Infocus fall 2014 by Jewish Policy Center

inFocus Vol. 8 Issue 4 | Fall 2014

Quarterly

inFOCUS examines europe: whole and free?

letter from the Publisher

Contributors

ovember will mark 25 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the stunning collapse of communism and the USSR without a shot fired. If you’ve forgotten what it looked like, I encourage you to watch the videos to be reminded of the euphoria in both East and West, and reread Francis Fukiyama’s The End of History for its expectation that the world would evermore be on a path of peace, personal liberty and economic freedom. It didn’t work out quite that way; Europe has more than its share of struggles in 2014. This issue of inFOCUS is devoted to “Europe Whole and Free?” With the Russian capture of Crimea and parts of Georgia, it is no longer whole, and freedom is taking somewhat of a beating as well. Fiamma Nirenstein sets the table with a 25-year look at Europe from the Continent. Stephen Bryen takes a 25-year look at NATO, while James Kirchick focuses on a response to Ukraine. Benjamin Weinthal and Mitchell Bard consider the rise of anti-Semitism from different angles, and Michael Ledeen writes about Italy as the

exception to the trend. Salim Furth, Soeren Kern, and Gal Luft take on economics, internal politics and energy policy respectively. Shoshana Bryen reviews The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan to place our last Cold War president in perspective. Don’t miss our interview with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce, the man who establishes Congress’s priorities for consideration of key political and security concerns. From ISIS to Ukraine to NATO to defense spending to Russia to Israel to Turkey, Chairman Royce is an articulate spokesman for strong relationships, particularly with Israel, and strong NATO capabilities in an unsettled world. If you appreciate our work, please consider making a generous donation to the JPC. As always, you may do so securely at www.jewishpolicycenter.org/ contribute.php Sincerely,

inFOCUS

Volume 8 | Issue 4

Publisher: Matthew Brooks Editor: Shoshana Bryen Associate Editor: Gabriel Scheinmann Managing Editor: Shari Hillman Contributing Editor: Michael Johnson Art Director: Andrea Cohen Copy Editor: Karen McCormick

inFOCUS is published by the Jewish Policy Center, 50 F Street, N.W., Suite 100, Washington, DC 20001. (202) 638-2411 Follow us on JewishPolicyCenter

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WRITERS’ GUIDELINES Essays must be 1,600 to 2,000 words in length. Email submissions to info@ jewishpolicycenter.org. Check our website to ensure your topic works with scheduled themes of future issues before submitting.

www.JewishPolicyCenter.org Matthew Brooks, Executive Director

Fiamma Nirenstein is a journalist and author, former member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, and deputypresident of its Foreign Affairs Committee. (page 3)

U.S. Representative Ed Royce serves as Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. (page 20)

Stephen Bryen is a former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Trade Security Policy. (page 7)

Benjamin Weinthal reports on European affairs for The Jerusalem Post and is a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. (page 24)

James Kirchick is a fellow with the Foreign Policy Initiative. (page 10)

Michael Ledeen is the Freedom Scholar at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. (page 27)

Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute and Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos. (page

Mitchell Bard is the author/editor of 23 books including After Anatevka: Tevye in Palestine. (page 31)

13)

Salim Furth is a Senior Policy Analyst for the Institute for Economic Freedom and Opportunity at The Heritage InFocus: Iran | Summer 2007 Foundation. (page 16)

Gal Luft is co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security and Senior Adviser to the United States Energy Security Council. (page 34) Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of The Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Magazine. (page 37)

Seeking the Soul of Europe: View from the Continent by Fiamma Nirenstein History offers no respite to countries that set aside their sense of identity in favor of a seemingly less arduous course. But nor does it assure success for the most elevated convictions in the absence of a comprehensive geopolitical strategy. –Henry Kissinger

’m upset with Europe because it is mine. Mine are Dante Alighieri, Giotto, Michelangelo; mine are Cosimo de’ Medici who scoured the art markets of the Netherlands and brought their magnificent paintings to Florence; mine are Shakespeare and Chaucer’s England; mine are The Charterhouse of Parma and even Baudelaire; and mine are, of course, Russian novels, wars, peace treaties, and revolutions fundamental to the history of mankind. Mine, and of all Europe’s. I don’t understand how a civilization as resounding as that of the ancient continent has become so trampled by bureaucracy as to become non-existent before its problems. My father was Polish, my mother is Florentine. I grew up between Florence and Rome and, while working as a special correspondent, I covered anti-Communist revolutions and discovered the antiSemitic background of Kurt Waldheim. Between the Shoah and Communism, I witnessed Europe trying to free itself from the worst totalitarianism. My Florentine grandmother raised us with the idea that the monsters had been vanquished. We had lost half our family in the Holocaust, but Europe had learned its lesson: “Never Again.” The Europe of my dreams—open, integrated, multi-lingual—would be able to fend off anti-Semitic hatred. But instead, like a weed, anti-Semitism has taken root everywhere. Who would have

thought that in this day and age we would witness demonstrations in Berlin that scream, “Death to Jews”? In addition to anti-Semitic perversion, I have seen the overthrow of the very idea of Human Rights, which now includes polygamy in Paris and the prohibition of alcohol in areas of London and Brussels defined as “Sharia neighborhoods.” Human Rights now mean support by EU Foreign Minister Catherine Ashton for a hunger strike in an Israeli jail while hundreds of thousands of Syrians and Iraqis are dying. I have seen European judges releasing terrorists who conspire to carry out attacks under the rubric of “fighting for freedom.” I have seen TV that invites an ISIS terrorist to debate a famous Jewish left-wing Italian conductor. Over the years I have witnessed the subtle strengthening of an anti-Israeli point of view, both persistent and persecutory, that hides under a false pretense of peace. I long for my Europe, I miss it.

z The European Construct

There are 754 EU parliamentarians and 14-15,000 people who move through the plenary four days a month. The European Commission has 29 Commissioners and approximately 25,000 employees; the system costs about 140 billion Euro annually, increased by the autonomous European diplomatic service. Salaries range from 2,300-16,000 Euro a month, plus

travel compensation. The Daily Telegraph reports that more than 1,000 officials earn more than their Prime Ministers. In highly regime-structured meetings we talk a few minutes each and hear dissonant and clashing opinions of Member States. All States are equal—but we know Germany always wins in the end, if it manages to get a word in. The EU debated the “Arab Spring” when I was head of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Italian Parliament. We each had to explain in three minutes how confident we were—or were not—in the development of democracy in Egypt, and give reasons to provide substantial economic aid to Cairo—or not. I chose the path of cross-compliance: if they start wars, if they veil their women, if they cut off your hand, etc., Europe must restrict aid. But the debate was irrelevant. A benevolent and well-known host of officials shot down each objection: you won’t want to question their marriage institutions, their traditions must be respected, and you won’t want to debate Middle East peace with President Morsi. If Egypt’s President threatens Israel, it’s tradition. The aid was the only subject, not the idea of a common foreign policy or European morality. In 2010, in Paris during a meeting of the Council of Europe, when the Mavi Marmara, a ship of the Turkish flotilla, tried to dock on the coast of Gaza, I found

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

myself being assassinated by the Turkish representative, whose definitive opinions about the cruelty of Israel were heard in religious silence. One last memory: an article had just come out in Sweden’s Aftonbladet claiming Israeli soldiers killed Palestinians to steal their organs. Carl Bildt, also Swedish, was then EU Foreign Minister. Asked how he was going to combat anti-Semitism, he replied that he had no knowledge of the existence of any. Bildt is the man who compared Netanyahu to Hamas. How could anti-Semitism exist in such a perfect, hopeful European creation, an accumulation of all its assets? Europe is essentially an ideological creature. Its troubles begin with the lack of an economic, foreign, and social policy. In his book A Lost Europe?, Ernesto Galli della Loggia ventures into the core of the founding documents of Europeanism when it was a “matter of intellectuals of various extraction and some isolated politicians.” The primary requirement in an environment destroyed by the Second

pean aspiration is apocalyptic. The Nation State is a monster intended to eliminate the Nazi degeneration saturated with the stench of “home ground.” It is necessary to imagine a European Federal State that makes sense, the Manifesto states, a State that seeks “the reform of society…against inequalities and privileges.” Galli quotes the Manifesto, “The European revolution must be Socialist,” and “democratic political methodology will be a dead weight in the revolutionary crisis.” It is not a dated document, a piece of forgotten history. It is cited by Ministers and deputies, and its signatories are memorialized by the EU. Perhaps the basic text at the time could have been sidelined if Europe had adopted a Constitution giving itself a suitable political sense, but that issue was settled in numerous “no” votes by Dutch and French voters in 2005. It can be said that instead of developing a philosophy, Europe developed a replacement law made of many rules and injunctions with no boundaries, culminating in the Lis-

Europe is essentially an ideological creature. Its troubles begin with the lack of an economic, foreign, and social policy. World War was to respond to Soviet pressure, which led to the beginning of what would become a Common Market to avoid economic rivalries. Political union was far off, the idea of a combined army failed because France refused, but the inspiration, the need to live with Russian and American power, was great.

z The Manifesto

The famous “Ventotene Manifesto” increasingly is the leitmotif of every proEuropean speech. Written by three prisoners confined by the fascists (a Socialist, a radical liberal, and a former Communist), this Manifesto is a sacred text to which everyone refers without ever having actually read it. But della Loggia makes us understand its message: Euro-

bon agreements: a gigantic text—150,000 rules weighing close to a ton—covering everything and promoting “global governance.” The minute prescriptive of the laws, ranging from lamps to dairy products, are above all, sick, but they bind all Member States. If this reflected a political choice it wouldn’t be too startling; Europe is large and complex. But although there is case law, there is no “soul of Europe.” Europe’s soul has marched robotically without attaching enough importance to why integration between disparate nations is so difficult, and how it makes sense to have a single currency when it applies to such unequal economies. An attempt was undertaken to define an economic identity for each Member, but that didn’t work,

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

in part because the number of countries grew to 29. Only a few fans see the EU as a support, a crutch, a source of identity, as a mother to these united states that want her as their central power. But Europe has continued to speak different languages, and to dream in different languages, and although it has a song all children learn together, in what language do they sing it?

z Transforming Hope into Hostility

Most Europeans have developed a kind of impatience, and the people often see the EU as a clash between institutions, laws, and papers that has resulted in a failed economy. To be more precise, they see it as the failure of their own national economy. The distribution of sacrifices in a time of crisis between unequal nations has transformed hope into hostility. Over the past 25 years, Europe has tried to pave the road to integration while its Member Countries try to defend their language, food, culture, and economy so as to deflect integration. Beethoven’s European Anthem is, of course, wonderful, but it’s absurd for a Polish or Italian to have to sing the Ode to Joy in German. In the absence of a common idea, the march for economic unity has paradoxically strengthened national identity. The early 1980s marked the enlargement of the EEC southward with the transition from 9 to 12 Member Countries taking place while Margaret Thatcher was fiercely defending the principle of national sovereignty in Britain. In 1992, the internal market was completed through the removal of tariff barriers. After the detachment of England, behind France’s lead, and with the push of Francois Mitterrand and the strengthening of the Commission chaired by Jacques Delors, there was a return to the idea of economic and monetary union. It is here that the fall of the Berlin Wall and the unification of Germany became a central issue, and the relationship between Helmut Kohl and Mitterrand turned into an urge to rearrange Europe in its entirety. In Rome

z Anti-Americanism and Condemnation of Israel

in 1990, Monetary Union was established through the planned adoption of a single currency. It didn’t work, hence its steady weakening. In 1995, the Schengen Area gradually abolished Europe’s frontiers, but England did not adhere. Thatcher would accept neither the border arrangement nor the single currency, which is probably when Europe’s decline became substantial. The power that had founded democracy and capitalism, had crossed the seas, and had the most forward-looking foreign policy, stayed home. Missing in Europe was England’s “magic touch,” its class and its elegant and practical historical blessing. The Maastricht Treaty, adopted in 1992 and entered into force the following year, was an unbalanced building. On the one hand it rested on a solid base for economic integration and on a number of Community policies, and on the other imposed limitations on national sovereignty with the aim of eventually be-

coming a single nation. Great confusion, halted by the present economic crisis, aggravated the economic instability of the poorest countries. Maastricht tried to broaden the powers of the European Parliament to initiate a common foreign and security policy, as well as to initiate social inclusion. But everything, especially the prospect of Monetary Union and the confusion between Parliament (representing the citizens) and the Council (representing the States), increased its difficulties. Foreign policy was delegated to the Council, which instead of looking out for the interests of Europe as a whole, had the task of making sure the States came into agreement. The creation of the European External Action Service (EEAS), born to ensure that the European diplomatic corps served to consolidate a European foreign policy, turned into yet another bureaucratic body. There is all the baggage necessary for politicians abroad, but

In the end, the agreement between the EU Member States is limited to certain circumstances, to express concerns and exhortations—especially when they need to condemn Israel. For the rest, Europe has always expected the United States to solve its problems even as antiAmerican sentiment has been growing. Anti-Americanism, interwoven with ignorance, envy, and anti-Semitism, became one of the main drivers of the European mindset. The slogan “America, gendarme of the world” was the consolidated vicious legacy of the Cold War, leading Europe to refuse to do its full share after September 11, 2001. In 2003 when the then-15 (now 29) members of the EU met in a special meeting to discuss the Iraq War, Europe split in two, France on one side and Tony Blair on the other. Atoning for its prior colonialism with multiculturalism, the anti-war left showed anti-imperialist hatred for America. Pro-American politicians such as Berlusconi and Aznar, and even Sarkozy to some extent, were accused of “Islamophobia” and racism against Muslims. Even more remarkable was the ineffectiveness of joint action in the Yugoslav crisis that has been before the EED since mid-1991. Germany encouraged the secession of Croatia and Slovenia, while others were more cautious and thought diplomatic and military intervention by the United States was divisive. The history of European foreign policy is non-existent: it is a supranational posturing that has no ideas and no army—and no common army has ever been nor will ever be. England and France will continue to make autonomous policy

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Fiamma Nirenstein: Seeking the Soul of Europe: View from the Continent

there are no politics. The election of Italian Federica Mogherini to replace Minister Ashton was the result of an exchange agreement among countries, some of which may have no skill in this. This is baffling when Europe is crossed by a genuine war within its own boundaries.

in Libya, Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere. Anti-Americanism is associated with anti-Zionism that grew up during the Second Intifada. Europe (according to this desperate working witness) is populated by groups of officials and politicians responsible only for obtaining convictions of Israel, and who as a practical matter are only able to produce periodic documents that establish essential parameters—the need to achieve peace; sanctioning “settlements”; and prohibiting dealing with Israeli institutions, public or private, in the territories beyond the Green Line (i.e. the 1949 armistice lines). The “territories” are the only point on which all Member States agree. Since 2006 about 100 Palestinian and Israeli NGOs with an anti-Israel agenda have received more than 30 million Euro—to which the funding of European States, regions, and municipalities must be added. This is an EU characteristic: to export

colonialism and affected by murderous jihadism. Multicultural policy was a “fix” for past colonialism. Sweden, Denmark, and—to a lesser extent—Italy promoted the dispensing of refugee work permits with lax asylum conditions. A wellintentioned policy to extend welfare to non-citizens made way for uncontrolled cultural autonomy. Contrast and discomfort are what principally result from an immigration policy based on ideology instead of familiar practicality. The Muslim presence has become ominous: • I n Sweden, there is political campaigning in Arabic. • I n Oslo, Mohammed is the most popular name among newborns. • I n England there are Islamic courts judging Muslims. • I n the shadow of the Eiffel Tower there is infibulation, polygamy, and child marriage.

Missing in Europe was England’s “magic touch,” its class and its elegant and practical historical blessing. their “principles” through “civil society” organizations—NGOs that pursue their own anti-Israel ends, which can be combined with those of terrorists. In December 2013, the European Court of Auditors published a series of reports that criticize the EU’s PEGASE program of support to the PA for its lack of transparency, risk of corruption, embezzlement, and lack of conditionality. So although it is known that the money is not put to good use, nothing is being done to stop it.

z Immigration and Muslim Growth

Maastricht laid the foundations of the great immigration problem. France, Holland, and England paved the road to the creation of a continent based on the principles of the free movement of persons, goods, and capital, which then became subject to the migratory wave of a ravenous world that was offended by

Hatred of Jews has led to heinous crimes such as the kidnapping to a banlieue, then torture and killing of Ilan Halimi, a young man from Paris. Cultural discomfort has become a clash, with the new focal point being European Muslims fighting in Syria and Iraq. They are returning to Europe with jihadist intentions that will be a tremendous problem in the future.

z The Euro and Economic Policy

Different countries have different interests, and not even the Amsterdam Treaty of 1997, which pointed to a policy of European expertise and recognized Human Rights as a fundamental part of the European legal system, was able to form a common ground on which Europe could build its essence. The single currency remains the main accomplishment, but cost the European people’s blood, sweat, tears, and confusion.

