Eurocrat Empire Building

From the desk of Paul Belien on Wed, 2007-03-28 07:47

On Sunday, the European Union celebrated its 50th anniversary. The EU was established on March 25, 1957, when its six founding states (Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxemburg) signed the Treaty of Rome. They solemnly declared that they would aim for "an ever closer union." As a first step towards the goal of political unification the six states decided to integrate their economies. They have meanwhile been joined by 21 other European countries.

Economic activities, however, cannot result in achieving a predetermined political goal without strict economic controls and centralist planning. The controlling and planning body of the EU is the European Commission, based in Brussels. The commissioners are not elected and are accountable to no one. This deliberate democratic deficit was built in as a structural feature of the EU. An unelected and unaccountable structure makes it easier to impose centrally driven change on a society.
 
Some of the EU's founding fathers claimed that political unification was needed to prevent European nations from going to war again. Others, such as Paul-Henri Spaak, the Belgian foreign minister who authored the Rome treaty, dreamed of a European superstate. He hoped that such a state might one day become as powerful as the United States. Robert Rothschild, Mr. Spaak's chef de cabinet, recalled later how Mr. Spaak told him in 1957: "I think we have re-established the Roman Empire without a single shot being fired."
 
Washington foolishly supported the European unification project. It failed to see that democratization and decentralization are far more likely to preserve peace than unification and centralization. Washington also thought that without the gradual obliteration of the former European nation-states the Europeans were bound to wage war on each other again. America became the EU's midwife. "Without the Americans we would not have gotten anywhere," Mr. Rothschild acknowledged.
 
Empires, however, are carnivorous monsters. They have to keep growing in order to avoid unraveling. Hence, they inevitably grow ever more totalitarian and expansionist. The EU is interfering more and more in the daily lives of its subjects. At the same time, its territory continues to expand, from the original six members to the present 27. By definition, there is no end to this process. The Leviathan has to be fed.

With the accession of Romania and Bulgaria on Jan. 1, the EU's territory has reached the outer boundaries of the European continent. Since the European Empire by definition has to expand, it has to move into Asia and Africa. The preparation for this crossing of the Rubicon -- in this case the crossing of the Strait of Gibraltar and the Bosporus -- has been going on for years.

Five years ago, Louis Michel, then the Belgian minister of foreign affairs and at present a member of the European Commission, told the Belgian parliament that eventually the EU will encompass the entire Mediterranean basin, including North Africa and the Middle East. Mr. Michel also posited that only by incorporating both Israel and Palestine into the EU will there be peace between them.

The European-Mediterranean ("Euro-Med") partnership between the EU and the countries of the Maghreb (an Arab word meaning "the West" and denoting Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya -- the North African Muslim countries to the west of Egypt) was established specifically to promote the economic, cultural and political integration of the EU and the Maghreb countries. The Brussels bureaucrats embrace Islam because they want the EU to expand into the Muslim east and south. They think that eventually the Maghreb will become part of Europe, but many ordinary Europeans fear that Europe is on its way to becoming the Maghreb, the Muslim "West."

The problem for the Brussels establishment is that the present institutional framework of the EU is not adapted to the rapid expansion which the EU has experienced since the fall of the Iron Curtain in the late 1980s. To cope with expansion, the EU establishment produced the so-called "European Constitution," a bloated 70,000-word document full of politically correct phrases and carefully omitting any reference to Europe's Christian heritage and its cultural tradition. It expands the powers of the Brussels Eurocracy and limits the national sovereignty of the member states.

In early 2005 the constitution was rejected in referendums in France and the Netherlands. One of the reasons why people voted against it was their fear of Islam and their subsequent opposition to the admission of Turkey into the EU. Theoretically the constitution should have been discarded after its rejection at the polls. The Europeanist politicians, however, refuse to accept the electorate's "no." "It has to be yes," they say, as they know that the empire will collapse if it cannot expand. They are now writing down a new and binding institutional framework, which, as German Chancellor Angela Merkel made clear, shall not be put before the electorate in a referendum. Empires cannot be democracies.

 
This piece was originally published in The Washington Times on March 28, 2007 .
[A longer version of this column can be found in the April issue of Chronicles]

In Reply

Submitted by Kapitein Andre on Sun, 2007-04-01 02:06.

