Posted on 06/02/2005 6:49:01 PM PDT by quidnunc
On Sunday night, at precisely the moment the French were angrily delivering their resounding “non” to Europe’s would-be nation-builders, I happened to be in Istanbul, in the genial company of a transatlantic crew of foreign-policy thinkers.
As the boat on which we were having dinner bobbed gently up the busy Bosphorus, it struck me that this was not a bad place from which to contemplate the latest European crisis. The waters that mark the very end of Europe provide a useful historical context in which to consider, what is for some, the End of Europe.
Out here, beyond the lights winking from the grand mansions that hug the Asian shoreline, begins the vast land mass into which the founders of Western civilisation poured in search of treasure and conquest. Millennia later, to the demoralised successors of those same enterprising Europeans, the traffic seems all the other way. Asia offers only threat, not promise; the future one of outsourced telemarketers in India and offshore manufacturing in China.
From here, too, at a more mortal crisis in Europe’s history, the Ottoman Empire stretched to every point of the compass, around the Black Sea, across the Middle East, into North Africa and deeper and deeper into a collapsing Europe. Today, it seems that the Caliph’s successors are reclaiming that territory, only this time moving more or less unopposed towards their goal.
These twin threats — the economic challenge of fiercely competitive globalisation and a political challenge to the culturally deracinated, splintering societies — are driving Europe into debilitating turmoil.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
bttt
excellent synoposis of the crisis facing Europe
hard times, they are a coming,
Wow! There so many good passages in this opinion piece I just don't know where to begin. :)
A most lovely PING!
I wonder...did anyone write stuff like this at the threshold of the medieval period?
Bump.
"When its American ally was attacked in September 2001, Europe gamely offered to reciprocate for US protection in the Cold War, but most European nations lacked the military resources to turn that promise into anything more than tokens.
Then in Iraq in 2003, confronted with a tyrant who had repeatedly thumbed his nose at the international system that Europe supposedly revered, it instinctively recoiled, and a softened-up intellectual elite turned on the Americans instead."
Yes, Europe thought that mere lip service, or better yet their "approval" of our venture in Iraq would more than pay for over 50 years of sacrifices by the American taxpayer and soldier. WRONG. Now, we sit and watch Europe's little experiment in self-aggrandizement shatter on the rocks of human interest, and laugh. Go to Hell Europe. We'll never help you with anything again. Count on it. In fact, given some leadership in DC that has balls, you'll be on our short list of "places to eradicate" if you're not really careful.
hard times, they are a coming,
That holds true no matter where you stand on this planet.
For a shorter and more accurate take on the same situation, click below.
Congressman Billybob
An excellent analysis. But it omits a couple of crucial factors. First, birth control and abortion. The European crisis is largely a demographic crisis. Muslims are flooding in because Europeans wanted cheap workers to replace the children they didn't have.
Second, it omits the corruption among the ruling classes in France, Belgium and elsewhere. Europe didn't really stay out of Iraq because they had no military. They stayed out of Iraq because they had corrupt deals with Saddam, as represented by Total-Fina-Elf and the UN Oil for Food program.
A key factor was France, which decided to ally itself with the Muslims instead of America. This was not the first time France acted in this way. France stayed home from the battles of Lepanto and Vienna. Louis XIV forged an alliance with the Grand Turk against the rest of Europe. Europe never for a minute wanted to spring to America's aid after 9/11; except for England, it only pretended to sympathize.
So, the essay is good as far as it goes, but it omits key factors.
Like most things, I suspect that the Euro press is overreacting to the French and Dutch votes. Yes, the constitution is dead, but does anyone think the French/German political elites are just going to go away? Just throw up their hands and say "oh, we didn't know you felt like that."?
Of course not. The EU bureaucracy and the French/German elites are going to work hard to overturn their own voters' increasing euro-skepticism. Disgust at that may, finally, cause the UK to begin to disengage and lead the Dutch and some others into a closer understanding with the States.
Wow... he really sums it all up!
ping
Is it possible??? Are the Europeans finally starting to "get it"?
Just so.
"At home [in Europe]...moral relativism, bred by years of pampered prosperity, was creating its own destructive forces. Again, egged on by intellectual elites, Europeans were encouraged to despise the civilisation that had nurtured them."
Great piece! And obviously sadly true of many of our fellow Americans as well.
true but somehow I think even pampered North Americans are somewhat better prepared for the hard times, because the socialist experiment never took root as deeply even in Canada, I would argue, thought we could follow Europe's decline if we aren't careful, but I think our proximity to the US prevents Canada from going whole hog, but also because we've been dealing with the free trade and outsourcing issues already......
because the welfare state, high taxes with a declining population to provide those tax revenues and economic protectionism is what is killing
we still have the standard two weeks paid vacation like the US, Canada and the US don't shut down for the month of August, cost of living even in Canada is cheaper than Europe, welfare rates are just enough to survive, etc.
in Europe however welfare rates are such that there is no incentive to go out and work or so I'm told, those 4 - 6 weeks standard vacations are killing employers.....
but yes, the world [as usual] is going to undergo some dramatic shifts, esp with the rising tigers of China and India, and it all depends on so many hard to predict variables
and that US deficit, man, I don't understand the Republican rationale on that one........
in 20 years, we may hardly recognize the place.....I could be living in the Republic of Ontario, selling pencils on the mean streets of Torontostan
Definitely a worth-your-time read. BTTT.
oh yeah I forgot about the Democrats and the liberal media, who are still living in the 1970's, for them the hard times started, when 1994, 2000?
Just like declaring "prosperity" as an economic policy.
Good call on the required reading. A fine article.
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