The Great Game in Europe

ALL great realignments are hammered out on the anvil of crisis. Ever since the end of the Cold War, both U.S. domestic politics and the shape of the West have been in an uncertain state. With socialism and statist liberalism discredited by the collapse of centrally planned economies, parties of Left and Right have been maneuvering in the dark, hoping to bump into winning issues. No one could quite define what issues would be the dividing lines between liberals and conservatives in future battles. Similarly, the West no longer had a sure instinct for what its joint interests dictated—or if indeed it any longer had joint interests in international politics. Maybe Europe and America were destined, as the French had been arguing since de Gaulle, to journey in different directions until they became rivals for world influence.

The first great post-Cold War crisis—Kuwait—seemed to refute this pessimistic Gaullism. But the second great crisis—Bosnia—amply confirmed it. Britain and France united to oppose the American approach of “lift and strike”— i.e., lift the U.N. arms embargo that effectively favored the Serb aggressors over the Bosnian victims, and strike by assisting the outgunned Bosnian forces with U.S. air sorties. Their opposition was based originally on a crude but understandable calculation that since the Serbs were bound to win anyway, we should not prolong the war by giving false hope to the Bosnians that the West would come to their aid. As the Cambridge historian Brendan Simms points out in his magisterial Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia, however, this Anglo-French Machtpolitik was itself prolonged, indeed redoubled, long after it had become clear that the Serbs were not going to enjoy a runaway victory. London and Paris did all they could to prevent the Americans from assisting Bosnia—until their cab culations were devastatingly rebuked by the course of the war itself, in which the modest U.S. and NATO intervention reversed Bosnian losses and forced the Serbs to negotiate. In persisting with their strategic and moral folly over a secondary issue, moreover, the Brits put their vital relationship with Washington to its greatest strain since Suez.

About the Author

John O’Sullivan

John O’Sullivan is a senior fellow at National Review Institute and a contributing editor of National Review.

Featured Tags

ALL great realignments are hammered out on the anvil of crisis. Ever since the end of the Cold War, both U.S. domestic politics and the shape of the West have been in an uncertain state. With socialism and statist liberalism discredited by the collapse of centrally planned economies, parties of Left and Right have been maneuvering in the dark, hoping to bump into winning issues. No one could quite define what issues would be the dividing lines between liberals and conservatives in future battles. Similarly, the West no longer had a sure instinct for what its joint interests dictated—or if indeed it any longer had joint interests in international politics. Maybe Europe and America were destined, as the French had been arguing since de Gaulle, to journey in different directions until they became rivals for world influence.

The first great post-Cold War crisis—Kuwait—seemed to refute this pessimistic Gaullism. But the second great crisis—Bosnia—amply confirmed it. Britain and France united to oppose the American approach of “lift and strike”— i.e., lift the U.N. arms embargo that effectively favored the Serb aggressors over the Bosnian victims, and strike by assisting the outgunned Bosnian forces with U.S. air sorties. Their opposition was based originally on a crude but understandable calculation that since the Serbs were bound to win anyway, we should not prolong the war by giving false hope to the Bosnians that the West would come to their aid. As the Cambridge historian Brendan Simms points out in his magisterial Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia, however, this Anglo-French Machtpolitik was itself prolonged, indeed redoubled, long after it had become clear that the Serbs were not going to enjoy a runaway victory. London and Paris did all they could to prevent the Americans from assisting Bosnia—until their cab culations were devastatingly rebuked by the course of the war itself, in which the modest U.S. and NATO intervention reversed Bosnian losses and forced the Serbs to negotiate. In persisting with their strategic and moral folly over a secondary issue, moreover, the Brits put their vital relationship with Washington to its greatest strain since Suez.