Extemporaneous Remarks by Henry Kissinger
Trilateral Commission Annual Meeting, Warsaw, May 9, 2004

*The Transatlantic Alliance: Common Desires or Opposing Views*

Since I have come here to Poland, I have been asked two questions. Does America promote European integration or is it attempting to undermine it? The second question, rather surprising to me, is how in view of the hostility which is perceived to exist between France and Germany, on one side, and the United States, on the other, Poland should conduct a policy that is committed to Europe and yet takes account of the people's friendship to the United States? From my perspective in America, I do not consider French and German policy hostile to the United States. I think there are disagreements, but I am surprised -- and it is a matter of some concern to me -- that countries like Poland might worry that they have to pay a penalty, especially to Germany, for being friendly to the United States. If that were to be true, this would be a very worrisome evolution of the transatlantic relationship.

The traditional position of America has been that a strong Europe and a united Europe is in the American national interest. Whenever an American administration has been asked to express its view, it has stated it in that manner. I know of no contrary statement. The "old Europe/new Europe" statement was a petulant reaction to a particular decision at NATO headquarters, and I am certain that it was not prepared as a statement of long-term American foreign policy. It was the reaction to the first veto in NATO history of the deployment of Patriot missiles to Turkey. This had never happened before. Whether the statement was appropriate or not, it was not a statement of long-range American policy.

On the other hand, in light of the complexity of the issues we have heard here from previous speakers, one cannot expect America to promote the sort of issues that now arise. They are not American policy issues. So, there is no opposition in America to the constitutional forms that are now emerging. You can even say, there is abstract goodwill. But it is not an effort in which America feels it needs to be engaged, and I would argue that that is a good thing. That it is a matter that is largely left to Europe.

Indeed, for an American audience, most of the discussion of the European Constitution seems totally elusive. One of the problems in transatlantic relations is the disproportion between the amount of time that is given to these problems on the two sides of the Atlantic. European foreign ministers spend perhaps 40% of their time on European matters and on the fine points we have heard so elegantly explained here. I doubt that any major American policymaker has ever read the European Constitution or that this is a subject for serious discussion in America.

TRANSATLANTIC RELATIONS AT A CROSSROADS

There is a different problem in which we should all be engaged and neither side is adequately engaged. When you take the original American view, typified by my generation of policy-making during the Cold War, it affirmed a united Europe but it had a somewhat patronising aspect to it: namely, that Europe would come to the same views as America on major policy issues. It was an aspect of burden sharing. It made our task easier but it did not change our direction. This leads to the result that even my generation becomes irritated when Europe attempts to change the direction of our policy and not just share our burdens. The adjustment that has to take place is to understand that common destiny implies not just a European technical input, but also a European conceptual and directional input.

On the European side, there is an even greater obstacle and I would define this key issue in transatlantic relationship as follows. Of course, Europe needs to define a common identity. The question is: is that identity sought through opposition to the United States or is it an identity that allows for occasional opposition to the United States but views the relationship in essence as a cooperative effort based on the conviction there are fundamentally common goals. That is the question that has not yet been answered.

If European identity is defined organically in opposition to the United States, then we are in a pre-World War I world in which you have blocs of countries pursuing their national interest, not excluding cooperation but not guaranteeing it and making no distinction between their relations to each other and the rest of the world. In such an international system, foreign policy becomes the adjustment of the national interest of each region to the circumstances as they are perceived at the moment with no guarantee of common action or opposition but shifting arrangements made between the blocs as they emerge -- whether Asia or China, Japan, Russia or whatever the constellation is. That system proved extremely difficult to operate in the pre-World War I situation. It would be unmanageable in the present globalised situation.

Therefore, what Atlantic nations ought to address is what is it that constitutes their community, if indeed there is a community. If Europe were to break up, it is in the American interest that it does so on its own and not under American impetus. It would be an unforgivable burden to have to bear. I don't want it to break up, and most thoughtful Americans wish this as well.

