The recent storms in American-German relations illuminate two basic truths. First, a solid and stable relationship between America and Germany remains, as it has for more than half a century, the indispensable precondition for progress toward European integration. Second, the area now causing the greatest disputes between Germany and the United States--the Middle East--is the area in which the two countries have major interests in common, and where both stand to gain the most by finding their way to a cooperative path. There is a third truth, that in Washington German frustration over its lack of influence in American policymaking represents a threat to U.S.-German relations that both Americans and Germans must address.

German leaders used to be among the most respected world figures in the United States. From the final resignation of Winston Churchill to the arrival of Margaret Thatcher, German leaders and diplomats were consistently more respected and frequently more listened to in Washington than their (admittedly mostly mediocre) British counterparts. Yet, since unification, Germany's standing in Washington has fallen, and recent transatlantic spats over the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court (ICC) and Iraq have not helped matters.

Germany's problems today in influencing America can be reduced to the following conclusion: key "Red State" or "American Revivalist" policymakers think Germany's advice is mostly bad, and so want to take as little of it as possible. They will only take German advice when the benefits of German cooperation or the costs of German obstruction are greater than the perceived cost of doing what Germany wants.

These conditions are only rarely met. American Revivalists place a low value both on Germany's potential to help the United States or to obstruct American initiatives by non-participation or resistance. Since 1989 and the end of Europe's special status as the strategic focus of American foreign policy, several factors have combined to produce a gradual reduction in Germany's perceived importance to the United States. Therefore, it is a relatively unusual event for Washington to defer to Germany or to make a major compromise with it on an important international issue.

Many have thought that the most effective way to change Washington's disposition is to change our opinion about either the benefits of German cooperation or the costs of German (and European) opposition. This is partly why many Germans have placed such importance on the centralization of European foreign policymaking: they hope that a centralized Europe will be seen in Washington as a larger and more important actor with greater impact to affect U.S. goals for good or for ill.

The American Revival analysis, however, believes that divisive European politics will continue to make the eu an inept and weak power even if constitutional reform creates a new, vigorous continental foreign minister. European nations will continue to undercut or resist the common policy on many issues. The option of a "two speed" Europe with an inner core of countries might create more rapid movement, but to the extent that this inner core includes only France, Germany and a sprinkling of smaller countries, American Revivalists do not fear its weight in the world. For American Revivalists the calculation is simple: a smaller Europe could develop common institutions and common policies, but this small core could not seriously challenge American interests. A 25 or thirty member European Union might have the weight to counterbalance the United States, but is extremely unlikely to develop enough political and institutional cohesion to challenge the United States on anything other than trade issues.

So, the most hopeful way to change the melancholy state of German influence in Washington is to improve the perceived value of German counsel. If American policymakers respected German statesmanship more, they would treat German policy advice with more respect. They would do this whether Europe was united or disunited, weak or strong, rich or poor.

But this cannot come about by "converting" Americans to a European or German point of view about history, morality, legality or the optimal world order. It is no more likely that George Bush will renounce his faith than that Gerhard Schröder will seek baptism at the hands of Billy Graham. Yet Konrad Adenauer did not have to become "an American" in order for his advice to be taken seriously by American policymakers. Statesmen like Adenauer and Helmut Schmidt--who both knew very well how to say "No" to the United States--commanded enormous respect in Washington. They were able to influence Americans not because they overawed them or bribed them. They have done it by their powers of communication and attraction--their soft power, as it were.

It may seem strange counsel coming from an American in the Age of Bush, but Europe's chief problem in the United States today results from a failure of European soft power. Europe beats the broad back of American power with the sticks that it has--mostly, its trade power--but somehow that does not move the behemoth more than a few halting steps. It abuses the United States for its boorishness and its weak grasp of the fine points of international co-existence--but this somehow does not move the beast either.

That is why I am taking the risk of revealing the most important secret of dealing with Americans: We cannot be kicked into submission, but we are easily kissed into bed. Even those who affect to despise soft power are easily ensorcelled by its charms.