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When the Lira was converted to the Euro, Italy found itself with prices having doubled; a pair of shoes that had cost 100,000 Lire cost 100 Euros, the equivalent of 200,000 Lire. It was a slip of the tongue that was remedied, but the single currency led to further differences between countries that were at different economic levels, and aggravated the economic instability of the poorest and weakest. It broke the public market between Germany and Greece. After a moment of brilliance, the dust settled. Spain and Ireland experienced considerable economic growth between 2005 and 2008 after entry into the Eurozone provided an artificial boost. Then came the letdown. From 2004 to 2008, Ireland had a youth unemployment rate of 4.5% that tripled to 14.7% in 2012. Spain’s 11% unemployment rate was reduced by one third over the years of growth, and then skyrocketed to 26% in 2013. Greece was bankrupted, and its unemployment rate doubled to 27% with the imposition of austerity measures. Germany, on the other hand, registered a decrease of unemployment because its economy had been growing steadily, and some others—Sweden, Austria, and France—can be expected to remain stable. If European economies could—and they cannot—recover, Europe would be left only with the Euro and a bureaucracy that the last elections contested. The main problem of the European Community is that it is still looking for an anthem, a memory, a meaning that puts its citizens in the game for an idea, for a purpose. Most important, it lacks a foreign policy, reflected by its confusion over a Russia that with no fear pursues a policy of territorial expansion in the heart of Europe. The myth that the new Europe has prevented internal conflicts is now buried. Fiamma Nirenstein is a journalist and author, former member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, and deputy-president of its Foreign Affairs Committee (2008-2013).

Will NATO Fight, Talk or Trade? by Stephen Bryen

ith the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact, the NATO alliance could have folded, and maybe should have folded with its raison d’etre gone. But not only did the alliance continue, it aggressively pursued an expanded membership base and broader non-member relationships under the Partnership Action Plan. Attempts to bring Ukraine and Georgia into NATO, and partnerships with Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kazakhstan, and Moldova caused considerable angst in Russia where they were seen treading on the Russian sphere of influence. But as NATO has become wider, it has become shallower and less able to meet its own standards for the defense of its members. And a weak NATO may in fact be worse than no NATO at all, inviting aggression against it. Russia, for all its bluster, still fears NATO encirclement and does not trust the United States. Leaving NATO in a posture where it lacks any real ability to fight is the worst of all possible worlds.

z NATO Has Been Busy

The NATO alliance has taken on a number of non-core missions since 1991. In 1992, NATO entered the BosnianSerbian war and on February 28, 1994 U.S. F-16s, operating under NATO command, shot down four Serbian J-21 jets near Banja Luka, marking the first time in NATO’s history that the alliance engaged in actual combat. The allied bombing campaign and on-the-ground enforcement activities led to the Dayton Accords and a negotiated settlement, contingent on the presence of 60,000 NATO peacekeepers who remained in one form or another until 2004. The Bosnia operation was extended

to Kosovo with the stabilization force known as KFOR deriving its mandate from the UN Security Council and the Military-Technical Agreement between NATO and the Federal Republic of Yu-

erations with mixed success. Its record overall is blemished by a number of unfortunate incidents including the massacre at Srebrenica that should have been prevented by Dutch peacekeeping forces;

As the Russians have amply demonstrated in Ukraine, non-state surrogates can always be used to accomplish state goals. goslavia and Serbia. In 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia, an announcement strongly rejected by the Russians—although Russia used the Kosovo “precedent” as a justification for Crimea’s independence in 2014. In 2003, NATO set up the International Security Assistance Force for Afghanistan to conduct security operations in that country. ISAF, too, was backed by the United Nations and consisted of both NATO and non-NATO countries. The largest contingent was American (30,700). Most countries provided only small numbers, with Britain (3,936) the only other country to exceed 1,000 personnel. In 2011, NATO launched Operation Unified Protector in Libya, based on UN resolutions that imposed sanctions on key members of the Gaddafi government and authorized NATO to implement an arms embargo and no-fly zone, and to use all means necessary, short of foreign occupation, to protect Libyan civilians and civilian populated areas. The recent NATO decision to create a “rapid reaction force” to protect Eastern Europe from Russia was created in response to the situation in the Ukraine. Overall, NATO—in its new clothes— has conducted a number of military op-

the bombing of a civilian train at Grdelica (300km south of Belgrade); and the “accidental” bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. Similar mistakes were made in Kosovo. In Afghanistan, airstrikes have killed many civilians, and the entire effort seems close to collapse as the U.S. prepares to withdraw. Gaddafi was ousted but today Islamists occupy Tripoli and the U.S. Embassy there.

z What does it mean to be NATO?

NATO was formed in 1949 in response to the Russian-precipitated Czech crisis and denial of land access to Berlin in the Russian Occupation Zone. In response, the U.S. and its allies organized an airlift of supplies—the celebrated Berlin Airlift—that not only replaced supplies previously going by rail, but exceeded the amounts delivered under normal conditions. The result was the creation of two German states and the formal division of Berlin itself. And the Cold War in Europe. At its inception, NATO included the U.S., Britain, Canada, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, and Portugal. In 1952, Greece and Turkey were added as both emerged from Soviet/ Communist challenges, followed by The

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Federal Republic of Germany in 1955 and Spain in 1982. Since the collapse of the USSR, a number of Eastern European countries have been added. While France continued to participate in NATO’s political meetings, it removed itself from military participation between 1966 and 2009. The key to NATO is collective de-

No one can say what NATO would do under conditions of an actual attack. We do know that when the U.S. was attacked on September 11, 2001, it asked NATO to consider it to be an attack under Article V. NATO agreed that the United States was attacked but did not determine that the attack was directed from abroad. There-

Another is that Article V allows for member states to decide what response is appropriate, whether military force or short of that. This is particularly important because presumed front line states, such as Poland or Estonia, could be exposed to political-military subversion, some of it involving armed violence, which under NATO rules would not trigger an Article V reaction.

z The Bronze Soldier of Tallinn

Photo by Cherie Cullen, Deparment of Defense fense, embodied in Article V of its Charter, which states that “an armed attack against one” state or more “shall be considered an attack against them all.” Moreover, member states each agree to “assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force.” Because Article V can be exercised by any state individually and in concert with other Parties, no formal NATO approval is required—meaning that no single state could object to action under this Article. That is the best that can be said. Article V authorizes each state to respond “as it deems necessary” but there is no obligation for any state to respond and no assurance that all the states will respond.

fore NATO did not see the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. as qualifying under Article V. Since 9/11 there have been a number of attacks on NATO member countries by terrorist organizations with clear foreign connections. NATO has remained inert. Article V, furthermore, presumes that it is a state actor that leads the attack. As the Russians have amply demonstrated in Ukraine, non-state surrogates can always be used to accomplish state goals. While Russia’s backing of these non-state actors is clear, would that be enough to trigger a NATO response were Ukraine a NATO member? If the precedent of 9/11 is any guide, the answer is that such a surrogate attack would not qualify. This is only one of the weaknesses in NATO’s collective defense agreement.

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The Bronze Soldier is a monument erected in September 1944 by then-Soviet controlled Estonian authorities commemorating the expulsion of the Nazis. Estonian nationalists regarded it as a symbol of Soviet occupation. In 2007, the now-independent Estonian government decided to relocate the monument, causing a bitter fight with Russians living in Estonia and with the Russian government. On April 27, 2007, websites of Estonian organizations, including the parliament, banks, ministries, newspapers, and broadcasters, were hit by strong cyber attacks coming from Russia. Until then, the major example of an attack on parts of a country’s critical infrastructure was a three-year Chinese attack on American assets culminating in 2003. Called “Titan Rain” by the U.S. government, the attacks struck defense contractor computer networks. The Estonia attacks were directly connected to political events. They damaged parts of the critical infrastructure and contained much that was new and unexpected. Certain hidden network locations for sensitive banking and finance systems and telecoms were identified and hit, which greatly surprised Estonian security authorities. Intending to demonstrate its ire toward the Estonian government, Russia also demonstrated that it could do considerable damage short of an actual military invasion. At the time, the Russians had the option to cause much more trouble, even to the point of sponsoring local terrorist attacks. They did not do so then, but what

soldiers) focused on protecting against a massed land attack. But the convoys of tank transporters moving heavy tanks, artillery and anti-aircraft systems moving into Ukraine from Russia indicates that they either intend to use these assets themselves or provide them to pro-Russia

Ukraine could certainly be a dress rehearsal for other, even more provocative, operations. Russians decided to use an EMP attack (electro-magnetic pulse)? Would that be actionable under Article V? The truth is that NATO has never tested the definition of “armed attack,” while demonstrating a strange variability when it came to protecting the United States after 9/11.

z Can NATO really Fight?

In 1953, the United States had over 450,000 soldiers overseas in NATO countries, spread across 1,200 different sites. Army, Air Force, Marine, and Naval forces presented a formidable obstacle and trip wire to any possible Soviet invasion of Western Europe, and certainly against an attack against a single country. By 1990, that number was reduced to 213,000 American military personnel, and over the next three years it was reduced to 122,000 troops. Today there are 64,000 American troops in Europe, mostly supporting U.S. operations elsewhere, including Afghanistan. In addition, in 2013 the U.S. deactivated an A-10 ground attack jet fighter squadron from Germany. Also in 2013, the U.S. deactivated an Air Control Squadron from Italy, vital to U.S. operations in Africa and the Middle East. The 170th and the 172nd Brigade combat teams were deactivated in 2013 and 2014 respectively, removing all U.S. Army heavy armor capability from Europe. These cutbacks may have been acceptable had intelligence supported the idea that Russia would not launch a land attack against NATO countries, as all the assets removed (not counting the

forces inside Ukraine. Ukraine could certainly be a dress rehearsal for other, even more provocative, operations. The bottom line is that the American ability to support ground operations in Europe, should it be needed, is very limited. About the only response the U.S. could mount would use American aircraft already in Europe, of which there are not many.

z Zapad 2013

Zapad (“West”) 2013 was a major Russia/Belarus military exercise that took place in September 2013. By combining anti-terrorist operations and urban warfare into major conventional operations, the exercise suggesed a renewed Russian focus on a large scale war doctrine. Most interestingly, Zapad 2013 featured the air transport of some 70,000 troops, a huge number considering that NATO’s answer to Zapad 2013, “Steadfast Jazz,” transported at most 6,000. Zapad 2013 deliberately did not show tactical nuclear weapons, but Russian doctrine is to back up its conventional forces with tactical nuclear weapons of various types including missile and artillery based systems.

z Europe’s Economic Dependency

In deciding how NATO might respond to a rapidly expanding challenge, it is important to understand that Europe’s economic relationship with Russia has changed since the end of the Cold War. Europe’s energy dependency on Russia continues to grow, and Europe enjoys considerable export advantages to

Russia and the former Soviet states. Russia is Germany’s 11th biggest trading partner at more than $104 billion annually. Germany is also one of the biggest investors in Russia, putting in $22 billion last year. Most important, Germany is a big customer for Russian gas and oil, receiving over 35% of its supplies from Russia. According to surveys, Germans approve of the relationship with Russia and oppose sanctions on the Russian government. While NATO has put sanctions in place as a result of Ukraine, it is far from clear Germany will adhere to them. Dependency on Russian energy exports, particularly natural gas, is very high for many European countries. Should an emergency result in the shutdown of these supplies, it would have a devastating impact on Europe’s already slumping economies. This creates an advantage for Russia in assuring that NATO won’t respond strongly to challenges on the non-NATO periphery, such as Georgia or Ukraine. What would happen if the challenge was directed against a NATO member is harder to judge, but NATO members would struggle, given the potential economic and social consequences to their people. It would take a tremendous challenge to force the Europeans to respond militarily, and even then the capacity for a meaningful response is limited. Such an assault would not be costfree for Russia. Putin can continue to point out that Russia is a force to be reckoned with, but if he finds his tactics leading him to a real military confrontation, the long-term consequences are neither predictable nor optimistic insofar as Russia’s stability and integrity are concerned. That may prove small comfort to both sides if a weak NATO is forced to respond militarily to Russian aggression.

Stephen Bryen: Will NATO Fight, Talk or Trade?

about the future? A cyber attack on critical infrastructure, even when the source is known (as it surely was in Estonia), is apparently not an attack under Article V because it is not what is conventionally thought of as an “armed attack.” Suppose, instead, the

Stephen Bryen Ph.D. is a former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Trade Security Policy.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Finlandization Is Not a Solution for Ukraine by JAMES KIRCHICK

he Ukrainian crisis bears many similarities to the Cold War. Once again, Russian tanks have rolled across an international border. Central and Eastern European countries openly fear Moscow’s revanchist and imperial foreign policy. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, long ago prophesied to go “out of area or out of business,” has found new purpose deterring an old adversary. Leaders in Moscow, Brussels, and Washington warn of an ideological conflict between East and West. And, in what must instill a sense of déjà vu among students of Cold War esoterica, the onceobscure term “Finlandization” is now being bruited about. Usually intended as a pejorative, “Finlandization” derives from the posture of neutrality that Finland adopted during the Cold War. In exchange for not joining NATO and other Western institutions such as the European Economic Community (forebear to the European Union), Finland enjoyed a degree of freedom unknown to the Soviet republics or communist satellite states. Defenders of the policy insist that it allowed Finland, a nation of just five million people sharing an 800-mile long border with Russia, to survive as a prosperous, free, and democratic country with a market economy and elected parliament, all the while maintaining good relations with both the Moscow and the West. Decades after the term achieved seeming obsolescence, “Finlandization” is making a comeback as a proposed remedy for Ukraine. Over the past few months, no less than three foreign policy wise men have recommended the Finnish model for Ukraine: former National Security Advi-

sor Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and Washington Post columnist David Ignatius. NATO membership for Ukraine, they argue, is unnecessary, and Moscow would view it as “provocative.” Kiev should instead pronounce its neutrality in return for a security guarantee from Moscow. Twenty years ago, Kiev signed just such a guarantee (the Budapest Memorandum), giving up its sizeable nuclear weapons arsenal only to see Russia blatantly violate the agreement with its annexation of Crimea and ongoing support for violent separatists. Understandably, Ukrainians are less sanguine about Russian promises than are Western advocates of nonalignment.

z Misreading History

Recommending Finlandization for Ukraine is bad advice on several levels. First, it misunderstands and misinterprets Finland’s experience, either downplaying or outright ignoring the costs that this policy imposed upon the country’s democracy. Proponents of Finlandization discount the danger that it posed to the European continent as a potential model for other countries susceptible to Russian pressure and influence. Furthermore, compelling neutrality upon an unwilling Ukraine is a stark moral capitulation to foreign aggression. Foreclosing the possibility of EU and NATO membership to Ukraine would shred the basic precepts of Europe’s postCold War security architecture, enshrined in agreements stipulating that countries be allowed to choose their own political and security alliances free from foreign intimidation and threats. A former duchy of the Czarist Em-

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

pire, Finland won its independence in December 1917 amid the chaos of the Bolshevik revolution. Twice during World War II, Finland fought off Soviet incursions into its territory, losing 100,000 men and 10 percent of its territory but ultimately maintaining independence. Through this massive sacrifice, Finland staved off the fate that would later befall every other country that bordered Russia. In 1948, Helsinki signed a “Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance” with Moscow that would set the terms of Finlandization over the ensuing decades. Though the agreement recognized Finland’s existence as an “independent state,” it also mandated military cooperation between the Soviet Union and Finland should NATO attempt to invade the Soviet Union or Finland through Finnish territory. Even before this treaty was signed, Finland proved its deference to the Soviets by refusing much-needed Marshall Plan aid, following the lead of other countries in the Eastern Bloc that faced more concrete forms of Russian pressure. The treaty laid the basis for the “Paasikivi-Kekkonen line,” named after Finnish Presidents Juho Paasikivi and his successor, Urho Kekkonen, which sought above all to keep Finland neutral in international affairs. Kekkonen, who served as President from 1956 to 1982 and with whom the policy of Finlandization is most closely associated, went to great, and at times surreptitious and autocratic, lengths to preserve this policy. By the time he resigned, Kekkonen had served as President for 26 consecutive years, and would have likely ruled even longer had poor health not forced him to step down. For his efforts,

its allies could be found in Finnish newspapers or heard on Finnish television and radio. Almost 2,000 books were banned over the course of the Finlandization era, as were films ranging from Dr. Strangelove and The Manchurian Candidate to Renny Harlin’s 1986 blood-splattered action flick Born American, which followed the fate of three American adventurers vacationing in Finland who mistakenly cross the border into the Soviet Union (a 2008 book revealed that Harlin’s film was banned at the express request of the Soviet Ambassador). No Finnish publisher would release Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago. (Copies of the Finnish translation had to be imported from a Swedish publishing house.) Not for nothing did the Finnish satirist Kari Suomalainen define Finlandization as “the art of bowing to the East so carefully that it could not be considered mooning the West.”

