Mr. Obama Has His Reasons for Snubbing Disunited Old Europe: Financial Times Deutschland

Why is German Chancellor Angela Merkel in town in part to dispel rumors that U.S.-German relations are strained – and that President Obama is less enamored by the Old Continent than his predecessors? Financial Times Deutschland columnist Thomas Klau surmises that at the root of President Obama’s “casual willingness to snub” Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy is that individually, European nations no longer warrant the attention they once did. According to Klau, the message from Obama is if European leaders want the United States to accord them the attention they crave – then they had best get their act together and start speaking with a united voice.

For the Financial Times Deutschland, Thomas Klau writes in part:

There were long faces in Berlin and in Paris after the recent visit by U.S. President Barack Obama: The superstar of the White House granted his most important continental allies less time than Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy would have liked. … In Paris, when it was leaked that Obama would prefer a relaxing visit with his family to a Paris bistro rather than play friendship-theater with the French presidential couple, it caused some irritation in the Elysée.

“Obama is a man who plots out and calculates his political moves like a chess player. Combined with the scheduling of his first visit to Europe and his businesslike conduct during his second, one can detect something like a programmatic statement of how this President would like to shape relations with his Allies on the Old Continent.

“Obama is unlike his predecessor George W. Bush, who was blind to history. And he also knows how much faster and deeper the descent of the Europeans will be as long as they don’t manage to counter the non-European world with a unified message and common representation. … If the Europeans misread the signs of the 21st century, Merkel, Sarkozy, and their successors cannot expect to be doted on by Obama – such was the message of his second visit.”

By Thomas Klau*

Translated By Jonathan Lobsien

June 19, 2009

Germany – Financial Times Deutschland – Original Article (German)

There were long faces in Berlin and in Paris after the recent visit by U.S. President Barack Obama: The superstar of the White House granted his most important continental allies less time than Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy would have liked.

In Paris, when it was leaked that Obama would prefer a relaxing visit with his family to a Paris bistro rather than play friendship-theater with the French presidential couple, it caused some irritation in the Elysée [the Presidential palace].

On his second visit to Europe as U.S. President, Obama focused his two stopovers on his tour of the Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany and the Allies’ commemoration of the Normandy landings. The expectations of his German and French hosts for photo-ops and friendly gestures he disappointed coolly.

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