By Dr Dana Allin, Senior Fellow for Transatlantic Affairs and Editor, Survival
Survival Vol 49 no 1, Spring 2007
American Power and Allied Restraint: Lessons of Iraq
Over the past six years, US moral prestige in Europe has collapsed. Following President George W. Bush’s re-election, allied governments for reasons of state have tried to restore relations, but we can only speculate on whether such raison d’état constitutes sufficient basis for an ambitious alliance of democracies. On this difficult foundation, what should the United States expect or hope for from European allies to help restore its position? In theory at least, Europe offers three things. First, capacity: the Europeans are not over-endowed with military power, to be sure, but their troops are needed in Afghanistan, Lebanon and beyond. Second, legitimacy: if America cannot bolster the perceived legitimacy of its foreign policy by way of a common moral vocabulary with France, who seriously expects to find it with Russia, China or even India? Third, restraint: the embedding of American power in the imperfect order of global institutions and governance. This does not mean an abrogation of US sovereignty or autonomy – America is too powerful to sacrifice these in any meaningful sense. It does mean American leaders allowing themselves to be restrained by international opinion – a restraint that would have helped the United States avoid disaster in Iraq.
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