The Journey Begins

Europe's center of gravity has been shifting to the European Union for 50 years, but America continues to forge foreign policy for Europe using Cold War realities, by viewing Europe through Anglo-tinted glasses.

Dean Acheson, one of America's great Secretaries of State had predicted a dismal future for Britain, Europe, and the United States if this situation was not corrected. The dangers Acheson foresaw in Britain overemphasizing its "special relationship" with the U.S., in lieu of its role as a full member and leader of Europe, may well have reached its zenith with Britain's unflinching support for the American decision to invade Iraq in March 2003.

Why would Britain, America's closest ally, the coinventor of modern Iraq, with intimate knowledge of, and deep historical ties to, the Middle East, and with its powerful understanding of Arabs and Islam, not have influenced its ally's actions more wisely?

Acheson would have immediately understood why it was not in Britain's best interest to offer this wise counsel. Addressing a student conference at the U.S. Mlitary Academy, West Point, in 1962 he presciently said, "Great Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a role. The attempt to play a separate power role, that is, a role apart from Europe, a role based primarily on a 'special relationship' with the United States,..., is about played out."

My recently published book, America and Europe after 9/11 and Iraq; The Great Divide, (see www.kashmeri.com,) addresses this issue using material from private conversations with former President George H. W. Bush (Sr.), Secretary James Baker III, former British PM John Major, former Spanish Foreign Minister Ana Palacio, U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel, General Wesley Clark, and other transatlantic leaders.

"I am not sure American administrations have ever understood the complexity of the European Union," one of my interlocutors told me. This lack of understanding needs to be corrected. It will result in a more enlightened American foreign policy, which is in America's best interest; and I would submit in the best interest of Europe, Britain, and the world.

Through this blog I hope to illuminate the continuing integration of Europe into an ever closer Union with personal observations on trends and developments that impact American business and foreign policy. I thereby hope to convey to my fellow Americans why transforming the so called "special relationship" between the U.S. and Britain to one between the U.S. and the EU should be a key foreign policy objective of the next American president.

America will always have a close relationship with Britain because of the cultural, business, and historical ties between the two countries. But in matters of foreign policy it is the European Union that matters.