In some respects I was surprised by the candid language in
this editorial. I was not surprised by the message but by its directness.
While democracy is evoked and prosperity mentioned, the key
term is security. The EU project needs to consolidate all of Europe in order to meet its goals. To create a bloc, a
fortress Europe it cannot have dissenting or even rebel provinces rooted in its
underbelly.
At a time when everyone is reflecting on the thirty year
anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall, the event which effectively shifted
gears and set the European project in full motion... the anniversary is marked
by angst and frustration. The project of consolidation under the auspices of
the EU and NATO has experienced great success but its failures are glaring and
represent existential dangers.
NATO is in a period of uncertainty and instability. The US
failure to fully commit to Article 5 and its obligation of mutual defense has
rattled many members. The appearance of the Aachen Bloc and Turkey's dissent
and deviation has left the 'security' aspects in question.
On the political front, the rise of the V4, once again
Aachen, Brexit, stresses and struggles with regard to the Eurozone and Schengen
and the rise of Right-wing forces have all put the EU under significant strain.
And yet for many in Brussels these things can be managed but
the real source of stress for them is the Balkans. For it is in the Balkans
that a crisis could quickly develop. Such an emergency has the potential to rip
Europe apart and place it in greater danger as outside players such as Turkey
and Russia would likely play a role.
Of course there's another basic problem to the concept of European
consolidation. What is Europe? What are its borders? North America, South
America, Africa and Australia are all easily enough defined but Europe is part
of Eurasia. This most massive and most populated land mass on Earth is not
easily divided or defined. Russia is a perfect case in point as the nation, its
history and culture transcend Europe. It is European and indisputably part of
European history but then again, it's Russia and in some respects it's very
Asiatic. It is in fact Eurasian.
The same is true of the Caucasus which straddle both European
and Middle Eastern cultures. Or look at a nation like Turkey. By some
estimations modern Turkey could be reckoned a 'rump state' a remnant of the
Ottoman Empire. Others could dispute this because the nation and its
foundational ideology were significantly changed (from that of the Sultanate)
when Ataturk created the republic in the 1920's. Regardless, the nation
inherited the Ottoman legacy which was in many ways the legacy of Byzantium.
The culture of Turkey and its history are both Asiatic and European. At one
time the Ottomans controlled all of the Balkans and portions of Central or
Eastern Europe (terms that are also not easily defined). Today, Turkey controls
only a small portion of European territory wedged between the Bosphorus,
Bulgaria and Greece. Does this mean Turkey is part of Europe?
Well, in once sense it certainly does but on the other hand
many have argued that Turkey is in fact not part of Europe and has no place in
it. Additionally few in Brussels (not to mention Paris) have been comfortable
with the idea that 'Europe' (if Turkey is included) would now find its borders
on the frontiers of Syria, Iraq and Iran.
And so we're left wondering about the consolidation project.
Just what is being consolidated? What is Europe? How does one draw the lines?
Is it East vs. West? What's the 'East'? Is that Asia? Is it the
Byzantine-Middle Eastern World?
In many respects nations like Bulgaria, Moldova, Greece, the
non-Transylvanian regions of Romania and certainly Albania have more in common
with the Turco-Byzantine and Asiatic worlds than the Enlightenment cultures of
Germany and France. These nations experienced no Renaissance, no Reformation
and no Enlightenment. Their cultures, values and even their socio-political impulses
and instincts are very different. This is of course changing as new generations
are exposed to Western education and media and have contacts with the West that
their parent's generation would not have known.
If such Enlightenment-Western values are not part of the
heritage of these nations, are they really part of Europe? Is Europe mere
geography or is it a cultural heritage? If cultural, how is that defined?
Christendom? That's not so easy given the history. Some notion of 'The West'?
Again, that's not so easy given the historical and cultural differences. Serbs
and many of the Balkan and Slavic peoples don't really identify with that
history or heritage and many resent it and are hostile to it. They remain
hostile to the Catholic West which to them encapsulates not just Rome, but
Protestantism and the evil legacy of the Enlightenment as well.
If Europe is defined in such ideological terms the EU project
can rightly be identified as a form of imperialism. These 'backward' nations
must be 'converted' and brought into line with the governing ideology of the
New Rome... Brussels.*
If it's merely geography or culture that defines Europe, the
argument falls under terrible stress.
