's security? It is tempting to say, at the end of the Cold War, that the United States should let the Europeans themselves work out a new concert of Europe, while the United States focuses on problems at home (Edwards, 1995, pp. 278-279).
This temptation must be resisted for a simple reason: a secure global peace. The context for U.S. relations with Europe may have changed, but bedrock American interests in Europe endure. These interests include the following: (1) a continent free from domination by any power or combination of powers hostile to the United States; (2) a community of shared values, extending across as much of Europe as possible, that can facilitate cooperation with the United States on a growing range of global issues; and (3) a continent that is not so wracked by strife that it drains inordinate resources from the United States or the rest of the world.
During the Cold War, Americans played an indispensable role in containing ancient conflicts by creating a framework of cooperative security across the western half of the continent and on its alw
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