One of Ours

...If the last two and a half years have done nothing else, they've exposed the breadth and depth of misapprehension around the world of Americans by non-Americans. [Osama] bin Laden expected the US to drop to its knees and beg after 9/11, along the lines of what Spain did after 3/11. The Europeans expected the US to collapse in paroxysms of self-loathing and guilt for past misdeeds which were perceived (in Europe) as being the "root cause" of the attack. The Europeans also expected the US to be chastened, and to see this as nemesis leading from American unilateral hubris. They expected a new dedication to multilateralism.

Saddam thought that the French and Russians would be able to prevent America from invading Iraq. The "Arab Street" thought that America was fundamentally cowardly, and would never be willing to make the sacrifice in blood needed to truly fight and win a war. The Baathist insurgency in Iraq thought that a few weeks or at most months of ongoing attacks against American forces there would cause America to give up and pull out. The last 30 months has been one long tale of all the ways in which "the world" has proved how little they truly understand us.

And now it seems that the Europeans believe that if Kerry is elected then the nightmare will be over, and the long-delayed "respectful equanimity" between America and Europe would take place. Which is to say that America would finally come to its senses and acknowledge the superior wisdom and sophistication of the Europeans and start following Europe's lead...

...they discount the fact that America remained steadfast during the entire Cold War despite both parties electing Presidents during that interval. There were differences in style and approach towards how the Cold War should be handled, but never any doubt that it would be handled, no matter which party held the White House.

And they discount the degree to which our system maintains continuity of policy. Even if Kerry wins this year, there's still essentially no chance of the Democrats regaining control of the House, and that would mean that the Democrats would have to compromise on foreign policy even if they thought the way the Europeans somehow hope they do.

But they also discount the fact that, as the IHT article points out, the Democrats don't have any higher regard for European opinion than the Republicans do, and are no more enchanted by the Europeans as any kind of role model. The main difference between the parties when it comes to foreign policy is that the Democrats are willing to smile and nod at the Europeans before ignoring them, whereas the Republicans are more straightforward in expressing their disdain...

...There's less real difference between them in practice than the Europeans think.

The Kyoto accord is a perfect example of that...Clinton signed the Kyoto accord as part of the process of smiling and nodding at the Europeans, but he never submitted it to the Senate for ratification and never intended to. He gave them the impression that he still thought it was a wonderful idea, and they held out hope that he might be biding his time until he thought there was a chance that it might be ratified...

...Clinton knew full well that there was no chance of the Senate ever ratifying the Kyoto accord. So did Bush. The only real difference between them was that Bush was willing to say so publicly...

...As I've written about how I thought we would continue handling the war, sometimes people would write and ask whether I was assuming the Republicans would win this year. My answer was that ultimately it didn't matter, because the Democrats would end up doing about the same thing. There might be political backbiting about how we ended up in Iraq in the first place, but no doubt at all about the fact that we had to finish what we'd started there.

Were Kerry to become president, the big change would be in manner and style, but there would be little change in substance. Kerry would willingly meet with European leaders, and speak to them in French, and then end up doing just about the same thing Bush will do when he gets reelected...

...Few have botched [their understanding of American foriegn policy] as badly as the AKP in Turkey. They won control over the Turkish government in January of 2003, and somehow became convinced that Turkish cooperation in preparations for the attack on Iraq were essential, thus that they could extort extraordinary concessions from us: vast amounts of money, lots of loans, and carte blanche to smash the Kurds flat. They also shopped around in Europe in hopes of inspiring a bidding war. In the end they deeply damaged Turkey's relationship with the US without gaining anything at all. We invaded Iraq without their help and won anyway...

...I think Tony Blair understands us, though he doesn't totally agree with us. But too many other European leaders have found us bewildering and infuriating, because they don't have the faintest clue about our true nature.

The people of France were apparently utterly surprised when American tourism fell off badly last summer. First, they seemed surprised that average Americans took offense at French political opposition. Second, they seemed surprised that average Americans would let that affect their decisions about vacation destinations.

You'd think that after two and a half years of "blows on the head" caused by their misapprehension, they'd begin to wonder whether we might be different than they had thought. But the forlorn hope that somehow a Kerry victory might lead to a new American renaissance and an end to the Bush dark ages shows that they still haven't figured it out.

If they assume that there will be some sort of cataclysmic shift in American foreign policy after a Kerry inauguration, then as Vinocur writes in the IHT article they'll be sadly disappointed...

...Democrats are Americans first, Democrats second...

...Before he was elected prime minister of Spain, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero said he was "aligning" himself with the Democrat. After Zapatero's victory and his statement that Spain would pull its troops out of Iraq if UN authorization was not forthcoming, Kerry was caught in the position of having to deal with a self-appointed European ally apparently clueless about American politics. Kerry urged Zapatero to reconsider on Iraq and said he should "send a message that terrorists cannot win by their acts of terror."

In fact, I can think of nothing more likely to guarantee a Bush victory than having Chirac and Schröder publicly endorse Kerry's candidacy...

...Why are they having such a hard time with this? Why don't they figure out what the problem is?

It's because too many of Europe's opinion makers are living in a delusional world anyway. They believe that raising taxes and increasing social spending doesn't stifle economic growth, and that labor laws which prevent layoffs increase employment. They think they can catch up to the US economically by 2010. They think all disagreements can be settled through negotiations and that no one needs or should have a military any longer. They think all citizens should rely on the state to protect them from criminals, and any who try to protect themselves should be punished.

They think they're still important, and they think that the world views them that way. Amidst that great sea of delusion, it's hardly surprising that they also think America is becoming more and more European as it finally grows up, and that deep down we admire them and want to be more like them.

So it won't be any surprise when they continue to find our behavior bewildering and infuriating as they continue to botch their dealings with us.