We have an unprecedented historic situation in the sense that an existing international system changes because new powers arise. There is a shift of power, capacity and concern. That adjustment has never been managed easily, rarely well, and that is upon us in any event.

At a meeting I attended here, someone spoke sort of lightly of an East Asian bloc that is going to emerge of Japan, China and Korea. That would be a stupendous event in history. It would be a reversal of alliances. It would be the creation of a union of nations that demographically and industrially would constitute an enormous weight in the balance and is something that would require major adjustments by

other nations and regions. It would also raise the question of what that would mean for the Atlantic union. Whether that happens or not, the rise of China alone, and the reaction of Japan and Korea to that inevitable fact, is a bigger adjustment than the international system has had to deal with for a century or two, certainly since the emergence of Germany. You can add to this India, on a perhaps parallel route. This requires an adjustment of the international system as heretofore conceived.

BEYOND TRADITIONAL FOREIGN POLICY: GLOBAL TERRORISM

But we are in a world beyond traditional foreign policy, which is really what we mean when we talk about terrorism and other such issues. That is to say, changes that come about through the acts of private groups that are based on sovereign territory but are not defined by the sovereignty of the state, that have their own agenda, that are not amenable to the traditional methods of the diplomacy with which we are familiar, that are not used to compromise or do not even seek compromise, and that cannot be deterred, at least as of now, because they have nothing to defend. Add in the whole world of ideology and conviction. This requires a kind of cooperation for which historic diplomacy gives no precedent but which is essential for our common future if indeed we view it as a common future.

There's endless talk about democracy, but do we know what we mean by
democracy. Have we any idea how to promote it? I keep reading that grave mistakes
were made because America did not support democracy in, say, the Muslim world in
the Cold War period. What countries are we talking about? Where was there such an
option and what would we have done? What does this mean for the future?

Since this is a transatlantic debate, one of the questions we have to ask ourselves,
and needs to be addressed, goes like this. I am struck by the compulsive anti-
Americanism I see in Europe today and by the concentration of this anti-Americanism
on one person. Thus, one has to ask: are we talking about a judgement or an alibi?
Are we talking about disagreements on substance or an emerging cultural difference
in which it is the principle of cooperation itself that is under attack. Whatever
happens in America in November, this is the question we have to answer and it is the
question Europe has to answer. One could list a whole series of issues. It does not
matter how we got into Iraq. The resolution of the Iraq problem is either a matter of
common concern or it is the beginning of a bifurcation that will have endless
consequences because, whatever we think of the original decisions, the impact on
the Islamic world of the outcome in Iraq will affect every aspect of the Atlantic
community. Similarly, the Palestinian issue - it guarantees deadlock to deal with it
as a purely American effort in Israel and a purely European effort among the Arabs.

Do we need new institutions to discuss these changed conditions? What we surely
need is something that raises the debate from the current emphasis on placating
various domestic pressure groups to the question of where are we trying to go and
to attempt a common analysis of where the world is going. What interventions are
legitimate, whether human rights or strategic? What do we mean by strategic?

I believe that the American administration was right when it pointed out that pre-
emption has to be an aspect of current foreign policy because there are dangers in
the world that cannot be encompassed by the traditional system. I think the
administration did not intend to imply that one nation alone could define each case
of pre-emption. If a wider, more multilateral, view is taken, under what rules can
pre-emptive and preventive action be taken is a subject that should be urgently
discussed. Again, it matters whether it is discussed by Europe and America in a
common or a competitive framework.

The Americans on the Trilateral Commission congratulate Europe on achieving what it has, and wish it well, but cannot consider the mechanics of European integration part of an American problem. The challenge is whether we can achieve, as we did in the 1940s, a sense of common destiny and operate the new institutions in Europe and supplement them with an Atlantic framework for a common future.

