America, Europe and bad consciences
Tuesday, March 18th, 2003 12:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
robinturnerThis article provides a thoughtful analysis of the ideological divide between Europe and America, and why the European model is, on the whole, better. However, I have to take issue with this:
Europe's inability to block the massacres of Bosnia and the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo reveal the shortcomings of its nonmilitary preferences when faced with a challenge to its own moral imperatives.
The author is right about Bosnia, where for too long no major power, European or otherwise, took decisive action, and only self-interested Croatian military intervention combined with the patient efforts of a lot of anonymous UN bureaucrats rescued some kind of peace with dishonour. America was non-existent in the Bosnian conflict, but they can be excused on the grounds that it really had nothing to do with them. On the other hand, in Kosovo, it was Europeans who dragged America kicking and screaming into the war. American administrations are not averse tokilling foreign civilians collateral damage, but at that time the prospect of GIs coming home in zipper bags was unconscionable.
A number of conscience-stricken European leaders played their part, but most of all it was Tony "Pit-bull" Blair who, by pledging an indefinite number of British fatalities, dragged NATO into the war (this in itself should be enough to dispell the popular myth that Blair is Bush's poodle - he is rabid in his own right, whtehr the cause is just or laughable). Kosovo was a small example of how the international community can intervene in a war that is already happening, in order to prevent crimes against humanity. Iraq, though superficially similar, is the exact opposite.
Anyway, I still recommend reading the article, which has many good things to say about domestic as well as foreign policy.
Europe's inability to block the massacres of Bosnia and the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo reveal the shortcomings of its nonmilitary preferences when faced with a challenge to its own moral imperatives.
The author is right about Bosnia, where for too long no major power, European or otherwise, took decisive action, and only self-interested Croatian military intervention combined with the patient efforts of a lot of anonymous UN bureaucrats rescued some kind of peace with dishonour. America was non-existent in the Bosnian conflict, but they can be excused on the grounds that it really had nothing to do with them. On the other hand, in Kosovo, it was Europeans who dragged America kicking and screaming into the war. American administrations are not averse to
A number of conscience-stricken European leaders played their part, but most of all it was Tony "Pit-bull" Blair who, by pledging an indefinite number of British fatalities, dragged NATO into the war (this in itself should be enough to dispell the popular myth that Blair is Bush's poodle - he is rabid in his own right, whtehr the cause is just or laughable). Kosovo was a small example of how the international community can intervene in a war that is already happening, in order to prevent crimes against humanity. Iraq, though superficially similar, is the exact opposite.
Anyway, I still recommend reading the article, which has many good things to say about domestic as well as foreign policy.
