President Bush hadn’t even left for Europe before some commentators were trying to downplay the significance of his visit. The Associated Press quoted one expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, James Goldgeier, as saying “There’s no reason for any leader to give him anything because he’s on the way out.” Said the AP: “For many Europeans, the Bush presidency is already in the rearview mirror.”

The Europeans, however, are largely going in the direction Mr. Bush pointed to. France tossed out what the New York Post famously called the cheese-eating surrender monkeys and brought in a pro-American leader. Germany and Italy did something similar. Prime Minister Berlusconi, President Sarkozy, and Chancellor Merkel all won elections while emphasizing their countries’ interest in strengthening relations with America.

And no wonder. President Bush’s approach to America’s foreign policy, which Secretary Rice, in the current issue of Foreign Affairs, calls “the new American Realism,” essentially holds that American interests are inseparable from democratic freedom. It was a departure from the previous ideas about American interests, particularly regarding the Middle East, that emphasized stability above other concerns.

No doubt this kind of talk will take place as Mr. Bush makes his rounds, which will include today’s European Union summit at Slovenia and stops at France, Germany, Italy, and Britain. Unlike, say, Prime Minister Putin, Mr. Bush will not direct American foreign policy after his term expires in January. But he has already articulated an ideology that is going to be difficult for any of the leaders he’s meeting — or his successor — to dodge. Many are signing up.

This is no doubt in direct proportion to the way Iraq’s prospects are waxing. Meanwhile, Russia’s opposition to Georgia and Ukraine joining NATO presents an opportunity to embolden Europeans to move away from an isolationist mindset and, most recently, to rethink their decades-long military retrenchments. Despite Russia’s efforts, the spirit that underlies NATO has rarely seemed stronger.

As Mr. Bush makes his rounds, his own transformation is something on which to reflect. If the Truman doctrine was containment, the Nixon doctrine the idea that our friends should do more for their own defense, and the Reagan doctrine was the rollback of communism, the Bush doctrine may be the most attractive of all, a doctrine that equates America’s interests with the expansion of democracy and freedom. It wasn’t a role he anticipated.

On the contrary, his doctrine was born of the reality of a new kind of war, brought to our shores on September 11, 2001. It convinced Mr. Bush that the stability afforded by dictators brings a false sense of security even to those beyond their immediate grasp. It will bring extra poignancy to the fact that as he tours Europe this week, he will commemorate the Berlin Airlift and the Marshall Plan. They are reminders of the way a president determined to take a great risk for our freedom and values can change the world.