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I wonder how viable the EU is now. They've had so many tests and failed. They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. They failed to coherently respond

I wonder how viable the EU is now. They've had so many tests and failed. They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. They failed to coherently respond to the migrant crisis resulting in many member states re-establishing border check points and even fences. They failed to provide any military deterrence to the Russian federation - NATO is still completely dominated by the US. And now they failed to persuade one of their most powerful members from leaving. Co-operation between neighbours is a inherently a fairly good idea, but that doesn't mean the bureaucratic fustercluck of the EU is the only vehicle with which this can be accomplished.

misja111 10y ago
The handling of the immigrant crisis was a failure, but the other two issues have little or nothing to do with the EU. The EU is primarily an economic union, it is not and will never be a military one. After all there is the NATO already. Also the list of European NATO members is quite different than that of the EU.
- ddebernardy 10y ago
  Actually, with the UK out the EU might (finally?) turn into a military union at some point. The UK was the main force against going in that direction, in that the UK didn't want their foreign policy done by Brussels. The smaller roadblock that remains will be to convince the Nordic countries that flexing the EU's military muscle is OK for purposes other than strict humanitarian purposes (or France and - to a lesser extent - Southern Europe the other way around).
  - M2Ys4U 10y ago
    The current rules around military cooperation mean that it's opt-in and wouldn't so much be an 'EU military' as one might think of it.
    - ZenoArrow 10y ago
      Plans for greater military integration appear to have been discussed recently: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/europe-forges-ahead-with-plans-for-eu-army/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/europe-forges-ahe...
- DasIch 10y ago
  The EU was created to ensure peace within Europe. The economic aspects are secondary and merely enable that to happen by binding the economies together, so that you cannot start a war or leave the EU without significant harm to your own economy. There is a European Defense Agency and there are EU battlegroups that sort of form a standing EU army. The EU definitely is a military union and there are quite a few people pushing for even more cooperation on that front. EDIT: For those people down voting I would suggest reading the preamble of the Paris treaty[1], which essentially started the EU. It's not exactly subtle or ambiguous about the goal. [1]: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:11951K:EN:PDF http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:...
pavlov 10y ago
The EU has been around for 50 years in evolving forms. It's easy to cherrypick failures, but the achievements ought to get some mention too. After the fall of the Soviet Union, about twenty countries wanted to join the EU as soon as they could. Some like Serbia are still working to fulfill the entry criteria. Brexit does nothing to change that: Britain was always an exception with its recent imperialist past. The EU institutions are often bureaucratic. Yet they offer more representation and individual freedom to small countries than does the American constitution, for example. Given the often conflicting requirements, many aspects of the EU work amazingly well.
- marcoperaza 10y ago
  >Britain was always an exception with its recent imperialist past This is a joke, right? Ever heard of French Indochina, French Syria, or the Algerian War? Or how about the Belgian Congo? Or Spanish Morocco? All from the second half of the 20th century. And let's not forget the Germans conquering all of Europe. And your own country, Finland, siding with them.
  - pavlov 10y ago
    The difference is that Britain still has factions clinging to the remnants of the Empire. Among Brexiteers, this was a common theme: "We should work with Commonwealth nations rather than continental Europe". As far as WWII and Nazis -- that is precisely the reason why we have the EU, and shouldn't be brash in dismissing it. Nationalism in Europe ends up badly.
    - marcoperaza 10y ago
      I'm not sure how wanting closer economic relations with former colonies is equivalent to lusting for empire, or even a bad thing. With Canada, Australia, New Zealand (and the US) especially, the UK has a lot of cultural and political synergy.
      - pavlov 10y ago
coldtea 10y ago
>I wonder how viable the EU is now. They've had so many tests and failed. They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. Why should they have a "unified front" in an irrelevant peripheral war? >They failed to provide any military deterrence to the Russian federation Because the "Russian federation" is a viable antagonist for EU? If anything, the US overestimates how important its "shield" is, as if they are some kind of cavalry and EU a damsel in distress. US involvement and NATO are mostly remnants of the Cold War, when USSR and its satellites in Eastern Europe was indeed a formidable antagonist for the European countries. The US, due to its size and economic/diplomatic influence still has lots of European politicians by the balls, and can buy others. This is what prevents an EU-driven NATO-like body. That, plus the fact that EU is just a loose union of different national countries, and not an actual federation of a single people, like the US is, and European national interest don't always see eye to eye. Russia is of little consequence in the European state of affairs/influence, and fundamentalism terrorism from the failed states is a mess the US created and/or fueled, and which European powers like France and UK could have handled 10 times better (and had, in the past).
- lacampbell 10y ago
  Why should they have a "unified front" in an irrelevant peripheral war? Because the war definitely created issues between states in the EU at the time, between those states part of the coalition of the willing and those states that were not. Because the "Russian federation" is a viable antagonist for EU? I don't know why you're scare quoting "Russian federation" - that is the official name of the Russian state. An economic union and monetary union that can't secure its on borders or have a unified foreign policy is just completely putting the cart before the horse.
