Perspectives: “Europe Whole and Free:” Ukraine Should Impel a Return to First Principles By Robert E. Hunter, former U.S. Ambassador to NATO, 1993-98

European Affairs

Perspectives: “Europe Whole and Free:” Ukraine Should Impel a Return to First Principles  

By Robert E. Hunter, former U.S. Ambassador to NATO, 1993-98

More than two decades ago, President George H. W. Bush set forth what quickly became a new grand strategy for the post-Cold War era: to create “a Europe whole and free” and at peace. With Russia’s seizure of Crimea and its new challenges to the integrity of Ukraine and potentially of other Central European states, the Bush vision has clearly gone off the rails.

But can it be gotten back on the rails? Can understanding be regained that his vision is still the best possible means for ensuring that the Continent will not revert to the divisions that kept it in thrall for the 40+ years of the Cold War? Can this be done without embracing the 19^th and 20^th century notions of “balance of power” and “spheres of influence?” The answers to all these questions should be – and in the interests of all concerned had better be -- an emphatic “Yes.”

To start answering those questions, it is necessary to look at how we got to here (the challenge by Russia’s Vladimir Putin) from there (the hopes inspired by the first President Bush).http://www.europeaninstitute.org/EA-May-2014/perspectives-europe-whole-and-free-ukraine-should-impel-a-return-to-first-principles.html