Europe's unilateral disarmament

Yet another article in NRO warning Americans to back away from the European slippery slope to international futility. "Defense lessons from Europe" is no more superficial than most European writing about the States, but it does underline the low priority given to self-defence by European governments.

We are learning a lot from Europe these days, especially how not to govern a modern democratic nation. Unsustainable social-welfare spending, multiculturalism instead of assimilation for immigrants, and ever-decreasing defense budgets all demonstrate that the path Europe has been following is not the model for a government by the people. And most significantly, we learn that Europe’s defense budgets will continue to decrease unless there is a dramatic rearrangement of priorities among its peoples. The NATO secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, recently warned that “the budget decreases across the continent could have dire consequences: If the cuts are too deep, we won’t be able to defend the security on which our democratic societies and prosperous economies depend. We risk a Europe increasingly adrift from the United States”.

Americans still tend to write more politely about Europe than vice-versa, but their underlying contempt is beginning to wear through the veneer of good manners. Of course Europe is not a model for government by the people: it is explicitly a model for the unrestrained government of an unelected and unaccountable bureaucratic oligarchy.

Europe is now ruled by the form of government that once supplied the palpable continental enemy against which it was necessary to maintain a military deterrent. Now that, thanks to American power, no such immediate threat looms, the Euro-oligarchy's sole priority is to perpetuate its hold on power. Only war could break that hold, therefore the means of war must be abolished.

So it is that the linked article misses the point when it states, "elected officials cannot spend unlimited sums on social-welfare and entitlement programs and expect to maintain a functioning democracy, much less a vibrant economy". But unelected officials can, because they are insulated from the consequences of their policies.

Europe is not an illustration of the dangers of people-pleasing democracy: it is an object lesson in what happens when peoples surrender their autonomy. Those who sacrifice freedom on the altar of collective security end up with neither.   

The primacy of politics over markets

In a preface written for the French edition of his Tract on Monetary Reform (1924), Keynes described the attitude of the French government in terms that apply with even greater force to Angela Merkel:

Each time the franc loses value, the Minister of Finance is convinced that the fact arises from everything but economic causes. He attributes it to the presence of a foreigner in the neighborhood of the Bourse or to the mysterious and malignant influences of speculation. This is not far removed intellectually from an African witch doctor’s ascription of cattle disease to the "evil eye" of a bystander and of bad weather to the unsatisfied appetites of an idol. - From Liaquat Ahamed, Lords of Finance (2009)

Hat-tip: Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

SDSR - as others see us

Here's a jaw-dropper. Headline from the the respected US mag Foreign Policy:

Why the U.S. needs to be more like Britain

What makes it all the more remarkable is that the author's focus is entirely on defence, the most cocked-up part of the spending review. If in the opinion of a well-informed US journopuke the Americans have much to learn from Liam Fox and the "British defense establishment", then they are many, many miles up shit creek.

Britain's reductions are substantial, and one wishes they had not been necessary. But the Cameron government deserves an awful lot of credit for facing Britain's debt crisis and making hard choices that accept risk in the near term to put their country on stronger strategic footing. The British set sensible priorities and programmed to them, making cuts that do not damage their ability to protect and advance their interests. Lots of other countries are set to make reductions in defense spending, including the United States; probably none - including us - will do as proficient a job as Defense Minister Liam Fox and the British defense establishment have done.