Many a European has come to American-hosted discussion boards to discuss the relatively generous welfare state their respective countries enjoy as compared with the United States. A predictable result of such an affirmation is that within seconds, an American respondent will chime in with, "well, the only reason you guys are able to have your 'socialized' medicine and 'free' education is because we've been footing the bill for you guys when it comes to defense; if it weren't for us, the Soviet Union would have obliterated you guys a long time ago!"
Repeated extensively, it has become truth to millions. What is sad is that in today's information age, when facts from reputable sources are so readily available, few bother to do any actual research into the validity of this statement.
It is true that all the nations of Europe have universal health care. It is also true that many of the European nations have heavily subsidized education, a system that normally does not leave its graduates mired in the level of debt that afflicts so many of their American counterparts. When a European takes rightful pride in this state of affairs, he is often reminded that without U.S. protection, his very nation state would not exist. That such a declaration is given such widespread approval among his American peers is disturbing, to say the least.
First of all, no society exists independently of the other. All nations are interdependent to some degree. Total self sufficiency is virtually impossible. For an example, look at the difficulties suffered by nations that have isolated themselves in modern history: North Korea and Hoxha's Albania. Even Bhutan, a culturally hermetic society has, nonetheless, extensive trade with its neighbors. The United States is no exception. Our existence is owed to one of the countries our citizens so love to revile: France. Without France's gallant aid at the Battle of Yorktown, it is not unlikely that we would be a member of the British Commonwealth today. This fact is overlooked as we pride ourselves on being the counterpart to the "self-made man," in this case, the "self-made nation." Much of the technical expertise that has made us a leader in engineering, arms' manufacturing, medicine and several branches of science has come from the international community.
America did not grow and prosper in a vacuum and neither did all nation states. Returning to our role as "Europe's savior" and thereby facilitator of their generous social-welfare states, this matter deserves greater scrutiny. To negate America's role in helping Western Europe secure lasting freedom would be an insult to our troops who sacrificed so much in two World Wars; however, America did not fight alone. As for WWII, we entered two years after the conflict erupted and some time after Britain had garnered substantial gains over the German Luftwaffe on its own soil. Canadians, British, Free French, partisans within the Resistance and Free Poles contributed substantially to the neutralization of the Nazi forces. What is often overlooked, particularly in the history curriculum devised after the close of the Second World War is the role of the Soviet Union in Germany's defeat. Three quarters of Nazi casualties were inflicted on the Eastern Front. The Soviets endured some of the most brutal fighting against the partisans of Hitler's monstrous regime. Seizing Berlin in the spring of 1945, the Soviet Union had finally put an end to Hitler's deranged vision of a new world order. In addition, the Soviet Union had another sobering experience fighting a Western European nation. That nation in question was Finland in the Winter War. The Winter War, nonetheless, did result in Finland losing 11% of its territory; however, it also was a brutal conflict that put the Soviet Union to the test and was an experience they were most likely unwilling to repeat after WWII. Now, it is true that much of the military elite had been purged by Stalin prior to the Winter War, but such a routing by a small nation is not a feat to be dismissed lightly, even if the invading forces were not enjoying optimal leadership.
This, of course, engendered another prospect for the new world order. This new world order being one of Soviet hegemony. Ceded at Yalta were the nations of Eastern Europe, including Bulgaria, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary and the Eastern part of Germany. The Soviet Union now had satellite states throughout the eastern sector of the continent. The Western nations of Europe, many of whom received generous allocations of resources thanks to the Marshall Plan, were able to develop a free-market system. Thus, the break between east and west was truly formed. The understandable fear was that the Soviet Union would eventually attempt to extend its grasp across the continent, aiming to take possession of nations such as West Germany, the countries of Scandinavia, Austria, Italy, Greece, Britain, Ireland, Iceland, France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands. To bolster themselves against such a prospect, U.S. bases were maintained on the soil of Western Europe and economic cooperation was facilitated with the creation of the EEC, the predecessor to the EU.
Regarding the fear of the Soviet Union and its aims of westward expansion, some factors must be taken into consideration. The Soviet Union did possess satellite nations in the East; however, discord with Moscow was evident from the very beginning. Flagrant evidence of this existed in the Budapest uprising of 1956, the Prague Spring of 1968, the Polish Solidarity movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s and the relative cordiality between Ceausescu's Romania and Washington D.C. Thus, Moscow's grasp on its Eastern subjects was tenuous, to say the least. What we had was hardly a candidate for a true military alliance despite the Warsaw Pact. Thus, one cannot aver that the U.S.S.R. had true logistical support from its neighbors despite official economic alignment.
Thus, campaigns abroad produced a staggering death toll, and it is inconceivable that the Soviets would have wanted a repeat of the Eastern Front and the Winter War. In addition, Post-War Europe now counted two states with an arsenal of nuclear weapons: France and the United Kingdom. The East and West now existed in a state of mutually assured destruction. In reference to this, one must ask exactly how an even larger deployment of U.S. ground forces would have been effective in the event of nuclear holocaust? No ground forces can compete with incineration via warheads. This naturally leads one to ask what the real purpose of having military installations throughout Western Europe was? It is within reason to conjecture that such installations would serve for easier deployments to other troubled regions within the globe. In addition, a military installation provides for intelligence gathering near the enemy state. Protection out of pure benevolence appears a tad far fetched, yet is readily accepted as the answer to the question regarding purpose.
So, have the nations of Western Europe been able to enjoy "free" university and "free" health care owing to the magnanimity of Uncle Sam and her selfless protection of her allies? Hardly. Let us look at what transpired when the nations of Eastern Europe were freed from Soviet hegemony in the early 1990s. Every single one of the Eastern Bloc nations made the transition to the free market and every single nation of the Warsaw Pact retained universal health care. The nations of Bulgaria, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland most certainly were not under the umbrella of Uncle Sam's protection, and were hardly enjoying a free ride at U.S. taxpayer expense all those years. The same can be said about the nations that were forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union, e.g., Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania. All of these nations have universal health care and, it can be said, that despite a rocky transition to a free-market economy, the statistics from those nations regarding life expectancy are hardly lamentable, although certainly not on a par with the West. Give it time, though, and we are likely to see the Baltics, as just one example, up there with Spain and the Netherlands in terms of World Health Organization statistics.
Russia today does not present a viable threat to the continent of Europe. Her military budget is less than that of Britain and less than that of France. Economic cooperation is mandatory for a new Russia of the free market. America is not giving Europe a free ride, thus enabling her to fund her social programs. The concept is additionally ludicrous as nations that most certainly do not enjoy U.S. protection have also implemented universal health care programs as well as subsidized university education. The examples are too numerous to cite here.
American society has become one where any excuse can be used to justify a negative status quo. The newest low in attempting to justify our inhumane health-insurance system is one that attempts to portray the world as indolent moochers all benefiting from our largess and thus being able to provide basic social services to their citizens. It is an argument that is accepted by only the most inert of our citizens, yet it has gained traction and is likely to be accepted as truth for some time to come unless more people speak up. The sooner the better, I might add!
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