Assessing the Debate, Assessing the Damage: Transatlantic Relations after Bush
| Published date | 01 February 2009 |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-856x.2008.00348.x |
| Date | 01 February 2009 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Assessing the Debate, Assessing
the Damage: Transatlantic Relations
after Bush
David Hastings Dunn
Transatlantic relations during the Bush administration sank to the lowest point in the post-war
period following the invasion of Iraq in 2003. This article provides an analysis of both the current
state of that relationship and the academic debate which accompanies it. Arguments over the
impact of various factors are analysed to determine the extent of transatlantic divergence. Thus,
demographic change in America and Europe, divergence of political values between Europe and
America, power differences, post-war geopolitical realignments, European integration and
American unilateralism and exceptionalism are all analysed and evaluated. While some of these
arguments presented are challenged, the article argues that the process of constructing separate
European and American identities from within the transatlantic community is the single most
significant contemporary challenge to transatlantic relations.
Keywords: transatlantic; values; divergence; Bush
The active and public political opposition to the US-led war in Iraq by France and
Germany in 2003 brought to an abrupt and dramatic end the post-war transatlantic
bargain—that of American leadership and European deference in exchange for a
militarysecurity guarantee in Europe and beyond. What was left was a divided alliance
unsure how to relate to American power,or even what that power should be used for
and directed against. Since the low point of 2003 there has been a concerted effort on
both sides to mend relations across the Atlantic but there has been no return to the
status quo ante.1What lay behind this particular crisis in transatlantic relations is an
interestingcase studyof thecurrent tensionsin transatlanticrelations andis thesubject
of this article. It is an assessment of the state of the debate as well as the extent of the
damage caused by the disputes of the Bush era. Arguments over the impact of various
factors are analysed to determine what is, and what is not, a structural driver of
transatlantic divergence. Thus, demographic change in America and Europe, diver-
gence of political values between Europe and America, power differences, post-war
geopolitical realignments, European integration and American unilateralism and
exceptionalism are all analysed and evaluated. While some of these arguments
presented are challenged, the article argues that the process of constructing separate
European and American identities from within what used to be the common
transatlantic community is the single most significant challenge to transatlantic
relations in the wake of the crisis over Iraq.
Transatlantic relations have long been the subject of academic debate, with each
successive episode being presented as uniquely different from the previous crisis in
The British Journal of
Politics and International Relations
doi: 10.1111/j.1467-856x.2008.00348.x BJPIR: 2009 VOL 11, 4–24
© 2008 The Author.Journal compilation © 2008 Political Studies Association
this troubled relationship. Michael Howard, referring to this long and troubled
history, remarked that the relationship was like a ‘successful but unhappy marriage’
(Howard 1999, 164), the point being that it was somehow inevitable that this odd
couple should and would be together but that did not mean they were always
entirely happy about the relationship. This of course does not foreclose the possibility
that any new crisis could be the straw that broke the camel’s back. And for many
observers the depth and nature of the transatlantic dispute over Iraq signified just
that, something quite different from previous disputes and therefore a radical
departure from the traditional way of thinking about this relationship. For Ivo Daalder
and Mick Cox, for example, it represents the ‘tipping point’ in a relationship which
was already badly fractured in the wake of diverging trends since the end of the cold
war (Daalder 2003; Cox 2005, 210). For this school of thought Iraq demonstrated
that within the transatlantic relationship at least two conceptions of what the
alliance meant were in operation. For the Bush administration and its allies the
existence of the alliance ought to have ensured European support for America’s
intervention in Iraq. The failure of many NATO allies actively to support the war
and the efforts of some to oppose it politically were seen as disloyalty to the point of
betrayal of both the United States as leader of that alliance and of the transatlantic
spirit more broadly. For the opponents of this view, Atlanticism had an entirely
different meaning. For this school the transatlantic relationship was premised less on
anotion of follow my leader than on a set of shared rules and values, among them being
a recognition of the importance of the institutions of the international system
including the United Nations, international law and collective decision-making
among the major transatlantic powers, over matters that materially affected their
interests and security,and indeed the stability of the international system as a whole.
In a sense the crisis of Iraq was only a failed attempt by France and Germany to do what
Americadid toFrance and Britainin 1956over theSuez Crisisin similarcircumstances,
and it is only different if you have an unequal view of what the alliance and
transatlanticismis more broadly. Thus those critical of the US over Iraq are also inclined
to be critical about the way that America has reacted to criticisms over Iraq.
What the conflict in Iraq did, according to many observers, was to illustrate starkly
these two conceptions of what transatlanticism was supposed to represent. From both
perspectives the split over the invasion of Iraq was seen as an infidelity from the
spirit of transatlanticism that could not easily be forgiven or forgotten by either side
because of what that infidelity was seen to represent. Like most extramarital
dalliances, while the act itself (the invasion/political opposition to the invasion) was
seen as repulsive, more damaging still was what this was seen to represent of how
one viewed the other. At the risk of taking this analogy too far, the relationship
between Europe and America has historically operated like the traditional 1940s
marriage that it was, not only in terms of its division of labour but also in the fidelity
to the ideas which the relationship enshrined. Historically it was like a courtly
marriage, a political deal conducted with affectionrather than love for mutual benefit.
For its critics, however, Iraq has brought into question the basis of that political deal.
For others, however, there is a danger in extrapolating too much from this single
event. For these observers, while Iraq demonstrates considerable differences the
overall trend is one of convergence of interests in the context of an external threat
rather than divergence of the modalities of dealing with it. Such observers are keen
ASSESSING THE TRANSATLANTIC DEBATE 5
© 2008 The Author.Journal compilation © 2008 Political Studies Association
BJPIR, 2009, 11(1)
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