BERLIN'S AMBITIONS FOR THE
EU AS A WORLD POWER
Date of Report 10 March 2003
Translated 16 March 2003
BERLIN: One of the most influential political experts in Berlin believes
that the opportunity has arrived to dispute "world hegemony"
with the USA. He demands that the EU (which he sees as "a world
power in the making") should make use of this chance. A foreign
policy specialist of the SPD (Socialist Party) favours a rapprochement
with the "Islamic states" to which the EU could offer an alternative
to the USA.
Werner Weidenfeld is Director of the Centre for Applied Political Research
(CAP) and a member of the presidium of the Bertelsman Foundation (a
company involved in publishing Nazi propaganda in the 1940s) as well
as of the German Society for Foreign Policy. He is reckoned to be the
most influential foreign policy adviser in Germany. His article appeared
in the newspaper "Die Welt", which formerly supported the
opposition CDU (Christian Democrat Party) and was committed to the alliance
with the USA and sceptical of the German government's aggressive policy.
Weidenfeld foresees an "epoch of disorder, risks and crises"
for which no new "forms of order" existed until now. The USA
had "neither the will nor potential" for a sustained policy
of world hegemony. The United Nations could order nothing above its
usual strength and capability. Since the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact,
NATO had lost its function and was displaying "elements of absurdity".
Other potential world powers such as China, Russia and India showed
"serious weaknesses" so that they were not in
the running for "world hegemony".
A WORLD POWER IN THE MAKING
It was however now valid for the EU to make use of the situation because
it has the potential to be the leading world power. "The population
of the EU will increase from today's 371 million to 539 million - almost
twice as many as the USA. It's area is approximately 5,097,00 square
kilometres, rather more than half that of the USA. The Gross Domestic
Product is about 15% higher than the USA. This potential could secure
the status of a world power - around 35% of world production (USA 27%)
and 30% of world trade (USA 18%) lies in European hands. This potential
carries outstanding weight". But for the first time since 1989
the EU was a "world power in the making".
Weidenfeld believes that what the EU lacks to become the leading world
power is essentially the will to power (note the old Nazi tirade about
"the Triumph of the Will"!) He sees this deficit as "the
lack of effective concentration of political energy and the failure
to think in world-political categories" ..."The key question
is this: can Europe translate this potential into world-political creative
power?" Up to now the EU had merely been a "consensus machine".
It did not provide a "world-political strategy and an offensive
ability to handle crises and conflict". It not only lacked an "operational
centre" (Berlin's claim to this role is no secret). Above all the
EU lacked strategic thinking. This was Europe's "real Achilles'
Heel". "There exists no agenda which can give direction to
Europe in conflicts and crises..This is lacking for transatlantic disagreements
as much as for the Near East, for ethnic explosions in the Caucasus
as in South East Asia, for the Kashmir conflict as much as for the breakdown
of African states".
THE STRENGTHS OF THE LAW
To achieve "world hegemony" Weidenfeld favours the closest
possible German-French alliance. He cites the Sixties as an example
when Berlin and Paris took the "world political horizon" into
their sights and attempted to found a "union of world-political
relevance" (against the USA). Weidenfeld is supported by the SPD
foreign policy specialist, Egon Bahr, who has for a long time propagandized
for the enforcement of "German interests" against the USA
(as in the title of his book). Writing in the same newspaper Bahr explained
that the closest possible contact between Berlin and Paris was "essential
if Europe was to achieve its aim- namely self-determination"
The USA would try to frustrate an "independent Europe" ("I
am firmly convinced that America prefers to deal with several than with
one factor") Bahr believes in keeping a lookout for further partners
in an alliance and favours "a policy of reducing tensions with
the Islamic states" which he wishes to mobilise against the USA.
"Europe should develop an acknowledgeable alternative in its model
of society, its armaments and in its policy so that the Islamic world
can perceive that there is not only one model in the Western world.
They should be able to see that there are two Western models of society
(...) We Europeans should try to establish that the strengths of law
will supersede the law of greater American strength".
SOURCES
"The frustrated World Power" Die Welt 8/03/2003
"When will we finally wake up?" Die Welt 8/03/2003
