The military impotence of Europe, which continues to lull itself into its one-sided pacifism
The unilateral pacifism that for decades has dominated the Italian and European public debate, with its infinite variations, reacts to international crises by proposing a shared path capable of nullifying the danger. At the heart of his speech is the belief that the causes of armed conflicts are always identifiable with extreme precision. To generate wars would be poverty and ignorance in the first place, and fanaticism (religious and otherwise), nationalism (in its many forms), the will to power theorized by Nietzsche should also be traced back to the two aforementioned plagues.
The problem is that what always before, coupled with poverty and ignorance, is much less convincing than it appears at first sight. It is not certain that a rich and highly educated society is, ipso facto , also a peaceful society. And yet another widely used key term, “sharing”, is somewhat problematic. To be effective, sharing must become truly universal, with no residue whatsoever. If it is partial, as always happens, it does not solve the problem at all.
The Afghan chaos, in addition to highlighting Joe Biden's weakness (which, moreover, many had already guessed), also demonstrates the irrelevance of the European Union from a military point of view. The founders never faced the problem of a common structure – not only defensive, but also offensive. And, when they did, the aforementioned pacifist drives led them to neglect the dimension of military power.
This is a numbness that dates back at least to the end of the Second World War, when the exhausted Europeans relied entirely on the United States for everything concerning the issues of defense and security. Except criticizing them when they used their war power to intervene in various parts of the globe. But they were also attacked for opposite reasons, namely for the refusal to employ troops on the ground in order to resolve – or at least try to do so – bloody conflicts which, often, concerned us more than them.
Whenever in Europe (and particularly in Italy) there is talk of increasing the military budget to make the armed forces more operational and efficient, cries of pain immediately arise. The money – this is the common refrain – must be spent on hospitals, assistance, education etc. A very noble affirmation which, however, overlooks a question of fundamental importance.
Our standard of living has been guaranteed in recent decades by the absence of serious threats to national security. If the picture changes, as it is actually happening, it is also necessary to change the mindset by pointing out that the possibility of an attack has now gone beyond the sphere of pure fantasy. It does not seem to me that such awareness exists and, if it exists, it is certainly not in the majority. We continue to lull ourselves into the pacifist dream while others have intentions of a completely different sign. Worrying, to say the least, and one can only hope that the awakening is not too traumatic.
For example, it would be necessary to rethink the functions of NATO, which now includes countries – such as Turkey – increasingly engaged on the anti-Western front. It would also require greater military autonomy from the US, where isolationist pressures are prevailing (as has often happened in their history). The error of having created a purely economic and monetary union is now comprehensible to its full extent, without at all worrying about political cohesion and above all, given the circumstances, about a common defense policy.
Hence the pessimistic considerations of a realist like Henry Kissinger on the current European Union, in which the integration process has been managed as a bureaucratic problem of increasing the competences of the various administrative bodies. The bluff is evident today. Certainly France and the United Kingdom (the latter, after all, left the Union) are not enough to reassure us since, with an American shield much less secure than in the past, the EU has little or nothing from a military point of view.
Therefore Atlanticism must always be defended. But we cannot overlook the fact that today in the White House we have a president who is not only weak and uncertain, but also contradictory. Hadn't it been Biden himself, in fact, who assured the allies that he would place the principles of the Atlantic Charter as the foundation of his foreign policy? In Afghanistan he has blatantly denied himself and at times, listening to his confused speeches, one gets the impression that he does not even understand him, despite having a reputation as an expert in international politics.
The same goes for NATO. The US has the right to run it because, without their financial contribution, the Alliance would collapse immediately. However, a clear strategy is needed on the American side to determine its goals. Europeans cannot raise their voice as their economic contribution is much less significant. We hope the time does not come when the United States will deem the "shield" to protect the allies useless, since the global scenario offers no plausible alternatives.
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This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/limpotenza-militare-delleuropa-che-continua-a-cullarsi-nel-suo-pacifismo-unilaterale/ on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 03:49:00 +0000.