If the United States were to stop worrying about Europe and the Mediterranean and “pivot” to the Pacific, it would be less a pirouette than a plunge. Countries with worldwide interests don’t have the luxury of withdrawing from anemic or troublesome areas unless those areas really don’t matter. Neither Europe nor the Mediterranean fits that criterion.
Declarations of withdrawal are unlikely to work out unless countries are ready to suffer the consequences. When, for example, King Philip V “pivoted” away from the support he promised Hannibal for his war against Rome, he only guaranteed that the Romans would eventually come after him—as they did, when they destroyed his power at the Battle of Cynoscephalae in 197 B.C. When in 1950 the U.S. stated its lack of interest in the Korean Peninsula, the result was the Korean War.
To be sure, some pivots have worked out. The British “pivot” from the rebellious Thirteen Colonies after the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 freed Britain to build a new empire in Canada, India, and the Antipodes. If the United States had “pivoted” away from Vietnam in the early 1960s instead of making a commitment to war there, it might have been spared an ordeal. There would have been a cost, of course, but it might have been lower than the one Americans paid.
For all the changes in the world, when Europe sneezes the U.S. will still catch cold. The Mediterranean may be a pleasure basin but it is too close to the oil regions of the Middle East for the U.S. to turn its back on.