In Reply to George2: If Ms. Buitenweg's comments as regards homosexuality and Polish public education are valid, than they are valid irrespective of her stances on other issues. Many on the left accuse nationalists of being 'facists,' 'national socialists,' 'racists' etc., simply because they might agree with some policies or programmes of 'extremist' groups. Such mud-slinging only serves to frame the debate such that free speech is repressed in popular and academic discourse. Therefore, if the right is to distinguish itself from the left, it cannot practice the same 'white-washing.'

 

In Reply to the new european: I agree that enlargement of the European Union to include Islamic states such as Turkiye is not the only factor involved in Islamization. From the demographic perspective, there are three components to Islamization: (1) the White European population is declining, (2) the Muslim European population is expanding, and (3) Muslim immigration is boosting the Muslim share of the European population. From the cultural perspective, there are three components also: (1) appeasement of Islamists in Western European states, (2) complicity and conspiracy by European Muslims with Islamization, and (3) external pressure from Islamic states.

I wonder

Submitted by George2 on Fri, 2007-03-30 23:30.

“Five years ago, Louis Michel, then the Belgian minister of foreign affairs and at present a member of the European Commission, told the Belgian parliament that eventually the EU will encompass the entire Mediterranean basin, including North Africa and the Middle East. Mr. Michel also posited that only by incorporating both Israel and Palestine into the EU will there be peace between them.”

I wonder if Dutch green MEP Kathalijne Buitenweg would be inclined to say that “there is a dark undercurrent in [Palestinian] politics and society at present, which seeks to promote discrimination of minorities and the disregard of civil rights” when talking about “disturbing proposals to outlaw discussion of homosexuality”. See TBJ article: Europe’s Dark Undercurrent

Enlargement is not the problem

Submitted by the new european on Thu, 2007-03-29 19:37.

Enlargement is not the cause of the increasing concessions made to Islam in Western European countries - Catholic Poland or Orthodox Romania have really nothing to do with that. The threat is WITHIN countries like Belgium, France, Germany or UK, not at their borders. Immigration/integration policies in all these countries have failed - the radicalization of the young Muslim generations is obvious and the concession trend is likely to accelerate. Actually countries like Poland might slow down a little this  slippery slope.

Not to mention that Mr. Michel's view is hardly in line with the mainstream Franco-German Eurocrats that imposed for the first time "open ended" accession negotiations with Turkey and gave absolutely no membership perspectives to European countries like Ukraine or Moldova...
Transatlantic Politics

March to Folly

Submitted by Kapitein Andre on Thu, 2007-03-29 09:05.

Paul Belien: "With the accession of Romania and Bulgaria on Jan. 1, the EU’s territory has reached the outer boundaries of the European continent."

 

However, it still does not encompass all the European states, especially in East-Central and Southern Europe, notably Russia, Serbia and Montenegro.

 

Paul Belien: "Since the European Empire by definition has to expand, it has to move into Asia and Africa. The preparation for this crossing of the Rubicon - in this case the crossing of the Strait of Gibraltar and the Bosporus - has been going on for years."

 

Firstly, it does not have to expand beyond including each European nation. Secondly, it should be expanding east to the Kuril Islands, not into Asia Minor or North Africa.

 

Paul Belien: "Five years ago, Louis Michel, then the Belgian minister of foreign affairs and at present a member of the European Commission, told the Belgian parliament that eventually the EU will encompass the entire Mediterranean basin, including North Africa and the Middle East. Mr. Michel also posited that only by incorporating both Israel and Palestine into the EU will there be peace between them."

 

This grand strategy seems to be a foolish attempt at securing greater labor inputs, markets, natural resources (esp. energy e.g. oil and gas), and therefore greater tax revenues. The French continue their colonial intrigues in Francophone Africa, and only relatively recently did the Belgians give up their possessions, but not after permanently destabilizing the Congo. Though I dislike laying the blame at the door of any one European culture, such a strategy reeks of Gallo-Roman (incl. Wallonian) elitism and neo-colonialism. As regards incorporating Israel and the Palestinian territories, such a development would not appease Palestinian territorial demands or repatriate their refugees abroad, even if it would provide them with sovereignty and therefore self-determination. Furthermore, Israel would reject such a proposal because its foreign aid, particularly from the United States, would significantly be reduced.

 

Paul Belien: "They think that eventually the Maghreb will become part of Europe, but many ordinary Europeans fear that Europe is on its way to becoming the Maghreb, the Muslim 'West.'"

 

French and Belgian elites seem to be complacent regarding their demographic crises, confident that they will retain their social, economic and political power and remain beyond the grip of angry Muslim and African mobs.