- BERLIN (Reuters) - Europeans,
having at times accused George W. Bush of cowboy diplomacy, worried on
Wednesday the U.S. president would be more emboldened, especially on Iraq,
following his Republican party's mid-term election gains.
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- The man from Texas and his center-right party gained
the historically rare opportunity to control the presidency and both houses
of Congress with a strong showing in Tuesday's elections.
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- "The likelihood that the American president will
feel even more self-confident about his own views than prior to the election
is great," Karsten Voigt, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's U.S.
affairs coordinator, told Reuters.
-
- "But on the other side, I think that he needs to
convince Europeans. And so far as military action (in Iraq) is concerned,
he has not convinced the Germans -- yet."
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- Much of Europe has voiced concern about U.S. calls for
regime change in Iraq and criticized Bush on such issues as global warming,
the U.N. war crimes court and his branding of Iraq, Iran and North Korea
as an "axis of evil."
-
- The Bush administration has had to prepare three drafts
since early last month of a resolution on disarming Iraq in hopes of getting
it through the U.N. Security Council.
-
- Schroeder has been the strongest voice in Europe against
a possible U.S.-led war against Saddam Hussein, resulting in a worsening
of German-American ties.
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- Will the Republican victory lead to a more unilateralist
foreign policy and irritation abroad?
-
- "Any support for Bush and the Republicans will be
in the interests of Bush's vision so that he can do what he wants,"
said Emad Gad, political analyst at Egypt's al-Ahram Center for Political
and Strategic Studies.
-
- "He considers this as authorization from the people
for his policies, especially on Iraq."
-
- One top U.S. diplomat in Europe said Bush would be encouraged
by the election result but insisted the president would not become reckless.
-
- "More self-confident, yes. More authority? He'll
probably interpret it that way," he said. "But does that mean
that he is going to grab the steering wheel and veer off course? No, I
don't believe that."
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- FEARS OF MORE TENSION
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- European Union diplomats expressed concern privately
that the Republican sweep could take the Bush administration further down
the path of unilateralism which has caused serious tension with Europe
since Bush took office in January 2001.
-
- "This is not going to make transatlantic relations
easier because we have many issues on the table which could be complicated
to handle with a Republican president and Congress," one diplomat
said, citing Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in particular.
-
- The sources said EU policymakers had hoped the Democrats
would at least hold on to their control of the Senate and rein in the more
hawkish, go-it-alone elements of the Bush administration.
-
- "Their economic policy worries us to a lesser extent
than political issues, because in trade you have the independent World
Trade Organization which is a mechanism to solve disputes. We don't have
that mechanism on political issues," another diplomat said.
-
- In Russia, analyst Sergei Morgunov of the Politika foundation
said: "There will not be a cardinal change, but the current positions
will be strengthened, especially as the defense budget is likely to receive
a boost."
-
- Andrei Ryabov, an analyst with the Moscow-based Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace, said the Republican gains would strain
U.S. ties with Europe rather than with Russia.
-
- "There is no reason for change, especially as the
Russian and the U.S. positions on terrorism are converging, while this
is not true for U.S.-European relations," he said. "The U.N.
resolution on Iraq will depend less on Russia and China than it will on
France."
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- Some officials were more optimistic about Bush's approach.
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- "I am still hopeful that President Bush will follow
through on his Iraq course of the last few weeks concentrating on the United
Nations," Friedbert Pflueger, a conservative expert on foreign affairs
in the German parliament, told Reuters. (Additional reporting by Paul Taylor
in Brussels, Clara Ferreira-Marques in Moscow and Andrew Hammond in Cairo)
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