Dueling Realisms

Germany and the United States are divided by very real cultural issues. Germans and other Europeans often fail to understand that most Americans are largely satisfied with the underpinnings of their strategic approach to the world. They are not about to change an approach that is grounded in American folk values, that has stood the test of time and that has brought the United States great power and success while, most Americans feel, defending ideals and values of great value not only to ourselves but to all humanity. In the view of the Red States, fascism and communism both originated in Europe and flourished worldwide because Europeans supported them--and they died in large part because Americans fought them at great cost in treasure and blood. For the Red States, case closed. There is nothing more to be said.

The social and international peace that contemporary Europeans see as their proudest achievement strikes this kind of American as the quiet of the grave--or, at least, the peace that comes with utter exhaustion. Europe has stopped warring with itself not because it has reached a plateau of spiritual enlightenment, but because it no longer has the vitality to live even biologically, much less to fight. Red State Americans believe that while the European project is not failing in any immediate or short-term perspective, overall, Europe has not yet laid the foundations for real success or influence in the world.

Many Red State Americans, moreover, believe that Germany has not found an effective foreign policy stance or identity since 1989. They consider unification to have been botched, permanently weakening Germany's fiscal foundations and significantly reducing the resources that Germany could bring either to underpin European integration or support initiatives elsewhere in the world. It has led to a progressive loss of faith in Germany's ability to deal with its own problems and, therefore, to a loss of faith in Germany's ability to bring much insight to broader world affairs.

Germany's unilateral decision to recognize Croatia in 1991 remains notorious among American analysts as the immediate cause of the Balkan wars and one of the great blunders of the post-Cold War era. Germany's record in triggering these wars by its ill-judged unilateral action, and its subsequent failure to manage the situation in partnership with its European allies, created one grave crisis after another for the Clinton Administration and the aftertaste in American mouths of the whole experience is still very bitter.

Germany's role in the evolution of European institutions during the last decade has also not enhanced its image in the United States. The stability pact that Germany forced on its partners in creating the common currency appeared from the beginning to be a colossal blunder on economic policy grounds as seen through American eyes. The vehemence and rigidity with which the German government imposed this foolish and unworkable straitjacket on its partners also attracted unfavorable notice. Germany was wrong to impose it--and also wrong to destroy it the way that it did. The impression of rigidity and self-righteousness conveyed throughout these changing stands damaged Germany's reputation in the United States--even though American opinion was sympathetic to the argument that without some agreed framework, irresponsible spending by eurozone countries presented a serious moral hazard. Yet the inability or unwillingness of German diplomacy to find less destructive ways to pursue reasonable goals sent quiet shockwaves through the American foreign policy world.

Red State Americans and Germans see Europe in very different ways. The expectation in Europe is that Europe--with Germany at its core--is a rising power in the world. Integration and coordination have overcome the divisions that crippled Europe throughout the 20th century. Europe can now resume the place in the world from which its wars and divisions temporarily blocked it. Its economic might and soft power is so great that no state, not even the United States, can ignore it, and Europe's only real equal in the 21st century will be the United States.

Most Americans are less sanguine about Europe's prospects, and for Red State analysts, the outlook is very different. They point to slow progress at overcoming structural barriers to growth, projected demographic declines, evident lack of public support for adequate defense spending, the failure to assimilate immigrants in most European countries, and they do not think that they are looking at the emergence of a superpower. They see continuing crises of governance in European institutions. Meanwhile, they look at demographic and economic projections from European and global sources that predict continuing declines in Europe's shares both of world population and world economic activity through at least 2050 and they conclude that further consolidation will at best slow Europe's historic decline. From this perspective, European integration looks more like a group of passengers huddling ever more closely together on the deck of a sinking ship than like an emerging superpower.

It is, obviously, impossible today to say who is right--only time will tell whether the ship of Europe is rising or sinking. But the conviction in Washington that European integration at best can slow the long decline of Europe in world affairs shapes Washington's approach to a great many world issues--just as Europe's faith in its recovery and emancipation informs the expectations that Europe brings to negotiations with Washington.

