George W. & Europe

The critics of the Bush Administration often complain that George W. has wrecked our relations with the rest of the world.  Like a lot of conventional wisdom, this was half true and is now behind the curve.  Our four most important European allies, Britain, France, Germany, and Italy, all have rather strongly pro-American governments just now.  The best news comes from France.  From the Washington Post:

President Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday announced a major new defense policy that would integrate French troops into the command structure of the NATO alliance for the first time in more than four decades.

Now that represents pretty dramatic progress in American-European relations, and even better news for NATO.  The military alliance between the U.S. and Europe is the only police force the world order has. 

It is not clear how much good this good news is worth.  Europe once hoped to rival the U.S. by uniting, but it is clear now that they aren't capable of much uniting and wouldn't be all that impressive if they were.  Europe is fading.  Still, having them with us is better than not.