Subservient, haplessly blinded, afraid, the EU wil not take any action re. NATO, the status quo will hold.
As for Kadhafi, he was the poster boy for success by the West, as he bended to an extraordinary degree, taking blame for terror attacks Lybia did not commit, gave up nuclear development, let the Bulgarian nurses go, etc.
It is understandable from his end, as all these points were symbolic rather than real.
Saddam was either made of sterner stuff or was way less smart in a survival sense.
Loosing Kadhafi, turning against him shows up the not only extreme hypocrisy but also staggering stupidity of the West, speaking only strategy here, not judicious policy or morals.
Tied up in their hopeless, ridiculous contradictions…ostensibly pro-democracy but sneakily supporting any tyrant who controls and kills his people…and can turn a profit here or here for banksters and the like…
The US has always complained about Europe not stepping up to the plate and joining US actions with ra-rah enthusiasm.
A vassal too shoddy, too timorous, too cheap, beholden, not armed enough, not keen enough, etc.
Dumb-asses saved !! by the US !! in WW2 !! Ungrateful bastards !!
Ha ha.

Posted by: Noirette | Jun 10 2011 20:02 utc | 3

The running-dogs of neo-colonialism have really come out of their kennels for this war on Libya. They are licking the hands of the US and slavering for more treats, and most particularly for more ammo, with which the dirty work can be done.

Posted by: Copeland | Jun 10 2011 20:46 utc | 5

Actually, this US resentment has an economic source. The US is annoyed that the Europeans won’t buy the expensive toys the MIC in that country is busy developing and churning out. What makes the MIC unique is that it hasn’t been outsourced.

Posted by: Albertde | Jun 11 2011 2:44 utc | 7

Europe is not threatened by anyone. Nor has it been since 1945. NATO was a scam from Day One.
As to the Social Democrats in Germany: they, like most of the European “left” have their origins, like NATO, in a US inspired Cold War campaign against socialism. Specifically Europe’s social democrats are, first of all, anti-communist. By which they mean anti-socialist. Case in point the French ‘Socialist Party.’
This is not to say that the Soviet Union was socialist, it was not. But it was a threat (though not a military threat) to the US capitalist class, which is why they invested so heavily in fascist regimes before the war and in the remnants of those regimes after the war.
As to Gates, he is a man who made a career out of vastly exaggerating the defensive abilities of the USSR. He supplied Reagan and the hawks with the lies and inflated estimates which ‘justified’the pernicious and irresponsible arms build up in the 1980s. He learned then that European governments have a lust for masochism: they like nothing better than to be scolded by the US for ‘weakness’ in not facing threats which don’t exist. Since most European governments are headed by CIA assets or true believers in the US Empire, this always leads to campaigns for increased military expenditure (and increased subservience to the US)which serve as handy excuses to rip holes in a social safety net which is already disintegrating.

Posted by: bevin | Jun 11 2011 3:17 utc | 9

Bevin, the Social Democrats go back to and have been criticized by Marx. They have nothing to do with the US. Actually the US in large part goes back to Europe, not the other way round :-))

Posted by: somebody | Jun 11 2011 7:32 utc | 11

“Bevin, the Social Democrats go back to and have been criticized by Marx. They have nothing to do with the US. Actually the US in large part goes back to Europe, not the other way round :-))”
I know the history, somebody.
After the Second World War social democratic parties in Continental Europe went through a process of re-foundation. In this there was enormous interference by agents of the US, the dominant power with a very large occupying army and enormous resources. It used this power, through a wide variety of cultural and political institutions and organisations, to encourage anti-communists and to marginalise those socialists who had collaborated with the Communists in the Resistance.
This had two basic effects, on the one hand it strengthened the forces of the right in the working class movements and created, within the Social Democracy, fifth columns often actually on the payroll of the US embassy. On the other hand it weakened the more radical, pragmatic, creative and independent elements within the Communist parties. Their ambition for a “thaw” (and a democratisation of the USSR) was crushed as the old line, often exiled, Stalinists purged the Communist movements of the Resistance fighters and settled down into playing political games. In the USSR the new generation, often Red Army men, was ruthlessly suppressed and until Stalin’s death in 1953 things got worse and the Camps got bigger.
The Cold War was on, much to the satisfaction of hardliners on both sides of the divide, and the enormous consensus for socialist measures, in Europe (and the US too, though to a smaller extent) was broken up.
As to the relations between the US and Europe: they are dialectical: the US is the centre of the Empire that Europeans founded on the basis of the American colonies. The centre of the Empire has been moving around ever since Spain’s period of dominance; by 1815 it had settled in London. After the 1914-18 War it gradually pulled up stakes and eventually settled in New York and Washington.
It is all complicated but I am neither suggesting secret conspiracies or unaware that the roots of US society lie largely in Europe.

Posted by: bevin | Jun 11 2011 13:44 utc | 13

“Wer hat uns verraten? Sozialdemokraten!” “Who betrayed us? Socialdemocrats!”
That was the slogan on the left (Liebknecht/Rosa Luxemburg) against social democrats after they had agreed to war budget debt in Germany at the start of World War I (August 4 1914). This led to the foundation of the USPD, the independent socialdemocrats.
Since then the social democrats in Germany haven’t changed much. When the question of war came back up under Schröder, the same happened as in 1914. The SPD was pro war, its left side parted from that and founded a new party, Die Linke.

Posted by: b | Jun 11 2011 17:12 utc | 15

alexno, you’re kiddng

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jun 11 2011 20:25 utc | 17

@ Alexno

NATO was necessary in the 50s and 60s.

NATO was a convenient tool for the ruling elites in Western Europe. It may well be that the Soviet generals had plans to invade, but so did the US (& as an anex, Nato) generals. But was it really necessary ? I doubt the Soviet Union really had the stomach to invade the whole of Europe.
At the same time, Nato was not much more than an arms clearing house and an instrument of US foreign policy (control of EU elites, control of weapon technology). From the 1970’s onwards, there have been repeated attempts by the nascent European Union to set up the skeleton of a common defensive body – all of which have been blocked by the US (and the UK poodle).
Fwiw, I see nothing really new in that Gates speech. The US has often enough complained that the EU didn’t do enough on the ‘defense’ front (read: buy our weapons systems) all wrapped up in the usual rhetoric. At the same time, the US has been very consistent in shooting any attempt to create a common EU defense policy. Will that speech be the proverbial straw that breaks the camels back ? I don’t know, crystal ball is broken. It would be good though.

Posted by: philippe | Jun 12 2011 2:18 utc | 19

I’ve bookmarked it Fran. Maybe I’ll en-lighten myself a little more about your part of the globe while having a good morning chuckle.
Thanks.

Posted by: juannie | Jun 12 2011 11:10 utc | 21