  - DasIch 10y ago
    Several countries in the EU aim for neutrality. A common front on defense issues is and will always will be difficult to pull of because of that. Additionally some countries have very high barriers for military interventions. Every time the German military does anything outside of German territory they're on questionable ground constitutionally. You either have the EU always be neutral or it will be split on matters of defense. Neither is necessarily bad.
mdekkers 10y ago
> NATO is still completely dominated by the US That is how NATO was designed.
- DasIch 10y ago
  It's also the purpose of NATO. NATO was created not only to provide defense during the cold war but also to prevent conflict between European countries and ensure US military dominance. There is not and never was a plan for the US not to be dominant.
varjag 10y ago
> I wonder how viable the EU is now. Stratfor/Friedman have been claiming EU is on disintegration path for years. Now George Soros, previously upbeat about EU and its values, is acknowledging the same trend.
jlg23 10y ago
Fascinating collection of "insights" you have there. > They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. All member states of the EU consider pluralism a core value. But yes, it would have been much nicer if all of Europe had just said "no". > They failed to provide any military deterrence to the Russian federation After a few hundred years of cultural exchange on an amicable level and another 50 years of a forced, much tighter relation between Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, one cannot seriously expect Europe to fight the US' war against someone most still consider a friend. Oh yes, we, as Europeans, also don't need to turn Europe into a war zone just to satisfy US geopolitical dreams. Or maybe it is just the memory of fighting in our home countries that makes us understand that we don't want this. > And now they failed to persuade one of their most powerful members from leaving. If you had followed European pre-Brexit news, you'd know that all reporting was against Brexit and that the vote for Brexit surprised even those who fought for it. I'm definitely no fan of the EU, but unsubstantiated generalities won't help you make your point.
- krona 10y ago
  > After a few hundred years of cultural exchange on an amicable level Do you know how many times Poland has been invaded or partitioned in the past 300 years? How about all the map redrawing in Europe over the past 1000 years? I'm guessing this too was completely amicable and was primarily just an excuse to ramble across the Prussian countryside? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2LgiMMGf6Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2LgiMMGf6Q > Oh yes, we, as Europeans, also don't need to turn Europe into a war zone just to satisfy US geopolitical dreams. Unsubstantiated generalities won't help you make your point.
  - jlg23 10y ago
    > Do you know how many times Poland has been invaded or partitioned in the past 300 years? 177 years. Poland has not existed as a sovereign country from 1795 to 1918. Since not even the Polish can agree on an answer to your question, I'll refrain from it as well. > How about all the map redrawing in Europe over the past 1000 years? Excluding islands, not much worse or better than anywhere else in the world? If you look at any of the published/leaked scenarios for US/RU-wars: All of them predict that the most heavy fighting will be in Europe, unless it's just nuked en passant.
perseusprime11 10y ago
The thing that really bothers me (or rather the preception they create) is their stance towards American Tech companies. They have an automatic impression that American companies like Microsoft, Apple and Google are ripping EU off because of their success and stopping local innovation.
- maverick_iceman 10y ago
  The European Commission thinks that by putting roadblocks in front of American companies they'll be able to foster home-grown tech giants. Unfortunately for them, innovation doesnt work like that.
paulmd 10y ago
I would throw in the failure to deal with the economic impacts of their single unified currency. The eurozone ties the poorer states to the richer states, they serve as a forced export market and cannot depreciate their currencies to provide labor-intensive products/services. They clearly need capital transfers to shore up the budgets of the poorer states (or direct spending to relieve some of the basic burdens of infrastructure/medical care/etc). The US accomplishes this with Federal spending - the coastal states have booming economies that pay much more in Federal taxes than they received in Federal spending; that money goes to the poorer states in the heartland and midwest. You don't act like a single nation either. When a hurricane hits the US we don't worry about who foots the bill, we collectively respond at the Federal level to solve the problem, in the expectation that if we ourselves have a similar disaster then everyone will step in for that too. You can't say that about, say, the refugee crisis in the EU, which has entirely been lumped onto the backs of the states least able to afford to deal with it. Basically the EU's problems are fundamentally the same as those of the Articles of Confederation. You can run down the list: no Federal military force, no Federal ability to tax and spend, a body of members who espouse values of unity but actually stand for the values of their own independence and sovereignty, who work against each other every step of the way if it'll mean a bigger slice of the pie for themselves, etc. Fundamentally you still view yourselves as sovereign nations and national citizens, rather than Euro Member States and Euro Citizens. Honestly what the EU really comes down to is a bunch of tiny, insignificant states who think they deserve a seat at the grown-ups table of international politics but are unwilling to make the sacrifices they need to get there. You don't have one foreign policy, you have 28 foreign policies, and the same thing internally. The EU is first and foremost an experiment in integration of economic and foreign policy, it clearly doesn't work at that. If you want to be a United States of Europe, then you need a Federal government with some authority. If all you want is European Peace, can't that be handled at the United Nations?