z A High Cost

Today’s proponents of Finlandization write as if all it entails is foreign policy neutrality; they have either forgotten or are completely unaware that it also involved frequent and substantive Soviet meddling in Finland’s domestic affairs and would entail constraining Kiev’s sovereignty beyond a mere formal commitment not to join certain multilateral organizations. For example, Brzezinski proposes Finlandiza-

tion in the same breath as he calls for the West to make clear that “overt or covert Russian participation in its neighbor’s domestic conflicts” would carry a high diplomatic and economic price for Moscow, an assertion that betrays ignorance of how the two are mutually exclusive. Were the proposed Finlandization of Ukraine limited to its foreign policy—that is, a formal commitment to stay out of NATO and the European Union—then it might be a compromise acceptable to the majority of Ukrainians. To be sure, such concessions would, on their face, violate the spirit of the Charter of Paris for a New Europe, the 1990 agreement signed by the Soviet Union that “fully recognize[s] the freedom of States to choose their own security arrangements.” Nonetheless, one might argue that, as with Finland during the Cold War, staying out of Western multilateral organizations and embracing a neutralist foreign policy is the most “realistic” option, a reasonable price to for a small and weak country with a big and aggressive neighbor to pay. But the more one understands the history of Finlandization and grasps the Kremlin’s present-day agenda, the less “realistic” this option becomes. Putting aside Ukraine’s need for rock-solid security guarantees in light of Russian actions (the sort of guarantee that only can be found in Article VI of the NATO Charter), not

JAMES KIRCHICK: Finlandization Is Not a Solution for Ukraine

Kekkonen was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize, the only Western leader to be garlanded in such fashion. Finnish “neutrality” meant turning a blind eye to Soviet imperialism and, occasionally, actively furthering Soviet interests in northern Europe. Finland did not join the majority of countries at the United Nations that denounced the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. Likewise, the Finns remained silent during the 1968 Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia. In 1952, when he was Prime Minister, Kekkonen delivered a speech implicitly calling on Norway and Denmark to leave NATO, creating the “neutral” Scandinavian zone that had long been a major aim of Soviet foreign policy, the easier by which to Finlandize it. Another manifestation of pernicious Soviet influence could be found in censorship, both official and informal, of the press and culture. The Finnish government invoked the preemptive right to censor any material that could “damage or jeopardize relations with a foreign power.” The government rarely had to exercise this power, however, as the Finnish press, willingly and shamefully, bowdlerized itself. A culture of self-censorship quickly took hold over the country’s media, and not-so-subtle threats from Kekkonen and other leading politicians instructing journalists to report “responsibly” about the Soviet Union meant that nary a critical word of that country or

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Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

to mention Russia’s history of blatantly ignoring the security commitments it has already signed, the most deleterious effect of swearing off Western integration would be on Ukraine’s internal development. For the past 25 years, the lure of European integration has been the greatest incentive for liberalizing the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The prospect of EU membership helped transform governments making the transition from corrupt, sclerotic, controlled systems to open, liberal societies that value the rule of law and Human Rights. Viewed in this light, any sort of Finlandization scheme would be disastrous for Ukraine’s future aspirations as a healthy, Western European-style democracy. A policy that offered Russia veto power over the composition of Ukrainian

ing that Ukraine’s future ought to be for Ukrainians to decide, not armchair observers of international politics. Finlandization would contravene the express wishes of the Ukrainian people, who demonstrated their overwhelming preference for a European future in May’s presidential election, in which more than 80 percent of the voters supported pro-Western candidates. Indeed, if Finlandization were such a success, one might expect the Finns to be at the forefront of those pushing it on the Ukrainians. Yet it is difficult to find anyone in Finland suggesting that Ukraine follow its example. Soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Finland immediately began wresting itself out of the Finlandization straightjacket. It made a mad dash for EU membership, formally joining the organi-

Ukrainians are less sanguine about Russian promises than are Western advocates of nonalignment. governments would mean the inevitable corrosion of honest administration, democratic practice, individual liberties, and an open market economy. For Ukraine, it would mean maintaining the sort of oligarchic system that has doomed it for the past 25 years. In spite of its many shortcomings, Finnish democracy under Finlandization was resilient enough, and its society sufficiently cohesive, to withstand the pressures of Soviet hegemony and their resultant debasements. Finland emerged from the Cold War era intact as a Western democracy. Ukraine, on the other hand, given its massively corrupt political culture, regional divides, and easily manipulated ethno-linguistic differences, is one of the worst possible candidates for Finlandization. Forcing such an arrangement on Ukraine would effectively surrender the country to the Russian sphere of influence. There is also the moral case against Finlandization. That there is even debate over whether or not this is a suitable model for Ukraine is indicative of a paternalistic attitude on the part of Western observers, who speak as if the fate of this country were theirs to dictate. It should go without say-

zation in 1995. And while opposition to NATO membership has usually enjoyed support from a plurality of Finns over the past 25 years, the annexation of Crimea has turned the debate on its head; immediately after taking office, the country’s new Prime Minister said the country ought to have joined the alliance back when it entered the European Union nearly two decades ago.

z Not a Solution

Finlandization was unique to its time and place. Finland has an obscure, homogenous, non-Slavic culture and language that had long resisted Russian domination. Ukraine, meanwhile, has deep historic, cultural, and linguistic ties to Russia that would make its resistance to Russian political and military subjugation next to impossible were it not for the strong, external pull of the West. A Finlandized Ukraine would therefore be significantly less independent, democratic, and prosperous than Finland was during the Cold War period. The Soviets upheld Finland as a model for their relations with non-communist countries for a reason: A compliant, politically neutral government in Helsinki—one

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

that censored its press for any negative comments about the Soviet Union or its communist allies, returned escaped dissidents, and traded on terms favorable to Moscow—was the next best thing to having one-party communist rule à la Poland or East Germany. That all this could be achieved without having to station a single Soviet soldier in the country made it all the more attractive to Moscow. During the years of détente, when political movements across Western Europe were calling for unilateral disarmament and the dissolution of NATO, there was real fear of what the “specter of Finlandization,” posed for the continent. Today, the signs of creeping Finlandization across Europe are abundant. With the rising popularity of anti-EU parties (some of which enjoy warm relations with, if not actual monetary assistance from, Moscow), a plurality of Germans favoring neutralism over the Western alliance, and the City of London effectively an oblast of the Russian Federation, sacrificing Ukraine on the altar of better relations with Moscow would reinforce a disquieting trend. Relinquishing Ukraine to this fate amounts to a massive strategic and moral failure on the part of the West. Nor would it repair relations with Moscow. For the Kremlin’s appetite will not be satisfied by a Finlandized Ukraine; it will next demand similar arrangements for all the countries in its “near abroad.” A relic of the Cold War, Finlandization was an unfortunate overreaction to Soviet aggression. And like the expansionist communist ideology that provoked it, so to the dustbin of history should Finlandization also be consigned. Far from being the scrappy strategy of fond memory, Finlandization was a kind of imperialism. Our foreign policy mandarins ought to study what exactly it was, the costs it entailed, and the threat it posed to the Western democracies before so casually wishing it upon others. James Kirchick is a fellow with the Foreign Policy Initiative. A longer version of this piece originally appeared on the website of The American Interest.

European Elections: “No to Europe, Yes to Europe” by Soeren Kern Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by the Gatestone Institute.

nti-establishment parties from both the left and the right won big in the 28-nation European Parliament elections that ended on May 25. Riding a wave of voter discontent over the existing political order in Europe, the electoral victories—especially those by Euro-skeptic politicians in major EU countries such as Britain, France and Germany—mark a clear turning point in the debate over the future of the European Union. The surge of anti-EU parties represents an important blow to the legitimacy of plans by the European establishment to transform the continent into a United States of Europe. Europe-wide, nearly 150 representatives from anti-establishment parties won seats in the European Parliament. This is up from around 60 seats in the 2009 election. Established pro-EU parties will remain in control of roughly 70% of the 751-seat parliament, which manages the EU’s €143 billion ($200 billion) annual budget and passes EU-wide laws that affect more than 500 million citizens. Moreover, Europe’s ruling elites are unlikely to allow these or any other election results to derail their quest to build a European superstate. Although European voters have sent an unmistakable message, efforts are already underway to discredit Euro-skeptics by branding them as extremists. Anti-establishment parties are also divided among themselves on many issues, a weakness that, if not overcome,

will blunt their effectiveness in the European Parliament. In summary, the Euro-skeptics face a daunting set of long-term challenges to stop the seemingly relentless march toward European federalism. In the near term, however, the greatest impact of their electoral victories will be felt at the local and national levels. Nowhere is this truer than in France, where the anti-EU and anti-immigration National Front (FN) party, led by Marine Le Pen, scored 25%, the largest share of the vote in the country. Her strong showing suggests that Le Pen now has a reasonable (although by no means certain) chance of winning the French presidency in national elections set for 2017. A Le Pen presidency could spell doom for the European Union: The FN party platform calls for taking France,

“by the French, for the French and with the French” and not by “foreign commissioners” in Brussels. For now, the FN will use its mandate “to defend France” and to fight “crazy measures” being implemented by French President François Hollande, a leading champion of the EU who also happens to be one of the most unpopular presidents in modern French history. But Hollande—whose ruling Socialist Party was pushed into third place (13.9%), behind the FN and the opposition center-right UMP (21%)—insists that European integration will continue apace. In a televised address, Hollande acknowledged that the “European Project” had become “remote and incomprehensible” and this had to change. But he also said: “Europe cannot advance without France but France’s future is in

In the end, it remains to be seen how the anti-establishment victories will impact the European Union. So far Europe’s ruling class appears content to ignore or ridicule them. the Euro-zone’s second-biggest economy after Germany, out of the European single currency. Monetary union without France would render the Euro pointless. Le Pen said at a press conference that the election results show that “the sovereign people have proclaimed that they want to take back the reins of their destiny into their hands.” She also said that French voters had “shouted loud and clear” that they wanted France to be run

Europe,” adding that his duty was to “reform France and re-orient Europe.” In Britain, the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), which campaigned aggressively for a complete exit from the EU, swept to the top of the national poll with 27.5% of the vote (almost twice the 16.5% it won in 2009). Drawing voters from both left and right, the UKIP victory marked the first time in more than a century that a party other than

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Photo by Claude TRUONG-NGOC Labour or Conservative won a national election. British Prime Minister David Cameron, whose Conservative party came in third behind UKIP and Labour, will now face calls from members of his party to move farther to the right on Europe and immigration. During a news conference, Cameron blamed the election results on the EU and said that “Brussels has got too big, too bossy, too interfering.” He added, “The European Union cannot just shrug off these results and carry on as before. We need change.” But he offered no details on how this would happen. Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg—whose Liberal Democrats party suffered a near-total defeat by losing ten of its 11 MEPs and coming in fifth in the popular vote behind the Green Party—was unrepentant and pledged to keep on pushing for greater British integration into the EU. “Its right we stuck to

our values,” Clegg said. In Germany, the main winner was the Euro-skeptic Alternative for Germany (AfD), which was founded only a year ago and won a respectable 7% of the vote. The AfD says it is anti-Euro, but not anti-EU. Party leader Bernd Lucke, an economics professor, argues that the single currency is fundamentally flawed and that southern European countries should be evicted from the Euro-zone. Also in Germany, the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) won its first EU seat. Elsewhere in Europe, the Danish People’s Party became the biggest in Denmark with about 25% of the vote. In Austria, the nationalist Freedom Party (FPÖ) finished third with 20%, compared with 12.7% in 2009. The party, which campaigned with slogans such as “Too much EU is dumb,” picked up four seats, two more than in the last election. In Greece, the left-wing, anti-estab-

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

lishment Syriza [Coalition of the Radical Left] party came in first with 27% of the vote. Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras said Europe had taken “an important step for the end of the disastrous policies of austerity and the return of democracy. The people of Europe condemned the policies of austerity.” Also in Greece, the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn garnered 10% of the vote and will be sending two MEPs to Brussels for the first time. In Hungary, the ruling conservative Fidesz [Hungarian Civic Union] party won a massive victory, with nearly 52% of the vote and 12 seats in the European Parliament. The far-right Jobbik came in second, garnering 15% of the vote. In the Netherlands, the Freedom Party (PVV) led by Geert Wilders came in second, winning four seats. In Spain, opposition leader Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said he was stepping down after his Socialist Party had its worst-ever election result. The Socialists

committees will give the anti-EU parties an important new platform on which they can sell their message. In the end, it remains to be seen how the anti-establishment victories will impact the European Union. So far Europe’s ruling class appears content to ignore or ridicule them. Jean-Claude Juncker, the former prime minister of Luxembourg and con-

Schaeuble as someone who supports the EU unconditionally, Philippot added: “Those kind of people no longer respect the ballot box.” Speaking after a May 26 meeting of EU leaders in Brussels to assess the election results, UKIP leader Nigel Farage said that despite the election results, it felt like “business as usual.” “We’ve just had a quite dramatic Eu-

The main task for Euro-skeptic parties now will be to form an official European Parliament political group, which would unlock EU funding and open up seats on committees, and thus ensure a stronger position in parliamentary procedure. summate European insider who is on a short list of candidates to become the next president of the European Commission (the administrative arm of the EU) had this to say about the election results, “The extreme right, contrary to what some of the media has said, did not win this election. We will have a clear proEuropean majority in this house.” For his part, the outgoing head of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, shifted blame for the EU’s unpopularity by accusing mainstream politicians of stirring up anti-European sentiments. “If you spend all week blaming Europe, you can’t ask people to vote for Europe on Sunday,” he said in an interview with the Financial Times. German Chancellor Angela Merkel described the rise of the Euro-skeptic parties as “regrettable” while German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Le Pen’s FN party was “fascist” and “extremist.” FN Vice President Florian Philippot urged President Hollande to summon the German ambassador in Paris over Schaeuble’s remarks. “It’s not up to a minister of another country, a German minister, to tell the French how to vote,” he told France 5 television. Referring to

ropean election, with new skeptical parties, some new extreme nationalist parties, a massive spectrum, from the left to the center to the right,” he said. “You know, there is a big dissident voice now in this parliament. And yet, I’ve just sat in a meeting where you wouldn’t have thought anything had happened at all.” In an essay published by The Guardian, the pro-European British historian Timothy Garton Ash says it should now be clear to everyone that “the old politics is no longer the answer” and that if the European Union hopes to survive, it should focus on one thing: implementing policies that promote job creation. But Garton Ash is not hopeful: “I have a dreadful feeling in my bones that future historians may write of the May 2014 elections: ‘This was the wake-up call from which Europe failed to wake up.’”

Soeren Kern: European Elections: “No to Europe, Yes to Europe”

lost nine of their 23 seats in the European Parliament while the ruling center-right People’s Party lost eight of its 24 seats. The big winner in Spain’s elections was an upstart leftist group called Podemos (“We Can”). The anti-establishment, anti-austerity party, founded in February, grabbed 8% of the vote and secured five seats. Podemos wants to prevent companies from firing employees, introduce a 35-hour workweek, and redistribute wages. It also wants to abolish private hospitals to return to a fully statecontrolled health care system. The main task for Euro-skeptic parties now will be to form an official European Parliament political group, which would unlock EU funding and open up seats on committees, and thus ensure a stronger position in parliamentary procedure. An official group requires at least 25 seats across seven countries. But given the wide range of interests and ideological persuasions, this may be a challenge. Some Euro-skeptic parties have pledged not to work with far-right parties, presumably in an effort not to alienate mainstream voters. The UKIP and the Danish People’s Party have distanced themselves from Le Pen, who has cemented an alliance with the Dutch Freedom Party. At the same time, Le Pen has said she will not enter into alliance with Greece’s Golden Dawn or Hungary’s Jobbik. In Germany, the leader of the AfD says he does not want to be in a coalition with Euro-skeptics of any kind, and will instead begin talks with other conservative parties. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel has ruled out any cooperation with AfD. Even if the anti-EU parties are upgraded to become an official political group within the European Parliament, they will still be outnumbered by the proEU parties by a wide margin. Moreover, the establishment parties may enter into a grand coalition of their own as a way to keep the anti-establishment parties at bay. But the opportunity to speak in parliamentary debates and chair certain

Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute and Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Stimulus or Austerity? The European Debt Crisis by Salim Furth

here is a well-known narrative that compares Europe’s recent economic history to that of the United States. The story goes that Europe enacted too little stimulus spending during the Great Recession of 2008–2009 and then turned to severe spending cuts afterward, triggering a second recession and leaving their economies far behind even the mediocre American recovery. However, not one aspect of the narrative is accurate. In a recent Heritage Foundation Special Report, Europe’s Fiscal Crisis Revealed, my co-authors and I debunk several of the common assumptions surrounding the European debt crisis. First, the U.S. and European governments exhibited similar spending increases during the height of the economic crisis, 2007-2009. In fact, the double-dip recessions in Europe did not begin in the most austere countries, but instead in the most profligate countries, such as Greece. Second, neither the United States nor most major European economies have implemented particularly austere fiscal policies. Finally, crisis countries aside, Europe’s healthier economies have experienced revivals similar to that of the United States. Since 2009, the American and German economies have grown by 11 percent, the United Kingdom by 8 percent, France by 7 percent, and Sweden by 15 percent. Many “austerity” policies have mostly involved merely the expiration of stimulus spending and temporary tax cuts. There is not much to be learned from the differences between the U.S. and Europe in policy or economic outcomes because those differences are small. Instead,

one can draw lessons from the diverse policy choices and economic outcome among European countries and other developed economies.

z Profligate or Austere?

