I don’t think anyone ever thought that the European Union
would become a military threat to the United States, but there were some who
thought and argued that the EU might grow to become an economic threat and
political counterweight. After all, the
European Union’s population is larger than ours (508 million vs 327 million in
2018) and its GDP almost the same as ours ($18.8 trillion vs $20.6 trillion in
2018), and it includes nations like Germany and Great Britain that are
efficient producers and quite innovative cultures. Under the right
circumstances a coalesced Europe might well have become a serious economic and
even political competitor to US hegemony.
By now it is clear that the EU is no threat, and indeed may
not even exist as a coherent force much longer. It simply can’t coalesce. Its
various nationalities and subcultures are not only too dissimilar, but many
actively despise one another for various historical reasons. And the founding
premise of the EU, the construction of a one-size-fits-all universal
bureaucracy and monetary union, is simply at odds with not only the differing
cultural attitudes of its members, but with the practical realities of their
differing economies.
But it is instructive that some in American saw the need to
worry about the EU, even though the EU was actually formed, reluctantly, under
American prodding, first as the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951 which
eventually morphed into the European Union in 1993. Its goals were certainly
laudable. From the American point of view, it was an attempt to weld together a
united Europe strong enough to contain the Soviet menace from the East, and
NATO was the military expression of that goal. From the European point of view,
it was an attempt to weld Germany in to such a strong cultural and economic
bond with its neighbors that there could be no repeat of the horrors of World
Wars I and II.
It is interesting that with the ongoing breakdown of the EU
the German issue is rising once again. From a geopolitical point of view German
is a recurrent problem. A strong, prosperous, capable nation, surrounded by
major powers and with largely indefensible borders, Germany is always in an uneasy
relationship with all its neighbors, and with France in particular. It had been
France’s hope in the beginning that it would dominate the EU, but in fact as it
turned out Germany dominates the EU, much to the distress of France. But it may be that Germany can salvage at
least a reduced European Union since it is an exporting nation and depends on
having a sizeable export market to stay healthy. (47% of Germany’s GDP was
exports in 2018).
But certainly at the moment there seems little prospect that
Western Europe will raise up either an economic or a military threat to
American hegemony anytime in the foreseeable future, nor for that matter (with
the exception of Britain) even a very significant military ally.
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