misja111 10y ago

The handling of the immigrant crisis was a failure, but the other two issues have little or nothing to do with the EU. The EU is primarily an economic union, it is not and will never be a military one. After all there is the NATO already. Also the list of European NATO members is quite different than that of the EU.

ddebernardy 10y ago
Actually, with the UK out the EU might (finally?) turn into a military union at some point. The UK was the main force against going in that direction, in that the UK didn't want their foreign policy done by Brussels. The smaller roadblock that remains will be to convince the Nordic countries that flexing the EU's military muscle is OK for purposes other than strict humanitarian purposes (or France and - to a lesser extent - Southern Europe the other way around).
- M2Ys4U 10y ago
  The current rules around military cooperation mean that it's opt-in and wouldn't so much be an 'EU military' as one might think of it.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    Plans for greater military integration appear to have been discussed recently: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/europe-forges-ahead-with-plans-for-eu-army/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/europe-forges-ahe...
DasIch 10y ago
The EU was created to ensure peace within Europe. The economic aspects are secondary and merely enable that to happen by binding the economies together, so that you cannot start a war or leave the EU without significant harm to your own economy. There is a European Defense Agency and there are EU battlegroups that sort of form a standing EU army. The EU definitely is a military union and there are quite a few people pushing for even more cooperation on that front. EDIT: For those people down voting I would suggest reading the preamble of the Paris treaty[1], which essentially started the EU. It's not exactly subtle or ambiguous about the goal. [1]: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:11951K:EN:PDF http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:...