Henry Kissinger is Chairman of Kissinger Associates, Inc., New York; former U.S. Secretary of State; former U.S. Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs

Henry Kissinger

I would like to make a tactless point at the beginning. For an American audience, most of the discussion of the European Constitution seems totally elusive. I invited Valéry Giscard d'Estaing to give a speech at the Library of Congress, and he gave a brilliant detailed explanation of the evolution of the European Constitution and its existing problems to a stunned audience that did not understand that this had the slightest relevance to any of their concerns. One of the problems in transatlantic relations is the disproportionate amount of time that is given on either side of the Atlantic to these problems. European foreign ministers spend, what, 40% of their time on European matters and on the fine points we have heard so elegantly explained here. I doubt that any major American policymaker has ever read the serious论文, European Constitution or that this is a subject for debate in America.

1

question, rather surprising to me, is in view of the hostility which exists between
France and Germany, on one side, and the United States, on the other, how can
Poland conduct a policy that is committed to Europe and yet takes account of the
people's friendship to the United States? From my perspective in America, I do not
consider French and German policy hostile to the United States. I think there are
disagreements, but I am surprised -- and it is a matter of some concern to me -- that
countries like Poland might worry that they have to pay a penalty, especially to
Germany, for being friendly to the United States. If that were to be true, this would
be a very worrisome evolution of the transatlantic relationship.

the first veto in NATO history of the deployment of Patriot missiles to Turkey. This
had never happened before. Whether the statement was appropriate or not, it was
not a statement of long-range American determination.

Europe.

There is a problem in which we should all be engaged and neither side is adequately
engaged. When you take the original American view, typified by my generation of

[4]

[Y]

policy-making during the Cold War, it affirmed a united Europe but it had a somewhat patronising aspect to it: namely, that Europe would of course come to the same views as America. It was an aspect of burden sharing. It made our task easier but it did not change our direction. This then leads to the result that even my generation, when Europe attempts to change our direction and not just share our burdens, becomes irritated. This points to the adjustment that has to take place: that common destiny implies not just a European technical input, but also a European conceptual and directional input.

On the European side, there is a greater obstacle than on the American side, and I would define the key issue in transatlantic relationship as follows. Of course, Europe needs to define a common identity — that's the nature of Europe. The question is: is that identity sought through opposition to the United States or is it an identity that allows for occasional opposition to the United States but views the relationship in essence as a cooperative relationship based on the conviction there are fundamentally common goals. That is the question that has not yet been answered.

4

If European identity is defined organically in opposition to the United States, then we
are in a pre-World War I world in which you have blocs of countries pursuing their
national interest and not excluding cooperation but not guaranteeing it and making
no distinction between their relations to each other and the rest of the world. In such
an international system, foreign policy becomes the adjustment of the national
interest of that region of each region, to the circumstances as they are perceived at
the moment with no guarantee of common action or opposition but shifting
arrangements made between the blocs as they emerge -- whether Asia or China,
Japan, Russia or whatever the constellation is. That system proved extremely difficult
to operate in the pre-World War I situation. I think it would be unmanageable in the
present globalised situation.

[Y]

We have an unprecedented historic situation in the sense it happens periodically every few hundred years that an existing international system changes because new powers arise. There is a shift of power, capacity and concern. That adjustment has never been managed easily, rarely well, and that is upon us in any event.

6

require an adjustment of the international
is traditional foreign policy.
system as therefore conceived

But we are in a world beyond traditional foreign policy, which is really what we mean
when we talk about terrorism and democracy and other such issues. That is to say,
changes that come about through the acts of private groups that are based on
sovereign territory but are not defined by the sovereignty of the state, that have
their own agenda, that are not amenable to the traditional methods of the diplomacy
with which we are familiar, that are not used to compromise or do not even seek
compromise, and that cannot be deterred, at least as of now, because they have
nothing to defend. Add in the whole world of ideology and conviction. This requires a
kind of cooperation for which historic diplomacy gives no precedent but which is
essential for our common future if indeed we view it as a common future.

