China Daily: Nationalism poses test for trans-Atlantic ties
China Daily |
Updated: 2018-11-15 16:00
The trans-Atlantic bond between the United States and Europe is showing signs of strain, and it is right for Europe to reflect on what it gains from that relationship in a world that has fundamentally changed from how it was in the days that bond was forged, a China Daily editorial said.
In his speech commemorating the 100th anniversary of World War I on Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron declared that self-interested nationalism marked "a betrayal of patriotism". The reverberations of his words were felt from across the Atlantic Ocean.
US President Donald Trump fired off a caustic series of early-morning tweets. On Nov 13, his salvo was against Macron, and his proposal that Europeans should defend Europe, as well as the bilateral trade deficit.
The tweets have laid bare the widening divergences between Europe and the US, which have become ever more apparent with each reaching of hands across the water. The traditional trans-Atlantic alliance is being tested more from within than by any challenge that had brought them together.
With the White House choosing to take offense at even minor or imagined pricks to its ego, and resorting to appeals to the red, white and blue at the slightest affront, it is giving an object lesson in how to lose friends, the editorial said.
The trans-Atlantic bond between the United States and Europe is showing signs of strain, and it is right for Europe to reflect on what it gains from that relationship in a world that has fundamentally changed from how it was in the days that bond was forged, a China Daily editorial said.
In his speech commemorating the 100th anniversary of World War I on Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron declared that self-interested nationalism marked "a betrayal of patriotism". The reverberations of his words were felt from across the Atlantic Ocean.
US President Donald Trump fired off a caustic series of early-morning tweets. On Nov 13, his salvo was against Macron, and his proposal that Europeans should defend Europe, as well as the bilateral trade deficit.
The tweets have laid bare the widening divergences between Europe and the US, which have become ever more apparent with each reaching of hands across the water. The traditional trans-Atlantic alliance is being tested more from within than by any challenge that had brought them together.
With the White House choosing to take offense at even minor or imagined pricks to its ego, and resorting to appeals to the red, white and blue at the slightest affront, it is giving an object lesson in how to lose friends, the editorial said.
