Rome ? The United States has been fighting a war in Afghanistan. It has troops in the field in the Philippines and in Colombia. It is trying to mediate the bloody Arab-Israeli conflict in the Middle East. The last thing it needs is a quarrel with Europe.

But that is exactly what has developed, as I was repeatedly reminded during a brief stay here for an international conference last week.

The immediate irritant is steel. The looming and larger point of conflict is Iraq. And the underlying complaint is that the Bush administration, whose leader has gained significantly in standing since my last trans-Atlantic visit 11 months ago, has reverted to an earlier and unsettling pattern of behavior. From the European perspective, Washington looks unpredictable, erratic and impulsive all the things that jar the allies’ nerves.

It is easy to dismiss their mutterings as the nattering of “nervous Nellies.” But when the questioning comes not only from chronic critics like the French but from such friends as Germany and even Britain, it may behoove Washington to take heed.

The Europeans are not without power, as they demonstrated last week with their response to President Bush’s surprise decision early this month to impose tariffs as high as 30 percent on steel imports from Europe and Asia. Americans living here or visiting Rome for the conference I attended were hard-pressed to explain the glaring contradiction between Bush’s professed support for free trade and his action to protect declining steelmakers in such political swing states as Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Many did not even try.

It does not matter, because the Europeans are not interested in excuses. They are furious. And they are ready to fight back. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that the European Union is planning to target Florida orange juice and Wisconsin-made motorcycles hitting two states which were virtual ties in the last presidential election. Their target list also includes steel exports from Pennsylvania and West Virginia and textiles from the Republican political strongholds of North and South Carolina.

By hitting Electoral College battlegrounds and states with key Senate and House races in November, the Journal said, the EU will strike Bush “where it could hurt the worst: at the ballot box.”

The steel tariff decision denounced by Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill in candid private comments which quickly became public looks more and more like one of the worst of the Bush presidency. Another Wall Street Journal article last week reported that the Commerce Department has been inundated by more than 1,000 requests for tariff exemptions from U.S. manufacturers who claim they cannot get the specialty steel they need from domestic steelmakers. Government officials are struggling to determine the merits of each case exactly the kind of heavy-handed bureaucratic interference with the marketplace that Republicans and conservatives are supposed to find abhorrent.

But all this is minor compared to European angst about Iraq. The “axis of evil” section of the State of the Union Address came as a shock to countries that had offered Washington strong support for the first phase of the post-Sept. 11 war on terrorism.

The linkage of Iraq, Iran and North Korea made no sense to them, and subsequent assurances that Bush had no immediate intention to take military action against the last two simply heightened fears that he planned to bomb or invade Iraq.

Americans are being asked: What has happened in the past few months that makes it so imperative to remove Saddam Hussein? Is there any evidence that Iraq was implicated in the 9/11 attacks? With whom do you plan to replace Saddam? And what will a war with Iraq mean for Israel, Egypt, Turkey and Saudi Arabia? If removing Saddam is vital to America’s national interest, how are the interests of the neighboring countries to be protected?

There may be answers to all these questions and the Europeans would like to hear them. And they would like to believe that Washington is interested in hearing from them. The lack of consultation is a chronic complaint, but rarely has it reached this level of anxiety.

Some Europeans believe Bush is on a mission of personal revenge against Saddam, determined to finish the work his father left incomplete at the end of the Gulf War. That trivializes his purpose. But the mere fact that such suspicions are being voiced is a warning that the slide in Euro-American relations needs to be addressed.

David Broder is a columnist for Washington Post Writers Group.