The EU thread

[Valmy]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

[Zanza]

The feeling is mutual - given the 1000+ pages Brexit thread. 

Fair. But people agree the EU doesn't have a significant foreign or defence policy outside of trade - so I just don't know why any country would. Maybe politeness, I suppose.

Britain on the other hand has no serious trade policy. It's almost as if they used to be complementary.

[Jacob]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

I predict Berkut will agree 100% with your last post Valmy.

[crazy canuck]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

I predict Berkut will agree 100% with your last post Valmy.

[Tamas]

How is Ukraine not Europe?

[Sheilbh]

How is Ukraine not Europe?

Sorry that was me not being clear - I meant it is Europe but neither EU nor NATO.

[Berkut]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

I totally agree 100%

Of course, just to help me out, could you actually provide me with the quote from DeGaulle where he says the US would invest trillions into European defense for 6 decades but THEN would "go home"?

[crazy canuck]

Well, turns out all predictions come true after all

[Valmy]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

I totally agree 100%

Of course, just to help me out, could you actually provide me with the quote from DeGaulle where he says the US would invest trillions into European defense for 6 decades but THEN would "go home"?

I don't get you man, do you want Europe to be dependent on trillions of our tax dollars that could better be used for the benefit of our own people? Don't you want them to see to their own defenses and own problems?

And de Gaulle was saying is that Europe could not depend on outside forces forever and eventually would need to see to itself. And 60 years is plenty eventually. I don't think having that opinion is offensive or ungrateful to the United States and what we have done, rather I think it is our interest and reflects gratitude for our efforts. That 6 trillion should result in a Europe able to fend for itself not continuing to be a strategic and economic burden. So why would you be upset or at least very sarcastic about that? I don't get it.

[Valmy]

Well, turns out all predictions come true after all

So if predict the device on which you typed this post will get shoved three feet up your ass, how long until that comes true?

Since just by me saying it, it now becomes an inevitability apparently. The Berkut principle.

[Berkut]

It is just as de Gaulle predicted. The US will eventually go home or shift its attention elsewhere. Europe must look to itself.

...except he predicted that like 60 years ago.

All predictions will eventually come true, if the timeline is long enough, I suppose.

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

What? That's stupid as fuck. All predictions do not eventually come true and 60 years was exactly the kind of time frame he was talking about.

I totally agree 100%

Of course, just to help me out, could you actually provide me with the quote from DeGaulle where he says the US would invest trillions into European defense for 6 decades but THEN would "go home"?

I don't get you man, do you want Europe to be dependent on trillions of our tax dollars that could better be used for the benefit of our own people? Don't you want them to see to their own defenses and own problems?

And de Gaulle was saying is that Europe could not depend on outside forces forever and eventually would need to see to itself. And 60 years is plenty eventually. I don't think having that opinion is offensive or ungrateful to the United States and what we have done, rather I think it is our interest and reflects gratitude for our efforts. That 6 trillion should result in a Europe able to fend for itself not continuing to be a strategic and economic burden. So why would you be upset or at least very sarcastic about that? I don't get it.

I think the west (meaning liberal western democracies) need to cooperate against those who don't much care for liberalism or democracy.

For a long time that was the USSR.

Now it is China and Russia and to a lesser extent radical Islam.

I don't want Europe to be dependent on the US at all, I just object to the idea that they should do anything because the US cannot be counted on.

They should see to their own defense because that is prudent and sane and they should want to contribute to the collective defense of the western liberal order.

Bullshit like French Gaullist crap where they are attacking their allies in an effort to promote their specific interests, rather then the common interest, is stupid and counter productive.

This entire episode is just the latest example of where some countries seem to think the enemy is not the ACTUAL enemy of western liberalism, but other western liberal countries. This attitude is basically the mirror of Putins basic desire for a new global power structure - regional powers. France is fucking idiotically thinking "Yes, if Europe ditches the US, then WE will be the regional power because we are the strongest in the EU!". It is short sighted and narcissistic in the extreme.

