Obama and Europe

The foreign policy team that Barack Obama presented on Monday, 1 December did not surprise anyone. The leaks to the press over the past few days were intended to prepare for the arrival of Hillary Clinton at the State Department and the continuation of Republican Robert Gates in Defense. But above all, no new face appeared, contrary to what could have been expected from a president elect who, as a candidate, had promised change.

True, the diplomacy that Mr. Obama will conduct will be distinguished, happily, from that of George W. Bush. However, far from suggesting an agonizing revision, these nominations announce a return to a centrist and bipartisan tradition in American foreign policy.

For Europeans – who tried to anticipate the choices of the future president by presenting a few requests to him in advance – this is not necessarily good news. Transatlantic relations will be less strained than with Mr. Bush, but the Europeans will have lost an excuse for distinguishing themselves from the United States. The new administration will not be giving them any gifts – Mr. Obama, like Mrs. Clinton, will give priority to American companies for public contracts – and at the same time it will demand more from them.

Afghanistan will be the first test of European goodwill. Mr. Obama has made it the center of the fight against terrorism. He is ready to send more troops there and expects the Europeans to increase their contingents. Will they be able to resist the pressure of a president whose election they noisily hailed? On Iran, Mr. Obama will embark more prudently on the path towards dialogue than he made out during the campaign. The Europeans are no less worried about it, and the French minister of foreign affairs, Bernard Kouchner, went to Washington to say, in diplomatic but unequivocal terms, that a bilateral U.S.-Iran negotiation would thwart European efforts – vain, it is true – to convince the Iranians to renounce their nuclear weapons program.

Finally, Mr. Obama unambiguously declared his desire to restore American leadership without referring to the multipolar world so valued on this side of the Atlantic.