One surprising feature of the data is how difficult it would be to lump countries into “Keynesian” (borrow and spend) or “austere” (tax and cut) categories. Economists believe that higher tax rates result in lower growth and that government spending results in temporary GDP growth, although it will crowd out the private sector in the long run.

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

In crises like the recent ones, the causal relationships can run in the opposite direction, too: straitened governments are forced into deficit reduction. Thus, unsurprisingly, GDP growth from 2007 to 2012 is positively correlated with spending and negatively correlated with the revenue rate over the same period. These correlations remain even after limiting consideration to countries that experienced positive GDP growth. One would thus reasonably expect that spending and tax rates are negatively correlated. In a crisis, the story goes, a country is either Keynesian or austere. Much of the

z Austerity Eurozone?

International Monetary Fund (IMF) data on deficit reduction reveals little geographic regularity. The three largest reductions were in Euro members Greece, Portugal, and Ireland. Spain’s budget cuts were similar to those of Romania and Iceland, non-Euro countries that experienced crises. The group of “crisis countries” consists of those that experienced sharp increases in their borrowing costs, reflecting investor worries about their willingness to repay. Most countries that ended up making major cuts did so after their borrowing costs started spiraling upward. According to the IMF report, the U.S. and Poland had greater deficit reduction than the U.K. and Italy, though the latter are often considered austere and the former Keynesian. The bulk of the Eurozone economy—Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, and Belgium—consolidated by a mere 1 percent of GDP. Finland acted like its non-Euro neighbors Sweden and Denmark in continuing expansionary policy.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) data on government spending also shows that several Eurozone crisis countries significantly cut spending from 2010 to 2012: Portugal, Spain, and Greece reduced spending by at least 3 percent of GDP. But even in the post-recession years, the core of the Eurozone did not decrease spending much. Government spending fell 1.4 percent of GDP in the Netherlands and 0.1 percent of GDP in France, but rose slightly in Austria, Belgium, and Germany. The OECD data is summarized in Table 1. Outside the Eurozone, spending rose during the recession and then stayed the same on average afterward. Post-recession spending cuts were concentrated in former Warsaw Pact countries. Revenue changes, however, show that the Eurozone engaged in a general shift toward higher taxation, unlike nonEurozone countries. Whereas non-Euro countries on average cut taxes during the Great Recession and then edged them back up afterwards, Eurozone countries raised taxes during the Great Recession and continued to raise them afterwards. During 2007–2012, the 12 non-Euro countries increased spending by 1.8 percent of GDP and cut the revenue rate by 1.2 points on average. The 10 Euro countries increased spending by 2.0 percent of GDP and revenue rates by 1.8 points.

Europe as such has not engaged in severe deficit reduction, although several European countries have done so. Claims that the U.S. economy is outpacing Europe’s due to the former’s lack of austerity are unconvincing. The Eurozone’s steadily rising revenue rates and spending totals distinguish it from the rest of the developed world and from some popular narratives of the Eurozone’s recent history. Explanations for the Eurozone’s economic performance should take the data into account.

Salim Furth: Stimulus or Austerity? The European Debt Crisis

familiar narrative is built around this assumed taxonomy. Instead, taxes and spending are positively correlated (0.16) across countries. While there are examples of Keynesian and austere countries, these are the exceptions, not the rule. Chart 1 shows that every combination of fiscal policies has been tried and that the most common combination has been rising taxes and rising core spending. Europe’s three largest economies followed that pattern. Far from cutting government to the bone, most countries in Europe expanded the role of government in the economy. In addition to the lack of a clear relationship between tax and spending policies, different measures of fiscal policy often give different results. Even in some countries that suffered large crises and made large and decisive policy changes, sources disagree on the magnitudes. And no matter what one’s economic philosophy, no country has been a paragon of good policy.

z Is Austerity Coming?

If serious spending cuts have not yet happened in Europe should observers conclude that the cuts must still come? One interpretation of recent history is that Southern Europe was just a few years ahead in terms of debt, deficits, and unfunded entitlements. But recent history ultimately gives few clues for the future. Long-term fiscal imbalances are driven by entitlements and demographics, not recent shifts in discretionary spending. And the focus on changes in fiscal policy since 2007 obscures large differences across countries in tax and spending levels. It turns out to be very difficult to accurately measure long-term fiscal imbalances. For example, estimates of longterm imbalance published by the EU are uncorrelated with estimates published by Jagadeesh Gokhale of the Cato Institute.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

The EU’s estimates change a great deal with each update, indicating that they are sensitive to short-run changes in policy or the business cycle. Thus, although one expects the countries with the greatest fiscal imbalances to face fiscal crises soonest, identifying those countries is not easy. More importantly, austerity in the midst of a debt crisis is neither the only nor the best way to resolve persistent fiscal imbalances. Several countries have demonstrated that tax reform and moderate adjustments to entitlements can improve growth, decrease obligations, and preserve revenue. In the Special Report, Romina Boccia chronicles how labor market and unemployment insurance reforms that encouraged work have made the German economy a dynamic leader in Europe again. While most unemployment rates in Europe have drifted higher, Germany’s has fallen from 9 percent in 2007 to 5 percent this year, with only a brief setback during the recession. The German labor market success is a reminder that policy details matter in ways that are not captured by aggregate measures. Malin Sahlen’s profile of Sweden in the Special Report shows that even in a major depression, such as Sweden’s in the early 1990s, structural reforms are possible. The well-known strength of the modern Swedish economy owes a great deal to tax reform and budget discipline enacted at the bottom of a major crisis. Just as the Great Recession and debt crisis of 2007-2012 did not provoke a unitary response across Europe, future deficit cuts are likely to transpire piecemeal. When opportunities for deficit reduction and structural reform arise, however, we do know which approaches are most likely to succeed in curbing debt and encouraging growth.

z Deficit Reduction and Growth: Historical Evidence

One of the main lessons of the scholarly literature on deficit reduction is that it is a mistake to lump together tax increases and spending cuts. In the Special

Report, Alberto Alesina and Veronique de Rugy review the last two decades of academic writing on deficit reduction, which they term “fiscal adjustment”: [Economists] seem to have recently reached a consensus that spending-based fiscal adjustments are not only more likely to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio than taxbased adjustment, but also less likely to trigger a recession. In fact, if accompanied by the right type of policies—especially changes in public employees’ pay and public pension reforms—spending-based adjustments can actually contribute to eco-

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

nomic growth.... However, it is important to refrain from oversimplifying these results because fiscal adjustment packages are often complex and multiyear affairs. Many successful (i.e., expansionary and debt reducing) fiscal adjustments in this literature are ones in which exports led growth when the rest of the global economy was healthy or even booming. While there has been some recovery in the midst of the recession, we should recognize that achieving export-led growth may be much harder today when many countries are struggling.

The Jewish Policy Center Board

more finding helpful once left office.Deficit remain of theheliterature: Lula’sby influence Argentina’s leftductions cutting with spending are much wingharmful presidenttoCristina was key less growthKirchner than tax-based to the reductions. UDI effort. However, Argentinaa issingle homeepito deficit Latin America’s largest Jewish commusode should never be over-interpreted, nity,this making a challenge for the lobbyand is no itexception. ing effort. Buttotal a simultaneous Because deficit cutsdiplomatic (as meaeffort by Muaqqat, veteran Palessured by Walid the IMF Fiscal aMonitor) were tinian diplomat in the region, convinced uncorrelated with the composition of the Argentine government to taxation), announce deficit cuts (spending versus of a Palestinian ititsisendorsement at least reasonable to lookstate, for also difin December 2010. ferential effects of taxes and spending on The Washington in Febgrowth. When usingPost a reported straightforward ruary that this “was aone strategy Palestinian regression analysis, discovers that diplomats across the continent one dollar repeated of tax increases was associlast year, advantage of theinregion’s ated withtaking two dollars less GDP 2012, growing economic ties to the Arab world and one dollar of spending cuts only deand eagerness its indecreased GDP byto70demonstrate cents. Furthermore, pendence Israel’s powerful ally,govthe there was from no correlation between United States. ” The Argentina endorseernment spending and private-sector ment,as coupled that GDP, seen inwith Chart 2. of Brazil, started a “me too”another cascade,approach, with countries like Using a country Chile, a strong allyincreases of the U.S. headed that relied on tax forand 80 percent byits a right-wing government, quickly anof deficit reduction had grown 3.1 pernouncing their endorsement of statehood centage points less than a country that reas well. lied on spending cuts for 80 percent of its Thereduction. Washington Post article deficit The estimated effectalso is quotedbut Nabil the Commissioner of large, it isShaath, also imprecise. International Relations for Fatah, saying, “Our next target is Western Europe. I think

Chairman: Richard Fox Honorary Chairman: Sheldon B. Kamins Vice Chairmen: Marshall J. Breger Michael David Epstein General Counsel: Jeffrey P. Altman

is a lot of readiness in Western Euzthere Conclusion

ropeThe to recognize an independent Palestinbest alternative to austerity is for ian state.” Indeed, thenational PA next finances set its sights governments to run soon theSmall EU, surpluses interestedduring in building upon berly. good times its success Latin during Americarecessions to convince and modestindeficits alenough members to alsoof support low future generations votersthe theUDI. opportunity to govern themselves as they z Soft opting Subversion at for Play choose, and paying the governThe vote for Palestinian statehood at ment of their choice. the UN is largely choose symbolic designed If Europeans to and expand govto create and an international impetusshows for a ernment raise taxes, history boycott campaign to presthat theyand candivestment expect fiscal conditions to sure Israel to accept untenable borders in worsen and high unemployment to ensue. anycontrast, final agreement. But thebased passage of By deficit reduction on tax the UDI liberalizing will upend decades of diplomatic reform, labor markets, narwork bywelfare the United States benefits, and Europe rowing and pension and to forge an agreement that first requires cutting spending offer a reasonable chance recognition of Israel’s rightbalance. to exist, and of rapid recovery and fiscal might actually stand a chance of creating a sustainable peace speed Salim Furth Ph.D. is a deal. SeniorThe Policy Anat which both the U.S. and Israel adapt to alyst for the Institute for Economic Freedom counter these softat subversion tactics will and Opportunity The Heritage Foundadetermine whether there is any chanceapfor tion. A version of this article originally peace, in ortwo whether misguided diplomacy, peared Heritage Foundation publicaonce again, willFiscal lead toCrisis war. Revealed: An tions: Europe’s In-Depth Analysis of Spending, Austerity, JONGrowth B. PERDUE is the or director of Latin and and Stimulus Austerity? FisAmerica at the Fund for cal Policyprograms in the Great Recession andAmeriEurocan Studies, and is the author of the forthpean Debt Crisis. coming book, The War of All the People.

Jon B. Perdue: Soft Subversion and Palestinian Statehood Salim Furth: Stimulus or Austerity? The European Debt Crisis

lomat was also austerity quoted saying thatspendLula’s While based on Middle wasthe “transparing East cuts freelancing can be costly, cost of ent” well-designed and only designed to gainplans support adjustments will for abe spot on the Security Council. low.... [T]he alternative for certain countries could be a very messy debt z Supporting the UDI crisis. Brazil under Lula became the first to unilaterally endorse a Palestinian state (inPresenting research at The Heritage side Israel’s pre-1967 borders) in Foundation in October 2013, DecemDaniel ber 2010, which the time Leigh of the IMFatshowed thatundermined he and his U.S. negotiations Israel and the colleagues estimatebetween that tax-based deficit Palestinians.leadHeto was responsible reductions three also or four times as for convincing presidents of much decline inthe consumption andArgengross tina and Uruguay a Palestinian domestic product to as endorse spending-based defstate, and prompted Uruguay to sponsor icit reductions. two summits in support of thepapers proposal. Of four recent scholarly that The Palestinians’ quiet campaign in estimate the growth effects of both taxes Uruguay has since come underyears, greaterthree scruand spending over several tiny after Iran’s charge Hojjatollah found that taxes haved’affaires, a stronger impact Soltani, denied the in a public on the economy andHolocaust one had ambiguous speech at the Uruguay-Sweden results. There is a growing bodyCultural of eviCenterthat in Montevideo. “They (thespendNazis) dence increasing government killed perhaps few thousand Jews, but that ing does littlea good and cutting it does number of millions ... is a lie,” Soltani told little harm. those gathered at the event. Lula was also the progenitor z Deficit Reduction and of the first Summit of South American-Arab Growth: Recent Evidence Countries (ASPA from by itsfiscal Portuguese and The evidence policy over Spanish initials) in 2005, where he asthe past five years tends to confirm the sured Abbas that he would become even

Board of Fellows: Richard Baehr, William J. Bennett, Mona Charen, Midge Decter, David Frum, Rabbi Joshua Haberman, David Horowitz, Rabbi Daniel Lapin, Michael A. Ledeen, Michael Medved, Larry Miller, David Novak, Daniel Pipes, John Podhoretz, Norman Podhoretz, Dennis Prager, Tevi Troy, Ruth Wisse

Board of Trustees: Diana Epstein, Cheryl Halpern, Joel Hoppenstein, Eliot Lauer, Mark L. Lezell, Herman Obermayer, J. Philip Rosen, Walter Stern

Fall 2011Examines | inFocus: A Palestinian Fall 2014 | inFocus Europe: Whole andState? Free?

11 19

NATO: Meeting Challenges in a Complex Environment An inFOCUS Interview with Chairman Ed Royce U.S. Representative Ed Royce serves as Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee—on which he has served since entering Congress in 1993. A staunch supporter of Israel and an important voice on confronting ISIS, Chairman Royce previously served as Chairman of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade, and was a member of the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific. inFOCUS Editor Shoshana Bryen caught up with him in Washington shortly after a visit to Israel. The conversation focused on NATO and its ability to meet the demands of security in an increasingly complex age.

inFOCUS: The crisis in Ukraine is the second Russian foray into independent countries that are former Russian territories, the 2008 Georgian war being the first. Do you see Russia having further designs on the territory of its former provinces? If so, how can the U.S. and Europeans discourage Russian adventurism? Ed Royce: The U.S. has always strongly supported the right of all countries to determine their own futures within their internationally recognized borders, especially those countries such as Ukraine and Georgia that once were part of the former Soviet Union. United States assistance has supported democratic development and free market economies, as these are prerequisites to stability and security in every country. Trade between the U.S. or Western Europe and these countries is one of the surest ways to enhance our ties with them and further their development. The U.S. could dramatically support Ukraine if we were to export our abundant natural gas supply, lessening the country’s depen-

dence on Russia for its energy. Putin has demonstrated that his goal is to reestablish the role of Russia as a “Great Power” with the right to dominate the countries of the former empire. He has stated that Russia has the right and duty to defend ethnic Russian populations in other countries, such as Ukraine. There are a number of countries that were once part of the Soviet Union and which have ethnic Russian minorities, the most important being Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Kazakhstan. A massive Russian propaganda machine is sowing discontent in these countries. The U.S. and its allies, especially in Europe, must make clear to Putin that his efforts to undermine the sovereignty and territorial integrity of other countries under any pretext will result in the imposition of sanctions and other measures that will isolate him and place unbearable pressure on his country.

iF: Would you support continued NATO enlargement into the Balkans, or even into former Russian territory such as Ukraine or Georgia?