Either way, the project is cast in somewhat dubious light. We
all know what is meant by Europe but when pressed it's not so easy.
One can easily argue that the Caucasus are not part of Europe
but then what about Turkey? What about Russia? What about Ukraine? And if the
status of these nations can be questioned, we're right back to the Balkans
where all the same cultural questions overlap... but with one difference. The
Balkans are clearly a part of geographic
Europe, connected by land, sea and waterways to the Central European
heartlands... the former Habsburg Empire.
This is not an exercise in sophistry. These are real and
valid questions regarding the EU project... real areas of doubt that were
overlooked by many. The mentality in the early 1990's was the 'end of history'
paradigm as naive as it was. The notion that Western Liberalism had won the day
was an argument rooted in a-historical ideology. Such progressivism has
received a veritable slap-down in the thirty years since. You can establish
Liberal institutions in non-Enlightenment cultures but they will amount to little
more than Potemkin villages, facades that go through the motions of Western
democracy but in reality are something quite different.
The editorial/signed statement regarding the Balkans barely
masks its imperialist goals in the euphemisms of diplomatic speech.
The EU
should assume its responsibilities by acting in a strategic manner. It is high
time for the EU to overview with creativity and to put in perspective its role
within the new international environment, so as to act independently in this
environment and to enhance its foreign policy and defence capabilities.
This is actually a
chilling paragraph. This is war in seed form. At the very least it's a
declaration of imperialism. The EU proclaims its 'responsibilities', a type of
'White Man's Burden'. The enlightened ever-wise nations of the West have a
responsibility to force conversion upon these lesser nations. The talk of
environment is about seizing the moment. Russia is on the rise or so it is
understood and the US is on the wane. The statement is a declaration that it's
now or never. These problems have to be solved in the short-term or the moment
will pass and they will not be solved... leading eventually to war. One need
not be a historian to understand this and what a Balkan crisis could mean,
especially in the context of a weak EU and a collapsing NATO. History's ghosts
still haunt the landscape but are only seen by those who gaze through the lens
of memory. The West post-1989 was a hubris-ridden creature that thought history
was obsolete. The historians laughed and rightly so.
The EU ministers call
upon Brussels to enhance foreign policy and defence capabilities...
This is a call to war
in order to prevent war. We know how well such thinking has worked out in the
past. But what they're calling for is for the EU to pursue an aggressive
foreign policy backed up by militarisation and threat. Militarisation is itself
a threat but this can be augmented by 'exercises' and the building of bases.
The US knows this game quite well.
There's an element
that remains unclear with regard to these statements, the question of
Atlanticism. Are these statements made within the context of Atlanticism
(Washington led US-European cooperation) or does it represent a defection from
it? If the latter, it's a watershed moment as EU leaders are acknowledging the
new Trumpian reality and calling for Europe to assume its place in the new
multi-polar world. Atlanticism has always assumed American unipolarity with
Europe as a 'partner' which has functionally meant 'satrap' or even 'vassal' for
the past seventy-five years.
The document is signed
by ten former ministers and this for me was the bombshell moment. The most
noticeable name on the list is that of German politician Sigmar Gabriel who has
been associated with the push for anti-Atlanticism and the resurgence of German
leadership within Europe and it is this signature alone that reveals the tone
and purpose of the document. The other names are effectively window dressing,
pro-Western personages and bureaucrats associated with the Balkan and
Mediterranean sphere. Gabriel and his faction are the force behind the
document. The thinking represents both a Fortress Europe mentality that in some
ways resonates with Macron's resistance to expansion but at the same time
challenges it. The document signals hairline cracks and fissures within the
Aachen Bloc itself. Both factions want a strong and somewhat independent Europe
and yet Gabriel represents the parties that see the necessity of consolidation.
Gabriel has been open to rapprochement with Russia but clearly doesn't want to
leave the Balkan question open... while Macron who also seeks to broker an
arrangement with Russia seems to be putting less faith in the overall EU
project. Both moves and strategies are being watched warily by Washington, especially
by those who are thinking in post-Trumpian terms and would heal the wounds
created by his faction. The leaders of Europe are starting to think in
post-Atlantic terms and the departure of Britain has only amplified and
accelerated this reality. But already there are disputes over the future course
of the European project.
