I like it that you guys are taking an interest in this thread.

To say something about a few points therein:

The USA finally came together as a single nation as a result of your civil war.
From just some of my reading about that event, all of the public-face issues that were in place at the time, such as slavery, were the fig leafs for the real reason for that civil war; the real reason was the imposition of the dollar bill across all of the States.
i.e. the single currency which is an absolute essential of any unified nation.

The campaigns about the referendum within the UK are just kicking off here now, following the usual dearth of sensible news reporting over the Christmas/New Year break (which, naturally, goes on for weeks).
A meeting in Brussels next month will cut a deal, be in no doubt about that, and then the money is on our govn calling a referendum as early as June 16 before the migrant situation in mainland Europe brings on any further heat into the arguments.

There is a mass of information out there about the aims and intentions of the EU commission, the "5 Presidents" etc. While these have been in place for quite a while, they are now openly avowed objectives of those bodies and individuals.
In a word, the aim is a single nation state for Europe, with a single currency (more or less in place for now), a single fiscal arrangement, and a single government.

Switzerland has a very open form of democracy: for instance, if any one of the cantons says no to a proposal then that proposal falls.
Hence their stability.
They also have virtually endless referenda, something which many in politics abhor because they feel the controls that places on their powers.

Agenda 21 of the UN is also relevant.

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Dave