It is perhaps a truism, but worth repeating: security commitments require careful and constant management. They cannot be put on autopilot after a treaty is signed or stating a guarantee stated. Based on rhetoric and action, they face constant pressure from both external and internal forces. A poorly phrased speech, a short-sighted policy, or far-off events can all have an impact on the credibility of the guarantor state, weakening its security commitments. In Europe, and Central Europe in particular, one gets the impression that in managing its commitments, Washington has been complacent and oblivious at best, dangerously myopic at worst. There are already clear signs of discontent in the region, resulting in a decrease of goodwill toward Washington. Unless addressed quickly, the neglect of America’s security guarantees in the region will lead to a fraying of U.S.-Central European ties, and in the long run, if left unattended, this trend could create a geopolitically unstable Eastern frontier in Europe.
The decision of the Obama administration to cancel its ballistic missile defense agreements with Poland and the Czech Republic did not single-handedly undermine U.S.-Central European ties. But combined with three other developments, it has created an atmosphere of strategic uncertainty in the region. First, President Obama’s attempts to “reset” relations with Moscow and more broadly, Washington’s ambivalent attitude toward Russia (also a characteristic of the Bush administration), have instilled doubt among many Central European foreign policy experts as to whether there was or would be in the future, some quid pro quo, exchanging Central Europe’s security to mollify Russian concerns. After all, nothing in international affairs is free. Perhaps, so the conventional wisdom goes, Central Europe declined in Washington’s geostrategic hierarchy while promise of rapprochement with Moscow gained in value.
Second, the White House’s Noble-prize winning rhetoric, which seeks a world without nuclear weapons and neglects efforts to modernize U.S. nuclear forces, may appeal to some quarters. However, for many Central Europeans these moves signal a weakening of U.S. deterrent capabilities. The question of whether the United States would sacrifice New York for Riga has not been posed with the same clarity as during the Cold War (Berlin for Boston?), but the doubt, inherent in any relationship based on deterrence, is strengthened.
Third, the rhetoric of the Obama administration seems to conflate allies and potential challengers into one category: “partners.” Further weakening and undermining U.S. security commitments to Central Europe. A world of partners seems to indicate that there is no need to defend allies. If all countries are working toward the same goal (climate change, “peace”) then countries need not compete. This idea is not new, of course, and it recalls the views of many thinkers and politicians who claim that a “harmony of interests” is a necessity in international relations. No matter how discredited such views are, they reappear with damaging consequences.
While it may be unintentional, the effect is that the United States is not perceived as a dedicated ally in Central Europe. It is distracted by engagements in other parts of the globe (Iraq, Afghanistan, China), overly reliant on its faith in deterrence and more recently, by advocating lofty goals that contradict needs and realities on the ground.
In this decade, America will have to reinforce its credibility in Central Europe. The placement of Patriot missiles in Poland is a small step, which will need to be followed by a concerted effort to show continued U.S. interest in the maintenance of a stable and secure Eastern frontier. American officials, including the president, should constantly remind Europe and its neighbors that a re-establishment of imperial spheres of interest is unacceptable and that Washington has a clear desire, deeply rooted in history, to keep Europe firmly anchored in the Atlantic alliance.
In fact, an absence or weakening of U.S. guarantees for Central Europe will not be automatically filled by the European Union (EU) or some other security architecture. Rather, it can lead to an increasingly unstable and isolated strategic frontier. The instability may be caused by a combination of domestic politics (e.g., more nationalist tendencies, a growing sense of insecurity demanding security policies stressing territorial defense, flaring anti-Russian sentiments) and European divisions. The latter is particularly worrisome because there are already signs of a deep European split over Russia. For different reasons, France and Germany are the most Russo-phile EU members. This worries Central Europeans, ever mindful of being caught in the middle of a strategic “partnership.” To a large degree, America’s continued and enhanced engagement in the region, for example through NATO, can both assuage Central Europe’s fears as well as impart a limited strategic coherence to the continent.
If not clearly reversed, current trends will not produce a military confrontation among armored divisions, but a gradual, unspoken change in strategic attitudes. Central Europe will be seen increasingly less as a defensive outpost of the Atlantic region and more as a problem and perhaps as a buffer zone. And the firm union of Central and Western Europe, one of the last century’s most significant successes, may be squandered. |
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