159 central asia and the caucasus

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No. 2(26), 2004

CENTRAL ASIA AND THE CAUCASUS

The European Component

This partnership is rooted deep in the past.

We can even say that the partnership began when the U.S. entered World War I on the side of En-

tente, that is, when the United States abandoned its traditional isolationism and non-interference in Euro-

pean affairs, which the country had been pursuing since the very first days of its independence. (The new

political course was registered in Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points and the U.S.’s active contribution

to the Versailles system.)

The “special relations” of today were generated by the countries’ joint struggle against fascist

Germany; it was at that time that a basis for later cooperation was formulated and still later used as

the cornerstone of the trans-Atlantic partnership. According to Foreign Secretary of Great Britain

Jack Straw, the trans-Atlantic partnership should be dated back to the Atlantic Charter signed by the

countries in 1941. The document that formulated the strategy of British-American partnership can

be described as the starting point of today’s trans-Atlantic contacts and the Washington-London

alliance of long standing.

Their cooperation during the Cold War can be described as another stage in developing and strength-

ening the trans-Atlantic partnership, the key link of American policies in Europe, while the “special re-

lations” between the U.S. and Great Britain were the main instrument for creating NATO. Today, the bloc

is instrumental in transmitting America’s political and military might to Europe; it ensures America’s

military presence in the Old World. More than that: NATO serves as the basis for contemporary trans-

Atlantic relations that tie together the U.S. and its European partners; NATO serves as the basis for the

contemporary European and trans-Atlantic security system supported by the American military-political

presence in Europe. Indeed, had the United States stayed away from Europe, America’s foreign, defense

and security policies would have been different.

Today, as in the past, the U.S.’s global policies pivot around the trans-Atlantic partnership, the

European component of which serves as the backbone of the trans-Atlantic system, thus bringing Amer-

ican influence to Europe. The alliance as a rigorous system uses NATO instruments to support and com-

plement American presence in Europe.

Allied relationships with London allow Washington to extend its political leeway within its bilat-

eral relations with European partners and the integrated European structures. Even though the Europe-

an and trans-Atlantic institutions are functioning, the British-American alliance is of fundamental im-

portance, as well as its influence on the European political climate. When carrying out its European

strategy Washington relies on London’s political, diplomatic and military support. It is this support

(successful for certain historical, mental, geographic, geopolitical, and other reasons) that allows the

United States to develop its foreign political successes in the European and trans-Atlantic structures

and to carry out decisions that meet America’s strategic interests. Later while still relying on these

structures and on the British-American tandem, the United States will be able to continue its European

and global games in the West’s strategic interests. We can say that reliance on the U.K. within the

European and trans-Atlantic structures is another important part of the British-American alliance’s

European component in the U.S.’s policies.

The alliance with London will help Washington extend its influence to the European structures (the

EU, for example) the U.S. is not a member of. In fact, in the absence of these two states in the European

and trans-Atlantic structures, the power and political weight of the latter would have been less signifi-

cant; they would have probably collapsed long ago because of internal contradictions and general inca-

pacity. It is precisely the United States and Great Britain that provide these structures with political might

and power, which serve, in turn, as the basis of power of the U.S. and the West as a whole and form a

single “center of power.”

Political experts believe that it is American and British membership in NATO, as well as the U.S.’s

military patronage of the E.U. that attract the former members of the Eastern bloc. They probably regard

the influential and strong British-American tandem as an additional guarantee of their national security

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