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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, JULY 15, 1983
PAGE 9
to the United States in population, [and is] the second economic power in
the world. It is just not logical that the Americans should be standing on
guard for Europe at the place where the Europeans could count [ on]
themselves."
Greater European defense measures, in the mind of Dr. Habsburg at least,
doesn't mean a parting of the ways between Europe and the United States. "We
are reliable partners for the United States," he told the audience in the
Ambassador Auditorium. "You can trust your allies across the Atlantic," he
said to those gathered at the L.A. World Affairs Council dinner meeting.
Decolonize Europe Tool
One factor distinguishes Dr. Habsburg from most of the others in Europe
pushing for a united Europe: His outspoken desire to "roll back" the Soviet
empire in Europe so that the captive nations in the East can also play a
vital role in the continent's future.
Since the February 1945 Yalta agreement establishing the postwar spheres of
interest in Europe, one-third of the continent has lain under Soviet
domination. Since that time, Cr. Habsburg stresses in every speech, the
continents of Africa and Asia have been decolonized--but not Europe.
"Let us not forget," he told an audience in London just prior to coming to
Pasadena, "that one of the tasks of Europe will be to [provide] the homeland
for all Europeans. That is to have the courage of saying very clearly that
for �decolonization should not stop in Africa and Asia; that Europe too
has a right to be decolonized. That is our responsibility towards those
nations that are just as much Europeans as we are."
In the European Parliament, Dr. Habsburg has acted as a sort of unofficial
representative of those nations still shut up behind the Iron Curtain. He
told the World Affairs Council that he won't rest his efforts until the
Eastern European countries also have the right of self-determination. He
is also looking beyond the next significant step in European unification-
the introduction of a common European passport on January 1, 1985--to pros
pects for the establishment of a common European citizenship.
In this
manner, those countries not yet a part of the European Community, even in
the East, would be more attracted to it, and have a hope for the future.
Dr. Habsburg has also been active inside the European Parliament advancing
the cause of the three small Baltic nations--Estonia, Latvia, and
Lithuania--forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union at the outset of
World War II. In an interview for The PLAIN TRUTH, he told me: "Despite
enormous campaigns of extermination and russification, the Baltics are
still resisting with a remarkable courage and I think we owe it to them to
work for their decolonization, because if there ever was colonialism in the
[truest] sense of the word...it is what is happening in the Baltic states."
Religion a Major Key
Dr. Habsburg, a devout Roman Catholic, is well-known for advocating a
strong religious role in any future United Europe. One of his better-known
books is a biography of Charles V, the Habsburg ruler who was crowned Holy
Roman Emperor in 1520. Charles V fought hard to maintain the spiritual
unity of Europe, then threatened by the revolt of Martin Luther.