I would be all for a EU that is as powerful as the US. They are a fellow western liberal power. Which is why I am all for Australia getting the best possible defense for the money. Again, they are on our broader side.

It does in fact annoy the fuck out of me that some specific countries within "our side" so clearly are willing to sink that overall alliance in favor of their narrow, self centered need to be the biggest fish in their smaller pond.

The fact that the country that seems most prone to this is the one country that in the 20th century most benefited from a western, liberal alliance I find simply fascinating. Of course, they were also the one country that was harmed the most in those wars as well (not counting Russia/the USSR), so the fact that they are "different" in their cynicism should not be surprising, I suppose. It is easy to prattle on about western liberal alliances and how grand they are when your country didn't see two generations of their youth wiped out in wars defending that alliance, even if the wars were eventually won.

[Berkut]

Well, turns out all predictions come true after all

So if predict the device on which you typed this post will get shoved three feet up your ass, how long until that comes true?

Since just by me saying it, it now becomes an inevitability apparently. The Berkut principle.

Surely, you actually understand what I meant when I said that....right? I don't have to lay out the precise limits of said point in the context of the discussion?

I suspect you actually understand what I mean quite well.

In any case, you said something very specific - that De Gaulle meant that the US would abandon Europe "exactly" now, present day. And that was what he meant when he said it 60 years ago.

So again, do you have that quote handy where he said exactly that? That Europe should definitely be fine depending on the US, RIGHT NOW, but should be prepared not to some many decades in the future?

That seems like a politically pretty useless stance to take back in the 50s, at least to me. I suspect De Gaulle was arguing that their inability to count on the US was quite a bit more immediate then in about half a century or more....

[Sheilbh]

I thought the Economist Charlemagne column was interesting on the European lessons/features from Germany's election.

I'm still thinking through what I think about the point around the decline of the EPP, and it's true: LR in France, CDU/CSU in Germany - the leaders of the EPP are now Kurz and Iohannis (if the EPP hadn't finally acted on Fidesz you could add Orban to the list). And perhaps it's just a delayed version of what happened to the centre-left.

Rather than a one-sided process of PASOKification, we're seeing broad fragmentation but the centre right has taken longer to fall apart. Ths is still the SPD's third worst result, so I'm not sure we're seeing a resurgence of the left and my suspicion is that the trend in European politics will instead be Dutchification. More fragmented national politics with the far-left to the far-right all taking somewhere between 15-20% of the vote with 20%+ looking decent, regional forces and strongly regionalised politics will also, possibly, matter more than 'national' trends.

From an EU perspective it feels like if that's the direction of travel for national politics it may be another reason to start looking at Europeanising some big policy areas

Germany's election is revealingly European
A fractured vote, a big age divide and long coalition talks ahead
Oct 2nd 2021

GERMAN ELECTIONS are idiosyncratic affairs. Armin Laschet, the leader of the Christian Democrat Union, was grilled over his choice of bratwurst condiment (ketchup, not mustard). Annalena Baerbock, the Green candidate for chancellor, was skewered over plagiarism claims, a sin that bedevils only German politics. All politics is local, but in Germany it is parochial. The country may be Europe's hegemon, yet foreign affairs and the future of the EU were barely mentioned. An at times surreal campaign ended with Angela Merkel, the outgoing chancellor and most powerful person in Europe, being photographed with a parrot on her head.

If the campaign was unmistakably German, the result was European. A slim victory for the Social Democratic Party (SPD) over its centre-right rivals, the Christian Democratic Union and its Bavarian sister the Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU), will kick off months of coalition negotiations. German politicians struggled with the same problems as their peers across the continent; German voters behaved the same way as their neighbours. Europe was invisible in the campaign. But it is visible in the outcome.

