I had a recent argument about the effects of the Bush Administration's diplomacy on the position of the United States in the world. I was not defending this diplomacy as such; instead, I was asserting that day-to-day diplomacy, or even year-to-year diplomacy only has impact at the margins. what really makes a difference are the fundamentals that underlie the relations of nations.
This position was met with some skepticism. I still think it is true. The ambassador to the UK could vomit on the Queen's shoes (or the President could vomit on the Japanese prime minister's lap) and it would just be laughed off as a merry prank. On the other hand, The United States could give billions of dollars to Egypt every year -- wait, it does give billions to Egypt every year -- and it can barely get Egypt to send a foreign minister to a meaningless meeting in Annapolis. In my view, this is easily explained. At the end of the day, the UK and the US are natural allies. They may spat about things, but their interests are too much in common for any long-term split to exist, regardless of any single event. On the other hand, Egypt simply can never get too close to the US. No matter how accommodating the US is, Egypt's interests and the US's interests are too dissimilar for any real long term alliance.
What do you think?
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