’s values have gotten more “European.” It should not be forgotten that Bush’s opponent in the last election, Al Gore, won some 540,000 more votes than Bush on a platform that was much closer on most issues to the European norm. The 2000 and 2002 Congressional elections were also divided right down the middle between Democrats and Republicans, suggesting very little change in America’s political and ideological balance, despite the fact that the approaches of the national leaders changed so dramatically. Polls ahead of the 2004 election suggest that the country remains evenly divided.
The point here is not to suggest that the Bush approach to domes- tic and world affairs is not widely supported in the United States or that most Democrats are not more “American” in their outlook than most Europeans. Rather, it is to underline that the alleged U.S.-European divide might look very different today had Al Gore polled a few more votes in Florida in 2000 or had the Supreme Court taken a different view of the Florida recount. There would still be real differences over the Middle East, the environment, and Iraq, as there were during the Clinton years, but they would not be anywhere near as brutal as is currently the case.
In fact, the view of Europeans toward the United States reflects an awareness of the distinction between the Bush administration and America. The European public is not as “anti-American” as is often assumed, but it is quite anti-Bush. In June 2003, for example, the Pew Global Attitudes Project found that Europeans who had unfavorable views of the United States overwhelmingly identified the problem as “Bush,” rather than as “America in general.” This was true for no less than 74 percent of the French and Germans, 67 percent of the Italians, and even 59 percent of the British.
A careful look at American and European perspectives and values, at least at the public level, suggests far more congruence than diver-
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gence between the two. Even while American and European leaders were publicly feuding over Iraq, public opinion polling conducted throughout the crisis showed, according to one survey, that “Americans and Europeans have remarkably similar assessments of the threats they face.” As late as the summer of 2002, favorable opinions of each other were held by strong majorities (63 percent of the French and 61 percent of Germans had a favorable view of the United States), which have been fairly consistent over time. The war in Iraq did cause a significant dip in those figures in the United States and across Europe, particularly in Germany and France, where they bottomed out at 25 and 31 percent respectively. But such dramatic declines reflect a spike typical of transatlantic crises rather than secular trends. By June 2003 they had already begun to reverse.
Taking a broader perspective, Americans and Europeans identify very similar issues as their primary foreign policy concerns—including international terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and global warming—demonstrate comparable perceptions of friends and allies, and express a strong affinity for each other. Before the Iraq war, Americans expressed discomfort with unilateralism, with 65 percent saying in a June 2002 poll that the United States should only invade Iraq with United Nations approval and the support of its allies. Even on the use of force, Europeans are at least in principle as ready to use force as Americans to uphold international law (80 to 76 percent), help a population struck by famine (88 to 81 percent), liberate hostages (78 to 77 percent), or destroy a terrorist camp (75 to 92 percent).
On other issues, polls also suggest much more similar public atti- tudes in Europe and America than the bitter public disputes between European leaders and the Bush administration would suggest. Seventy- five percent of Americans, for example, consider global warming a “serious problem,” and a clear majority believes that the United States should join the European Union in ratifying the Kyoto accord. Even on genetically modified organisms, supposedly an example of the vastly
diverging transatlantic attitudes toward science and technology, a plu- rality of Americans, like Europeans, believe that genetically modified organisms will “make food more poisonous,” and 86 percent think the government should require labeling, which happens to be the EU’s policy. U.S.-European differences on these and other important issues exist, but the data on public attitudes hardly seem a sign of two soci- eties “living in different worlds.”
The Europeans’ harshest American critics suggest that whatever their sentiments in theory, Europeans are not likely to be useful allies when it really matters—that is, when military force must be threatened or used. It is certainly true that attitudes toward force differ, that Europeans are generally far more inclined to try diplomatic approach- es to conflict. But the record of the 1990s and early 2000s does not match the caricature of a Europe that is so hopelessly pacifistic and appeasing that warlike Americans simply have no other choice but to seek other alliances or act alone. In the 1990–1991 Gulf War, Europeans were hardly keen to go to war (not unlike 47 U.S. senators and some prominent American generals), but they ultimately backed Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm at the United Nations, provided tens of thousands of troops, and contributed over $10 billion to the American- led effort to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait.