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

ER: This alliance has been, and always will be, about collective defense, and we should be cautious about making sacrosanct defense commitments far from our shores. If NATO had admitted Ukraine or Georgia, then the U.S. and its European allies may have found themselves at war with Russia. Making commitments that we may not be prepared to carry out also holds the inherent danger of encouraging some foreign leaders to miscalculate their actions. We don’t want a situation in which faith in NATO’s defense commitments are eroded. At a time when several of our European allies have cut their defense budgets below responsible levels and our own defense budget is under increasing pressure, the U.S. should not seek to expand our commitments to where there is little or no threat to U.S. interests. Our focus should be on ensuring that we can meet our existing commitments to our allies and our allies to us. We can still provide security assistance to non-NATO members, as we have. We just need to be careful in extending absolute defense commitments.

iF: NATO was conceived as an

ER: Our European allies have slashed their defense spending well below responsible levels and are even losing basic capabilities to defend themselves. Only four NATO members currently meet the requirement of spending 2 percent of GDP on defense, one of which is the U.S. So it is difficult to see more NATO operations outside of Europe. Several of our NATO allies have made significant contributions to our efforts in Afghanistan, but similar missions in the future are increasingly unlikely. Despite the pressures on the U.S. defense budget, we have managed to maintain our ability to carry out our commitments to our NATO allies. Russian aggression against Ukraine and other countries has highlighted the danger created by our European allies slashing their defense budgets. Our allies, and not just the U.S., must commit to maintaining adequate defenses for their own and the collective defense.

iF: Do you foresee further American disengagement from Europe given a) the limitations on the American budget and b) the lack of direct threat posed to the United States from Europe? ER: Despite sequestration and other constraints to the defense budget, the United States has prioritized funding our commitments to the NATO alliance, and I believe we will continue to do so. The

recent aggressive actions by Russia in Ukraine and throughout Eastern Europe have had the additional impact of emphasizing how critical it is that the United States remains involved in the region as a demonstration of our Article V NATO Treaty obligation. Our strong transatlantic relationship is the cornerstone for U.S. security, therefore I do not believe we’ll see reductions in the U.S. military contribution to NATO. In fact, at the recent NATO Summit in Wales the United States and other partners agreed to bolster NATO’s “rapid reaction force” to strengthen deterrence and reassure worried member states.

iF: Could European concerns about ISIS and radical jihadists returning from Iraq/Syria create movement in Europe for joint US-European action against ISIS? ER: The return of radicalized European Islamists from the conflicts in Iraq and Syria is a security concern both for Europe and the United States. I do believe that there are opportunities for enhanced cooperation against ISIS. Several European nations have already agreed to join a coalition with the United States to fight against ISIS forces, and those who may not be able or willing to engage ISIS militarily can strengthen the coalition’s efforts by increased intelligence sharing and logistical support. Such increased cooperation between the U.S. and Europe is needed, but equally important is the need for greater intelligence sharing among European nations themselves, particularly in regard to their own citizens who have been radicalized while fighting abroad with ISIL. This was unfortunately illustrated by Frenchman Mehdi Nemmouche, a member of ISIL, who had fought in Syria and is currently detained by Belgian authorities for a deadly shooting at the Holocaust Museum in Brussels. Nemmouche was able to travel freely throughout Europe on his return from Syria despite being on France’s

terrorist watch list. He was only detained after a random border drug search found the weapons he used in the shooting at the museum in his luggage. If his inclusion on France’s terror watch list had been adequately shared with other European nations, he would never have been allowed to travel through Europe so freely. Greater transparency and information sharing of national terror watch lists is therefore critical for Europe to effectively combat this growing threat.

interview with Chairman Ed Royce

alliance to prevent the westward movement of the Soviet Union, but even with the collapse of the USSR, NATO remains a cornerstone of our defense policy. You mentioned the defense spending cuts. How can the U.S. encourage NATO allies to fund important initiatives while sequestration has made the U.S. defense budget shrink for now and for the foreseeable future?

iF: Can you talk about our NATO ally Turkey? ER: I’m very worried about the direction of Turkey. If Turkey is to become a more central part of Europe, European ideals and principles must be the foundation of its government’s policies. Unfortunately, the recent trend in Turkey has been to actively curtail those very ideals of democracy, free expression, religious liberty, and tolerance. Furthermore, greater integration with the European Union will only be possible once Turkey ends its hostility towards EU member-states, specifically Greece and Cyprus. While there has been some rhetorical show of support in Ankara for reconciliation efforts on Cyprus in recent months, Turkey must follow through with concrete actions to end its aggressive posturing in the Aegean, stop its harassment of Cypriot merchant and energy exploration vessels, open its ports to Cypriot flagged vessels, and commit its full, unqualified support for the reunification efforts on Cyprus, including the agreement to withdraw its military troops from the island. These efforts need to be undertaken before Turkey’s process towards integration with the EU advances. It’s disappointing to watch the Turkish-Israeli relationship derail. Previous efforts such as official statements and bilateral meetings have obviously not been enough to persuade Turkey to remove its opposition. We must continue and increase those diplomatic efforts. In addition, we should make clear to Turkish

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

leaders that continued opposition may be reflected in our military aid relationship. Also, we should increase our military cooperation with Israel, including conduct of more bilateral or multilateral military exercises with Israel outside of the NATO context. I was just in Israel where I discussed with Israeli officials the tremendous success of the Iron Dome rocket defense system, a joint U.S.-Israel undertaking. The two countries can do even more together in this area. I was also in one of the Gaza tunnels. The U.S. and Israel should be cooperating more on new technologies to detect Hamas’ tunnels into Israel. But we must not lose sight of the fact that this is a symptom of a larger problem—the overall deterioration of Turkish-Israeli relations. Many observers state that those ties began to unravel following the 2010 Mavi Marmara incident, but I believe they began long before that. Just look at how since coming to power the AKP has hosted Hamas leaders on official “state visits” and the time in Davos when then Prime Minister Erdogan called Israeli President Shimon Peres a leader who “really knows how to kill.” Furthermore, if relations were strained simply due to the flotilla incident, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s apology should have paved the way back to normalization of relations. Yet we continue to see Turkish leaders voice hateful rhetoric against Israel that incites violence against the Jewish community. Just this July, then-Prime Minister Erdogan claimed that Israel had “surpassed the Nazis in barbarism.” The United States cannot allow such heinous rhetoric to stand unchallenged. We must condemn such comments at every opportunity, and press Turkey to restore positive relations with Israel.

iF: Are you supporting the USEU free trade deal (TTIP)? How does it fit into overall U.S. economic and political interests? ER: I strongly support the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership

(TTIP) because it has the potential to boost U.S.-EU trade by more than $120 billion within five years, generate millions of new jobs, and reduce costs for consumers. TTIP is an opportunity we simply cannot afford to miss. I have encouraged the Obama Administration to intensify its negotiations with the European Union and send TTIP to Congress for approval as soon as possible. Closer cooperation between the U.S. and EU will lead to common approaches to resolving trade issues with other countries, to a stronger hand in our negotiations at the World Trade Organization, and ultimately to higher job and economic growth. With TTIP in place, we can more effectively push back on threats like the “indigenous innovation” policy in Beijing that continues to require our companies hand over valuable intellectual property and technology in order to access China’s market. Trade has an immense impact on my home state of California. Last year, more than $168 billion in goods were export-

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

ed through California ports, 17 percent of which were purchased by European Union countries.

iF: The major European allies were generally supportive of Israel’s response to Hamas rocket fire – but only to a point. How strong can U.S. support of Israel be absent the support of our major political and economic allies, the Europeans? ER: The United States has continued to stand strongly behind Israel in multiple UN and international bodies, and U.S. support for Israel will continue to be strong—particularly when faced with initiatives such as “BDS.” By working with our European counterparts, we can hope to change this dynamic. However, the Israelis are better suited to do so themselves. Israel is a bastion of free-market, democratic governance in a sea of autocracies and chaos.

iF: Could the advancement of ISIS encourage the Europeans (and the U.S.) to see Israel’s fight against Hamas in the same vein as the Western fight against ISIS? ER: Unfortunately, the ISIS threat may not change Europe’s view of Israel’s fight against Hamas, at least for now. The political dynamics in Europe are very different from those in the U.S. In fact, the very reasons that European governments are so vocally opposed to ISIS—in part, public opinion influenced by their Muslim population—are the same reasons they tend to be critical of Israeli strikes in against Hamas targets in Gaza. Further complicating these issues is the fact that Americans are much more likely to consider Hamas a terrorist organization, while European governments are more willing to accept Hamas as a political organization, at times even providing them with direct foreign aid. However, I believe the Europeans, the United States and Israel can see the wisdom of aligning our policies to prevent Hamas from rearming; in the same manner that we are examining ways to

deny ISIS the resources necessary to continue its operations. Reports indicate that Hamas has started to rebuild its military capabilities, including rebuilding tunnels and rockets. Now is the time to act. We must proactively target their sources of financing. Qatar, which hosts Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal, has been identified by various sources as Hamas’s main external source of funding. Turkey has also been named in many instances as a financial backer of Hamas and alleged host for major Hamas fundraisers. We need the help of our European allies to address this problem. And then there is Iranian and North Korean support for Hamas. We need their help in ensuring that any long-term agreement guarantees that Hamas cannot replenish its arsenal of rockets or rebuild the tunnels it uses to attack Israel. I have been in one of these tunnels and they present a serious threat to our ally. In fact, our mutual goal must be the dismantlement of the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza—particularly in any UN Security Council Resolution creating a framework for Gaza. A critical component of this strategy is working with our European allies to target Hamas’ logistical and financial networks—and ultimately prevent them from acquiring the resources to rearm. It is frustrating that Hamas maintains the sympathy it does given that it abuses the Palestinian people, using them as human shields, murdering its Palestinian political opponents, spending money on rockets and tunnels and not books. In Europe, we see Hamas supporters leading the protest chants, “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas.” We all need to do a better job de-legitimizing this terrorist organization in Europe, but most importantly, among Palestinians. This will take time, but there will be no peace for Israel if it doesn’t happen.

iF: As we have discussed, antiSemitism has been rising in Europe for the past several years and the recent Gaza war ignited an explosion of anti-Semitic

rhetoric and violent behavior across European cities. Do you see the potential for a rift between the United States and our European allies over antiSemitism? ER: I am concerned with a general rise in anti-Semitism in Europe, and, indeed globally. When Israel was forced to confront Hamas rockets earlier this year, it also had to contend with a multifaceted attempt to de-legitimatize the country around the globe. Once again, we see the UN Human Rights Council passing a one-sided resolution holding Israel to a different standard than the rest of the world. While the Administration voted against the resolution, many of our European allies merely abstained, leaving us and Israel very isolated. Too many countries take a callous attitude toward Israel with these votes. The effort made by the UN Human Rights Council must be seen in the context of rising anti-Semitism. In Germany and other European countries—especially France—Jews have been attacked on the street, synagogues have been bombed, Jewish groups have received hate mail and anti-Semitic slogans have been spraypainted on buildings. I am particularly concerned with how these sentiments feed into the recruitment ability of ISIS. For example, the French citizen suspected of killing four people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in May fought with ISIS forces in Syria, the very group that the U.S. is currently striking in Iraq and a fight that several European nations have agreed to join. The return of battle hardened fighters to Europe and the U.S. is a serious threat.

interview with Chairman Ed Royce

The Israelis have a dynamic and growing economy, which is clearly an asset to leverage with respect to Europe. For example, in the agricultural sector, Israel has not only made the desert bloom, but they have become a major exporter of agricultural commodities such as citrus to Europe. And now, with the continuing discoveries of non-associated gas, which has just come online, and associated gas and crude oil, Israel has the opportunity to not only become energy self-sufficient, but also a major energy exporter to Europe—a dynamic that could help reduce Europe’s vulnerability to Russian-supplied gas. The Europeans seem to misalign their economic interests and political proclivities. Working with Israel, we can help them understand the tangible benefits to maintaining close ties with the Jewish State.

iF: Chairman Royce, on behalf of The Jewish Policy Center and the readers of inFOCUS, I want to thank you for a thoughtful tour d’horizon that puts a number of important issues into perspective. We appreciate your time and your candor.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Non-Islamic anti-Semitism in Europe by Benjamin Weinthal

(Berlin) he wave of modern anti-Semitism across Europe in July and August revealed a dangerous amalgamation of left-wing, Islamic-animated, and right-wing extremist Jew-hatred. Mainstream Europeans remained largely indifferent to contemporary antiSemitism, namely, the hatred of the Jewish State surrounding Israel’s Operation Protective Edge. The firebombing of a synagogue in Wuppertal, Germany, along with protestors at mass rallies calling to “Gas the Jews” prompted scant outrage in German society. “There is a startling indifference in the German public to the current display of anti-Semitism,” said Samuel Salzborn, a leading expert on anti-Semitism at the University of Göttingen in Lower Saxony, in early August. The pressing question is, how can one explain Europe’s robust tolerance of Jew-hatred? This essay will begin by describing the social-psychological mechanism, in response to the Holocaust, driving nonIslamic anti-Semitism among Europeans. The core of a powerful explanatory model was developed by two German Jewish philosophers, Theodor Adorno (1903-1969) and Max Horkheimer (1895-1973). According to Adorno and Horkheimer’s post-Holocaust concept of “guilt-defensiveness anti-Semitism,” Germans react pathologically to Jews because of the reminder of the crimes of the Shoah. In the early 1960s Adorno adopted a new phrase for Germany’s response to the Holocaust: Secondary anti-Semitism. The Israeli psychoanalyst Zvi Rex neatly formulated Adorno and Hork-

heimer’s sociological theory in a biting, sarcastic sentence: The Germans will never forgive the Jews for Auschwitz. To understand the modernized version of guilt-defensiveness anti-Semitism, the role of Israel as the whipping boy for Europe’s bad conscience must be recognized. While it was politically and socially incorrect in post-Holocaust Europe to attack Jews, Israel rapidly became the collective embodiment of the “Nazified Jew” of the Hitler movement. The late French historian Léon Poliakov neatly captured this form of modern anti-Semitism: Israel is the “Jew among the nations.” There were some rare moments of

an independent state in any part of their ancestral homeland — and anti-Judaism, already reed-thin, has pretty much vanished,” the American Middle East expert Jeffrey Goldberg noted. The interplay between Europe’s complicity in the Holocaust and its tolerance for hatred of the Jewish State remains a sparsely researched topic. One of the few to do so has been Daniel J. Goldhagen. In his seminal 2013 book The Devil That Never Dies: The Rise and Threat of Global Anti-Semitism, Goldhagen writes: “The critical importance of Europeans’ displacement of guilt onto Israel and its Jews by Nazifying them is still greater. It creates a direct bond with

To understand the modernized version of guilt-defensiveness anti-Semitism, the role of Israel as the whipping boy for Europe’s bad conscience must be recognized. political clarity about the inner workings of anti-Semitism surrounding Israel’s Operation Protective Edge during the summer. French Prime Minister Manuel Valls argued that classical anti-Semitism has repackaged itself, and “feeds off hate for Israel. It feeds off anti-Zionism because anti-Zionism is an invitation to anti-Semitism.” Valls’s voice was a rare one among Europe’s political leaders. In a post-Operation Protective Edge world, it is no longer possible to decouple antiSemitism from hatred of Israel. “The line separating anti-Zionism — the belief that Jews have no right to

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

Arab and Islamic anti-Semites of a shared demonizing of Israel and Jews, and allows the two regional discourses to overlap, meaning in particular that it makes Europeans immediately more receptive to the virulently anti-Semitic Arab and Islamic discourse about Jews and particularly about Israel.” The ubiquitous comparison of Israel to Nazi Germany at European anti-Israel rallies during Operation Protective Edge had a basis in elite opinion. Take the example of Jakob Augstein, a principal owner of the German news weekly Der Spiegel, who invoked the word “camp”

Benjamin Weinthal: Non-Islamic anti-Semitism in Europe

Desecrated graves in the main Jewish cemetery of Strasbourg, France, in 2010. (Photo by AP/Christian Lutz) in a 2012 Spiegel Online column, which conjured up the image of extermination camp in German, to describe the Palestinians’ conditions in the Gaza Strip. Augstein’s emotional hostility toward Jews, Israel and America was typified by such assertions: “With backing from the U.S., where the president must secure the support of Jewish lobby groups, and in Germany, where coping with history, in the meantime, has a military component, the Netanyahu government keeps the world on a leash with an ever-swelling war chant,” he wrote. The Simon Wiesenthal Center included Augstein in its list of the top ten anti-Semitic slurs of 2012. Augstein is, of course, not an anomaly. He, along with many other writers and opinion makers in the European intelligentsia, has contributed to a solid foundation for the anti-Jewish vitriol that unfolded during Israel’s 50-day war of self-defense to stop Hamas from firing rockets at civilian communities. As the distinguished Boston University historian Dr. Richard Landes has argued, the seeds of projecting Holocaust guilt onto Israel to cleanse one’s conscience were planted during the 2000