These different perceptions lead the two sides to very different assessments of what is due to the other. While European observers attribute the Bush Administration's diminished appetite for consultation and shared decision making with Europe to a perverse moral preference for unilateralism, the Administration's record in Asia and with Russia suggests an even more unsettling explanation. American relations with both China and Japan have rarely been better; the Bush Administration has managed its relationship with Russia with some care. The delicate balancing act required to manage simultaneously relations with Pakistan and India has been carried out reasonably well. The conclusion seems sadly evident that the Bush Administration is pragmatic rather than doctrinal when it comes to multilateral and unilateral options. It has proceeded without closer consultation with Germany and France because it has simply concluded that Germany and France demand more attention and consultation than their support is worth.

Not everyone in the United States shares this harsh perception in the full, undiluted form in which it is proclaimed in the Pentagon. However, the Bush Administration is not alone in the perception that Europe (or at least the Franco-German axis) asks too much and offers too little. "Europe" wants real political control over vital matters of American foreign policy in exchange for kind words at the UN, mostly symbolic military support and limited financial aid. For Bush, the price is simply too high. He chooses not to pay.

Here it is important to elucidate another factor guiding this thinking. While these Americans do understand that Europe could provide a great deal of help for American goals in the Middle East, they do not think that it realistically will. A combination of different interests, a certain sterility which Americans think is inherent in the Franco-German partnership, and a lack of assets will combine to ensure that, even if America and Europe had a better consensus on the Middle East, Europe's help would not be great enough to justify the high political price that Europe demands in exchange. It is even likely that many Red State Americans are quietly thankful that there is no significant French presence in Iraq.

From the American perspective, Europeans seem to demand a veto over American actions abroad, but Europe does not offer the United States a reciprocal veto over Europe's policy agenda. That is, either alone or together, France or Germany must be able to block a U.S. action like the invasion of Iraq, but the United States has no business blocking a European initiative like the Kyoto Protocol or the ICC. Indeed, to judge by what Europeans often say, the United States not only has no right to veto the establishment by Europeans of such institutions: it has no legitimate right of abstention from institutions which Europe in its wisdom has decreed for the world.

If the price of a good relationship with Europe is the acceptance of a non-reciprocal European veto over American actions, no American president will ever accept it. France and Germany would have to defeat the United States in a war to impose a veto--and even then, the United States would not rest until it had freed itself from this unequal relationship. Europeans must either drop their demand for the non-reciprocal veto, change the way Americans perceive the nature of this proposed basis for the relationship, or accept a basic, permanent frustration and unhappiness resulting from America's unshakeable refusal to engage on these terms.

Germans often do not appreciate that Europe's stance on these issues has changed over the decades. Following Woodrow Wilson's failure to get the Treaty of Versailles ratified in the U.S. Senate, Europeans developed great sensitivity to the need to shape international institutions and treaties in ways that would take the views of Red State solons into account. NATO's founding treaties are a classic example. It became clear that the Senate would reject any version of these treaties that created an automatic guarantee that the United States would fight if any power invaded the territory of the NATO allies. The U.S. Constitution reserves the right to declare war to the Congress; the Senate refused to give up this power. Europe was eager enough to form the alliance that a compromise was found; NATO allies are now merely bound to follow their constitutional procedures to determine their response in case of attack. Breathtaking in theory, this concession has had little impact on NATO security; one of the main reasons for stationing American troops on the Cold War front line was to ensure that Americans would be among the first casualties of any invasion. An attack on U.S. troops would essentially guarantee that Congress would declare war. A similar ingenuity would have developed a version of the ICC which would have achieved virtually all that its supporters might have wished in practical terms--and in a form that the American Senate could have ratified. In the 1950s, Europe was willing to make these compromises. Today, it is not. I am not sure whether Europeans have fully thought this matter through or whether they have stumbled into their current position through sheer inattention.

If Europeans do not appreciate how unrealistic the non-reciprocal veto approach to the relationship appears from the Red State perspective, they probably also do not realize how this position affects their reputation for clear reasoning and straight thinking among many Americans. The non-reciprocal European veto appears somewhat deranged from the American side, suggesting either that Europeans have a completely swollen and disproportionate idea of their power and importance or that their approach to international politics is careless, unsophisticated and based on illusions and wishful thinking. It powerfully reinforces what is already too strong a view in the United States--that Europeans are children playing in the post-historical sandbox that Europe has become under American security guarantees. They must sometimes be humored but must never be mistaken for responsible, thoughtful adult partners when matters of life and death must be decided.

