LONDON – “What is Europe?” Winston Churchill wrote in 1946, “A rubble heap, a charnel house, a breeding ground for pestilence and hate”- language that would not be out of place on one side of the vitriolic debate on the Euro, a new European constitution and indeed all things European that is now the everyday grist of Britain’s most populist press and which spills over not only into the Conservative party, as it has since the days of prime minister Margaret Thatcher, but into the ambivalence in the Labour party leadership that is unable to bite the bullet on taking Britain into full membership of the Euro currency.
Yet Churchill, aware of Europe’s problems- a hundred times worse than today, if not a thousand- reached a different conclusion. On 19th September, 1946, speaking in Zurich a bare six months after his more famous Iron Curtain speech, Churchill appealed for a United States of Europe. “We must proclaim the mission and the design of Europe whose moral conception will win the respect and gratitude of mankind, and whose physical strength will be such that no will dare molest her tranquil sway‚” I hope to see a Europe where men and women of every country will think of belonging to their native land, and wherever they go in this wide domain they truly feel, ‘I am at home'”.
The vision of the victor of World War 2 was splendid to behold, all the more so when set against the pussyfooting of Britain’s current political leadership. Prime Minister Tony Blair has had his moment of opportunity for putting his country at the centre of Europe and missed it twice. This time, when the government has announced that Britain’s economy is not sufficiently synchronized with that of the Euro zone to allow for a smooth entry, the reason is clearly, if not bogus, insufficient. It is simply that Blair has not thrown his heart into the battle in the way he did to align Britain’s position with America’s on its ambition to depose Saddam Hussein.
The first time was when Blair first came to power with a huge majority. Although before the election he had boxed himself in by promising a referendum on the Euro and indicated that this was to be at some later date, he could have used the flush of overwhelming victory to announce that he had now “read the books”, that it was in Britain’s interest to enter the Euro at the onset and he was calling a referendum in two month’s time. Very few would have wanted to vote “no” at this moment of enthusiasm in British political life after the savage infighting and grim anti-Europeanism of the previous Conservative government.
Admittedly it is not easy to push Britain towards Europe. The internal resistance, which the popular press rides on, is immense. The British have always looked at the continent as if from a great distance. Although from the Norman Conquest to the Hundred Years War (1337-1453) the kingdom of England was deeply involved in continental affairs after that, having absorbed its neighbours in the British Isles, it sailed away to build an Empire at the four corners of the world. Only the end of Empire brought Britain back, but even then it was with the utmost difficulty that it could mentally detach itself sufficiently from the United States to put Europe first and decide after years of debate to seek entry into Europe.
This present negative decision to stay out of the Euro adds to the current European crisis because it comes at the worst of times. It comes after one of Britain’s periodic lurches across the Atlantic into American arms. And it comes just when Europe is welcoming in new members from the far side of the old Iron Curtain. And it comes when Europe is debating a Constitution that will determine both the democratic method of Europe for the future, the way its leadership will be structured, and not least how much it will go down the road towards Churchill’s vision of it being a superpower (albeit a quiet one, more in accord with today’s non- militaristic mood) and one where every European feels equally at home wherever they are.
Europe at the moment is in a fragile state. It is still reeling from its quarrel with America over Iraq. It is worried stiff about how to bring in the east Europeans, and before long, Turkey, Russia and maybe even Israel (as part of a peace deal) without making the running of Europe a bureaucratic nightmare. It is divided on whether it wants a powerful permanent president to give those who want “ever closer union” some substance. And all this is happening at a time when the economies of most of its member countries are performing badly.
Britain, which could have been in at the onset of all things European, from the days of the creation of the Common Market of the founding six countries to the present day Euro, the natural post war leader, has chosen to be semi-detached. By making a united, integrated, Europe harder to create, it pushes further away the day when the early visionaries like Churchill can rest quietly in their graves knowing that Europe is so locked together the terrible conflicts, wars and the “hate filled” relationships of yesterday will never return.
I can be reached by phone +44 7785 351172 and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
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