Muhammad al-Dura affair. European critics rushed to judgment, accusing Israeli soldiers of murdering the Palestinian boy during the Second Intifada. An image purporting to show alDura’s father using his body to shield him from gunfire electrified the international community. Convincing evidence later showed that al-Dura’s death was manufactured by Palestinians to garner world sympathy. However, the French journalist Catherine Nay seized on the alleged death, declaring, “The death of Muhammad cancels out, erases that of the Jewish child, his hands in the air from the SS in the Warsaw Ghetto.” Perhaps the literary work that best expresses, in stark terms, the phenomenon of guilt-defensiveness anti-Semitism in Germany is the play Garbage, the City, and Death, written in 1975 by the film director and writer Rainer Werner Fassbinder: “And it’s the Jew’s fault, because he makes us feel guilty because he exists. If he’d stayed where he came from, or if they’d gassed him, I would sleep better.” The metamorphosis from “It’s the Jew’s fault” to “It’s Israel’s fault” is reinforced ad nauseam in European discourse

on the Middle East. With anti-Israelism raging in Germany during Operation Protective Edge, a non-Jewish supporter of Israel became a victim of the anti-Semitic guilt complex. Gitta Connemann, a vice president of the German-Israel friendship society and a Christian Democratic Union deputy in the Bundestag, was attacked in emails as a “Jewish whore.” A trade union in her district of Emsland withdrew its invitation for her to speak at a memorial event at a former concentration camp. The heavy-handed attacks on Connemann were triggered by her support for Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas rockets. “Hamas terrorists use schools and senior centers to store rockets, misuse women and children as human shields. Israel takes great measures to protect these civilians,” she said. Anti-Semites “Jewified” Connemann because of her support for Israel. Trade union leaders viewed her as too pro-Jewish state to deliver a speech at the former concentration camp. According to the labor union, it “expected a neutral position” from Connemann. With bitter irony, Eike Geisel (1945-1997), a critic of Germany’s

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

post-Holocaust remembrance culture, neatly summed up the dynamic of the trade union event: “The Jews, if they’re not dead, should please suffer, admonish and warn, but not fight back.” Expunging Connemann’s presence— a reminder of Jewish self-defense—from the concentration camp event because

a window into the soul of 21st-century German anti-Semitism: The modern anti-Semite looks entirely different. He does not have a shaved head. He has good manners and often an academic title as well. He mourns for the Jews who died in the Holocaust. But at the same

Animating Europe’s obsession with Israel is a defective emotional mechanism that seemingly defies logic but can be traced to effects of the destruction of European Jewry during the Holocaust. of her pro-Israel position suggests a new form of anti-Semitism, namely, so-called ethical behavior animated by anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism fueled by “morality” has gained considerable traction over the decades in Germany. Germany has gone to great lengths to ingrain the maxim of “Never Again” as a bulwark against repeating the crimes of the Holocaust. Scores of commemoration events take place each year to memorialize the Shoah. In September, Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke at a “Never Again—Jew Hatred” rally in front of the Brandenburg Gate in the heart of Berlin’s government district. Germany’s didactic effort to not repeat its jingoism and eliminatory antiSemitism has morphed into a kind of hubris and holier-than-thou attitude toward Israel. The writer Wolfgang Pohrt described the phenomenon as Germans acting as Israel’s probation officers to prevent “their victims from relapsing.” Putting aside Pohrt’s satiric form, he articulated the German societal expectation, albeit irrational, that the Jews (i.e., the victims) should have learned lessons from the Holocaust like the Germans (i.e., the perpetrators). Henryk M. Broder, a German Jewish author and columnist, is arguably the leading expert on contemporary antiSemitism in the country. He testified at a Bundestag hearing in 2008, and provided

time, he wonders why the survivors and their descendants have learned nothing from history and today treat another people as badly as they were once treated themselves. The modern anti-Semite does not believe in The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. But instead he fantasizes about an “Israel lobby” that is supposed to control American foreign policy like a tail that wags the dog. Broder’s characterization of the modern anti-Semite is also relevant for other European countries where there is a relentlessly intense preoccupation with demonizing the Jewish State among many academics and politicians. During Operation Protective Edge, the popular Italian philosopher Gianni Vattimo declared, “I’d like to shoot those bastard Zionists.” There is a long tradition of German politicians and intellectuals shifting the blame to Israel for Middle East violence. In 1991, a leading German Green Party deputy, Hans-Christian Ströbele, justified Saddam Hussein’s rocket attacks on Israel as a “logical, almost compelling consequence of Israel’s politics.” The same Green Party vigorously pursued a 2013 legislative initiative to demarcate Israeli products from the disputed territories. Former Green Party deputy Kerstin Müller, who now heads the party’s Heinrich Böll Foundation branch in Tel Aviv,

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

helped push the initiative in the Bundestag to label Israeli products. There were no other initiatives in the Bundestag to label products from countries where there are territorial disputes, including Turkey’s occupation of northern Cyprus. The European Union is considering a formal policy to label Israeli products from the disputed territories. Animating Europe’s obsession with Israel is a defective emotional mechanism that seemingly defies logic but can be traced to effects of the destruction of European Jewry during the Holocaust. European polling suggests that Adorno and Horkheimer’s theory carries weight. Studies over the last decade of German views toward the Jewish State reveal that nearly half (at times more than 50%) consider Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians to be the equivalent of the Nazi extermination of European Jewry. In 2012, 38% of Norwegians mirrored the German attitude toward Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. Adorno asserted, in commenting on the Holocaust in 1959: “We will not have come to terms with the past until the causes of what happened then are no longer active. Only because these causes live on does the spell of the past remain, to this very day, unbroken.” Adorno was grappling with Germany’s inability to confront the crimes of the Final Solution. He remained deeply pessimistic about the third-person plural “we” eradicating the “causes” of the Holocaust. To his despair, in the late 1960s he observed many German leftist students, who he had hoped would experience a change in their character structures, in how they related to others and to the environment, developing a raging contempt for the Jewish State. The cause continues, but the target (now Israel) has changed for Germany in particular and Europe in general. Benjamin Weinthal reports on European affairs for The Jerusalem Post and is a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow him on Twitter @BenWeinthal.

The Italian Exception: Defeating the Anti-Semites by Michael A. Ledeen

he headlines from Europe are all grim. Synagogues assaulted in France, Jews murdered at the Jewish Museum in Brussels and savagely beaten in the streets of Great Britain and Scandinavia, mobs of antiSemites demonstrating in the central squares, calling for the fulfillment of the Nazi “Final Solution.” As if that were not bad enough, antiSemitism is getting a new lease on life in countries such as Hungary, and public opinion polls show that Jew-hatred and negative Jewish stereotypes are very deeply embedded in Europe. No wonder thoughtful scholars including Michel Gurfinkiel and leaders of the quality of Jewish Agency President Natan Sharansky (“We are seeing the beginning of the end of Jewish history in Europe”) are predicting the doom of European Jewry. No wonder that there is a significant increase in European olim (immigrants to Israel). No wonder one hears more and more French in the streets of Israel. It remains to be seen if European anti-Semites will gain the upper hand, but in Italy, and especially in Rome— where the largest and oldest Jewish community lives—you will find a very different story. Italian Jews are flourishing, anti-Semites are the ones worried about physical conflict in the streets, and there is even a small, but growing, process of conversion to Judaism, especially in the south.

z Rome

The oldest remnant of a monotheistic house of worship in Europe is the Jewish synagogue at Ostia Antica, the

port of ancient Rome, testifying to the longstanding Jewish presence. There are no reliable statistics about ancient Roman Jews—guesstimates range from a few thousand to more than a million— but there was certainly a sizeable influx after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, and in the next century non-citizen Jews were expelled from Rome. The old Jewish neighborhood on the banks of the Tiber was originally a commercial center, and has remained a largely Jewish neighborhood until the present. Over the centuries, Roman Jews maintained a unique t’filah (prayer) and many claim that the ritual, and especially

ments of terrible Catholic, fascist and Nazi anti-Semitism, and two hundred years of being closed into the Ghetto area (the Ghetto walls came down in 1870), they have remained proud of their Roman identity. By the early twentieth century, Jews were well accepted in most areas of Italian life and there had been two Jewish prime ministers. During the first fifteen years of the fascist period, Jews held key positions in Italian universities, industry and banking, the arts, literature, and cinema. Mussolini had a Jewish mistress, Margherita Sarfatti. Anti-Semitic oppression returned with the passage of the Racial Laws in

By the early twentieth century, Jews were wellaccepted in most areas of Italian life and there had been two Jewish prime ministers. the music, is the closest exemplar of the celebrations in the Temple. Services in the big synagogue on the Tiber are certainly unique, and a succession of rabbis has maintained their integrity. Since the entry of Rome into the Italian State (1870), the Jewish population of the capital has apparently been stable at about 15,000 (out of a total national number of 45,000), its current estimated level. There was an influx of refugees from Libya in the 1950s that settled in the area around Piazza Bologna and remain an identifiable group, but that is the only meaningful demographic event. So the Roman Jewish community has a long tradition, and despite mo-

1938. Jews were excluded from many professions, subjected to public humiliation, and exiled to labor camps in remote areas (Carlo Levi’s novel, Christ Stopped at Eboli, tells a typical story with extraordinary sympathy). Recent literature has painted a much darker picture of Italian fascist anti-Semitism than had previously been presented, but even at its worst, fascist anti-Semitism was incomparably milder than the destruction of the European Jews elsewhere. Nonetheless, the fascists laid the groundwork for extension of the Holocaust into Italy following the overthrow of Mussolini in July 1943 and Italy’s agreement to join the Allies in the war. German troops, which

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

controlled large parts of Italy, immediately began to hunt down the Jews, a task greatly facilitated by a Jewish census in the summer of 1938. The Roman Jews were grievously diminished: on the night of October 18, 1943, 1,270 Jews were arrested, 235 of whom were released. It went very quickly. On the 23rd, 1,035 Jewish men, women and children arrived at Auschwitz-

Jewish Hospital was housed (and where, in total secrecy, Roman Jews celebrated Shabbat and the holidays throughout the Nazi occupation). The new t’filah and the revived Jewish schools went hand in hand with selfdefense. Moretto was a pure Roman and utterly fearless. Virtually alone, he fought fascist anti-Semites and gave courage to the community. During the Nazi occu-

In Italy, community leaders organized the self-defense group, and integrated it within an energetic program of religious and cultural training that contributes to the survival and revival of Italian Judaism. Birkenau and 839 were murdered in the gas chambers. Today, their names are on small brass plaques in the cobblestones in front of their residences. During the period between the Racial Laws and the end of the war, there was a tiny Jewish resistance in Rome, from which there emerged a full-fledged self-defense organization in the 1950s. The two key figures were the longtime chief rabbi, Elio Toaff (now retired, 99 years old) and a boxer and street fighter named Pacifico Di Consiglio, better known as “Moretto.” Toaff was born in Livorno on the Tuscan coast, became rabbi in Venice and went to Rome in 1951. In his public persona, Toaff was modest, unassuming, and careful to cultivate good working relations with the city’s political class and with the Vatican. Privately, he was the driving force of the Jewish underground, and the guru of a new generation of Roman Jews. Over time, Toaff moved the Jewish school from the other side of the Tiber into the old Ghetto area, recruited young teachers, and created a new ritual that incorporated some themes from outside the old Roman tradition. The young Romans frequented the Tempio dei Giovani, the Youth Synagogue, just a stone’s throw from the big synagogue, on the famous island in the river where the

pation he continued to fight, usually escaping from the SS after the street fights. He was arrested and tortured, but managed to escape, once jumping from a train headed north to the death camps. Moretto and Toaff worked together very closely, Moretto organizing the fighters who protected the schools, shops and synagogues of the Jewish Community to whom Toaff gave spiritual guidance. Over time, and especially after the murderous assault by Abu Nidal terrorists on the synagogue in 1982, Moretto’s organization increasingly attacked anti-Semitic groups, smashing their offices, seizing their documents, flags and posters, demonstrating in their neighborhoods, and intimidating the fascist sympathizers. Through most of these years, the Roman Jewish Community was governed by people with no stomach for this sort of conflict. They preferred to curry favor with the city’s overwhelmingly leftist and anti-Israel intelligentsia and political class. But in the early 2000s, the community was taken over by young people who had been raised by Toaff and Moretto, and today their leading figures—notably President Riccardo Pacifici—are outspoken Zionists who constantly denounce all who challenge Jews or Israel. When the Jewish Museum in Brussels was targeted by terrorists a few

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

months ago, the Romans kept their own museum open until midnight in solidarity with the Belgians, and organized a mass rally attended by the country’s political elite. And when three Israeli boys were kidnapped last summer, the Roman Jews organized a mass rally attended by more than a thousand people, including many famous non-Jews. In Rome, and elsewhere in Italy, the Jews have the upper hand over the antiSemites. Indeed, Jews, Jewish neighborhoods, and Jewish food have become very popular. The Ghetto neighborhood, which until quite recently was a working-class area, is now very desirable and bursting with activity. Rents and prices are high, lots of kosher restaurants have opened with great success (and the clientele is certainly not limited to observant Jews), and tourists—foreign and Italian—fill the streets. To be sure, there are Italian antiSemites and Israel-haters, and their public statements invariably make headlines for all the usual reasons. Yet, during the Gaza battle this summer, there were two big pro-Israel demonstrations, one in Rome and the other in Milan. The Rome demonstration was notable because it was in support of the Jews and Christians in the Middle East. In another significant event, plans for the Rome Shoah (Holocaust) Museum were approved, with the first exhibition already scheduled for next January. Finally, in yet another indicator of the strength of Italy’s Jewish community, the Italian Government recently expelled an Imam when he preached a radical sermon of the sort commonly heard in Islamist mosques. It was just the most recent of a series of crackdowns.

z Revival

The self-confidence of Italian Jews is reflected in an unexpected surge of interest in the religion itself, from believers and Christians as well. There are no fewer than eighteen synagogues in Rome, four in Milan, and new shuls (synagogues) are to be found in such

very surprising locations as Trani, a small town just outside Bari in the south. There, the concert pianist and researcher Francesco Lotoro—who converted to Judaism in 2004—convinced the authorities to permit him to take charge of one of the town’s oldest churches and turn it back into the synagogue it had been before the Inquisition, the Temple of Scolanova. Lotoro had a successful performing career, but his enduring contribution is to have collected, performed, arranged, and sometimes recorded thousands of musical compositions from the Holocaust camps. A decade ago, Lotoro decided to become a Jew. He told me he had been interested in, and attracted to, Judaism from the time he was 14 or 15 years old. His grandfather told him about family practices—such as washing hands before meals, not making the sign of the cross at church services, and baking white bread for the Sabbath—that suggested a Marrano background. Years later, he found archival evidence that his grandfather’s grandfather was officially considered to have come from a Jewish family. Lotoro’s is not the only such story. There is a trickle of conversion throughout the country, but especially in the

south, where people are finding evidence that their ancestors were originally Jewish and were forcibly converted to Catholicism during the Inquisition. This past March, Shalom Bahbout, at the time chief rabbi of Naples and Southern Italy (now chief rabbi of Venice), sent a letter to the governors of Sicily,

Michael A. Ledeen: The Italian Exception: Defeating the Anti-Semites

The Great Synagogue of Florence, Italy.

moting tolerance of all those considered different or outside the mainstream of society. Thus far, at least two of the governors have quietly informed their Jewish interlocutors that they will authorize the holiday. The south has attracted the interest of the Jerusalem-based Shavei Israel, which devotes its considerable talents and energies to “lost Jews” worldwide. Its president, Michael Freund, assisted by the former rabbi of Naples, Pinhas Punturello, has organized systematic contact with southern Italian Catholics who have reason to believe they are descendants of forced converts. Last June, they were involved in a very successful Shabbaton (Sabbath program) in the small town of San Nicandro, whose story of the mass conversion of nearly a hundred Catholics during and immediately after the fascist period has become the subject of several books and at least two documentary films. All this activity revolves around traditional Italian Judaism, and is either managed by, or through, official

The self-confidence of Italian Jews is reflected in an unexpected surge of interest in the religion itself, from believers and Christians as well. Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise, and Puglia—the old Spanish Viceroyalty—calling on them to institute an annual holiday for “research and memory” about the expulsion or forced conversion of the Jews from the former Kingdom of the Two Sicilies on Oct. 31, 1541. “The departure of those people, by all rights native Italians, created grave damage to the cultural, economic, and social patrimony of the southern regions,” Bahbout wrote. His letter stressed that remembering the episode—which is rarely studied or seriously discussed in schools and universities, if at all—was important not only for Jews, but for pro-

organizations such as the Union of Italian Jewish Communities. And there is more. An Italian-American Reform rabbi, Barbara Aiello, created a shul in the tiny town of Serrastretta, Calabria, from which her father immigrated to the United States a generation ago. Rabbi Aiello has led public ceremonies in the south, including a Bar Mitzvah in Sicily, only the third public Bar Mitzvah in Sicily since the Inquisition. Rabbi Aiello also managed the conversion of the celebrant, Vincenzo Uziel Li Calzi. When it proved too difficult to organize through an official rabbinate (Li Calzi’s poor health does not permit

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

him to travel, and the official standards for conversion are traditionally very high and challenging), she brought together three British rabbis who conducted the process by telephone.

