Campaigning has started:
EU Referendum

There's going to be a lot of it.

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Dave

Merkel made her bed, and as the saying goes...she can now lay in it. Yes I feel a bit sorry for the Germans now but just because she dropped the ball doesn't mean to say we in the rest of Europe should suffer...sometimes I am really pleased we are not joined to the mainland

As for an European Army ...its nearly as funny as been a member of NATO. Putin must laugh himself to sleep on a night when he thinks of NATO, he waltzed into Crimea and now his troops are another area of Ukraine (even though he denies it) and what has NATO or anyone in the EU done to protect our borders? Nothing, they did a bit of shouting and did some sanctions. Even the US was not bothered, maybe because it was in Europe or maybe because there is no oil? I know the Ukraine is not a member of NATO or the EU but it is still part of mainland Europe and not Russia.
I served in HM Forces and it should remain Her Majesties Forces. We do not need to be run by some Spanish or French General being told what to do by people who don't like curved bananas and don't have a back bone. Serving in a Regiment which is the 309th Battalion of the European Army does not appeal to me nor probably to any of the Men and Women who are serving their country now.

I also get fed up of my country paying billions to help support the EU and the lesser countries within it when we can not look after our own elderly, homeless, sick etc. Maybe we should worry about ourselves for a bit before we worry about others?

Wayne

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The Balkans
https://new.horizonsunlimited.com/poi_entity/8417

Quite a comprehensive and interesting read. Somewhere near the bottom there's a section on in / out by political party support and it seems that 10% (a rough average of the different polls) of UKIP voters want to stay in. Now that's a section of the electorate that really knows their mind.

Having spent a while as a doorstep pollster (asking about all sorts of stuff, not just politics) it surprises me that the polls get as close as they do. A good percentage of the people I interviewed would be "don't knows" on just about every topic unless you pushed them, and then they'd just pick one of the offered alternatives at random.

A couple of items.

Russia has long standing interests and claims in the Crimea in much the same way that Britain has interests in, say, the Falkland Islands or Gibraltar.
Nor am I equating these examples but just pointing out that territorial disputes are rarely clear cases.

As a politicial alliance, NATO carries out diplomacy and has diplomats at ambassador level within it's HQ.
The EU is embryonic in this field in comparison which is why they, the commission basically, would wish to raise a standing military force; there has been some movement toward this aim very recently with the raisiing of a border control force with international staff, deployable anywhere in Europe with or without the permission of the home nation.
I believe that "force" is now in place in Greece.


Some irony therein in the light of yesterday's report about the pollsters take on May 2015.

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Dave

Yes I realise this but that doesn't stop me thinking its a farce and that we as a country do not need a Euro Army dictating where Her Majesty's Troops go

Wayne


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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The Balkans
https://new.horizonsunlimited.com/poi_entity/8417

Yes but in 1994, Russia, along with the US and Britain undertook to defend Ukraine from aggression if it gave up its nuclear arsenal, "to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine."

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclea...ns_and_Ukraine

The US and Britain conveniently forgot about this undertaking when Russia kicked off.

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"For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)

Of course, we met our match in the diplomacy; Putin was not playing poker.

Same for Syria: Russia has a treaty with the current Syrian government, hence they are legally in there even having long established bases in that country.

As before, every country has it's interests.
Everyone raise their hand if they want to fight for the current government of the Ukraine.

But, we are probably way off topic.
It's reported that Merkel is not visiting Davos this year for the WEF.


ps
There is a noticeable lack of "refugees" departing the Crimea for Europe.

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Dave

For any new-age-Europe of the future, it wouldn't operate in that manner for each and every nation that signs up to the 5 president proposals.

As per earlier posts, a single EU government would logically lead to a single standing Navy, Air Force and Army, perhaps by 2025 as per the "document of 5".
Such forces would recruit from across all of the previous nations but act on behalf of the new government as a single entity.
Hence NATO would have a few concerns, if it were to still exist by then.

Scots and English regiments must have felt something similar when their respective nations combined a few 100 years ago, albeit that was not the same cirmcumstance, exactly, because of the oath of allegiance to the Crown.

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Dave

Interesting discussion, which I presume is mainly of importance to the British. The „continentals“ are often much less inclined to linger on this subject. They usually dismiss this as dreams of imperial grandezza of past centuries Many people on the continent believe that the UK tries to exert pressure on the EU just to pick the rasins, i.e. to get a better deal at the expense of the other members.

The post of greenmanalishi is also worth reading, stating that it might be „an age thing with older people more likely to want to leave the EU than the younger ones.“ This probably applies to most discussions regarding the EU. In the beginning many Germans were strongly opposed to relinquish their Deutschmark, believing that the Euro would ruin economic stability. Even nowadays the older people (sic!) convert Euro prices to Deutschmark and grumble about inflation.... But most people forget that the EU has also increased inter-european trade significantly, not to speak of all the other improvements to make life easier.


Some of the posts IMHO don't belong into this thread. Like Tim Cullis' post „I also have an ill feeling about the power wielded by Angela Merkel who appears to be a rule unto herself. She unilaterally decides to throw open the borders of Germany to what we now realise are predominantly young male economic migrants, and then a couple of months later is trying to force other countries to shoulder the burden. WTF. „ for example.



First of all I believe that if someone is running for his life (Syrians), humanitarian actions are not to be discussed. I'm not speaking of economic refugees. Britain is in the comfortable position to be an island state with a useful neighbour (France), who blocks off any attempts of refugees to board any kind of transport to get into the UK.
Greece and Italy aren't in this comfortable position. Turkey and northern Africa care a damn whether anybody tries to get across the border to Europe. If anyone has a serious suggestion as how to stop the stampede, here's your chance. Gunboats are no arguments.


