Hegemania

Two weeks ago, British Broadcasting Corporation columnist and BBC World News America anchor Matt Frei complained about the failure of the United States to lead a global charge against the autocracies in places like Zimbabwe, Burma, the Sudan and Iran.

“Just when you actually want Uncle Sam to throw his weight around a bit, he says he is bogged down, busy, otherwise engaged – call back later,” Frei wrote. “The U.N. is toothless, the EU is gormless (i.e., stupid) and the U.S. has had ‘the willing’ kicked out of it by Iraq and Afghanistan.”

The funny thing is that, if I happen to recall correctly, no small amount of that kicking came from Western Europe.

Now, I don’t mean to single out Frei. From reading his columns, it’s clear that he understands and sympathizes with Americans far more than the vast majority of his colleagues at the BBC, whose other U.S. reporters seem to leave their New York, Washington and Los Angeles enclaves to explore the nation’s mysterious interior only for presidential elections (during which they are invariably shocked to find that liberals, secularists and non-gun owners manage to survive in the “flyover” lands, uneaten by the rest of the heathen natives). But the column is telling of a larger problem in U.S.-European relations and, indeed, for the rest of the world.

It’s simply this: For decades, Western European politicians and populations have looked forward to the end of U.S. hegemony and the rise of the European Union as a major global power – and, congrats folks, you got it. Hope you enjoy it. Now, what are you going to do about the brutality of Zimbabwe’s dictator, Robert Mugabe?

Because, while we were overthrowing Saddam Hussein and struggling to replace him with a democratic government, you had a grand old time shouting that this was a neo-con fantasy, a flight of Wilsonian idealism, the true face of U.S. imperialism and brutality, and that we should’ve been patient with diplomacy and trusted the wisdom of the United Nations. But never mind that Hussein, at least, was a threat to the United States and its interests (if a badly exaggerated one) – we should just ignore all those “American hyperpower” quips and send the Marines after Mugabe (and the Burmese junta and the rulers of Sudan).

Meanwhile, gee, all those U.N. resolutions aren’t doing a dang thing to stop Iran from building atomic weapons? Strange, that. You’d almost think that it’s necessary to back diplomacy with something scarier than sanctions.

But despite all this sarcasm, I really do think that the United States and European Union should work together against the world’s tyrants and threats (avoiding force, if possible). But I mean together: The days of Europe getting its cake and eating it (benefitting from U.S.-provided security, while gaining diplomatic goodies from criticizing it) are over. That is, unless the EU wants to just let the Chinese and Russian governments call the shots, and they, I’m sure, will care deeply about the treatment of Mugabe’s political opposition.