Politics in Germany has fragmented in the past decade or so, just as in every other western European country. Five parties got more than 10% of the vote each. When Angela Merkel came to power in 2005, only two did. In that same election, the CDU/CSU and SPD won 70% of the vote. On 26th September they managed barely half. It is a familiar story. In the Netherlands, 19 different parties now sit in parliament. In Italy, four parties ranging from centre-left to far-right hover around the 20% mark. Traditionally two-party systems, such as Spain, have become complex multi-party affairs. Germany is simply catching up.

After posting the worst result in their history, the CDU/CSU can take some consolation from the fact they are not alone. Their political siblings in other countries have also lost ground. At the start of the 2010s, practically every big EU country had a centre-right government. Now, barring extremely canny negotiations from the CDU, none will. Conservative politicians used to run a continent; now they control a rump. In Germany, a bad campaign by a gaffe-prone candidate is part of the explanation. But the causes of the CDU's malaise run deeper, and stretch beyond Germany's borders.

By contrast, after a decade of losing ground, the centre-left had something to cheer. Although not too loudly. Olaf Scholz, the SPD's prospective chancellor, ran a cautious campaign based on competence, with enough radicalism to stop his party's left from leaving for the Greens. It resulted in his party's third-lowest postwar vote share, but paved a likely path to power.

Now, Mr Scholz will endure the fate suffered by his fellow leftie leaders: staying in office via rickety coalitions. In Spain the Socialist Workers' Party, another grandee of the centre left, took power with a little over a quarter of the vote. Once-mighty Scandinavian social democrats are still in government, but weaker than before. In the late 1990s centre-left parties were dominant across Europe. Their pitch was usually some variant of: "Things can only get better." Now it is more like: "Things might not get worse."

Older voters keep the big-tent parties alive, both in Germany and across the EU. Call it the boomer bulwark. While four in ten under-30s backed the liberal Free Democrats or the Greens, 70% of over-60s voted for the SPD or the CDU/CSU. In Spain younger voters swoon for challenger parties, such as Podemos or Vox. But their parents and grandparents stick to traditional ones. In France, Marine Le Pen's base is the discontented young. In Italy the far-right Lega and Brothers of Italy also rely on youthful voters. Parties now stand for young or old as much as left or right.

Fractured politics mean complicated coalition talks. Germany is used to haggling between two parties. This time three will be necessary and negotiations could drag on. In a first for Germany, the Greens and the FDP (who came third and fourth) pledged to agree to terms with each other before negotiating with SPD or CDU/CSU. Again, Germany is joining a new European norm. Negotiations in Belgium are notorious for taking years and producing cumbersome coalitions. In the Netherlands, stuck in coalition talks since elections in March, the GreenLeft and Labour party discussed their own pact. In Nordic countries, four- or five-party coalitions are common. European politics is an increasingly complex (and increasingly Belgian) beast.

Stick a pin in almost any rich, western EU country and one will find a populist party polling between 10% and 20%, offering a cocktail of immigrant- and Brussels-bashing. Germany, again, fits the norm. Alternative for Germany (Af D) won about 10% of the vote on just such a platform. Only Italy, where such parties collectively attract 40% of the vote, and France, where Marine Le Pen is a possible (though unlikely) president, buck the trend. By contrast, the alternative on offer to German voters is standard European fare.

All European life is here

When asked why Germany does not take a bigger role in running the EU, Angela Merkel argued that it was impossible, since Germany was too much like the EU. Germany was already a delicate compromise between 16 different Länder (states), with a complicated relationship between its levels of government. German leadership was simply not feasible.

But if Germany resembled the EU constitutionally, it now matches the club politically. Germany is fragmented, like its neighbours; its main centre-left and centre-right parties share the same woes as their peers. The nightmare of forming coalitions will draw sympathetic noises from Dutch, Belgian and Nordic neighbours. Old voters behave in the same way in Germany as they do in France or Italy, as do their children; fringe parties are better at causing a racket than winning power. When it comes to elections in the EU, the votes may still be national. But the politics are distinctly European.

[viper37]

I predict France will eventually cease to exist, so Europe should look for security somewhere other then Paris.

We'll always have Paris. 

[Zanza]

Interesting article, Sheilbh.