Exemplary words from Theodore Roosevelt

That the European Union is seen very favourably in many countries, particularly those in the European Neighbourhood, increases our moral authority in the wider world. To be loved is a good thing. But at the same time, as Machiavelli warned, to be loved is not enough. Lasting order and a durable peace are not built only through love. They are also constructed through power, authority and respect. As such, the European Union must also be feared. Other countries must realise that there might be considerable consequences should they fail to meet European preferences and requests—and that misbehaviour will not go unpunished. As the former United States president, Theodore Roosevelt, told his people in the early twentieth century, when the United States was itself emerging as a major industrial and economic power:

There is a homely adage which runs: “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.” If the American nation will speak softly and yet build and keep at a pitch a thoroughly efficient navy, the Monroe Doctrine will go far.

These words apply as much to the contemporary European Union as they do to America in the Edwardian era. We might rephrase Roosevelt’s citation a little, making it directly relevant to us:

There is a homely adage which runs: “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.” If the European Union will speak softly and yet build up and sustain its battlegroups and institutionalise its security strategy, the European Neighbourhood will prosper and European security will grow.

At the same time, we Europeans must constitute a distinct geopolitical zone in the form of the European Neighbourhood in which we are the exclusive and legitimate authority. The Americans did something similar in 1823 when President James Monroe crafted the ‘Monroe Doctrine’, which declared that:

The American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonisation by any European powers...We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety.

Indeed, Theodore Roosevelt provided a ‘corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine by offering an appropriate strategy for influencing such a zone. As he put it in May 1904:

All that this country desires is to see the neighbouring countries stable, orderly, and prosperous. Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilised society, may...ultimately require intervention by some civilised nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power.

By substituting the ‘United States’ for the ‘European Union’, and ‘Western Hemisphere’ for ‘European Neighbourhood’, Roosevelt’s words could apply just as directly to us. The European Union must proclaim itself the sole and legitimate ‘police power’ in all regions surrounding our territorial and maritime boundaries. These spaces include the Western Balkans, Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus, Russia, Central Asia, North and Central Africa and parts of the Middle East. It is precisely these geopolitical areas that are of the greatest importance to our security, prosperity and cohesion. Keeping order in these regions by promoting constitutional government, justice and the rule of law—the ties of civilised society—is in our direct interest, and will accordingly build a progressively domesticated zone of security and prosperity around the European Union.