The conflict with Iraq has widened the trans-Atlantic rift between Europe and the United States, according to campus scholars.
Miroslav Nincic, a UC Davis political science professor, believes the country is facing its greatest challenge as the world’s lone superpower — especially with old friends in Europe. Political scientist Jeannette Money and historian Kathryn Olmsted also foresee difficulty ahead for U.S. international relations.
Nincic, who researches and teaches American foreign policy and international relations, says, “The perception is that Am-erican power is now based mainly on wealth and air power, and much less on the moral authority the United States once enjoyed.”
America has lost favor with many of its European allies and much of the sympathy it had gained in the wake of 9/11, Nincic says. But it’s not so much Americans that the Euro-peans are having trouble with — it’s President George Bush.
“What appears to be anti-Americanism in Europe is more of a reaction against the Bush administration. Iraq has become almost an obsession with the Bush White House and it seems personal to an extent,” said Nincic, noting the failed 1993 Iraqi assassination attempt against Bush’s father and the United States’ decision not to dislodge Saddam Hussein in the first Persian Gulf War.
“There’s some unfinished business here,” he says.
Nincic once studied under one of the major architects of Bush’s current Iraq policy, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. Along with Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz is considered one of the most influential “hawks” in the administration.
Nincic believes one problem facing Wolfowitz and other Bush policy-makers is that America has long symbolized “elevated principles” in Western democracy. But that sentiment “no longer exists” among Europeans, who now pride themselves on evolving traditions in civil liberties, diplomacy, international affairs, the environment and human rights.
“These days, Europeans find America falling short of these ideals,” he says.
Long before 9/11 the Bush team was already establishing a “unilateralist” image by choosing to ignore the Kyoto global warming treaty and setting aside the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty.
Some say that American protection of Europe during the Cold War allowed Euro-pean countries to focus on social programs instead of military matters. Nincic, however, says, “Europeans feel they also provided an important part of the strategic military containment against the Soviet Union and they have in recent years absorbed the heavy costs associated with the former Soviet bloc countries.”
Nincic was born in Yugo-slavia and spent most of his childhood in New York City. He earned his undergraduate degree from the Universite Libre de Bruxelles and his doctorate from Yale University in 1977. His most recent book is titled, Beyond the Ivory Tower: International Relations Theory and the Issue of Policy Relevance (2001).
“We’ve never had a world before with a single superpower,” he says. “It may take some time before we actually understand what this implies.”
Military supremacy, however, is one area in which the European Union, which represents 374 million people in 15 countries, is unlikely to compete with America for quite some time, he says. “Europe may find itself as a block to America more in terms of ‘soft power’ rather than the ‘hard power’ associated with military might. Europe simply has invested far too little in military strength to rival the U.S.”
Europe, says Nincic, is searching for its identity. “It’s a new day for them — this convulsion and discord between Old and New Europe,” he said, noting that large Muslim populations throughout European countries also factor into that continent’s appraisal of the Iraqi and terrorist situation.
Nincic believes the issue of Iraq’s possible weapons of mass destruction is not the major driving force behind the war effort.
“If we really cared that much about weapons of mass destruction we’d be also looking at Syria, Israel, Libya, Iran, Pakistan and certainly North Korea,” he says.
One outcome of a successful war would be less American reliance on Saudi Arabia’s oil. But that would mean stationing U.S. occupation troops in Iraq and controlling that country’s oil production for some time to come. This would only heighten the probability of more Islamic terrorism against America, Nincic believes.
The geography of world politics
Europeans have long been critical of what they see as American hegemony in economic and military matters, and Amer-icans often criticize what they see as weakness in the diminished military capabilities of European nations, along with their unwillingness to use the force necessary to achieve foreign policy goals and ensure security against terrorism.
Jeannette Money, associate professor and director of the International Relations Program at UC Davis, says the United States and its European allies have survived many “tense periods” before. The United States faced trouble with Britain and France during the Suez Canal crisis in 1956 and when France withdrew from the military structure of NATO in 1966.
