Nonetheless, the Americans worried that if the Europeans organized their own defenses, separate from NATO, it would undermine domestic support for NATO in the United States. Furthermore, it was unclear from Washington’s vantage point whether Europeans “can or truly wish to realize the integration of foreign, security and defense policy.” The French and Germans, for example, had plans to create an integrated army brigade outside of NATO, but the CIA dismissed the plan as militarily useless.
The Americans determined that they could not “quash” the impulse in European capitals for European security cooperation, but they could seek to prevent any European development that might harm NATO. Washington indicated to its allies that the United States would be pleased if the Europeans were to cooperate on a foreign and defense policy for issues outside Europe. 111 If new European plans would compete with NATO or create redundant common structures, however, the American government would oppose them.
The American premise in 1989 had been that the Europeans could not keep peace in Europe by themselves. Nothing had changed by 1990 or 1991. There was no confidence in the United States government, or in NATO’s higher echelons, that Europeans, the European Community, or the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe could serve as a substitute for NATO if Moscow one day “contemplates another westward push.” 112 Early postwar American hopes that Europeans could and would be capable of building up their own effective defenses were long gone.
The immediate stake, however, was in American domestic support for NATO. 113 The Bush administration knew that many in Washington expected the financial benefits of a “peace dividend.” If the Europeans looked like they were creating “an alternative to NATO,” the calls for the return of American troops from Europe might become unmanageable. 114
In 1991, American efforts and European political developments served to put a brake on any European development that would challenge NATO. John Major replaced Margaret Thatcher as prime minister of the UK. Where Thatcher’s dislike of the EC had made it easier for the Western Europeans to cooperate without London, Major’s interest in Europe but preference for sovereign defenses—a position shared by the Dutch—complicated the matter. American officials launched what Mitterrand called “a major American offensive” against a European common defense. Ultimately, the Americans were able to drive a wedge between the Germans and French, whose agreement would have been essential for any major step toward a European defense identity. Genscher and Baker signed a joint declaration stating that NATO was “the principal venue for consultation and the forum for agreement on all policies bearing on the security and defense commitment of its members.” 115 The Europeans would continue inching toward greater defense cooperation, but there was no question that a common European defense could substitute for NATO and the American commitment.
Toward the end of 1991, the Americans pressed the allies to use the December summit in Rome to “reaffirm” that NATO was the “essential foundation for European stability and security.” 116 But the Americans understood that after the dramatic changes in Europe, the alliance’s “East-West mission” was all but “accomplished in the minds of allied publics.” 117 As Woerner told Bush, it was essential to describe NATO as a tool for “confronting instability and uncertainty” rather than confronting the East. 118