It's ironic but a
century after World War I, the Balkans are once more becoming a powder keg that
has the potential to divide Europe and lead it down a path to war. This irony is
further exacerbated by Washington's call for increased military spending in
order to meet NATO responsibilities. If NATO falls apart and tensions lead to
conflict, it is both startling and sad to think of all these nations so
robustly armed and primed for the fight.
Militarism or pre-war
is just as much a period of lies and deception as the time when the bullets are
flying and the bombs are dropping. People are stirred and whipped up into
nationalist frenzies. Conformity becomes a central part of ethical expectation.
There are witch hunts, purges and forced displays of patriotism. Duty,
citizenship and other unfortunate watchwords frame the discussion and play
their part in driving men mad. This has always been absolutely destructive in
terms of the New Testament Church. These sorts of stresses and tensions breed
doctrinal wolves and tear apart congregations. The faithful are despised and
the Scriptures are subsumed and manipulated by the idolaters of nations.
Thirty years were
granted to build strong foundations, especially in the regions once part of the
Warsaw Pact. I hope they're strong because they're going to be put to the test
and long before the bullets start flying.
---
*If Liberalism is viewed as a new religion it's easy to
understand and it draws a powerful analogy with historical precedent. Join the
Pax Romana and embrace its values and polity. Join Christendom and embrace its
values and polity. Today it's join Liberalism etc.
A sort of 'conversion' must take place, even a 'national
conversion' as we saw in the Middle Ages. Dissidents are 'heretics', not just
in their beliefs but in their political and cultural sympathies.
In this sense the EU is very analogous to both the Roman
Empire and the Holy Roman Empire. They're just analogies, one must not get too
hung up on the details. They're helpful generalisations which is the best we
can hope for when trying to analyse historical cycles. But when viewed in this
sense... well, one must also consider one's views of the past. What does one
think of the policies of Rome toward say, Dacia? Or what of Charlemagne's
policies vis-à-vis the Saxons? What of Rome's attempts to divide and conquer and
the way it intervened in the affairs of the various tribes outside the empire?
One is also bound to recall the way in which Catholic Christendom crusaded
against the Baltic pagans as well as the rivalry and machinations between the
Byzantine and Catholic worlds. There are clear parallels. The EU's power
centres flow from what was the Western Roman Empire and Roman Catholic
Christendom and yet it (like Rome via the Crusaders, the Habsburgs, the
Teutonic Knights and Venice and Protestant Enlightenment-ism via Napoleon and
the Hohenzollerns) seeks to expand to the East and seize lands beyond its
cultural sphere. It has ever been thus.
It's really the same story happening over and over again. It
culminated in WWII and this has to be understood when considering the mindset,
strategy and responses of those in the east... particularly in Moscow. What
seems benign in the West is not viewed through the same lens in the East, which
hands down paid the greatest price during the war. While contemporary German
rearmament and the Brussels power centre of the EU and NATO seem benign and
orderly to the Western eye, the Eastern eye sees the same historical pattern
starting to shape up once more. The history of the Indian Subcontinent is an
endless tale of invasion from the Northwest and for the Byzantine world the
fear is always of the West... Rome... the legions and the crusaders, the
Habsburgs and the Nazis... they're all the same.
The ghost of Barbarossa looms large. 22 June 1941 is not
easily forgotten and you can be sure the Russians not going to just sit by and
watch it all start to form up again. Just as the Holocaust elicited the promise
of 'Never Again' from the Jews, you can be assured the Russians who lost over
twenty million in the war feel exactly the same way.
See also:
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-guardian-establishment.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-endless-battle-for-balkans.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2017/07/the-simmering-balkans.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/04/an-army-for-kosovo.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2019/03/north-macedonia-nato-and-eu.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2017/02/balkan-tensions-generation-after-wars.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/06/further-balkan-intrigues-and-questions.html
See also:
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-guardian-establishment.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-endless-battle-for-balkans.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2017/07/the-simmering-balkans.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/04/an-army-for-kosovo.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2019/03/north-macedonia-nato-and-eu.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2017/02/balkan-tensions-generation-after-wars.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2018/06/further-balkan-intrigues-and-questions.html