Some European critics soften views on Bush Allies sift issues, trying to come to terms with war

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 3/21/5 | Elizabeth Bryant

[SmithL]

Paris -- After Pascal Bruckner publicly backed the U.S.-led war in Iraq in 2003, anonymous callers threatened him by phone. Strangers insulted him on the street. Friends and colleagues told him that he had taken a gutsy but mistaken stance against the mighty antiwar tide in France.

Two years later, the prominent French novelist is hearing very different reactions.

"People are saying that even if Americans are making a lot of mistakes, they are changing things," said Bruckner, who supported ousting Saddam Hussein but is sharply critical of the Bush administration's handling of the conflict, "while Europe -- and especially France -- remains terribly conservative. We're the world champions of the status quo."

Since Iraq's Jan. 30 elections, and fledgling signs of democracy elsewhere in the Middle East, doubts are spreading among scattered European pundits, politicians and ordinary citizens who once staunchly opposed the war.

"The Middle East moves: Should one thank Bush?" France's Le Monde newspaper asked in a front-page headline this month.

"Could George W. be right?" echoed an article in Germany's Der Spiegel newspaper.

"In private, I've heard a number of times after this election in Iraq that Bush was right -- in his determination to go along with the political process in Iraq, and to commit himself to change," said Iraq's ambassador to France, Mowafak Abboud. "And I've heard this from diplomats and politicians."

To be sure, the second guessing remains only a small aspect of tangled and shifting transatlantic sentiments, two years after the first U.S. bombs were lobbed into Iraq. While they now talk about helping in Iraq's reconstruction, French President Jacques Chirac and other war opponents argue the conflict has made the Middle East -- and the rest of the world -- a more dangerous place.

[SmithL]

We told you so.

[pissant]

American's are making few mistakes. Better to be feared than loved.

[Billthedrill]

The elephant that is in the living room that the European commentators pretend not to notice is the monumental free election in Iraq that took place in spite of bitter opposition from Old Europe for the policies that made it possible. It was not, as the one fellow said, "harder" than the Americans imagined it would be, but it was a bit lonelier.

[CatAtomic]

I'm not sure about your take on it, but I think the article paints a picture of an anti-american Europe in that they don't really acknowledge being wrong about Iraq, give or take a couple of begrudging acknowledgements that the Mid East is changing,,, in fact they still insist they were right and are having to "go along" with our mistake to avoid catastrophe. No doubt that is how their history books will record it (and probably our's)

[Fruitbat]

Aka "Eating Crow!"

[Owl558]

When the European powers ruled the world, they chose to conquor, colonize, and plunder much of the 3rd world. Their legacy in Iraq and too many other places was despotism, mass-murder, and neglect. Few Europeans saw their colonized subjects as individuals, and surely not as equals. This racist attitude is visible in the reactions many Europeans had to the invasion of Iraq so many years later. Too many Europeans think brown people are too stupid for democracy, that they could never appreciate freedom and democracy like their so much more enlightened European societies do.

All this has been put to the lie. How dare the children of racist, colonial despots critisize anyone on this issue. The momentous changes in the Missle East today show who was wrong and who the ignorant really are!

[SmithL]

My take is that it's fun to watch Old Europe squirm, but what they think is completely irrelevant, except to themselves.

[ClaireSolt]

You are very right. Note that you never hear Iraqis begging for Europeans to come in. They've been there' done that.

[q_an_a]

near the end of this story is a paragraph on reconsturction - too bad most of that work will go to the people that died helping Iraq become a free and democratic country.

[hershey]

Great reply. Every word needed to be said.

[Owl558]

"Every word needed to be said."

Well, maybe more to the point is that I needed to vent. The left - European and North American - have been so racist and supportive of tyranny in the name of maintaining the status quo in the Middle East and opposing Bush that I feel like I have to scream once in a while.