This essay represents a synthesis of nearly 7 months' study of U.S. and European security issues at the National War College. It results from insights gained through readings, seminars, lectures, and meetings with top U.S. and foreign civilian and military policy makers and national security specialists. The essay will examine U.S. security interests in Europe, European views of its own and U.S. security interests, and potential arrangements for securing those interests. Competition in responding fully to the challenges of a redefined strategy toward Europe will come not only from other deserving geographic regions, but from the perennial American penchant to reduce foreign entanglements, and increasingly from preoccupation with resolving domestic economic and budgetary problems. If, as this essay suggests, the Atlantic Alliance (NATO) is at risk of being marginalized by other European-only security frameworks whose form and substance are only beginning to take shape, and whose definition is by no means assured, the need arises to provide other mechanisms for ensuring full expression of U.S. interests in Europe. Against this backdrop, this examination of U.S.-European security interests will be conducted with a critical eye toward the potential for intensifying U.S.-German relations -- a strategic partnership with arguably the new center of gravity in Europe. The author is particularly indebted to Colonel Eckart Fischer, Federal Republic of Germany Army, and adjunct Instructor at the National War College, both for his insights on German views of post-Cold War European security arrangements as provided through his advanced regional studies course on Germany, and for providing meaningful access to senior German and other European diplomatic and military officials. Their candid discussions were invaluable in determining trends and tendencies in U.S.-European security relations.

The dramatic events since the late 1980s, which witnessed the end of the Cold War, the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, the fragmentation of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a united Germany, have set in motion a recasting of the European security order.

At the EU's Helsinki summit in 1999, European leaders took a decisive step toward the development of a new Common European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) aimed at giving the EU a stronger role in international affairs backed by a credible military force. This report analyzes the processes leading to the ESDP by examining why and how this new European consensus came about. It touches upon the controversies and challenges that still lie ahead. What are the national interests and driving forces behind it, and what steps need to be taken to realize Europe's ambitions to achieve a workable European crisis mgmt. capability?

"With new leaders in place in Germany, France, and Britain and with elections in Russia, Spain, Italy, and the United States in 2008, the stage is set for change and a new transatlantic beginning in 2009. The contributors to this volume offer an agenda for action - not to reinvent either NATO or the European Union but, rather, to recast these two main institutional dimensions of the transatlantic partnership in ways that can make each better suited to the other and make both more effectively prepared to help their 32 members address the issues - security, economic, political, and societal - they face in common."--BOOK JACKET.

The end of the unipolar moment completes the passing of a Western era that was prolonged for half a century when the United States took over for a defeated and exhausted group of European states after World War II. Distinguished scholar Simon Serfaty vigorously argues that while it is possible, and even desirable, to acknowledge the passing of the Western era, it is exaggerated to present it as an irreversible decline of the West relative to an irresistible rise of the Rest. Rather, he shows that the unfolding post-Western moment will be messy. In addition to the United States and the states of Europe as a Union, the new cast of significant powers will involve a dozen or more countries: emerging powers like China and India, postimperial powers such as Japan and Russia, new influentials like Brazil and Turkey, pivot states like Egypt and Pakistan, nuisance states like Iran, failed or failing states like North Korea and Sudan, and others. Echoes of a Sarajevo moment played out this time in the greater Middle East, the new global Balkans for the twenty-first century. But Serfaty convincingly contends that even during a zero-polar moment of geopolitical transition, American power remains superior, and thus indispensable though no longer decisive; Western power stands on top and thus is inescapable though no longer exclusive; and even as the Rest gains broadly in stature and reach it is unlikely to achieve preponderance any time soon. This powerful and provocative book should be read by all who share a deep concern for the future of America—and a recast world.

This edited volume sets out to explore the paradox that the European Union (EU) produces policies with strategic qualities, but lacks the institutions and concepts to engage in strategic reasoning and action proper. The book has a two-fold agenda, exploring current EU external policies that are, or seem to be, linked to strategic priorities, and also studying the concept of strategy in the particular context of EU decision- and policymaking. The volume first examines the character of the Union as a strategic actor at this stage of its development. It then explores the ability of the Union to act and otherwise influence both its periphery and the wider world, focusing in particular on how it is perceived by other actors. The final section comprises personal assessments by a group of contributors regarding the character of the union as a strategic actor in the present and future. When these are pieced together, a picture emerges of a European strategy in the making, albeit one that so far is modest and partial. This book will be of interest to students of European Security, European Politics and IR.