With Jews under siege, the Italian case stands out as a remarkable counterexample. First and foremost, it is the story of a tiny community that has not only survived, but flourished, both in terms of physical security and religious enthusiasm. As always, a good deal of the explanation has to do with good leadership. From rabbis like Toaff (and his successor in Rome, Riccardo Di Segni) and Bahbout, to community leaders like Riccardo Pacifici, Italian Jewry has been blessed with brave, tough leaders. But there are other, broader elements, of which two seem particularly important.

governments with mixed results. As we see today, when national officials are either personally or politically reluctant to fight anti-Semites, or intimidated by them, the Jews are abandoned. Italians have a deep-seated distrust of government, and determined from the first post-war years to tend to their own defenses. The French, to take the classic example, have relied almost entirely on official security forces to protect them. This subverts efforts from within the community to prepare for dark days. When, in recent months French Jewish self-defense groups defended Parisian synagogues against virulent attacks, official Jewish spokesmen shunned them. In Italy, community leaders organized the self-defense group, and integrated it within an energetic program of religious and cultural training that contributes to the survival and revival of Italian Judaism.

1. The role of the state By and large, European Jews have entrusted their security to their national

2. The Jew as Victim Large Jewish organizations in both the old and new worlds devote enor-

z Lessons for European and American Jews

mous energy to publicizing anti-Semitism. This is not only proper, but indispensable; it is their raison d’etre. But their campaigns all too often consist of complaints about anti-Semites rather than vigorous action against them. The clearest example in this country is the intimidation of Jewish students and faculty on American college campuses. The Italians do not limit their efforts to public relations; they take the fight physically and politically to their enemies. Rabbis and community leaders are armed and trained, and while they work closely with local authorities, they know there will be times when they will have to defend themselves. At the June rally in support of the three kidnapped Israeli boys, Rome Community President Pacifici took the microphone and told the crowd, “We are not afraid.” You don’t hear such words in Paris, Brussels or Copenhagen. Michael Ledeen is Freedom Scholar, Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

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Wake-Up Europe: Radical Islam is Coming for You by Mitchell Bard

ccording to Professor Assaf Moghadam of the International Institute for Counterterrorism, radical Muslims have a threepronged enemies list of Jews, “apostate” Muslims, and the Christian nations of Europe. Israeli Jews are a principal target of the Islamists, but the extremists have had little success in their holy war against Israel. Iran and its allies, as well as ISIS have, however, made gains in battling the apostates in Syria, Iraq, and other Arab countries as the Arab Spring transformed into the Islamic Winter. Still, they have a long way to go before they can begin to reconstruct the Muslim Empire. In the meantime, radical Muslims already living in Europe form another front that is eating away at those secular democracies. The danger of the growth of radical Islam in Europe is, as French journalist Michel Gurfinkiel observes: …a philosophy and a way of life that reject democracy, the open society, and, needless to add, Jews. Islamists see Europe as an Islamicsociety-in-the-making; attempts by ethnic Europeans or by democratically-minded Muslims to reverse that process, or to reconcile Islam with European and democratic values, are regarded prima facie as “Islamophobia”: i.e., a Western war on Islam. Indeed, in the radical Islamic view, any objection or opposition to Islam or to the transformation of Western secular democracy into Islamic theocracy vindicates jihadism as a legitimate form of self-defense. European Muslims are a heteroge-

neous group, with representatives from around the world, many of whom do not agree on interpretations of Islam. Because of their colonial ties, France has a large population of Muslims from North Africa while Britain’s Muslims come mostly from Asia. France had a net influx of 66,000 Muslim immigrants in 2010 alone; the United Kingdom nearly 64,000. If current trends continue, with the non-Muslim population declining and the Muslim population growing exponentially, Pew forecasts that by 2030, the total Muslim population in Europe will increase from approximately 18 million to nearly 30 million and Muslims will make up more than 10 percent of the total population in 10 countries, including France and Belgium. Some European countries are looking for ways to force Muslims to assimi-

cision so they are opposed to such measures. As Muslims become larger percentages of the population (today France is 7.5 percent Muslim, Germany 5 percent, the United Kingdom 4.6 percent, and Denmark 4 percent), they will have increasing political clout. The impact of demographics, however, is not merely political. While Western countries are open to Muslims and the free practice of their religion, non-Muslims are not welcome in most Muslim countries. This one-sided flow of Muslims, including extremists, has allowed the radicals to find havens in European countries where they can recruit jihadists, plan attacks domestically and abroad, and take advantage of Western democracy to create bases of operations. Public opinion polls present an

Pew forecasts that by 2030, the total Muslim population in Europe will increase from approximately 18 million to nearly 30 million. late into their societies or to discourage them from immigrating or staying in their countries, and have adopted restrictions on ritual slaughter, circumcision, head coverings and the building of mosques. If Israel adopted any such restrictions on its Muslim citizens, the Europeans would be the first to condemn them, but hypocrisy has long been a hallmark of Europe’s Middle East policy. The irony is that Jews are collaterally affected by bans on ritual slaughter and circum-

alarming picture of the attitudes of Muslims in Europe. A Pew study in 2006, for example, asked Muslims and nonMuslims if they have a “favorable or unfavorable opinion of Jews.” In the United Kingdom, 7 percent of the general public said they had an unfavorable attitude toward Jews compared with 47 percent of Muslims; in France, the corresponding figures were 13 percent and 28 percent; and in Germany, the results were 22 percent and 44 percent. While these figures

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

Protest in Trafalgar Square, London. (Photo by Richard Stevenson) are disturbing, they are still light years away from the hostility of Muslims in the Middle East where Pew’s 2008 poll of Arab countries found that more than 95 percent of respondents, on average, had unfavorable impressions of Jews. Meanwhile European Jews have witnessed a rising tide of anti-Semitism. In fact, a poll of Jews in Belgium, Britain, France, Germany Hungary, Italy, Latvia, and Sweden conducted in 2013 by the Fundamental Rights Agency (a European Union agency that monitors discrimination and other violations of basic rights) found that nearly one-third of European Jews are considering emigration because they don’t feel safe. Two-thirds said they considered anti-Semitism to be a major problem, and 76 percent said the situation had grown worse in the last five years. The Jewish respondents said the threats came from Muslim extremists (27 percent), people with left-wing political views (22 percent), and people with right-wing views (19 percent). As the European country with the largest Muslim population, it is not surprising that France has the most serious problem with Muslim-Jewish violence. As journalist Bernard Edinger report-

ed, “Spontaneous, unprovoked attacks against Jews, overwhelmingly carried out by young Arabs, have traumatized French Jewry. Young religious Jews on their own have been officially advised by the rabbinate to wear baseball caps instead of kippas when using public transport or in the street.” The situation has become so serious that 25 percent of French Jews have expressed a desire to emigrate. In Great Britain, anti-Semitic literature is widely available in the British Muslim community and disseminated through libraries, mosques, and bookstores. One study found that Muslims are responsible for 30 percent of the antiSemitic incidents in Britain, even though they comprised only 3 percent of the population. Another study found that 37 percent of British Muslims believe British Jews are “legitimate targets as part of the struggle for justice in the Middle East.” Smaller Jewish communities throughout Europe are especially vulnerable. In Norway, a country that has grown increasingly hostile to Israel, the largest anti-Semitic riots in the country’s history were instigated by Muslims during Israel’s “Operation Cast Lead” in Gaza in 2009.

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

In August 2014, a Swedish woman wearing a Star of David was attacked while walking through a largely Muslim neighborhood, a suburb of the city of Uppsala. Approximately 700 Jews, mostly descendants of World War II refugees from Poland and Germany, live in Malmö, Sweden’s third largest city, whose population of 300,000 is now estimated to be nearly one-fifth Muslim. Swedish Jews say they are targets of physical and verbal attacks, primarily by Muslims, and have reported record numbers of hate crimes. In 2010 and 2011, those complaints did not result in a single conviction. Not surprisingly, a survey found that 50 percent of Swedish Jews are afraid to openly identify themselves as Jewish. “The increasingly isolated Jewish communities have become the targets of militant Muslim rage in much of Western Europe,” observes historian Robert Wistrich. “Their synagogues, communal institutions and even cultural centers have steadily been turned into fortresses—for whose maintenance Jews have, in most cases, to bear the cost. No other ethnoreligious group in Europe has had to take such drastic measures for its communal security.” The situation has become so bad in Europe, Wistrich believes, that “any clear-sighted and sensible Jew who has a sense of history would understand that this is the time to get out.” Former Dutch defense minister, Professor Frits Bolkestein, was equally adamant about the fate of Jews in the Netherlands. “Jews have to realize,” he said, “That there is no future for them in the Netherlands and that they best advise their children to leave for the United States or Israel.” Muslim anti-Semitism outside the Middle East has multiple roots. Inspiration can be found in the Koran, the media, sermons, the Internet, and the policies of Israel. It is also taught to Muslims in schools and mosques primarily financed by Saudi Arabia with the objective of indoctrinating Muslims with their Wahhabi beliefs and the conviction that Islam “is the superior religion and must

roughly two decades of terror attacks and still maintained the specious distinction between Hezbollah’s armed and political wings. Criticism of Islam is already squelched through intimidation, violence, and threats of violence. Ayatollah Khomeini, for example, deemed Salman Rushdie’s book Satanic Verses blasphemous and issued a fatwa calling for his murder. Dutch film director Theo van Gogh was killed after making a movie documenting violence against women in some Islamic societies; the film’s writer, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, received death threats and spent time in hiding. The Danish artist and publisher of cartoons depicting the Prophet faced death threats and provoked violent demonstrations by Muslims around the world. The situation in Europe has become even more dangerous as Muslims who went to join the extremists fighting in Syria return home radicalized and trained in terrorist tactics. We saw what these returning fighters are capable of when Mehdi Nemmouche, who spent more than a year training with jihadists

If Israel adopted any such restrictions on its Muslim citizens, the Europeans would be the first to condemn them, but hypocrisy has long been a hallmark of Europe’s Middle East policy. spread of extremism in leading university campuses.” Meanwhile, Islamist violence continues to spread; attempted terrorist attacks were thwarted in Cyprus, Hungary, India, Turkey, Thailand, and Azerbaijan. In 2012, a bomb aboard a bus carrying Israeli tourists in Burgas, Bulgaria, killed the Bulgarian driver and five Israelis, and injured 32. It was only after Hezbollah’s complicity in the Burgas attack was proven that the European Union finally designated Hezbollah’s “armed wing” a terrorist organization. The decision came after

in Syria, shot four Jews at the Jewish Museum in Brussels. European leaders have historically been reluctant to speak out against Islamic radicalism for fear of being accused of “Islamophobia” or angering their Muslim citizens or countries in the Middle East that they depend on for oil. European intelligence agencies have been less circumspect in their analysis of the terror threats posed by Muslims in their countries. Growing concern that London has become a hub for the Muslim Brotherhood’s extremist activities, for example,

prompted Prime Minister David Cameron to order an investigation to determine whether the Brotherhood is planning attacks in the Middle East from Britain. The beheading of American journalist James Foley by ISIS in Iraq has awakened the West to the growing threat of radical Islamists. Shortly after the grisly murder, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel declared that ISIS terrorists “are an imminent threat to every interest we have, whether it’s in Iraq or anywhere else” and “as sophisticated and wellfunded as any group we have seen.” The British are even more alarmed, given the estimate that 1,500 British Muslims are fighting with ISIS, the largest number of Western recruits among foreign jihadists. One of these Islamist mercenaries may have beheaded Foley, just as Omar Sheik, a British terrorist of Pakistani descent, kidnapped and murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl 12 years ago. While President Obama was focused on his golf game, British Prime Minister David Cameron cut short his holiday to address the growing threat. “The creation of an extremist caliphate in the heart of Iraq and extending into Syria is not a problem miles away from home,” he said. “Because if we do not act to stem the onslaught of this exceptionally dangerous terrorist movement, it will only grow stronger until it can target us on the streets of Britain. We already know that it has the murderous intent. Indeed, the first ISIL-inspired terrorist acts on the continent of Europe have already taken place.” Cameron declared that Europeans have “no choice but to summon up the political will to defend our own values and way of life with the same determination, courage and tenacity as we have faced danger before in our history.” It remains to be seen if Europeans are prepared to meet the challenge.

Mitchell Bard: Wake-Up Europe: Radical Islam is Coming for You

always be so.” In the United Kingdom, for example, British filmmakers went undercover at the London Central Mosque and exposed imams “teaching the faithful that God orders them to kill homosexuals and apostates; that they should curtail the freedom of women; and that they should view non-Muslims in a derogatory manner and limit contact with them.” Furthermore, textbooks found in more than three dozen British Islamic schools and clubs “promoted dehumanizing and demonizing anti-Semitism, including the notion that Jews descended from ‘monkeys’ and ‘pigs,’ and tasking the schoolchildren to list the ‘reprehensible qualities of Jews.’” Another study of Islamic schools found that some of the 166 full-time institutions taught the rejection of Western values and hatred of Jews. The indoctrination in British schools is so serious that the director-general of MI5, Jonathan Evans, said in 2008 that the Saudi government’s multimilliondollar investments in British universities have led to a “dangerous increase in the

Dr. Mitchell Bard is the author/editor of 23 books including After Anatevka: Tevye in Palestine and Death to the Infidels: Radical Islam’s War Against the Jews.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

European Energy Security: An American Responsibility? by Gal Luft

hen the Ukraine crisis broke out threatening to compromise Europe’s energy supply from Russia, many American politicians and pundits called for the United States to expedite exports of liquefied natural gas, or LNG, to help bolster European energy security. Speaker of the House John Boehner opined in The Wall Street Journal, “America not only has a right to develop and market its natural resources. In the face of rising danger, it has an obligation to do so.” Never mind that the United States won’t have its first LNG export terminal in operation until late 2015 at the very earliest; that much of its approved gas exports are already committed to longterm contracts in Asia; and that Ukraine as well as most European countries under the Kremlin’s boot do not have the terminals for receiving LNG. The United States is under no obligation to bolster Europe’s energy security just because Europe, in its fixation on climate change, has for years undermined its own energy security and brought upon itself its current predicament.

z Energy Policy

While both Europe and the United States depend on oil for their transportation sectors, when it comes to electricity generation they are in a completely different position. Rich in coal and gas reserves and equipped with one fourth of the world’s total number of nuclear power plants, the United States can generate all of its electricity from domestic resources. Europe, on the other hand, is heav-

ily dependent for its power generation on imported energy, primarily natural gas from Russia. The reason for this is not a dearth of energy resources. To the contrary, Europe has vast reserves of coal, a significant endowment of more than 470 trillion cubic feet of shale gas—over 50 years worth of Russia’s current gas exports to Europe—as well as one third of the world’s nuclear power plants. Those three resources of base load (24/7) electricity—coal, natural gas and nuclear— could have brought Europe to self-sufficiency in power generation. But Europe has turned its back on all three.

and Spain have banned the construction of new reactors. Belgium is considering phasing out its nuclear plants. France is contemplating cutting nuclear power’s electricity contribution by more than a third by 2025, and Italy maintains its non-nuclear policy. As a result of this nuclear freeze, of the 72 reactors currently under construction globally, only six are being built in Europe, mostly in Belarus and Slovakia, and only 19 out of 147 reactors currently in planning are in Europe. Domestic production of natural gas is also facing challenges in Europe. Hydraulic fracturing (fracking), the tech-

Europe, in its fixation with climate change, has for years undermined its own energy security and brought upon itself its current predicament.

Spearheading the global effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the European Union adopted carbon dioxide emissions reduction targets so aggressive that they effectively made coal impossible to utilize. At the same time, a war has been waged against nuclear power by some European countries, primarily Germany, despite the fact that nuclear energy is the only source of base load electricity that emits no greenhouse gases. Following the Fukushima nuclear incident in Japan, Germany, which until then was getting a quarter of its electricity from nuclear power, decided to shut down eight nuclear plants. Switzerland

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

nology which enabled the North American oil and gas boom and that could have alleviated Europe’s dependence on Russia, is banned in France and is facing strong opposition in Germany and the United Kingdom due to local communities’ concerns about ground water contamination. In rejecting three of the most important sources of base load electricity— photovoltaic solar and wind are intermittent sources of power and therefore not substitutable for fossil fuels and nuclear—Europe has sleepwalked into deep dependency on Vladimir Putin’s natural gas.