In calm times, as in the Clinton years, Washington could afford for the sake of a quiet life to palm Europe off with sweet words--to humor the fretful children. The Kyoto Protocol was defeated 95-0 in the Senate, but the Clinton Administration assured Europeans that the process was still alive. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty could not be ratified, but the Administration would continue to observe it. The ICC treaty was in a form that the U.S. Senate would not ratify in a thousand years, but President Clinton could make the empty gesture of signing an agreement that would never be ratified.

Even before September 11, the Bush Administration seems to have decided that in the long run, the maintenance of this charade only stoked what it considered Europe's exaggerated sense of self-importance and created additional expectations of compliance that the United States could never fulfill. It decided to treat the Franco-Germans in accordance with what it considered to be their real weight in the world--and to take the consequences if France and/or Germany refused to accept this approach. At the moment, Bush shows no signs of regretting this decision.

Cherchez La France

The growing estrangement between the United States and France places Germany in a difficult position. One unhappy result of the Iraq crisis is that the United States now largely considers France a determined and open opponent. Many Americans believe that France has defined excessive American power in the world as the greatest danger to French independence and great power status and that France has made a strategic choice to curb that excessive strength. If this perception proves correct and becomes entrenched over time, the entire framework of the transatlantic relationship will have to be rethought, and German foreign policy will be subjected to a whole series of painful shocks and upheavals.

Already, this deep and envenomed suspicion of France is changing America's historic approach to the European Union. In a sense, the Monroe Doctrine has been extended to Europe. The United States now appears ready to reassume the traditional Anglo-Saxon role of defending the "liberties of Europe" to ensure that no combination of powerful European states can dictate to smaller and weaker ones. Specifically, a significant current of opinion in the United States no longer trusts the Franco-German axis to carry out the complex and delicate task of European integration with the requisite sensitivity and flexibility.

Essentially, this feeling reflects a lack of confidence in Germany's ability (and, perhaps, inclination) to manage France. The American perception, partly rooted in the views described earlier that the Berlin Republic has yet to find its proper footing in world affairs, remains that France has consistently outmaneuvered and outclassed its German partners. The German sea-anchor is unable to keep the French frigate from drifting into dangerous waters.

This vision of German weakness and diplomatic inadequacy seems to be one of the few points of intellectual agreement between Paris and Washington today. Indeed, the precondition of France's daring European and global diplomacy in recent months is probably a conviction that France no longer has to worry that a united Germany will emerge as the natural and inevitable leader of a united Europe. There is a new confidence in Paris that the new Germany is more manageable than the old one. Should Germany master European diplomacy and once again look like a strong and rising power capable of leading the reshaping of Europe, France would, as it has done in the past, look to repair its Atlantic links. In the meantime, the progressive passing of initiative in the Franco-German relationship from Germany to France in recent years is an additional factor that undermines American confidence in Germany's ability to provide useful and helpful policy guidance.

Restoring the Relationship

If we rule out a mass conversion in the Red States to European values--or unprecedented success for the next Billy Graham evangelization crusades in Germany--and if we assume that, because the present situation is more painful to Germany than to Red State America, Germany will, in its own interests, need to act more forcefully to change the situation, we are left with three major avenues for action.

First and foremost, German diplomacy must, once again, become steadier, more strategic and more magisterial, allowing American policymakers to regain once again their old respect for German views. This is above all a matter of German diplomacy in Europe and has little or nothing to do with Germany becoming more pliant to American wishes or embracing American ideas about the use of force. Germany has lost its relatively sure touch in Europe and needs to recover it. For reasons that have nothing to do with the current problems in Franco-American relations, this has a great deal to do with curbing certain French tendencies and predilections in Europe. Germany's historic task is to integrate France into Europe, not to abandon European integration for France's sake.

