The European Council on Foreign Relations

Madrid View: A German BRIC at the UN?

Date: 18th March 2011  |  Author: Jose Ignacio Torreblanca,

Categories: Europe and the world, Madrid view,
Tags: , germany, libya, un, arab revolutions

For a few hours, I thought it was "game over". That was in fact the title I had chosen for my weekly column on international politics in El País, which comes out every Friday. I was so pessimistic that I had finalised my text with a reference to the 1956 Suez Crisis and the crushing of the popular uprising in Hungary. It all made sense: like the Hungarians in 1956, it seemed the fact that Libyans are ready for democracy did not necessarily mean they would get it any time soon. Rather, it seemed they would be crushed without anybody being able or willing to help.

As for Europeans, the blocking of the French-British attempt to intervene in Libya by Russia and the US reminded me all too much of 1956. That was the swan song of European power, and I really feared that 2011 would show that we had learnt very little in the 55 years that have passed since. It was 4pm yesterday and my column was finished. Then, having already sent my column to the paper, Reuters cables started to feature French diplomats being confident about a positive vote.

Later, Nicholas Burns’ testimony before the US Foreign Affairs Committee chaired by John Kerry, and statements by Susan Rice (US Ambassador to UN) about a very ambitious resolution, started to flood my inbox. I called the paper and start writing all over again, so I could come out with a column on how the Arab Revolutions had changed the polarity of all leaders involved.

Faced with the prospect of standing up to Gaddafi, former hawks like Robert Gates, US Secretary of Defence, have become doves and former Democrat doves are becoming hawks. The same in Europe: Cameron started his time in office slashing defence expenditure, wanting to get out of Afghanistan and promoting commercial interests, only to end up calling for an intervention in Libya, apparently over-riding his dovish defence secretary. As for Sarkozy, he too moved from zero to infinite in a few weeks, from supporting Ben Ali to calling for air strikes and recognising the rebels. I sent my column off for the second time before the vote was taken, and went to have dinner with Commissioner Fühle, who was in Madrid to discuss the new neighbourhood policy.

We learn about the vote on Libya while discussing what to do with the Union for the Mediterranean. And I could not but reflect on why Germany had abstained. Was it because the memory of its North African past, and the divisions of 1942 (France and the UK versus Germany and Italy) was - amazingly - on the table? Or did the fact that Germany voted with the BRICs point to a "memory of the future", i.e. Germany is a BRIC in itself who does not need to show that it is aligned with the big three?

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