Europe in the Shadow of the U.S. Election

Discussion

Europe in the Shadow of the U.S. Strategic Debate: Are We Losing to Greater Middle East, Asia and Pacific?

 

Participants in the second panel dismissed concerns that the U.S. is seeking to turn away from Europe and were optimistic about cooperation between Europe and the U.S. The  discussion began with a discussion of the American “pivot” to Asia and went on to explore the transatlantic partnership more generally. 

Julianne Smith, Deputy National Security Advisor to Vice President Joe Biden, explained the greater focus on Asia as a result of past under-investment in the region. Although the U.S. is removing two brigade combat teams from Europe as a part of larger global cuts, she argued that the United States is strengthening is presence in Europe with a new aviation division in Poland and continuing efforts on missile defense. Ms. Smith informed participants that every meeting she has attended in the Situation Room has a European aspect to it. 

Professor Simon Serfaty, the Zbiegniew Brzezinski Chair (Emeritus) in Global Security and Geostrategy at CSIS and Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, saw the Euro-Atlantic structures as pivotal to the balance of the world today. But, he said, Europe needs to continue its journey of integration. 

Ambassador Kurt Volker, the Executive Director of the McCain Institute for International Leadership, emphasized the need for the West to support its values rather than trying to keep problems at arm’s length. “There is a retrenchment going on Europe, in the United States, in the West generally,” he said. Ambassador Hans-Friedrich von Ploetz provided more grounds for a  skeptical view, posing philosophical questions about the compatibility of the West’s moral aspirations and our strategic reality.
 
Topics of the discussion included Europe’s potential contribution to U.S. policy in the East, approaches to the Middle East, and suggestions of American and European decline.