Don't ignore European economic powerhouse

By Paul Isbell
The Miami Herald, November 11, 2008

It did not take long for the election of Barack Obama to begin to repair the U.S.-Spain bilateral relationship. Only days after becoming president-elect, Obama returned Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's call with a 10-minute conversation full of high spirits and laughter. This is a far cry from the cold-shoulder treatment that Spain -- an historic NATO ally and host to one of the most important U.S. naval bases abroad -- has been getting from the American president for nearly the past five years.

Political relations have been on ice since Spain's social democratic party won the March 2004 elections, only three days after the Atocha train station bombings. Even before Zapatero fulfilled his campaign promise to bring the token Spanish military force home from Iraq, Bush and company reacted as if they had been stabbed in the back by a country they spuriously claimed had ''surrendered to terrorists.'' An informal policy of ostracizing the Spanish prime minister was imposed, limiting contact to nothing more than an infrequent hand shake. No White House for Zapatero, no cigar at the Crawford ranch.

Bush's snubbing of Zapatero was about to reach its apotheosis this week when the G-20 countries will meet to come up with an international response to the financial crisis. Because Spain emerged as the world's 8th largest economy only after the G-20 came into existence, it looked as if Spain would be left out in the cold during one of the most important international economic summits of our lifetime, despite being universally lauded for its world-class financial regulatory regime. For this outcome to be avoided, President Bush would have to explicitly invite Spain to attend, or at least cede to pressure from other members to provide a seat for Zapatero.

The diplomatic efforts of European friends have certainly helped to arrange for the EU seat (held by France, the current EU president) to be ceded to Spain. Nevertheless, it is not at all clear that President Bush would have consented to Zapatero's presence had McCain defeated Obama last week, or if Bush himself were not a lame-duck president.

Now that Zapatero is coming to Washington for the November summit, the horizon looks bright for the U.S.-Spain relationship.

Not that it has been all that bad, at least in the practical terms that really matter: bilateral trade and investment have continued to flourish (the United States is still the largest national investor in Spain, while Spanish investment here has tripled over the last four years, propelled by Spain's renewable energy companies). Still, of all the U.S.-European relationships, the only one that has been maintained in this chilly state of anomaly has been the one with Spain. Obama's victory has now generated -- in a single stroke -- an opportunity for renewal.

Obama's priority to revive the economy and reform its regulatory framework, along with his pledge to achieve energy independence and rebuild the country's failing infrastructure, bodes well for Spain. Not only might Spain share the lessons of the regulatory experience that has kept its banks from collapsing, it might also -- as one of the worlds leaders in wind and solar energy -- offer to create an energy independence alliance with the United States. Spain's construction companies -- world leaders in their own right, but now feeling the effects of a whopping hangover from their own bubble -- would be willing and able to lend a hand in the rebuilding of U.S. infrastructure.

Finally, Obama's proposal to create a new Partnership for Energy Security in the Western Hemisphere, and to send an Energy Corps of young engineers into Latin America, offers Zapatero the opportunity to suggest some tangible content for the kind of productive U.S.-Spanish collaboration in Latin America that Bush and former Prime Minister José María Aznar used to only dream about.

With surveys on both sides of the Atlantic showing that Spaniards and Americans are once again viewing each other in an increasingly favorable light, now is the time to turn the page on the past.