What of the claims made by federalists that "the EU has kept peace in Europe for 50 years" and that for Britain "pooling sovereignty within the EU" is no different to "pooling sovereignty in NATO".

They evidently haven't read the North Atlantic Treaty of 1949 which set up NATO.

• Article 2 provides for NATO members to "strengthen their free institutions" and "provide conditions of well-being". The EU is deliberately weakening free national parliaments. It could also be argued that the policies pursued to prepare their economies for the Single Currency are hardly conducive to national well-being!



• Under Article 8, NATO members "undertake not to enter into any international agreement in conflict with the Treaty". It could be argued that the EU does just that.



• Article 13 specifically provides for members to leave - unlike the EU treaties - although Britain can still regain her independence by cancelling the latter.



• There is no majority voting, qualified or otherwise.



• Most importantly, all NATO members retain their sovereignty and autonomy in defence matters. Article 5 states that, in the event of one of them being attacked, each of them will take "such action as it deems necessary". No NATO member can be forced to join in any action.



• NATO members are free to act independently, as Britain and France have both demonstrated. In short, NATO is a good example of how nations can co-operate in their mutual interests but retaining their independence - unlike the EU.



• Yet the EU has its eyes on expanding its area of control to include "a common defence policy, and eventually a common defence". Don't be fooled by claims that "the EU has helped keep peace in Europe for 50 years". For a start the original EEC was only founded in 1957. The proposed European Defence Community of 1954 never materialised, yet war never broke out! Nuclear weapons were never covered by the early EEC treaties - and in particular France kept hers, without war breaking out!
  
  In the words of Bill Cash MP: simply "Two democracies [in Europe] do not go to war". With the first-hand lessons of WW2 and NATO around, does anyone seriously believe that France & Germany would have attacked each other after 1945?
  
  Two of Europe's most democratic nations, Norway and Switzerland have stayed resolutely outside the EU, yet no-one would say that they were in danger of declaring war!



• Yet the history of artificial federative states like Yugoslavia is that they are inherently unstable. And it was the EU's megalomaniac need to have a 'common foreign policy' that triggered off the fighting in the Balkans.
  
  On a smaller scale, forcing nation states to accept contrived EU policies, such as the Common Fisheries Policy, have led to conflict between peoples.






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With acknowledgement to Eurofacts' research.
Date this page updated: 2 January 1999

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