No national ambition possible outside Europe. A European defence policy, what for? The only valid response is: to male a common foreign policy credible, giving Europe autonomous positions in the world, in line with its interests, its traditions and its ambitions. The starting point, therefore, is CFSP, the common foreign and security policy, for which ESDP, European security and defence policy, will essentially be an instrument. This small pedagogical prelude aims to make it easier to understand the attitude of those who have never been considered particularly passionate about European integration and who, even so, are today in the van of the construction of political Europe and the Europe of defence. The political and psychological roots of Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder did not spontaneously lead them in this direction (and the same can be said of Guy Verhofstadt). But they understood that there will be no global future for their countries other than via Europe, and that is true from all points of view: political, economic and cultureal.
No political autonomy without the Euro. An affirmation to this effect by international currency experts did not receive enough notice, in my view. They stressed that France would not have been able to take the stance it did over the Iraqi war without the Euro. The old French Franc could have been attacked on the markets of New York, London, and elsewhere, making brutal devaluation inevitable. With the European currency, this is no longer possible. The Euro is a condition of European autonomy. A common defence policy is equally vital, but it will be of no use unless at the service of a foreign policy. And so we are back to the CFSP.
The Convention predicted the indispensable. The most reliable analyses state that the Convention forecasted what the Union needs at the moment, the instruments to get our countries' authorities used to thinking together, rather than taking isolated national positions- giving them the "European reflex". A sweeping cross-over to majority deliberations in foreign policy matters would be ridiculous now, and it is wrong to recommend it, because, in the words of Jacques Delors, "the differences between the Member States, who are tied to historical weights, are still too deep". Valéry Giscard d'Estaing observed that during the Iraqi crisis majority voting would have torn Europe apart, because the result of the vote would never have been respected. The United Kingdom would never have turned down a piece of the American action, and France and Germany would never have accepted Europe's involvement in the war. Our objective, said VGE, is to unite the Europeans, not divide them even further. The road to a genuine common policy must be gradual and include conditions and precautions.
The chapter of the draft Constitution on CFSP creates the instruments needed for this process: the Union's Foreign Minister with his faculty of initiative, the voting procedures with the option of "constructive abstention" (the abstaining country cannot block the envisaged common action, but is not obliged to participate), cases where majority voting is admitted and the mechanisms to defer on this vote, the faculty of the European Council to expand cases of majority voting when the time comes. Adjustments to these texts are still possible, on the role of the European Minister and the procedures, but the groundwork of what can be done today is there. Etienne Davignon noted (I heard him personally) that both texts on Iraq, which appear to be opposites, and which caused such uproar and created such division, could easily have been made into a single text, because they were so similar! They referred to the "letter of the eight" expressing fidelity to the Atlantic Pact by a group of central and eastern European countries, to the letter from Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, Felipe Gonzales and Jean-Luc Dehaene (co-signed by many others, including the two former Chancellors Helmut Schmidt and Helmut Kohl, plus Douglas Hurd, Carl Bildt, Raymond Barre, Emilio Colombo, Giorgio Napolitano, and even Bronislav Geremek), and which was, in a way, a response to the first letter. The inspiration and contents were so alike, that, according to Etienne Davignon, any half-competent official could have united them. The viscount maybe over-estimated the capabilities of a half-competent official; let us say that he himself would have been able to do it. What's behind his comment is clear: get the Union's diplomats into the habit of studying dossiers together, reinforce the powers of the current High Representative, and we can avoid the tentative and the excessive positions which are quickly regretted. It is a first step, to be accompanied by the carrot of common defence.
Open door to differentiation. This would be the first concrete phase of the European foreign policy, leaving the door open to "differentiation" between the Member States, which the EU will in any case not be able to avoid, either in ESDP (see this column yesterday), or in CFSP. (F.R.)