There's also one glaring error in the text that can only be explained by hindsight wisdom: >The Single Market launched just four months later, in January 1993,

There's also one glaring error in the text that can only be explained by hindsight wisdom: >The Single Market launched just four months later, in January 1993, though something like it had been in the works for a while. But on that launch date was there anyone in Europe with any doubts about which nation — which “area” — was ascendant, economically speaking? Germany in 1993 was in no shape or form to be the ascending economic superpower, in fact 1993 was a recession year: https://d3fy651gv2fhd3.cloudfront.net/embed/?s=wgdpgerm&v=201907011545V20191105&d1=19900101&d2=20000101&h=300&w=600 https://d3fy651gv2fhd3.cloudfront.net/embed/?s=wgdpgerm&v=20.... That of course is due to reunification which was extremely costly at the time and the implosion of the former socialist economy hindered growth massively. Germany got extremely lucky with its timing - when the exchange rate for the DM to EUR conversion was fixed, the German economy was still in dire straits, so it was basically undervalued. But the German companies used the sudden strategic location of the country between east and west to massively invest in production capacities in the former eastern block to keep production costs low while selling to the industrialized neighbors in the west.