New Europe, new problems: the case of the Baltic States

ON JULY 1, 2003, the United States suspended military aid to more than thirty nations, among which were six of the seven countries scheduled to join NATO next year. With the exception of Romania, the other countries so recently lionized as "New Europe"--including the three Baltic states, as well as Slovakia, Slovenia and Bulgaria--have refused to sign the pledge giving immunity to U.S. military personnel and civilians serving abroad from prosecution by the International Criminal Court (ICC). (1) U.S. efforts to sign bilateral agreements with new NATO member-states have been stymied by pressure being exerted on these states in their roles as EU candidate countries. Indeed, on June 24, the EU Presidency issued a statement declaring that prospective members are expected to follow the official EU position on the ICC. It is certainly true that the amounts of foreign military aid the United States earmarked for these countries in FY2003 and 2004 are relatively small in terms of the overall U.S. defense budget. (Latvia, for example, was only to receive around $3 million this year.) Nevertheless, these funds represent vital "seed monies" for integrating the defense ministries of these NATO candidate countries with the institution's force structures.

This nasty little episode demonstrates quite dearly the growing tension the countries of "New Europe" face as both American allies and prospective members of an enlarged European Union. Most of these countries deeply value their cultural and security ties to the United States. This is particularly true of the Baltic States. All three enlisted early in President Bush's "coalition of the willing", earning a haughty scolding from Monsieur Chirac for "acting childishly." (2) All three have sent personnel to Iraq and Afghanistan. Yet it is not inconceivable that "Old Europe" might require the Baltic countries to curtail their active support of the United States as a final price for full integration into the EU.

In addition to difficulties over Iraq and the ICC, the transatlantic rift seems to be widening in four other areas, as well. First, the EU is setting up a competing military organization designed to operate outside of NATO, and an initial deployment is already underway (in Macedonia). Second, a trade dispute may be brewing over civilian aircraft, with Boeing losing out to the subsidized Airbus planes. (Airbus is also launching a $23.7 billion project to develop A400M military transport planes.) Third, European companies appear to be setting up independent telecom operations that are (perhaps deliberately) incompatible with American technologies--including a global positioning system that would not use U.S. satellites. An unusual shared venture between the European Space Agency and the EU, which will be run by a private firm, the Galileo Operating Company, will begin operating a twenty-year concession in 2008. The organization will be based in Brussels, have operating costs of around 220 million euros and will serve 1.8 billion people by 2010 (double that by 2020). Last but not least, the dollar has been falling noticeably against the euro, from around $0.85 two years ago to about $1.11 in mid-August. This development has left our "friends" in OPEC talking about pricing oil in euros rather than dollars.

The countries of "New Europe", and the three Baltic States in particular, are thus beginning to face what only a few years ago would have seemed an unthinkable dilemma: having to choose between the United States and Europe. Furthermore, this dilemma is only exacerbated by the fact that Washington is still viewed as the region's primary security provider, while the region's economic destiny lies with Europe.

THE BALTIC diaspora has long been a force in American politics. After all, Chicago is said to be the second largest Lithuanian city in the world after Vilnius, Lithuania's capital. Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois (allegedly of Lithuanian stock) heads the bipartisan Baltic caucus in the U.S. Congress, which has 15 Senate and 75 House members. The Latvian diaspora was particularly active in lobbying the U.S. government to catalyze the disintegration of the USSR and to establish a pro-Western, market-oriented government in Latvia during the early transitional years. A large number of North American Balts then returned to serve in the governments of their newly independent homelands--even at the highest levels. Vaira VikeFreiberga, president of Latvia since 1999, was formerly a psychology professor from Montreal, while Valdas Adamkus, president of Lithuania from 1998-2003, had been an environmental expert from (where else) Chicago.

Initially, the Baltic States thus believed they possessed a "special relationship" with Washington. After all, the United States withheld de jure recognition of the incorporation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania into the USSR after World War II and did not repatriate Balts to their Soviet homelands after the war. (The forcible repatriation of a small group of Latvian legionnaires by Sweden, however, is an ugly blotch on that country's history.) The Clinton Administration contributed significantly to the withdrawal of Russian troops--a process completed on August 31, 1994--and to the removal of ex-Soviet military facilities from Baltic territory. (The demolition of Latvia's Skrunda radar base, for example, was financed by the United States and supervised by American technicians.) The United States, further, strongly championed the NATO candidacy of former Warsaw Pact members and refused to let Moscow veto the decision. Washington's position was firm despite considerable grumbling in the Russian establishment: one prominent Moscow-based expert even declared, "The day Estonia joins NATO, we send the tanks...." Most recently, the U.S.-Baltic relationship was reaffirmed when President George W. Bush met with all three Baltic presidents in Vilnius after the fall 2002 NATO summit in Prague, where a large Lithuanian audience applauded him loudly and enthusiastically. That this reception was considerably more positive than any he received in "Old Europe" goes without saying.