European Document / Old Europe, New Relations
Aron, Raymond
"European Document / Old Europe, New Relations" The lines are drawn: Barring an unforeseeable accident, the presidential contest this November will take place between Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. The...
...If they looked at the map, they would readily see that, by using the Baluchi tribes that are spread over Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran, the Soviets can destabilize three countries and reach the Sea of Oman...
...Nothing is easier for them to do, since they are making no commitments either to obtain the withdrawal from the territories occupied in 1967 or to guarantee the survival of the state of Israel...
...The United States, humiliated rather than imperialistic, needs its allies' support more than their criticisms...
...But they both expressed their firm intention of preserving detente...
...Since 1965, since the sending of an expeditionary corps to Vietnam, the United States has lost on every front: military power, prestige, moral unity...
...An increase in defense-related production would demand transfers of labor or machinery away from the civilian sector...
...Nevertheless, he inherited an America which had been decreasing its defense programs for ten years, while the Soviet Union was arming itself beyond its needs...
...To be sure, the United States remains potentially the leading economic and military power of the world--potentially, not effectively...
...The Persian Gulf concerns them as much as it does the United States...
...Except for the protection of American territory, the nuclear threat seems to have less and less deterrent value...
...To be sure, Carter seems unable to control his team, and he himself appears to hesitate and to shift from one view and advisor to another...
...The European governments, with the French President in the lead, are announcing that the Palestinian people have the right to self-determination, and they are forging quasi-official links with the PLO...
...but he rose to his tasks...
...What would Schmidt, Giscard d'Estaing, or Lord Carrington do in the White House...
...Carter--why deny it?--is judged even more severely abroad than at home...
...in recent years, candidates representing extremes-McGovern on the left of the Democrats, Goldwater on the right of the Republicans--have been overwhelmed by moderates or centrists...
...A national defeat would destroy trust in the President, who is already considered by many voters to be incompetent and not up to his responsibilities...
...Before entering the White House, Harry Truman, too, was perceived as mediocre...
...Reagan belongs to the hard conservative faction of the GOP...
...Thirty years ago, when the Korean war broke out, the United States was able to triple its defense budget in two years, without imposing sacrifices upon its population...
...There again, the French and the Germans talked, condemning the occupation of that country by the Soviet army...
...by Raymond Aron The Europeans are not lacking in arguments to explain and justify their loss of trust in the United States...
...Are they concerned about the President, or about the United States as a whole...
...They have a way of acting like spectators, keeping score and imputing to Carter's weakness the Soviets' use of force...
...Elections have been democratized: There are more primaries now, which augments the difficulty of being a candidate...
...OLD EUROPE, NEW RELATIONS The lines are drawn: Barring an unforeseeable accident, the presidential contest this November will take place between Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan...
...Even though they had proclaimed detente to be indivisible, they were hoping to preserve both a relaxed climate in Europe and their commercial relations...
...Let us take as an example the problem of the Middle East...
...do is talk, collecting marginal gains and leaving to the United States the trouble of finding a solution or of avoiding a catastrophe...
...The titleholder, to use a sporting term, will have a head start...
...Perhaps, as Henry Kissinger used to say, the Europeans should behave like regional powers...
...One would like to know what their secret plan is for guaranteeing the peaceful coexistence between Israel and the PLO, which does not mask its aim: the destruction of the Jewish state...
...The enhanced role of the primaries provides opportunities to candidates like Carter and Reagan, candidates who know nothing about Washington, Congress, or even the outside world...
...Between now and November, Carter may be the victim either of some spectacular mistakes of his owr~ or of events...
...To increase this same budget by 5 percent, the President must trim domestic spending in a couple of ways...
...The Europeans can claim for themselves the virtue of lucidity because all they Raymond Aron is a columnist for the Frenc/7 magazine L'Express, from whose April 5th edition this essay is reprinted...
...THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JUNE 1980 27...
...Very well...
...Today, for the first time, American public opinion is aware of the sorry state of the Republic, and is prepared to respond to the call of a president who inspires confidence...
...Without denying his weaknesses or his mistakes, however, I would like to recall some extenuating circumstances, a few facts about the world and the American situation which ought to suggest some degree of modesty to the ministers--and even the journalists--who are so certain of their superiority...
...In the coming years, the American president, whoever he may be, will try to save what is most important...
...But I ask myself if they are following their thought all the way through...
...The Democratic Party is more popular nation-wide...
...Today, the United States has neither an industrial nor a financial surplus...
...Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon were not mediocre men...
...Even if there still exists a rough equality at the level of strategic nuclear weapons, Soviet superiority in conventional armaments cannot be doubted...
...Let us take another example: the Soviet Union's military intervention in Afghanistan...
...Why, Europeans ask themselves, does this great country, so rich in scientists and writers, find itself having to choose in the end between two apparently mediocre men, to whom no president of a large corporation would entrust the running of a division...
...Despite the rightward movement of American public opinion, Reagan needs some good fortune if he is to win...
Vol. 13 • June 1980 • No. 6
