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March 5, 2003, 9:20 a.m. Old Europe, Old Problem The French and the Germans and decline. By Gleaves Whitney

his weekend U.S. planes dropped some 600,000 leaflets on Iraq. Perhaps they should have made a detour over Berlin and Paris, which remain infuriatingly indulgent toward Baghdad.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld obviously hit a raw nerve when he said, in one of the understatements of the year, that "Germany has been a problem, and France has been a problem." They are "old Europe."

What can you say about the French, who have often been fickle allies of the U.S.? Their debating and delaying and pirouetting around U.N. resolutions is hardly unexpected. There have been more than a few reports of unsavory business and financial dealings between the French and the Iraqi dictator.

But the Germans? The change in our German allies over the past decade has been disappointing. Twelve years ago, during the Persian Gulf War, Germany was newly united and warmly appreciative of U.S. support for reunification. In that era of good feelings, Germany vigorously supported the international coalition and picked up some of the tab for ejecting the Iraqi army from Kuwait.

Relations over the winter have chilled to the point where a government minister believes that it's okay to compare President Bush to Adolf Hitler.

The old Europe offers many reasons to refuse to support the U.S. drive to war. Some of the arguments are intellectually serious. For example, there is the objection to preemptive action based on the belief that Saddam's threat does not yet meet all of St. Augustine's criteria for a just war. In this view, weapons inspections are doing the job. They continue to keep Iraq on the defensive, and plausible alternatives to armed conflict have not been exhausted.

Other Europeans are wary pragmatists, with justification. The Germans and French who remember World War II know the horrors of war better than most. They also are aware of the law of unintended consequences: War could unsettle the Middle East and create problems for European nations that have sizeable Muslim populations and that are dependent on Middle Eastern oil.

Fine. These are questions that people of good will and high intelligence can debate across the Atlantic.

There are, however, less honorable reasons to oppose war with Iraq. Hate is one of them. The reflexive anti-Americanism among some French and Germans is real. They envy the United States, resent our relatively light historical burdens, and sneer at our optimistic, can-do spirit. Piqued that their own nation has diminishing prestige in international affairs, they fear Washington's ability to project deadly force around the globe — even if for a just cause.

Even less honorable than anti-Americanism, which in radical chic circles at least provides a patina of respectability, may be a deeper cause of old Europe's failure of nerve: decadence. Old Europe reveals unmistakable signs of decadence, and by that I do not mean an obsession with petit fours.

One of the deans of American history, Jacques Barzun — a Frenchman by birth — has written compellingly about Western decadence. In his wise retrospective, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, the Columbia University professor emeritus observes that a decadent age is full of contradictions. On the one hand, it is marked by great bursts of talent and energy. It "is a very active time, full of deep concerns." (Item: mass peace demonstrations.)

On the other hand, Barzun writes, a decadent age is "peculiarly restless, for it sees no clear lines of advance." (Item: Germany and France seem incapable of acting even in the face of a murderous tyrant with weapons of mass destruction.)

Worse, "Institutions function painfully." (Item: it's Iraq's turn to chair the U.N.'s disarmament conference.)

"Repetition and frustration are the intolerable result." (Item: eighteen resolutions later, there is no resolution to the Iraq problem.)

Indeed in decadent ages, Barzun argues, "Boredom and fatigue are great historical forces." (Item: France and Germany show signs of both.)

There are plenty of telling symptoms of old Europe's decline. France and Germany both suffer from historically low birthrates, insufficient even to replace themselves. Commentators note that the decision of couples not to have children usually reflects narcissism and/or lack of confidence in the future. Interestingly, the Muslim populations in the two countries do not suffer from low birthrates.

Further, in both nations there is a lack of faith, especially among young people, in the religion that shaped their culture: to them churches are archaeological curiosities. There is also a lack of faith in their civilization's intellectual inheritance. Look at what is taught in the most prestigious universities: France's chief contribution to postmodern thought has been the deconstruction of its brilliant literary legacy.

At a more mundane level, Chancellor Schroeder's behavior suggests the deconstruction of German politics within the framework of the Western alliance. His guiding star is not so much principle or precedent as it is public opinion polls. To make matters worse, Germany cannot break out of the economic doldrums into which it has drifted. Tellingly, a recent poll conducted for Business Week indicated that two-thirds of Germans look at the future with skepticism and fear.

Decadence is nothing new to either the French or Germans. Throughout modern times the idea of historical decline has been a powerful element in old Europe's discourse. Thinkers from both nations have preoccupied themselves with civilizational decline more than intellectuals anywhere else. One need only recall Baudelaire and Gobineau west of the Rhine, Spengler and Nietzsche east of it. One historian famously noted that Europe's decadence in the last century led to the "politics of cultural despair." The consequences were not pretty: In the 1930s, decadent Weimar yielded to Nazi ideology while, less than a decade later, the decadent Third Republic easily succumbed to Nazi bombs and bullets.

So when Secretary Rumsfeld perceptively speaks of the old Europe, much more is at stake than cobbling together a coalition against Saddam Hussein. If Barzun is right, if it is true that decadent countries see no clear line of advance, then Washington should brace itself for deeper fissures among our allies. The old Europe is not just annoying; it is a problem in its own right, one that Washington will have increasingly to deal with. Boredom and fatigue are indeed powerful historical forces against which to contend.

— Gleaves Whitney is editing a book of American presidents' wartime speeches, which will be published later this year by Rowman & Littlefield. He was also a Fulbright scholar to West Germany in 1984-85.