In the Balkans, it took the United States years to overcome its own reluctance to act militarily, and in both Bosnia and Kosovo there were times when both France and Britain were more ready than Washington to threaten or use force or to risk deploying forces on the ground. In 1995 it was Chirac who, in some ways, took the lead in galvanizing the international community to use force—ironically, given what would happen some seven years later, against the strenuous objections that Colin Powell had raised when he was Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff in 1989–1993. While the Americans limited themselves to bomb- ing, the British, French, and Dutch deployed a Rapid Reaction Force on the ground.
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Europe and the United States eventually joined together to effectively undertake NATO’s first military missions in Bosnia and Kosovo, in which European military forces flew hundreds of sorties, provided critical bases and logistical support, and played key combat and then peacekeeping roles. In the peacekeeping phase, particularly, Europeans eventually provided over 80 percent of the troops in Bosnia and Kosovo.
More recently, when the United States took military action in Afghanistan to retaliate against al Qaeda terrorists and to overthrow their host, the Taliban regime, European support—and desire to par- ticipate—was solid. As the fighting was going on, according to an October 2002 poll, majorities in 11 out of 15 EU states “agreed with the U.S. military action,” and in the largest states the majority was substan- tial (France 73 percent, Germany 65 percent, and the UK 68 percent). Majorities of European populations even agreed that their own coun- tries should take part in the fighting, and some European leaders chafed not at the fact that the United States was using force, but that their offers to contribute forces were rebuffed by a Pentagon that pre- ferred to undertake the operation alone. Despite Pentagon reticence, European forces were involved by early 2002 in bombing, reconnais- sance, cave-clearing, and Special Forces operations. European coun- tries—first Britain, then Turkey, Germany, and the Netherlands, and eventually NATO itself—took on the lead role in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) deployed to keep the peace.
At one point in 2002, France had over 4200 troops deployed for operations in Afghanistan. At American request, France continues to deploy about 150 highly trained Special Forces on the Afghan-Pakistani frontier to hunt down Taliban and al Qaeda remnants. In Germany, the leftist-dominated German parliament approved the sending of 3900 combat troops to Afghanistan where, according to President Bush, “not only is Germany’s participation important, it’s robust, more robust than we would have anticipated.” At the start of 2004, Germany main-
tained some 1600 troops in Afghanistan (as part of the NATO-led 5700-strong ISAF) and was taking the lead in the deployment of Provincial Reconstruction Teams of several hundred troops outside of Kabul.
The lesson of all of these episodes was not that Europe is un- willing to use force or has nothing to contribute, but that when the United States shows leadership, it is able to bring allies along—even to the fight.
Iraq, of course, demonstrated the limits of U.S. and European—or at least French and German—willingness to join together on such operations, and worsened the picture of alliance cooperation consider- ably. But a dramatic decline brought about by one event does not nec- essarily represent an irreversible trend. In the flush of apparent American victory after the fall of Baghdad in April 2003, the U.S.- European gap on Iraq seemed greater than ever. Nearly 80 percent of Americans thought the war had made them “more secure,” and over 70 percent saw it as a “major step forward” in the war on terrorism. In contrast, large majorities across Europe—82 percent in France, 72 per- cent in Germany, 63 percent in Spain, and 55 percent in the UK—felt that the war in Iraq had made the world a “more dangerous place.”
But as difficulties emerged in the U.S. occupation of Iraq and the “rally around the flag” effect that usually increases support for presi- dents during military operations began to fade, these differences between Europe and the United States started to shrink. Whereas just after the Iraqi war 70 percent of Americans said “the war with Iraq was worth fighting,” by November 2003 that number had fallen to 52 per- cent, rising only slightly after the December 2003 capture of Saddam Hussein. While 56 percent of Americans felt France was wrong to oppose the war, 39 percent said France was right, implying that even the French position enjoyed substantial minority support in the United States. The divide over this issue, moreover—reflecting the overall polarization of U.S. politics—is highly partisan. In the fall of 2003, 78
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