7

[Y]

There's endless talk about democracy, but do we know what we mean by
democracy. What is the operational meaning of a democracy that is benevolent
toward the question of war and peace, because we know early stages of democracy
have not always been. Have we any idea how to promote it? I keep reading that
grave mistakes were made because America did not support democracy in, say, the
Muslim world in the Cold War period. What countries are we talking about? Where
was there such an option and what would we have done? But let's not worry about
the past. What does this mean for the future?

Since this is a transatlantic debate, one of the questions we have to ask ourselves,
and needs to be addressed, goes like this. I am struck by the compulsive anti-
Americanism I see in Europe today and by the concentration of this anti-Americanism
on one person, that whatever you think of his policies does not deserve that
particular degree of emphasis. Thus, one has to ask: are we talking about a
judgement or an alibi? Are we talking about disagreements on substance or an

8

[Y]

emerging cultural difference in which it is the cooperation itself that is no longer

altad

sought? I think that whatever happens in America in November, this is the question

of the original decision

bifurcation that will have endless consequences because, whatever we think, the

similarly

guarantees deadline

Atlantic community, the Palestinian issue -- it just doesn't do to deal with it as a

could go through a whole catalogue of almost any problem you discuss, the

necessary changes of the international system and the Security Council, and so forth.

These changed circumstances

Do we need new institutions to discuss this? What we surely need is something that raises the debate from the current emphasis on placating various domestic pressure groups to the question of where are we trying to go and to attempt a common

9

I believe that the American administration was right when it pointed out that pre-emption has to be an aspect of current foreign policy because there are dangers in the world that cannot be encompassed by the traditional system. I think the administration was too much dominated by its necessary immediate actions in implying that one nation alone could define the legitimacy of pre-emption, under what rules can pre-emptive and preventive action be taken is a subject that should be discussed. Again, it matters whether it is discussed by Europe and America in a common or a competitive framework.

The Americans on the Trilateral Commission congratulate Europe on achieving what it has, and wish it well, but cannot consider that part of an American problem. The American problem is what happens now, and whether we can achieve, as we did in

10

**Henry Kissinger** is Chairman of Kissinger Associates, Inc., New York; former U.S. Secretary of State; former U.S. Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs

[Y]

11

Henry Kissinger

I would like to make a tactless point at the beginning. For an American audience, most of the discussion of the European Constitution seems totally elusive. I invited Valéry Giscard d'Estaing to give a speech at the Library of Congress, and he gave a brilliant detailed explanation of the evolution of the European Constitution and its existing problems to a stunned audience that did not understand that this had the slightest relevance to any of their concerns. One of the problems in transatlantic relations is the disproportionate amount of time that is given on either side of the Atlantic to these problems. European foreign ministers spend, what, 40% of their time on European matters and on the fine points we have heard so elegantly explained here. I doubt that any major American policymaker has ever read the European Constitution or that this is a subject for debate in America.

1

[Y]

2

[4]

3

On the European side, there is a greater obstacle than on the American side, and I would define the key issue in transatlantic relationship as follows. Of course, Europe needs to define a common identity -- that's the nature of Europe. The question is: is that identity sought through opposition to the United States or is it an identity that allows for occasional opposition to the United States but views the relationship in essence as a cooperative relationship based on the conviction there are fundamentally common goals. That is the question that has not yet been answered.

M

4

[Y]

If European identity is defined organically in opposition to the United States, then we are in a pre-World War I world in which you have blocs of countries pursuing their national interest and not excluding cooperation but not guaranteeing it and making no distinction between their relations to each other and the rest of the world. In such an international system, foreign policy becomes the adjustment of the national interest of that region, of each region, to the circumstances as they are perceived at the moment with no guarantee of common action or opposition but shifting arrangements made between the blocs as they emerge -- whether Asia or China, Japan, Russia or whatever the constellation is. That system proved extremely difficult to operate in the pre-World War I situation. I think it would be unmanageable in the present globalised situation.

5

M

6