Thursday, February 12, 2009

More for More

In his first weeks in office, Obama has shown a much greater willingness to trust and work with European governments than the Bush administration ever did. Obama has reached out to Europe by closing Guantanamo, promising direct talks with Iran, and urging the importance of US-European consultation on climate change. For showing Europe favor, however, Obama and his administration will expect the European governments to "share the heavy lifting" by sending troops to Afghanistan, taking a harsher stance on the Iranian nuclear program, and adopting some of the released prisoners from Guantanamo. As one European diplomat said after hearing these new terms of cooperation: "be careful what you wish for."

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