Europe also bears some responsibility for the fact that one of the world’s richest deposits of natural gas, the Caspian region, is still disconnected from its energy market. Despite years of negotiations, Europe has failed to reach consensus about the best pipeline route to transport gas from energy-rich Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan to the European market. It also failed to reduce its dependency on Ukraine as a corridor for Russian gas. Ukraine’s chronic political instability, its deep corruption—in 2013, Transparency International called Ukraine the most corrupt nation in Europe—its adversarial relations with Moscow, and its poor payment history make it an unreliable transit country. Yet, nearly one fifth of Europe’s gas imports still flow via Ukraine. Despite the various alternative routes that have been proposed over the years, with the exception of Nord Stream, the pipeline from Russia to Germany, the Europeans have failed to develop conduits for Russian gas that do not traverse Ukraine. For example, the South Stream pipeline which could transport annually over 60 billion cubic meters from Russia through the Black Sea and to Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia, Austria, Italy and beyond has been rejected by the European Union, and its construction has recently been stalled. All this is to say that Europe’s energy predicament is self-inflicted. It is the policies of the European Union that made Europe increasingly dependent on Russia’s gas and on the unreliable transit country of Ukraine. Europe’s green fixation has caused in some European countries a spike in electricity prices, making electricity “a luxury good,” to use Der Spiegel Magazine’s term. Germany’s case is the most extreme. Today, 17 percent of German households are now in a state of “energy poverty” because of aggressive environmental policies. The traditional definition of energy security is “availability of sufficient energy supply at affordable prices.” Europe’s green policies have thus far compromised both the availabil-

Gal Luft: European Energy Security: An American Responsibility?

z A Disconnect from the Market

Rich in coal and gas reserves and equipped with one-fourth of the world’s total number of nuclear power plants, the United States can generate all of its electricity from domestic resources. ity and the affordability of energy.

z European Self-Help

If the United States is to come to Europe’s aid, as it has done several times over the past century, such mobilization

would only be warranted once Europe decides to help itself first by assigning a higher priority to energy security. The May 6, 2014 Rome Declaration of the G-7 energy ministers announced in the wake of the Ukraine crisis shows

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

that Europe is still not there. Oblivious to the unfolding energy security crisis, the declaration took a business-as-usual approach, highlighting the transition to a low carbon economy as a supposedly key contributor to enduring energy security. In this, the ministers reaffirmed their belief that climate policies are actually conducive to stronger energy secu-

European market while contributing to the U.S. economy. Nuclear Europe should also rethink its position on nuclear power. Contrary to popular opinion, nuclear energy is one of the safest sources of energy. The so-called “Fukushima disaster” claimed no lives

Europe also bears some responsibility for the fact that one of the world’s richest deposits of natural gas, the Caspian region, is still disconnected from its energy market. rity. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Energy security and greenhouse gas reduction may complement each other in some areas, but as Europe’s case demonstrates, in most cases the focus on “greening” comes at the expense of energy security. Coal If Europe is to truly address its energy security problem, it should first and foremost change its attitude toward coal. While the environmental problems associated with coal burning cannot be ignored, they should be balanced against the energy security implications associated with an overly aggressive shift away from the commodity. As Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk correctly stated, “We need to fight for a cleaner planet, but we must have access to energy resources and jobs to finance it.” In adopting a more positive disposition toward coal Europe can find America a reliable source of the commodity. The United States is by far the world’s largest reserve holder of coal, owning 27 percent of the globe’s total. But as American electric utilities are shifting rapidly from coal-fired power generation to natural gas-powered turbines the United States is left with surplus coal which can be utilized by the

and its environmental consequences have been much more modest than the public is led to believe. China, Russia and India are building dozens of civilian reactors utilizing new reactor designs, and if Europe wishes to be less dependent on Russia and at the same time reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, it cannot afford to take nuclear off its menu of options. Fracking European countries should also embrace environmentally responsible fracking in order to tap into their shale gas resources. Here too the United States can be helpful. The U.S. State Department launched the Unconventional Gas Technical Engagement Program and the Energy Governance and Capacity Initiative—two programs that help other countries to enhance investment and technical cooperation in shale gas development. Working with the United States, Europe can learn how to develop new fracking techniques and adopt new fracking fluids, safety standards and environmental best practices. Energy Corridors Europe should also get serious about opening a new energy corridor from the Caspian region and possibly from Israel’s newly discovered offshore

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

gas fields in the Eastern Mediterranean. Some of the proposed projects that are expected to make Europe more independent of Russia’s gas supplies include Nabucco-West (Turkey-Austria Pipeline), the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP, connecting Greece, Albania and Italy), and the Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP, connecting Georgia and Greece through Turkey). However, with the exception of TANAP, construction has not yet begun on any of the pipelines. TANAP is not likely to be commissioned before 2018 and TAP is expected to become operational by 2019. No matter which route is chosen for importing gas from the Caspian and the Eastern Mediterranean, Turkey will be a key transit country for European energy security. The importance of its security and stability is therefore paramount. At the same time, Turkey’s opposition to LNG tanker traffic through the Bosporus due to safety concerns undermines the energy security of the Black Sea countries, especially Ukraine and Bulgaria. Europe should develop and advance a grand bargain with Turkey, one which on the one hand supports Turkey’s aspirations to become a land bridge for European energy while on the other persuades Turkey to facilitate the transit of LNG tankers through its straits. The Ukraine crisis should come as a wake up call to Europe’s leaders. It is past time for them to depart from some long held positions and to candidly articulate to their people the tradeoffs among security, environment, health, and economic prosperity associated with each element of the energy mix in order to reach the most balanced and economically sustainable energy strategy. Then, and only then, should the United States consider helping its allies once again. Gal Luft is co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security and Senior Adviser to the United States Energy Security Council.

Ending the Cold War Without A Bang review by Shoshana Bryen

The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan by James Mann Penguin Books, 2009

ho won the Cold War? It’s not a question that arises about World War II, the Napoleonic Wars or the American Civil War. But when the Cold War, communism, and the Soviet Union disappeared without a shot, pundits had a free hand theorizing precisely which act by which actor was the key to defeating the second great “ism” of the 20th Century. The role of Ronald Reagan has been subject to tugging from left and right, realists and idealists, Reagan supporters and Reagan bashers. Was it the “Reagan defense buildup” and the “evil empire” speech of the first term? According to some, it was arms control and the more conciliatory attitude toward Mikhail Gorbachev in the second term. According to others, the whole thing was, in fact, Gorbachev’s doing and Gorbachev’s mistake. Having reduced military spending and introduced domestic reforms to keep communism viable, he lost control of the process, subsequently losing the colonies and the system itself. Reagan just happened to be around. Everyone has a theory. In The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, James Mann takes a synthesized view: it was some of this and some of that, and there was a fair degree of serendipity in the concurrent administrations of Reagan and Gorbachev—rather like the serendipity of the Founding Fathers in Philadelphia in 1776. It couldn’t have been orchestrated, but was the natural result of events as they occurred. Mann considers Reagan’s evolving approach to communism, the Cold War, and Mikhail Gorbachev through four aspects of his presidency: his relationship with Richard Nixon, his

interest in author Suzanne Massie, the crafting of the “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” speech, and the late arms control negotiations. Through these avenues, he creates a picture of Reagan with his core beliefs intact throughout, a willingness to follow his intuition—which turned out to be better than most—and able to tell his staff when to back off. Reagan emerges as grounded but flexible; trusting but verifying. He also emerges as disconnected, uninterested in details of the nuclear negotiations he was having with the Russians, and, in fact, uninterested in the details of most issues. And, toward the end, increasingly disengaged except where it touched his core. In other words, a Ronald Reagan both his friends and his enemies would recognize.

z Nixon and Reagan

The President and the former President were “friendly, if not friends,” with entirely different views of the nature of communism. For Nixon, “the assumption was that [communism] was a permanent if unpleasant fact of life.” Détente was the best that could be hoped for and Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were determined to pursue it. Reagan, on the other hand, viewed the Soviet system as “neither legitimate nor well-established at home.” It was, he wrote, “a temporary aberration which will one day disappear from the earth because it is contrary to human nature.” “The ash heap of history” line was not a mistake, although he later called it outdated. Communism was also, according to Reagan, secretive, duplicitous and immoral. Reagan’s view that communism was

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

not a permanent force in the world, according to Mann, “implied that once a Soviet leader could establish that he was straightforward rather than deceitful and was trying to change the Soviet system, then Reagan might be willing… to give credence to that leader and try to do business with him.” The ascent of Gorbachev, a new generation Soviet, made the Washington policy community reconsider the questions, “Could the system ever be changed? Did the nature of the regime matter to the United States? Was the Cold War primarily a conflict of tanks and missiles, or was it a contest of beliefs and economic systems?” Did Nixon peg it correctly, or did Reagan? Therein lies the core of the book. Reagan was as unalterably anti-communist as Nixon, but neither inflexible in his dealings with communists nor unwilling to explore unusual avenues to reach his bedrock goal—communism’s demise.

z Suzanne Massie

One of the more unusual avenues was Suzanne Massie, author of Land of the Firebird. Neither an academic nor a policy professional, she began by volunteering her services to the NSC as an informal emissary for cultural affairs, using her contacts at the Institute of the USA and Canada (likely a KGB front, which Massie recognized). The NSC agreed, and agreed to Massie’s request to meet with Reagan before she went to Moscow. One meeting turned into many. Massie had an abiding love of the Russian people and a briefcase full of the sorts of personal stories that appealed to Reagan. She gave him impressions of the Russian people “as an entity separate from the Soviet government or communism,” and taught him the proverb, “Doveryai no proveryai” (“Trust but verify”). She was attuned to the role of religion in the USSR. “In Russia, I saw religion alive; beleaguered, tormented, but alive,” she wrote. She spoke Reagan’s language. Reagan had Massie carry a message to Moscow in 1984 — word that he would

like to forge a new cultural agreement— and she brought messages back. The informal channel, one of many, drove Secretary of State George Shultz to distraction,

z The Berlin Speech

The third prism is the “Tear down this wall” speech, delivered in Berlin in June 1987. A section for policy-wonks,

He creates a picture of Reagan with his core beliefs intact throughout, a willingness to follow his intuition—which turned out to be better than most— and able to tell his staff when to back off. but while Reagan and Gorbachev ultimately agreed to one set of informal channels—Dobrynin in Washington and Hartman in Moscow—Massie continued to carry messages from Moscow to Reagan and back again. She encouraged Reagan to give Gorbachev breathing room. The depth of her influence on Reagan is hard to calculate because she supported his own instinct that Gorbachev was a Soviet leader with whom he could, in fact, do business. And, while Mann paints Reagan as out of touch on details and uninterested in the mechanics of the nuclear weapons he wanted to negotiate away, his instincts were sharp. “The Reagan outlook, shared by Shultz, proved to be more accurate than that of the CIA… Reagan was acting on instinct, and at this important moment, his instincts turned out to be right.” At perhaps the most important meeting Massie had with Reagan, early in 1987, she suggested he change the planned order of his and Gorbachev’s visits to each other’s country. He wasn’t having it, but he did permit her to take one more message to Gorbachev. Massie finally fell afoul of a Washington whispering campaign after she tried to turn her informal position into a paid government job — including, at one point, presenting herself as a candidate for Ambassador to Moscow. Reagan’s staff moved her away from meetings with the President and over to the bureaucracy; she reappears only briefly.

inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free? | Fall 2014

this one tells a convoluted tale of presidential staff bickering, speechwriting and the ways the State Department, the NSC and the speechwriters each vied for their own version of the words to be delivered: the rewrites, cross-outs, new versions, and old versions reappearing. Added to that were the logistical difficulties of producing the speech in the divided city and ensuring that the Germans—particularly the mayor of West Berlin—understood that the city was actually governed by the Four Powers and the U.S. could and would insist on what it wanted. The politics of the mayors of East and West Berlin are well covered, and East Germany’s party chief Erich Honecker’s understanding that Gorbachev’s reforms at home would ultimately deprive the Eastern Bloc of legitimacy for its ruthless rule is particularly interesting. Reagan hardly appears here, except to insist on the Brandenburg Gate as the venue and that he would keep the line, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” No matter how many times or in how many ways the naysayers in State and the NSC tried to get rid of it, Reagan preserved it and it was the biggest applause line of an otherwise fairly tepidly received speech. Mann does the readers a service by including the entire speech in the text.

z Arms Control and Summits

The last section gives the most play to Gorbachev’s interests. In the second and third sections, we met Gorbachev trying to save the communist system by

President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev signing the INF Treaty in the East Room of the White House in 1987. (White House Photographic Office) ment including the words “peaceful coexistence”—a phrase with a long communist history. Reagan’s aides rejected the statement, but Gorbachev raised it again directly with Reagan, who stuck with his aides. Mann emphasizes Gorbachev’s continuing belief that better relations with the U.S. were essential to domestic reforms. “The Cold War supplied the rationale used by the Communist Party leadership

“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” No matter how many times or in how many ways the naysayers in State and the NSC tried to get rid of it, Reagan preserved it and it was the biggest applause line of an otherwise fairly tepidly received speech. could be achieved—with Republicans in Congress. The INF Treaty was submitted to Congress and ratified before Reagan’s visit to Moscow in the last year of his presidency. The Moscow summit is almost an afterthought, except that Reagan’s instincts came to the fore one more time: Gorbachev had given Reagan a state-

to resist change and political liberalization at home.” The Epilogue covers the inevitable liberalization in Eastern Europe after their repressive governments knew Moscow wouldn’t step in to save them.

z Two Almost-Nitpicks

First, Mann comes down squarely on the side of Gorbachev as the crucial figure

review by Shoshana Bryen: The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan

cutting defense spending and improving relations with Europe. In the fourth, the conservative backlash to Gorbachev’s reforms had begun to worry him and he looked for increasing concessions from the United States in exchange for an arms control treaty. He waffled on the dates of his proposed U.S. visit, demanded additional American concessions, and, when the dates were finally agreed, Gorbachev announced he would not take the grand tour. “Gorbachev would not fly to California…There would be no national parks, no farm states, no visit to the Reagans’ ranch, not even a trip to Camp David. Gorbachev made clear he would spend time only in Washington.” But Gorbachev’s posturing masked an increasing concern that his conservative opposition might rise against him. Reagan’s concern was that the American right—conservatives in Congress and the media—might rise up against him and deny him ratification of any treaty presented. Neither fear was realized. Gorbachev’s visit to Washington was a success—his impromptu “meet and greet” on Connecticut Avenue helped convince American public opinion that the Soviet Union had mellowed. That helped Reagan—who saw part of his role as providing the atmospherics in which the treaty

in ending the Cold War. “Reagan didn’t win the cold War; Gorbachev abandoned it.” And he credits Reagan’s second term flexibility as the mechanism that allowed Gorbachev to succeed. “Reagan’s policies gave Gorbachev enough time, latitude, and prestige to proceed with his reforms, to the points where they could no longer be undone.” But without the military buildup and political confidence of the first term that convinced Gorbachev (mistakenly) that reform was essential to communist survival, Reagan’s second term would simply have been Jimmy Carter’s third term. Second, the title. The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan contains little, if any, rebellion by Ronald Reagan—except against the mindset of the Nixon/Kissinger view that the Cold War was a perpetual fact of American life. For this, Mann concludes with slightly backhanded credit: “By recognizing Gorbachev’s significance, when many others in the United States did not, Reagan helped create the climate in which the Cold War could end.” Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of The Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Magazine.

Fall 2014 | inFocus Examines Europe: Whole and Free?

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A Final Thought ...

The Condition of Victory To the extent that the Israeli public wanted the elimination of Hamas during Operation Protective Edge, or an end to the rocket threat, it was doomed by unreasonable expectations. Americans suffer similarly. Having understood the Islamic State [IS] as a threat not only in Syria and Iraq, but also to our interests and potentially to our country, they want it defeated. The question for both governments is, “Can you defeat an armed ideological movement with a territorial base if you are unwilling to fight in that territorial base?” Neither Israelis nor Americans are prepared to control enemy territory as a means to determine the ultimate outcome. Americans are wary of “boots on the ground” and most Israelis acknowledge they do not want their sons on permanent patrol inside Gaza, although they accept control of the periphery and occasional forays inside. There is no appetite for warfare of the “allies island-hopping in the Pacific” sort that convinced President Truman the atomic bomb would produce fewer overall casualties than invading Japan’s mainland. But that means there will be no elimination of

the enemy. No “victory.” Control of territory and the ability to subject one’s enemies to enforceable rules is the only known mechanism for ending, rather than managing, wars. Despite the Western propensity for “peace processes” and negotiations, it is impossible to find a historical example of one side simply agreeing to give up its arms and its raison d’etre without a forcing mechanism—military defeat. The enemies of Israel and the West are similar: both are vicious and absolutist, and neither plays by Western rules regarding women, children, religious diversity, or war crimes. They rely on the relative gentility and humanity of their adversaries—Israel and the West—to protect them from ultimate defeat. Thus far, theirs is the correct bet. The national bad mood in Israel in late summer may simply be the realization that there is no victory to be had, no peace in the offing, but only a long struggle in which patience, fortitude, a good defense, and an occasional burst of offense are their best weapons. Americans may come to that conclusion as well. – Shoshana Bryen, Editor