Since 2001, European politicians have bemoaned the lack of a Washington administration that believed in multilateralism. We Europeans have been able to define ourselves in opposition to President George W. Bush and his “my way or the highway” approach to international affairs. For Europe, the 43rd president was a sort of solution in the search for our own global vocation.
“If only we had a real multilateralist across the Atlantic we could do such things . . . ” The sentence was not usually completed. Well, now we appear to have got the president of our dreams – Barack Obama, the man for whom 200,000 Berliners turned out to cheer. So what will we say when he comes calling and asks us to put our resolve, money, unity and soldiers where our mouths have been? Maybe we will look back with nostalgia to the days of Bush-Cheney. Having a unilateralist in Washington made it so easy to be multilateralists in Brussels.
Here are half a dozen things Europeans could do to show that our multilateralism is more than a vacuous slogan.