The Flip Side of the Coin
Published in die Tageszeitung
(Germany) on 8 June 2011
by Bettina Gaus (link to original)
(Germany) on 8 June 2011
by Bettina Gaus (link to original)
Translated from
by Ron Argentati.
Edited by Heidi Kaufmann.
The U.S. and Germany need to take an honest inventory of shared values.
It’s seldom a good sign for relations when one has to reach deep into past history and far into the future in order to demonstrate some kind of halfway-convincing harmony.
But that was the case with Chancellor Merkel’s visit to Washington. There was a lot said about young Angela Merkel’s thirst for freedom during her years in East Germany. In addition, Barack Obama expressed his hope that Germany would play a major role in rebuilding Libya after Gadhafi’s fall.
As if that were the most pressing question in that context.
Both sides spared no effort in mitigating the impression of disunity. But clever staging isn’t enough if the conflicts are very apparent, and that’s currently the case with Germany and the United States — most of the disunity being strictly along party lines, by the way, regardless of who’s in power in Washington or Berlin.
The respective interests in Europe and the United States are no longer as congruent as they were in the days of the Cold War. Therefore, minor differences of opinion that existed previously now have taken on more importance.
That’s shown not only by the Libyan example but also by the Greek financial crisis, where a debt restructuring involving private creditors is threatened by investment banks in the United States.
Under these conditions, an honest assessment is needed, with the goal of defining actual shared values. They actually exist, but it’s necessary to identify them, as well as to identify the conflicts of interest. Otherwise, all declarations of friendship come off as vapid, and no number of beautiful, shiny medals can change that.
It’s seldom a good sign for relations when one has to reach deep into past history and far into the future in order to demonstrate some kind of halfway-convincing harmony.
But that was the case with Chancellor Merkel’s visit to Washington. There was a lot said about young Angela Merkel’s thirst for freedom during her years in East Germany. In addition, Barack Obama expressed his hope that Germany would play a major role in rebuilding Libya after Gadhafi’s fall.
As if that were the most pressing question in that context.
Both sides spared no effort in mitigating the impression of disunity. But clever staging isn’t enough if the conflicts are very apparent, and that’s currently the case with Germany and the United States — most of the disunity being strictly along party lines, by the way, regardless of who’s in power in Washington or Berlin.
The respective interests in Europe and the United States are no longer as congruent as they were in the days of the Cold War. Therefore, minor differences of opinion that existed previously now have taken on more importance.
That’s shown not only by the Libyan example but also by the Greek financial crisis, where a debt restructuring involving private creditors is threatened by investment banks in the United States.
Under these conditions, an honest assessment is needed, with the goal of defining actual shared values. They actually exist, but it’s necessary to identify them, as well as to identify the conflicts of interest. Otherwise, all declarations of friendship come off as vapid, and no number of beautiful, shiny medals can change that.