A Mr. Green has written that the poor performance of France in the current unpleasantness stirring up the Middle East is largely a creation of American largess beginning with World War II. I have to admit that I never looked at it in this light; however, on reflection I find the idea is nothing new. It seems to me that this is part and parcel of the evolution of western liberalism. Remember, in an evolutionary process some lines can start out strong, then whither and die as the weight of their anti-survival traits drag them down.

In the case of France, this was a World Power of the Old Continental Europe- a nation to be reckoned with whenever any nation sought to make any sort of power play in wide swaths of the world. They handed America her independence simply to annoy the British, and in the process sowed the seeds of their own demise- the collapse of the Royaume de France in to revolution essentially eviscerated that nation’s ability to remain a world power. Unlike the United States, France descended in to the Reign of Terror that most modern revolutions spawn; rather than a Stalin or a Mao, they begat Napoleon (after some serious struggles) who proceeded to seal their fate as an essentially failed world power. That France has been able to remain the force it is today is a tribute to American charity and the social inertia that plays such an immense role in the post World War II miasma that is modern Europe.

One cannot ignore the immense psychosocial impact of the past 200 years. How many times can a once great power see itself humbled before the world without either lashing out or engaging in the soul-balm of self delusion? The major powers of Europe, both politically and culturally had always regarded the United States as an uncultured and unreliable power in the world, yet in the twentieth century it was that same uncultured and unreliable power which arrived to pull their more sophisticated betters out of the ashes of their own folly. Particularly in World War II, it was the United States, and even more so the new and frightening Communist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics which won the war against the evil of a Fascism that was a native son to the very same sophisticated powers. The impact of this on the psyche of Europe has been profound, and the aftershocks are still reverberating across the poliscape of the world. Those nations able to adapt remain active in the world of real events and real power. Those that cannot descend in to a state of irrelevance from where the only option is to cry out for caution and demand circumspection from those who are able and willing to act.

It is a sad fate, really, but an unavoidable reality as the world grinds ever so slowly forward.

Posted on January 24th, 2003 by Zsallia
Filed under: Philosophy