Europe, on Sidelines, Waits for Next Move on Syria
By STEPHEN CASTLE
Europeans, divided over Syria, arrive in Russia at this week’s meeting
of the Group of 20 nations waiting for the United States to take the
lead on the conflict.
- Questions of Policy Dog Obama Before Meeting in Russia
- Letter From Europe: Syria Crisis Reveals New Paradigm
By STEPHEN CASTLE
Published: September 4, 2013
LONDON — Europeans, who prided themselves on a muscular foreign policy in Libya, arrive at this week’s meeting of the Group of 20 nations deflated and divided, waiting for the United States to take the lead on Syria and wondering just how much resistance to intervention Russia will ultimately muster.
Justin Tallis/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, left, will attend the Group of 20 gathering this week.
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After his parliamentary defeat last week,
Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain has lost much of his leverage
to address the Syrian conflict, analysts said, while France’s president,
François Hollande, is struggling to persuade a skeptical public of the
need for military strikes against Syria after what is suspected to be
its use of chemical weapons.
That makes the two-day summit meeting, which begins Thursday, the site
for a potential standoff between the Russian president, Vladimir V.
Putin — the host of the gathering in St. Petersburg and a prominent ally
of the Syrian leader, President Bashar al-Assad — and President Obama,
with the Europeans largely on the sidelines.
Indeed, analysts said, the British Parliament’s rebuff of Mr. Cameron,
by rejecting his call for a response to the attacks, ended a period of
foreign policy leadership by Europe’s two defense powers, Britain and
France. It also provoked a kind of existential crisis, particularly for
Britain, which prides itself on its “special relationship” with
Washington.
It is a reversal from the recent past, when an activist foreign policy
worked well for the British and French leaders. A successful military
campaign in Libya in 2011 helped Mr. Cameron, and Mr. Hollande gained
popularity more recently after a military intervention in Mali.
Similarly, on Syria, the two nations had played the role of interventionist outriders to a cautious American president.
But Mr. Cameron’s parliamentary defeat has left him “diminished, and
that activism is in doubt,” said Mark Leonard, director of the European
Council on Foreign Relations. That defeat now threatens to undo a
dynamic that had defined the French-British position within the European
Union and farther abroad.
“In the European context, as Germany becomes the all-powerful economic
player, the only way for Britain and France to exert their influence is
through foreign policy and defense,” Mr. Leonard said. “They had been
slightly clinging to each other to show that they still count in a world
in which Germany is economically dominant.”
Now, the prospect of Britain’s loss of its traditional role as the
closest defense partner of the United States has left policy makers in
London nervous, particularly after Secretary of State John Kerry
pointedly praised France as his country’s oldest ally.
“People are very jittery about the precedent it sets and what it means,”
said one British official, speaking on the condition of anonymity under
government regulations, while adding that it was too soon to draw
decisive conclusions about the implications for Britain’s role in future
military operations.
Some British politicians have sought unsuccessfully to reopen the option
of taking part in military action in Syria if the situation changes,
and in Parliament on Wednesday, Mr. Cameron put his best gloss on the
situation, arguing that Britain could still play a role.
“Britain has a very proud record on humanitarian aid, not just in this
conflict but in many previous conflicts,” Mr. Cameron told lawmakers.
“In this one we are actually the second-largest aid donor that there has
been. We have spent over £400 million.”
“I accept that Britain can’t be part, and won’t be part, of any military
action on that front,” he added, “but we must not, in any degree, give
up our revulsion at the chemical weapons attacks we have seen and we
must press this point in every forum of which we are a member.”
On Tuesday, Mr. Cameron’s spokesman pointed out that the Group of 20
summit meeting was predominantly an economic forum but insisted that the
prime minister would play a full role in all discussions, including
those on Syria, and would continue to press the case for a political
transition in Damascus, the Syrian capital.
Yet one official conceded privately that Mr. Cameron’s position in St. Petersburg would be “pretty tough.”
Syria will probably come up for debate on Friday morning, and Mr. Putin
may relish British discomfort at the parliamentary rebuff, added the
official, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity under
government regulations.
For Mr. Cameron, personally, the embarrassment is acute. When leaders of the Group of 8
of nations met by a lake in Northern Ireland in June, none was more
hawkish on Syria than the British prime minister, who denounced Mr.
Assad as a man with “blood on his hands.”
During the discussions, which he hosted, Mr. Cameron sought
unsuccessfully to put pressure on Mr. Putin to abandon Mr. Assad. Now,
with his parliamentary defeat, Mr. Cameron’s powers of persuasion are
likely to be further reduced.
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