Germany is not a normal European country, and if it pursues its short term national interest in an erratic and domineering way it will wreak enormous damage to its broader interests as well as to the esteem it commands on the Potomac. But the alternative is not a weaker or less assertive Germany; it is a Germany that knows how to assert and increase its strength through service to the common European project.

The irony is not lost on me that this is precisely the kind of criticism that many Germans make of the Bush Administration in the context of global institutions. I merely note that these criticisms would be received with more interest and respect if the German house were in better order. As it is, Germany often looks to Americans like a country which throws its weight around on a small scale, only to demand that the United States treat Germany with a respect that Germany itself denies its smaller partners.

In any case, to the degree that Germany succeeds in regaining the Euro-pean high ground, it will command spontaneous respect even in Red State America as a serious and important partner whose views are well worth taking into account.

Second, there are the problems of the Greater Middle East. From an American perspective, the future of Washington-Brussels cooperation (and, therefore, of Washington-Berlin relations) depends to a very large degree on the extent to which the U.S. and Europe can develop a common agenda and a common project in this vital region.

It is not surprising that this topic was so prominent in the February 2004 White House summit between Bush and Schrder. But the Bush-Schröder dialogue is only the beginning of a much broader process. A deep conversation about the Middle East needs to be undertaken--less by people in government than by what remains, thankfully, a rich and committed group on both sides of the Atlantic who passionately believe that both Germany and the United States would benefit from a common approach. There are a host of issues, including Israel-Palestine, terrorism, reform in the Arab world and others where U.S.-German discussions, perhaps with others from the Atlantic community, could develop to the point that even Red State policymakers could become more excited about the real gains from cooperation and agreement. This would increase the enthusiasm and commitment with which both governments would look for compromises on points of difficulty in order to get on with a positive common program that deals with serious issues. Even the most doctrinally pure Red State Americans have their pragmatic side; to the degree that Germans can help identify and implement real and practical solutions to real problems in the Middle East, Germany's impact on American policymaking will increase. (The recent German-led approach to Iran which President Bush went out of his way to praise at his press conference following Saddam Hussein's capture is a case in point.)

There is a real prospect that serious engagement on these points could lead to a joint agenda on at least some of the contentious and vital Middle East issues. Take the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, for example. Germany and the United States agree on the nature and outline of the territorial and political solution. Currently, however, there is less than consensus on how to get there. From the American perspective it seems that while certain Israeli policies are an unnecessary irritant to be deplored, the real obstacle to further progress is the lack of consensus on the Palestinian side to accept the kind of settlement that Barak proposed in 2000-1. In this view, hardliners dominate Israeli politics only when it has become clear that the Palestinian leadership is unwilling or unable to accept a compromise; if the Palestinians were sincerely ready for this kind of peace, Israeli public opinion would quickly produce a government that would respond. Sharon-style policy is a symptom and sometimes makes a bad situation worse, but the real problem is on the Palestinian side.

Germans argue that while there is some truth to this, moderate Palestinians will only be in a position to win broad support for the painful compromises necessary for peace if the Israelis stop inflaming Palestinian opinion. Furthermore, Germans suspect, not without reason, that factions in Israeli politics opposed to the two state solution deliberately push provocative policies in the hope of preventing peace. From this standpoint, Israeli intransigence is the chief obstacle to peace, while Palestinian intransigence, though real, is in large part a byproduct of Israeli policy. While experts in both Germany and the United States have more nuanced views than those sketched here, the general difference in emphasis is an important one, and has helped turn the Middle East into a contentious issue between Germany and the United States even as the two countries collaborate from time to time.

A deeper conversation might find more points of contact even if both sides remain more or less attached to their current diagnoses. Both Americans and Germans can agree that the miserable human conditions facing Palestinians, now and even after a compromise two-state agreement, will remain a major obstacle to peace and stability in the region. The lack of enthusiasm on the "Palestinian street" for a Barak-style compromise reflects the lack of concrete provisions either for a right of return, compensation for lost property, or real assurances that a Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza will have the economic base necessary to meet the needs of its citizens. The Oslo process produced what is, among experts and most leaders, a reasonably clear vision of the territorial solution. What does not yet really exist is a vision of the human solution for Palestinians. Who will live in the new state? What will happen to those it cannot absorb? What happens to those who now depend on refugee agencies for the necessities of life once there is peace and they are no longer refugees? Compensation for refugees is clearly called for in the relevant United Nations resolutions. How will the amounts be determined, where will the money to pay these claims come from, and what is the procedure for making a claim and receiving compensation?

