Commentary February 2005Financial Times, - PDF document

[50] Commentary February 2005Financial Times, that FrancesJacques Chirac and Germanys Gerhard Schroederabout Ukraines orange revolutionŽ„an event offar greater consequence for them, and for the Eu-The plain fact is that, for 50 years, Europe en-ican deterrent of the need to defend itself againstthat means. Europe is incapable of guaranteeing,on its territory, the security and freedom of move-the van Gogh murder. To which might be addedUnfortunately, many Europeans are still trappedFinancial Timeseditorial: Irans De-terrent: Only the U.S. Can Address Teherans that, rightly or wrongly, excludes the United States?But there are other, more heartening signs asprogram„so far, a minuscule one. Some 7,000 EUthemselves about whether they really need a sepa-rate security organization. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer,for example, the secretary general of NATO, seesnecessarily willing to pay the freight. Currently,more than any other European country (the Unit-haps I should say dialectically), Washington may beplaying a helpful role. To reduce matters to theirStates. Of course Americans have values and sym-American ability to destroy any target in the world,the details of what happens eight or nine hours eastby air from Washington will usually turn out to beTo this reality, too, more and more Europeanssecurity, so in matters economic. At Lis-dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world.ŽRecently, this project was labeled a big failureŽ bynone other than Romano Prodi, the outgoing Eu-With five years to go before the target date ofchequer, speaking early in 2004, EurozoneŽgrowth for the year would be half that of the U.S.Structural unemployment, itself intimately relat-ed to European welfare policies, is imbedded in thecent in French-speaking Wallonia, and an aston-Germany, where an individual unemployed formore than a year can receive up to half his previ-Moreover, and despite the widespread unem-ployment, simply to fill existing jobs requires a netinflow of 1.5 million migrants a year. To bring Eu- [52] Commentary February 2005on solidarity, and on compromise between em-er, with its grandiose yet undistinguished buildingsin Brussels and Strasbourg, its shameless feather-bedding and extravagant entertainment and con-tion, and reflexive habit of impotently wagging afinger across the Atlantic while ignoring Russia,derestimate the depth, and the longevity, of Eu-ropes determination to make something of itself as an entity. The project of unification did notemerge from some glass and steel office tower. Itwas forged in the fire of World War I, which wasan even more catastrophic world war. Since then,however creepingly, the course has been set, andcuitous, and ridiculously costly, and will becomepoint. Will it be vital, actively taking a role in thepressing issues of war, peace, and development, orverted into real power. But then the same questionwould arise that has been hiding in plain sight allalong: is it really in Europes best interest to beto believe today, or might not a rediscovery of whatprecondition for Europes emergence from its cur-Here, too, there are some intriguing straws inthe wind. To begin with, even amid the generalthings otherwise„who indeed saw positive lessonsfor Europe. In mid-November, the well-knownreelection of George W. Bush should be regardednot as a fit of collective madness but rather as anThe conservative revolutionŽ victoriously ledby George Bush despite the predictions of theligion, security„are not specific to theirAnglo-Protestant culture. . . . Frances politicalonly imperfectly reflects the preoccupations ofcould go if France were led by an international vi-We hear a great deal about European values, andhow they differ from their inferior American coun-poses, or groups of states insisting on the indefiniteWest European capitals today tend not to graspfeld termed oldŽ and newŽ Europe. Reactions tograsped its significance, old Europeans fell backGuardiansia for Western Europe to abandon all support forThe noble values of economic and political free-dom, pioneered by Western Europe, are in low re-pute in Western Europe, though they are plainlywhat should serve as the EUs missing ideological