There was a time.. not so long ago in a place not far away, when the stereotypical images of the World Powers were lampooned regularly..
The Red Army sang songs, while the US army dropped bombs.
It is funny to see some of these images again, after all this time. The same mad cartoon generals, holding the same missiles or dropping the same fat-bellied bombs. The other week, the New Statesman carried a cover piece by Francis Beckett, in which he wrote: 'The Bush administration is the final corruption of an imperial nation convinced that its destiny is to rule.' I am pretty sure that, circa 1959, you could have read almost exactly the same words in the Daily Worker, substituting Eisenhower for Bush.
The Red Army, as discovered in August 1968, did not just sing about the glories of the steppe. The Chinese were not all delighted to find themselves living through the Cultural Revolution. The list of crimes - from Chile to Angola - which are trotted out every time America is discussed, mostly took place in the context of the Cold War, when we had a terrified nuclear peace in Europe, and proxy wars and proxy dictators throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America. Yet, if anything, the idea of 'America' is more widely shared now than it was even back then.
Some of this is almost eternal semi-prejudice. Young, brash America is characterised by recklessness, naivety and greed, just as (for the British, at any rate) Italy is full of theatrical cowards and France of cynical philanderers. Bill Clinton (that odd combination, a theatrical philanderer) was often depicted by British cartoonists as riding a phallic rocket, wearing a cowboy hat and going to war to try and extricate himself from the consequences of his various liaisons.
But now it matters more.
Since 11 September, we have all been frightened. And, increasingly, we blame the Americans for frightening us. I think a lot of ordinary Europeans (and quite a few Americans) believe that if the US would somehow stop doing whatever it is that is so upsetting people, then the threat would lessen, and we could get back to normal. The Yanks are stirring the nest, we think, and we could all be stung.
But.. this perception is facile..
George came to power wanting not to intervene and not to build nations. During the bitterly divisive election of November 2000, the Texas Governor cast Al Gore as the naïve moralist who wanted to be the world's policeman. As one observer noted at the time, George's story was that, 'America is over-committed around the world, pushes its weight around too much, and tells other countries how to run their affairs too often. We need to scale back, be humble and get out of the nation-building business.' A Bush-supporting commentator put it this way, 'Virtually every friendly state expects America to take the lead in solving every problem everywhere. But the Cold War is over. The world is dramatically less dangerous for the United States.' A year later, four planes blew this conceit to smithereens.
Criticism.. if any is due.. applies with equal force to us in Europe. We have, over years, dealt with torturers and tyrants, sold them weapons and flattered their egos. And if there is one thing that the west could do to win over sceptics, it would be to admit the nature and origin of these errors..
That being said, there are those in opposition to the west's recovery from this scenario, who would take nothing as admitted.. nor would they admit any similar acts in their own spotted histories.. These must simply be endured.. while the problem of the Middle East, so long in addressing, is dealt with, finally..