pavlov 10y ago

The EU has been around for 50 years in evolving forms. It's easy to cherrypick failures, but the achievements ought to get some mention too. After the fall of the Soviet Union, about twenty countries wanted to join the EU as soon as they could. Some like Serbia are still working to fulfill the entry criteria. Brexit does nothing to change that: Britain was always an exception with its recent imperialist past. The EU institutions are often bureaucratic. Yet they offer more representation and individual freedom to small countries than does the American constitution, for example. Given the often conflicting requirements, many aspects of the EU work amazingly well.

marcoperaza 10y ago
>Britain was always an exception with its recent imperialist past This is a joke, right? Ever heard of French Indochina, French Syria, or the Algerian War? Or how about the Belgian Congo? Or Spanish Morocco? All from the second half of the 20th century. And let's not forget the Germans conquering all of Europe. And your own country, Finland, siding with them.
- pavlov 10y ago
  The difference is that Britain still has factions clinging to the remnants of the Empire. Among Brexiteers, this was a common theme: "We should work with Commonwealth nations rather than continental Europe". As far as WWII and Nazis -- that is precisely the reason why we have the EU, and shouldn't be brash in dismissing it. Nationalism in Europe ends up badly.
  - marcoperaza 10y ago
    I'm not sure how wanting closer economic relations with former colonies is equivalent to lusting for empire, or even a bad thing. With Canada, Australia, New Zealand (and the US) especially, the UK has a lot of cultural and political synergy.
    - pavlov 10y ago

coldtea 10y ago

>I wonder how viable the EU is now. They've had so many tests and failed. They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. Why should they have a "unified front" in an irrelevant peripheral war? >They failed to provide any military deterrence to the Russian federation Because the "Russian federation" is a viable antagonist for EU? If anything, the US overestimates how important its "shield" is, as if they are some kind of cavalry and EU a damsel in distress. US involvement and NATO are mostly remnants of the Cold War, when USSR and its satellites in Eastern Europe was indeed a formidable antagonist for the European countries. The US, due to its size and economic/diplomatic influence still has lots of European politicians by the balls, and can buy others. This is what prevents an EU-driven NATO-like body. That, plus the fact that EU is just a loose union of different national countries, and not an actual federation of a single people, like the US is, and European national interest don't always see eye to eye. Russia is of little consequence in the European state of affairs/influence, and fundamentalism terrorism from the failed states is a mess the US created and/or fueled, and which European powers like France and UK could have handled 10 times better (and had, in the past).

lacampbell 10y ago
Why should they have a "unified front" in an irrelevant peripheral war? Because the war definitely created issues between states in the EU at the time, between those states part of the coalition of the willing and those states that were not. Because the "Russian federation" is a viable antagonist for EU? I don't know why you're scare quoting "Russian federation" - that is the official name of the Russian state. An economic union and monetary union that can't secure its on borders or have a unified foreign policy is just completely putting the cart before the horse.
- DasIch 10y ago
  Several countries in the EU aim for neutrality. A common front on defense issues is and will always will be difficult to pull of because of that. Additionally some countries have very high barriers for military interventions. Every time the German military does anything outside of German territory they're on questionable ground constitutionally. You either have the EU always be neutral or it will be split on matters of defense. Neither is necessarily bad.

mdekkers 10y ago

> NATO is still completely dominated by the US That is how NATO was designed.

DasIch 10y ago
It's also the purpose of NATO. NATO was created not only to provide defense during the cold war but also to prevent conflict between European countries and ensure US military dominance. There is not and never was a plan for the US not to be dominant.

varjag 10y ago

> I wonder how viable the EU is now. Stratfor/Friedman have been claiming EU is on disintegration path for years. Now George Soros, previously upbeat about EU and its values, is acknowledging the same trend.

