Old Europe and New Europe

If you look at the entire NATO Europe today, the center of gravity is shifting to the east.

They're not with France and Germany on this, they're with the United States.The expression was interpreted as a dig against a "sclerotic" and old-fashioned Western Europe.

[5] Rumsfeld would later claim his comment was "unintentional," and that he had meant to say "old NATO" instead of "old Europe;" during his time as ambassador to NATO, there were only fifteen alliance members, and France and Germany had played a much larger role than after the admission of many new (particularly Eastern European) countries.

[6] Further diplomatic tension built up when Rumsfeld pointed out in February 2003, that Germany, Cuba and Libya were the only nations completely opposing a possible war in Iraq (a statement that was formally correct at the time).

This was interpreted by many that he would put Germany on a common level with dictatorships violating human rights.

[8] It was frequently used with pride and a reference to a perceived position of greater moral integrity.

The terms altes Europa and Old Europe have subsequently surfaced in European economic and political discourse.

For example, in a January 2005 unveiling for the new Airbus A380 aircraft, German chancellor Gerhard Schröder said, "There is the tradition of good old Europe that has made this possible."

A BBC News article about the unveiling said Schröder "deliberately redefined the phrase previously used by...

Rumsfeld made fun of his statement shortly before a 2005 diplomatic trip to Europe.

There is only your friend Europe," which The Boston Globe called "an oblique shot at" Rumsfeld.

All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies.When Marx used the term in 1848, the year of failed liberal revolutions across Europe, he was referring to the restoration of Ancien régime dynasties, following the defeat of Napoleon.

[13] In his ultra-nationalistic, anti-European book of 1904, America Rules the World, E. David used 'Old Europe' in the following context: The true American citizen is by nature brave, honest, amiable, hospitable, patriotic, energetic and intelligent; he is practical and yet idealistic and enthusiastic.

Cultivation and refinement make him a gentleman equal, if not superior, to the gentry of the best educated classes of Old Europe for manners and behavior.

[14]In his book La Hora de los Pueblos (1968), Argentine politician Juan Perón used the phrase when he enunciated the main principles of his purported new tricontinental political vision: Mao is at the head of Asia, Nasser of Africa, De Gaulle of the old Europe and Castro of Latin America.