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December 18, 2004
No Yes-men

Helmut Schmidt, chancellor of Germany between 1974 and 1982, just published his new book "The Powers of the Future", meant as a global strategic overview. (So far it is only available in German.)

From the covertext:

"In the foreseeable future there is neither a strategic nor a moral reason for the majority of the continental-european nations to willingly subdue to a possible american imperialism … We shall not degenerate to compliable yes-men. Even if the USA for the next decades may be more capable of acting as the European Union, even if the hegemony of America will endure for a longer time, the European nations must keep their dignity. This dignity is based in holding fast to our responsibility in front of our own conscience."

This will sell like fresh baked bread.

Posted by b on December 18, 2004 at 15:41 UTC | Permalink
Comments

Note, also, that in Europe it is common the retired politicians to express views and opinions that the active ones don’t want to pronounce in public.
The big problem for the Americans is not France, is Germany. Until now few American strategic thinkers have thought about Germany and its new foreign policy. They really believe that Stoiber will turn Germany back to the old good days. Or maybe they believe that…Poland and Esthonia will block Germany’s strategic moves.
When the EU lifts the arms embargo to China, they will wake up, rather shocked.

Posted by: Greco | Dec 18 2004 16:42 utc | 1

Well, it would work if most EU leaders weren’t a bunch of inept wankers, as has been proven just yesterday with the despicable “negotiations” with US-backed Turkey. You have a country who committed genocide on grand scale, and who unlike Germany refuses to recognise it – and I don’t even talk about reparations -, who has expelled something like 1 mio of citizens of a EU member (granted, there wasn’t an EU back in 1920s, but it was the same Turkey with basically the same regime), who actually occupies 1/3 of a EU country and doesn’t even acknowledge that it exists and still refuses to do it, who treated the Kurds for the last decades just as badly as Saddam did. The Armenian genocide wasn’t the Europeans killing some natives in an overseas country like Mexico or Congo, no, it was like Rwanda and Nazi Germany, killing their neighbors – same with the Kurds, who’re not some remote-living people but their direct neighbors. And the Turkish leaders showed an arrogance unheard of in potential future members, and probably even in actual members, acting as if EU owed them the membership, as if it was their birth-right, the same way Bush thinks the White House is his birth-right. Well, if EU had true leaders, they would have said since a long time that EU membership isn’t a human right, you don’t just have to meet some criteria to join, otherwise Brazil would be in since years. But then, of course, if EU hadn’t inept wankers as leaders, they would have insisted that there would be no negotiation as long as Turkey hadn’t withdrew from Cyprus, expelled all the Turkish settlers sent there since 1970s – heck, if Israeli settlements in occupied territories are illegal, so are the Turkish ones in occupied Cyprus -, asked for financial compensations for the occupation, asked for autonomy of Kurdistan, asked for compensations to the million Greeks expelled from Asia Minor in the 1920s, asked for compensations for the 1.5-2 mio Armenians killed in the 1910s. And they would have ended by mentioning that Turkey should be glad that they didn’t ask for the full implementation of the true post-WWI peace treaty, the Treaty of Sèvres. Instead, well, they just laid down as a beated wife and asked if they could have more.
So, yeah, there are a few good signs in EU, but there’s a lot to do before it becomes a decent political body, and bowing to US demands and act as if the EU was the vassal of a US vassal isn’t the way to do it.

Posted by: Clueless Joe | Dec 18 2004 18:49 utc | 2

Clueless,
I think you look at Turkey to much as a american pawn and not enough as a piece in its own right. Remember that Turkey neither joined the Iraq war nor let the US use it as a base for attack. I see this more as a intereuropean negotiation about where Europe ends than a EU-USA struggle.
Basically, EU is about making a better future and finally letting go of the past. It doesn´t have to be just, it just has to something that can work. And everything before the end of WW2 is out. This after all started with the Germans and French trying to stop fighting all the time.
That leaves Cyprus and the Kurds.
Turkey has to somewhat acknowledge Cyprus before the 3 of October, because before that date it has to sign a customs agreement with all the current members including Cyprus. A typical compromise where both Cyprus and Turkey can claim victory. This is probably the way it will continue, a lot of compromises about all the details of northern Cyprus until in the end the borders become nothing more than the lines on a piece of paper. And since southern Cyprus turned down the UN-backed reunification plan last spring, its position is not so strong when it comes to arguing how horrible it is that 1/3 of its territory is occupied.
The oppression of the Kurds are one of the many human-rights issues that will have to be dealt with if the negotiations are to end succesfully. Remember that many of the states in the east of EU was in as bad shape when it came to HR when they started their negotiations.
I think it is a good thing that negotiations has started, and I hope they will lead to turkish membership, despite Turkey being poorer and much much more Muslim than the eastern european states. And of those two I think it is the poverty that will be the bigger issue, but I might be wrong.

Posted by: A swedish kind of death | Dec 19 2004 2:49 utc | 3

This will sell like fresh baked bread.
It will, but it won’t amount to much if European voters continue electing right-leaning governments in the west (Britain, Italy) and recently independent countries in the east want American protection as well as European (Poland, Bulgaria). Those governments will be willing to “subdue” to American interests. Their electorates will not toss out those parties unless their domestic policies become unpopular (or they do something egregiously stupid, like José Maria Aznar).
Still, as the Iraqi snafu drags on, Europe and America fight more and more trade skirmishes, and especially if an American economic crisis badly affects Europe, then Schmidt will get a big boost.
Greco, I think with the EU’s move towards more rep-by-pop voting with fewer one-country vetoes, Germany and France will have an easier time working together to push through an agenda that’s not necessarily friendly to the US. But, at least for now, there are many other states who are willing to balance them.

Posted by: Harrow | Dec 19 2004 5:32 utc | 4

Go Helmut, go Helmut, its your birthday….

Posted by: stoy | Dec 19 2004 6:59 utc | 5

speaking of fresh baked bread, if we could get more media coverage in europe about ohio. ..
The civil rights of every man, woman and child in America are at stake here. I don’t care what it takes, convince somebody to break our story, to back us and give us the credibility we need and to let the world know we’re here doing this. Redford, Sting, Kennedy, Kerry… I don’t care who, somebody, anybody who can attract the attention of the media (evidently John Conyers’ and Jesse Jackson’s brave voices are not loud enough.) We’ve kinda got our hands full here, or we’d be doing that ourselves too.
and more
The progressive strategists and operatives prattle on about the “White Elephant” of the “race factor” in the 2004 election (duh!), but no one seems to notice the gaggle of 500-pound gorillas sitting in the corner of the national living room. Please, look at the data, citizens. The election was stolen — just like in 2000, 2002 and so many more before. The system is rigged. Don’t get over it; get with it! You can’t win in a rigged game. Stop playing. Change the game
will somebody in europe start step up to the plate. we need your help

Posted by: annie | Dec 20 2004 9:18 utc | 6

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