My two cents worth as a South African expat living in Munich – but not as an economic refugee
S.A. by the way accommodates many refugees facing famine and violence at home in Zimbabwe, but unfortunately it is also flooded by economic refugees from other African countries – all in all an estimated 5 million. I suspect the routes to SA are much easier than those to the EU.....

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Only when we pause to wonder
do we go beyond the limits of our little lives.
(Rod McKuen)

Why shouldn't we as we are in the top 5 of the highest payers to the EU rather than the top 5 of the highest takers
Yes I know it is based on GNI, a percentage of VAT and additional revenues

But in 2013 (according to the daily telegraph) we payed a total of 17 billion Euro whilst only getting 6.3 billion back so our Net contribution was 10 billion give or take, whilst another country paid 4.2 billion euros and took 16.1 billion,,,thats why we like raisins.
As I have said before that money may be better spent looking after our own people instead of propping up others. That is one of the things for me that should change if we stop in.

Added info
looking further we got a 4 billion rebate along with Germany, Austria, Holland and Sweden (don't know how much they got)...bonus

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The Balkans
https://new.horizonsunlimited.com/poi_entity/8417

Your suggestion that Britain is focused purely on financial matters is way off target. For many British people the issue with the EU is not economic but loss of sovereignty which has everything to do with 'Der Frau', sorry, 'Mutti'.

So for me the most important of Cameron's four shopping list items is the request, "to end Britain's obligation to work towards an 'ever-closer union'... to make clear that this commitment will no longer apply to the United Kingdom." Everything else I could reluctantly live with, even if it means our country and our services are swamped by EU citizens attracted to the higher-performing British economy.

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"For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)

Good to hear of a SA taking an interest.

The issue of a UK Brexit is very much on the agenda here in the UK; if the nationals of the other European countries are not hearing about this in the news coverage, it is because it is coming up on the inside rail of the "migrant crisis".
My own acquaintances living on the mainland tell me this is how it is at present regarding the lack of discussion about what the UK is doing right now.

Throwing the door open to 1m new inhabitants made little sense but it is a German problem for their own solution; IMO there is no chance of other countries, especially those in eastern Europe, shouldering that burden which is why the fall of Merkel may be a good bet.

Inter-European trade has been unbalanced, at best; Greece and Germany are at opposite ends of the scales.
There is much to this one-line-view of mine and it has been discussed in the other thread in this HUBB pub about the economic crisis - that is the real event that will dominate everything else during 2016, IMO.
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...crisis-59853-8

You will know that the South African economy is more or less tanking at present; that is the way forward for many more nations during this year; there's my view again.

All of this is going to concentrate a few minds; for some, the easy life has been over for a while (again Greece is the prime example) and for others ............. well, let's see how the year goes.

ps "Currency wars" is the name of the game for this year at least and China has not taken a seat at that gaming table to date.

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Dave

I am a "continental" and the subject of the referendum in the UK interests me very much. It will have an impact on the EU as a whole. I, for one, truly hope that Brexit happens so that this thing called EU can end once and for all.

Of course I can not discuss (it isn't really my place) the effects on the UK and for UK citizens. But I can present the point of view of a continental.


That post by Tim was very interesting along with many others. Those posts show aspects of the EU and how it works nowadays. As a matter of fact the preponderance of Germany is one of the reasons why I doubt that the EU still exists. And, please, don't confuse things. I am not a germanophobe, far, very far from it. And as a matter of fact I fully understand why Germany is the country who bosses the rest around. After all, they are the ones who pay, specially on what concerns the Eurozone. But, of course, this state of affairs led to the erosion of EU institutions to the point that I often question if the EU still exists other than on paper.


Fair enough, there exists the duty to protect those running from wars. It's true, that duty exists and good that it does. But this is not synonimous with accepting everybody and allowing everybody to mingle in our societies regardless of each country's capabilities to absorb the influx. Her Majesty's government approached the question the right way and exactly the same way as Australia, Canada or the US approach it: ok, Britain will accept some refugess... but we will go and pick them from refugee camps. This is the right way to do things for several reasons. Ok, Greece, Italy and other states can not do it this way as easily as the UK. But there is a very simple way to solve the problem. The creation of refugee camps in Greece or Italy or Serbia or Croatia or something of the sort where those who arrive in Europe are placed, even those who manage to reach Germany or France or whichever country. They arrive there, they are sent back to the refugee camps. Then, once in the camps, they may apply for asylum in a certain country but the granting of asylum is at the discretion of each individual country. Not granted under pressure of a gigantic exodus. As a matter of fact this is a no-brainer. It is what has been done all over the world for the last several decades. No need to invent the wheel again.

I can agree with you there Tim. I don't think any country in the EU should be ruled by anyone else, but I do think we could still be a strong working EU without it

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The Balkans
https://new.horizonsunlimited.com/poi_entity/8417

As was written earlier, the clue lies in the U of the EU.
The U was not visible in the previous EEC but now it is exposed for all to see.

Just to throw in a wider set of factors, on a longer timescale:

Russia/Putin would be welcoming to a weaker Europe, in general, and a reduction of the "will" of the European continent in particular.

Longer term, if Putin (who is here to stay, unlike, say, Obama who disappears in 12 months) can detect a sufficiently disunited Europe he may see good sense in some form of bilateral alliance between Germany and Russia, for trade alone.

China has ideas about constructing a new "silk route" to increase trade.
Such a new land based route would probably
- avoid the sealanes altogether
- terminate in Europe, likely with Germany as a terminus
- pass via Moscow
- be a rail link rather than a highway

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Dave