jlg23 10y ago

Fascinating collection of "insights" you have there. > They failed to have a unified front on the Iraq war. All member states of the EU consider pluralism a core value. But yes, it would have been much nicer if all of Europe had just said "no". > They failed to provide any military deterrence to the Russian federation After a few hundred years of cultural exchange on an amicable level and another 50 years of a forced, much tighter relation between Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, one cannot seriously expect Europe to fight the US' war against someone most still consider a friend. Oh yes, we, as Europeans, also don't need to turn Europe into a war zone just to satisfy US geopolitical dreams. Or maybe it is just the memory of fighting in our home countries that makes us understand that we don't want this. > And now they failed to persuade one of their most powerful members from leaving. If you had followed European pre-Brexit news, you'd know that all reporting was against Brexit and that the vote for Brexit surprised even those who fought for it. I'm definitely no fan of the EU, but unsubstantiated generalities won't help you make your point.

krona 10y ago
> After a few hundred years of cultural exchange on an amicable level Do you know how many times Poland has been invaded or partitioned in the past 300 years? How about all the map redrawing in Europe over the past 1000 years? I'm guessing this too was completely amicable and was primarily just an excuse to ramble across the Prussian countryside? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2LgiMMGf6Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2LgiMMGf6Q > Oh yes, we, as Europeans, also don't need to turn Europe into a war zone just to satisfy US geopolitical dreams. Unsubstantiated generalities won't help you make your point.
- jlg23 10y ago
  > Do you know how many times Poland has been invaded or partitioned in the past 300 years? 177 years. Poland has not existed as a sovereign country from 1795 to 1918. Since not even the Polish can agree on an answer to your question, I'll refrain from it as well. > How about all the map redrawing in Europe over the past 1000 years? Excluding islands, not much worse or better than anywhere else in the world? If you look at any of the published/leaked scenarios for US/RU-wars: All of them predict that the most heavy fighting will be in Europe, unless it's just nuked en passant.

perseusprime11 10y ago

The thing that really bothers me (or rather the preception they create) is their stance towards American Tech companies. They have an automatic impression that American companies like Microsoft, Apple and Google are ripping EU off because of their success and stopping local innovation.

maverick_iceman 10y ago
The European Commission thinks that by putting roadblocks in front of American companies they'll be able to foster home-grown tech giants. Unfortunately for them, innovation doesnt work like that.

paulmd 10y ago

I would throw in the failure to deal with the economic impacts of their single unified currency. The eurozone ties the poorer states to the richer states, they serve as a forced export market and cannot depreciate their currencies to provide labor-intensive products/services. They clearly need capital transfers to shore up the budgets of the poorer states (or direct spending to relieve some of the basic burdens of infrastructure/medical care/etc). The US accomplishes this with Federal spending - the coastal states have booming economies that pay much more in Federal taxes than they received in Federal spending; that money goes to the poorer states in the heartland and midwest. You don't act like a single nation either. When a hurricane hits the US we don't worry about who foots the bill, we collectively respond at the Federal level to solve the problem, in the expectation that if we ourselves have a similar disaster then everyone will step in for that too. You can't say that about, say, the refugee crisis in the EU, which has entirely been lumped onto the backs of the states least able to afford to deal with it. Basically the EU's problems are fundamentally the same as those of the Articles of Confederation. You can run down the list: no Federal military force, no Federal ability to tax and spend, a body of members who espouse values of unity but actually stand for the values of their own independence and sovereignty, who work against each other every step of the way if it'll mean a bigger slice of the pie for themselves, etc. Fundamentally you still view yourselves as sovereign nations and national citizens, rather than Euro Member States and Euro Citizens. Honestly what the EU really comes down to is a bunch of tiny, insignificant states who think they deserve a seat at the grown-ups table of international politics but are unwilling to make the sacrifices they need to get there. You don't have one foreign policy, you have 28 foreign policies, and the same thing internally. The EU is first and foremost an experiment in integration of economic and foreign policy, it clearly doesn't work at that. If you want to be a United States of Europe, then you need a Federal government with some authority. If all you want is European Peace, can't that be handled at the United Nations?