SPECTATOR
The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone: 020-7405 1706; Fax 020-7242 0603
BILL CLINTON IS RIGHT
Bravo, Clinton. Well said. After eight embarrassing years, in which we have had to endure his ego-sexo-psycho-drama, the ?resident of the United States has made a major foreign policy pronouncement, which is at once exciting, profound and far- sighted. What bliss it would have been to have sat among the corpulent Euro-wor- thies last week and watched with them as 13 ill received the Charlemagne Prize for contribution to European unity', which is, these days, the highest honour the Conti- nent can confer. The day before, the Financial Times had published an oleagi- nous leader, congratulating Mr Clinton for suPPorting EU integration. Yet, when he spoke after accepting the gong, he made a suggestion so stunning, so alarming to the tender federastic sensibilities of the FT that the newspaper hissed that he was 'not entitled to make such an offer'. He spoke with the simplicity of the child who spied that the emperor was naked. He recommended that Russia should be admit- ted not just to Nato, but to the EU as well; and one can only imagine the girning he !Yoked among the Continent's elite. Mr k2linton's point is unanswerable, which is Why they fear it. If you say that Mr Clinton Wrong and that Russia is not a European CountrY, and is therefore not admissible under the terms of the Treaty of Rome, whn You have to say what Europe is. So at is it? , In their efforts to exclude the Turks it Democrats, been customary for German Christian hernOCIatS, and the likes of Jacques 71ors, to hint that the EU is the successor nit .Charlemagne's empire, in that it is coter- onclus with Christendom. This will obvi- _,(7 not do. If 'Europe' means Christen- t _ _m, then You might as well include Ameri- ,4' North and South, where there are far 1Ore Christians per head than in most relPean countries, and you certainly turativel „ couldn't exclude the Russians. More Y, some in Brussels will hint to you that t Europe really means chaps like us: you rw, white men on the end of the "irrasian landmass. Let us i tuA,a_ , leave aside the racism this implies iilitel. s the Turks, the Israelis and other t,"..,!°I.tants of the Mediterranean littoral, though it is worth noting, in passing, that all
those who accuse Eurosceptics of being `xenophobes' are in reality defending a political construction whose avowed intent is to keep out the Muslims. Even if this, deep down, is the rationale of the builders of Little Europe, they still have no answer to the question posed by Bill Clinton. Let us suppose that Ken Clarke, Michael Hes- eltine and Tony Blair are really so ugly in their prejudices that they want to build a Europe to keep out the `towelheads'; they still have no reply to the claims of the Slays and the Baits and the endless vista of Chris- tian white folk stretching to Vladivostok.
What Mr Clinton, or whoever wrote his speech, has realised is that in the last ten years Little Europe has lost its geo-political
logic. European integration was a noble idea, born of the desire that France and Germany should.not go to war again. As the 1950s and 1960s wore on, the Ameri- cans strongly supported an integrated EU as a valuable bulwark against the Soviet threat. In 2000, more than ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, both those con- siderations look absurd. There will be no war between France and Germany, and the Soviet threat is a busted flush. That leaves no urgent necessity to create a tightly uni- fied Little Europe, except in the hearts of those who are so anti-American that they would abandon national independence in the chimerical hope of creating a rival superstate. To that end, they continue to pour out federalising legislation (this week, abandoning its pretence of defiance, Labour accepted a new EU law to change the burden of proof in race discrimination cases) and militate for Britain to join the euro.
Everything is intended not just to com- plicate the lives of businessmen, but to frustrate would-be applicant countries. What is the point of this preposterous new Charter of Fundamental Rights, which is to be bestowed upon us by the EU? Why do we need Brussels to give us 'the right to reconcile family and professional life'? What the hell has this to do with the free movement of goods, people, services and capital? The objective is to pull up the drawbridge against those nations, especial- ly, perhaps, the Turks, who cannot subject their national traditions to such a detailed and intimate destruction. Tony Blair has indicated that he will veto the Charter when it comes before the Nice summit at the end of the year. Let us hope he does so, though his record of resistance is not convincing.
Before then, the Prime Minister might tell us whether he agrees with Bill Clinton, his political mentor. Is Russia part of Europe? Is there any reason why Russia should not ultimately be admitted to mem- bership? If not, why not? If the Prime Min- ister or one of his gnomes in Downing Street would like to write us an article, our columns are open. Come on, Mr Blair: is Chekhov a European author? Is St Peters- burg a European city? Yes or no?
Previous page
