The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

If the war drags on

2023-01-29T11:00:28.531Z


As Germany torturously becomes involved in the conflict, the Franco-German axis weakens, and Europe's center of gravity shifts to the East.


The European Union was built in the face of the experience of war, as a space for peace, a liberal Leviathan that decided to deny violence, which is why the return of war is, inevitably, a shock to its very heart.

Now we will talk about the Franco-German axis, the diastole and systole of Europe, but that is one of the keys to the tense debates that German public opinion is experiencing in the heat of the conflict.

His first political victim, Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht, is just a taste of the pieces that may fall if the war drags on, without ruling out Chancellor Olaf Scholz's own re-election.

Today it seems taboo to wonder about a post-war or negotiation scenario, but the truth is that while the war is going on, things in Europe are changing.

Western unity under the Atlantic umbrella is a consolation, but as Germany deviously engages in the conflict, the Franco-German axis (functioning as European hegemon only as a tandem) weakens, and Europe's center of gravity shifts to the West. This.

While Poles and Baltics denounce Berlin's vacillations and Macron's alleged condescension towards the master of the Kremlin, the dynamics of a continent profoundly shaken by war seem to be in equilibrium.

The fact that Poland emerges as a key country in the future of the Union does not only imply that Spain fades as a new pivotal State in Europe.

The change in European political power will affect our liberal sensibility, the very idea of ​​Europe as a normative power capable of conditioning the weight of States and financial aid to its democratic values.

The path of European nations during the 20th century is very uneven, which is why the wounds and reactions that the war in Ukraine provokes in us are different.

Today, illiberal Poland stands as a moral authority due to its position towards Russia, explained by its geography and by its tragic experience under the Kremlin's yoke, which seems to eclipse the political and ultranationalist authoritarianism of its Government,

sheltered under that certain arrogance with which he speaks to a Germany weakened by its historical complacency with Russia.

If the war drags on, as a US that yearns for regime change in the Kremlin seems to want, it will be the hosts of the Ukrainian refugees, the hosts of the most US troops and military hardware, who are most likely to control the community agenda.

Time seems to agree with the old Wolfgang Streeck when he affirmed that, as long as this happens, the US geostrategic objectives will prevail over the liberal DNA of the Union, weakening it as a supposed sovereign global power with strategic autonomy capable of rivaling the decline of the United States and the power Chinese descent.

Because there is another war that is being played in the future:

the unity that the West boasts of must not make us forget that Europe will have to find its stability.

But doing so while watching over its liberal order cannot be reduced to the sole obligation of ensuring the victory of a young democracy against the satrap of the Kremlin.

Subscribe to continue reading

Read without limits

Keep reading

I'm already a subscriber

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2023-01-29

You may like

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-27T16:45:54.081Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.