“These crises did not cause the relationship between the traditional Western democracies to disintegrate,” says Money, who teaches contemporary European politics, comparative government and the European Union.
The difference now, she believes, is that the global structure is no longer bipolar. “The structure of the international system has changed. The question is whether the changed global structure will allow these new rifts to undermine ongoing alliance relations.”
Right now, the Western alliance is “more fragile,” she says. It’s possible that NATO will gradually fade in importance if the allies cannot find common ground on issues of importance in the future. And it’s also possible that the United States will embark on more “coalitions of the willing” — a phrase recently used by Bush — in international forays.
Money says the European Union is divided over the Iraqi war issue. Some of the applicant states of central Europe, along with Britain, Spain and Italy, are supporting the United States, while some of the “old” or major European countries like France and Germany are not. And, public opinion and leadership are divergent in some countries.
“A disconnect exists in some of these countries,” says Money, noting that British Prime Minister Tony Blair is a “consummate politician” who has found himself in an awkward position supporting the U.S. policy while polls show many of his fellow Brits do not.
Money says Europe has had a different relationship with the Middle East, in part because of immigration and terrorism. Countries like France, which has had experience with Algerian terrorists for decades, see themselves as more vulnerable to this problem.
Europe, she says, has absorbed large numbers of Muslim immigrants and as a result has strived to maintain good relationships with Arab nations while also urging a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
“The U.S. has been isolated and lucky — that is until 9/11 — in escaping most terrorist activity, while the Europeans have encountered it before,” says Money, the author of Fences and Neighbors: The Political Geography of Immigration Control (1999).
‘Surreal and absurd’ times
Kathryn Olmsted, an assistant professor of history, believes this day and age is extraordinarily unique.
“It’s hard to find many parallels,” she says. “This could be a historic turning point.”
Olmsted, who specializes in 20th century history, says the Iraqi situation is much different than in 1991 when the United States enjoyed widespread support and built a 27-member coalition.
“Now it looks as if this action may be unilateral and opposed by most of the world.”
She says that recent U.S. wars — the two world wars and Korean conflict — involved broad support and participation from other countries. Yet now, she added, America would be taking the unprecedented step of preemptively attacking another country.
Olmsted, who is an expert on government secrecy and the Cold War, says she is troubled by new laws — such as the Patriot Act — that expand the government’s powers at the expense of civil liberties. “There’s more secrecy in government now than in the last 25 years,” she says.
Through terror alerts and bleak scenarios of America’s future vis-a-vis terrorism, the U.S. government is exhibiting a “definite interest” in increasing the “fear level” among ordinary Americans as it gears up for a war, she believes. “They’re trying to get the people behind their effort.”
Still, while a certain “stability” existed in a world dominated by two Cold War superpowers, it was not as safe and sound as some might romanticize it today. “Back in 1984, there was a lot of fear of total annihilation” between two countries bulked up with nuclear weapons.
Now, America’s foes — terrorists — live in a shadowy world that’s hard to find and hold accountable. “It’s more unpredictable than before when our enemy was another superpower,” Olmsted says.
Much depends, Olmsted says, on the length of the war and the number of lives lost on both sides. Also, support for the president should not be thought of as a long-term phenomenon.
“At the end of the Persian Gulf war, President Bush had a 91 percent approval rate. But he lost his re-election.”
Culture and politics are converging on the war issue, Olmsted said. For example, the U.S. House of Representatives recently renamed French fries as “freedom fries” and French toast as “freedom toast.”
“It’s so surreal and absurd,” Olmsted said, comparing it to the anti-German fever that swept the country during World War I and resulted in similar acts.
Olmsted knows a thing or two about conspiracies. She is author of Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI (1996), and most recently, The Red Spy Queen: A Biography of Elizabeth Bentley (2002).