Providing real answers for these questions is a vital part of advancing the peace agenda whether one shares American or German assumptions about the relative importance of Arab and Israeli obstacles to the peace process. Supporting this agenda is pro-Palestinian and pro-peace, but it is not anti-Israeli. It does not depend on concessions from either side, and it is something that terrorists and extremists cannot interrupt. Working on this agenda together is a way that Germans and Americans can move toward common goals while respecting the independence and points of view of both parties.

Third, a new conversation between Americans and Germans about the future of Europe is also important. There has been a serious breakdown of trust on both sides. Germans have questions about whether and to what extent the United States still supports European integration; Americans need to be reassured that the European project is not being hijacked and converted into an instrument of national power by its two largest members.

Both sides need to think through their understanding of the future place of Europe in world affairs. This cannot be exclusively a U.S.-German conversation, but a vital U.S.-German conversation must be a central part of it. Does Europe really want to be a world power? What (if anything) do Europeans mean by the oft-repeated cry that Europe should be an "equal partner" in the transatlantic alliance? To Americans, this makes sense in the context of a narrowly focused alliance agenda--when the alliance is focused exclusively on defending Europe itself from foreign foes. When it comes to the defense of Europe itself, greater parity for the two partners, accompanied by greater European spending on defense, is something that Washington has welcomed and will continue to welcome.

But sometimes we get the impression that Europeans who speak of this have in mind some vague concept of a joint Euro-American global condominium, in which Europe and America jointly set an international, economic and institutional agenda to the rest of the world. The United States can never accept this model. In fact, as Asia continues to grow more rapidly and become more important, the United States is likely to support Asian efforts to revise the balance of strength in institutions ranging from the Security Council to the IMF and the g-7 in ways that generally will reduce Europe's historic profile. The United States is a global power; without radical changes that seem unlikely, Europe will remain a strong regional power with significant extra-regional interests. A global power must deal with its regional partners on a basis that accords them equality with each other rather than with itself, and if Europe expects anything else, it will find continuing disappointment. Can we find ways of thinking these issues through together, or should we work together to minimize the impact of any mutual unhappiness on this issue on other aspects of the relationship?

For America, which never has thought of itself as a normal country and does not want to begin now, part of its historic and psychological bond with the Bonn Republic was that both countries saw themselves as following a difficult and challenging vocation that transcended foreign policy as it was traditionally understood. Both were trying to construct international structures (one global, one in Europe) that at least to some degree replaced the old rules of power politics with new and more stable ones. Both had to make painful tradeoffs; both had the difficult duty of basing foreign policy intended to serve a wider, transnational community on public opinion in a national democracy.

It was in large part because they faced common and complementary international tasks that the two countries communicated so well and on so many levels. This common experience was a major factor in the great weight which Washington attached to Bonn's views. The feeling in Washington was that Germans understood us better than most others--inside and outside Europe--and because of this, Americans had more to learn from Germany than from other states.

Even as the United States reconsiders the place of institutional structures and of Europe in the global edifice, it remains committed to a global policy that aims at more than hard power projection. President Bush is as committed to a transcendental, transformational foreign policy as any of his predecessors since Franklin D. Roosevelt. Germany's choices today do not seem as different from Bush's as much rhetoric on both sides would have it. Germany remains committed to large and wide goals in both Europe and the wider world, but it has decided to pursue its European agenda making a fuller use of strictly national instruments of power.

Possibly, we could reignite the discussion and rebuild the community of strategic thinking among Germans and Americans on this highest level of statesmanship-even without resolving all the moral and cultural differences between us. This is a more difficult and challenging discussion. But once achieved, it would lead to the greatest rewards. If we managed this, German policymakers would once again find themselves insiders in Washington debates in a way that few could match and many would envy.