BBC NEWS | Magazine | A Point of View

BBC NEWS Magazine's Brian Walden ponders "the West".

He believes the term no longer has any meaning. Europe and the US diverge more and more from the common ground they once shared. Europeans can't forgive the Americans for what many see as their cultural zeitgest, the juggernaut that has rendered European ambitions into ruin:

There are deep-seated economic, political and cultural factors that are pushing Europe and America apart. The first is romantic anti-capitalism. That socialism was, for some people, a great romance, tends to be forgotten these days.

But I recall an extraordinary character named Konni Zilliacus. He was always being expelled, or about to be expelled, from the Labour Party. For a time he was the MP for Gorton in Manchester and, though I didn't share his views, I liked him.

He'd met Lenin and was forever wedded to a Socialist Utopia. One evening tears trickled down his cheeks as he explained to me the beautiful vision that American capitalism had destroyed.

"Nobody should want possessions," he said. "Whatever their faults, Lenin and Stalin never had any money. The Socialist dream was to produce a new man who loved society and was loved by society.

"Capitalism, in general, was no threat. It worked badly. But this Yankee capitalism has corrupted everybody. People want cars, clothes and gadgets. America has destroyed mankind's future."

There can't be many socialist visionaries like Konni Zilliacus left. But there are millions of Europeans who morally reject American materialism and blame it for the faults in their society.

Mr. Walden cites at least two other significant political and cultural differences between Europe and America that divide them. While he does not welcome this division, he does see it as inevitable now that the Soviet Union no longer threatens both of them.

I think that he discounts the threat of Islamo-fascism to both Europe and the US. It's not surprising; Even after 7/7 Europeans, with the exception of the British, still do not appear to take the threat seriously. Perhaps they comfort themselves with the rationalizations that American globalism agitates the extremists. Perhaps they honestly believe that a world devoid of the American Super-Power will lead to peace with the Islamo-Fascists.

Such beliefs are delusions. The Islamo-Fascists have not forgotten nor forgiven what they consider Europe's betrayal of Muslims. Their national and imperial ambitions have been frustrated far too often by European Nations. Driven by envy and a desire to live proudly, as their ancestors did, muslims sympathetic to the Islamo-Fascists find themselves seduced by their siren song. The IFs themselves will not rest until Sharia law reins supreme over all civilizations; Osama Bin Laden's desire to rule as the new Caliph of a worldwide Islamic empire represents one example of this. There's no room for European Social Democracy's in this worldview. Europeans that believe their is place their hope in a mirage.

Until the threat posed by the Islamo-Fascists is eliminated, Europeans and the U.S. have a vested interest in remaining allies. I hope both of them, particularly the EU, recognize this before it's too late.