Eric Hoesli

Editorial Director of the Swiss media group Edipresse

Europe lacks something. Since the end of the Cold War nothing has marked the armistice between the former two military, political and ideological blocks, nor built the foundations of a new era on the continent. As nobody had declared (cold) war, nobody cared about signing its end. No peace treaty, no institution - like the League of Nations after World War I, United Nations or European Union after World War II - to inspire Europe with a new impetus, a new will, and nothing either to prove that anybody had learned from this 30-year long episode.

Some will say that this lack of conclusion may hide secret regrets. Unlike traditional conflicts, no one has been forced by events to admit defeat and draw conclusions from it. The only defeat was a “cold defeat”, subject to discussions, balanced interpretations and endless misunderstandings. The current debates reveal it clearly: whereas most Western people believe to have won this war, Russians think they did not lose it. This deeply divergent perception made nothing to facilitate post-war reflections.

The dissymmetry of power struggles stemmed from this period has made the elaboration of a new European order more difficult. While all dialogues and negotiations of the Cold War were led between two blocks – symbolically, politically and militarily considered as equal – the end of the 80’s and the 90’s in Europe have meant the collapse of the military, political and ideological alliance built on the Soviet Union, on the strengthening of the Atlantic Alliance and then of the European Union. Russia has been isolated and sometimes deliberately marginalized and humiliated. Since then, this disproportion in forces is constantly hanging over minds and slowing down prospects of common institutions. Any claim, even implicit, from Russia to be treated as an equal (and to negotiate equally with NATO or European Union) is immediately interpreted in Europe as a trace of Cold War’s mentality. Conversely, the influence granted to each one of its members by the European Union is worse than freezing any progress: many Russians feel it as an expression of arrogance from the small states towards Russia. How dare some of these small countries pretend to compare with powerful Russia in the discussions with European Union? From two “equal” blocks, or considered as such, we now have come to unbalanced entities between which a real negotiation is harder. From a dialogue semantically based on equality between partners, we now have come to a discussion.

In such a context, it’s easy to understand 20 years have passed since the end of the Cold War without real progress and without institutions or treaties enabling a new cooperation. All this time gone by, key countries’ young leaders, Obama’s and his administration’s new agenda and, above all, the extent of the economic and financial crisis now offer a new opportunity to historically end the Cold War and to fill in the void it left.

Should security be the first issue to be addressed? And should the setting-up of new institutions or of a new Russian-European space begin by defining its defense and its police? This is a well-known ground. It was the essence of most of the negotiations led during the Cold War. The natural and historical inclination of habits tends to favor this kind of debate. But is this really the most urgent and pertinent thing to do in the global world of 21st century? Are guarantees of peace, of stability and of mutual developments really better ensured by military or security agreements?

A very similar dispute troubled the pioneers of European integration (Monnet, Adenauer, de Gasperi,etc.) at the end of World War II. The idea of a common defense bringing together the victors (particularly the United Kingdom and France) and the defeated (mainly Germany and Italy) was one of the first in emerging. It was nevertheless turned down to favor instead the economical interdependence which already appeared as a much stronger and lasting guarantee of peace and prosperity for the continent. This choice was also a way of not having to immediately involve extra-European Atlantic forces in the integration project.

Some of the lessons then learned are still valid for the current reflection on the new European structure. Not to speak about adhering to the European Union - a very unlikely prospect even in the medium-term -  building a privileged Russian-European space of cooperation and exchanges, based on common economical principles, on free exchanges and circulation, and on shared strategies about energy offers food for audacious but interesting thoughts. Security, of course, but primarily through interdependence and foremost by using the exceptional complementarity and complicity Europe’s history has given us.

Such an objective will of course need a huge change in mentalities. It means trustful relationships must be gradually built, as they are essential to the wish of mutual interdependence. This objective defines, unlike any military or security construction, an area where national borders continue to exist but slowly become porous. By favoring the creation of a common space, it prevents certain pivot States like Ukraine from always having to choose a side. It gives an immediate, visible and real role to citizens who can move along and identify themselves with a new region whose cultural common roots are obvious to them.

We can paraphrase one of the great players of European integration and repeat today that European security is too serious a matter to be left to the army. It’s the same for the new Russian-European cooperation still to be built.