A Revolutionary Change in Britain’s Relationship With Europe

 

Europe is on the brink of becoming a superstate. The economic crisis has shoved aside a host of obstacles—but one remains: Britain.

Earlier this month, for example, the EU’s high representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Catherine Ashton, suggested the European Union build a new military headquarters. Virtually everyone in the EU backed it until it was slapped down by British Foreign Minister William Hague.

But the British brake is about to be released. Comments by both the British Prime Minister David Cameron and Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne show a huge change in the direction of British foreign policy.

For years Britain has fought against a “two-speed Europe,” where the more gung-ho nations would speed toward a superstate while nations like Britain trundled along in the slow lane. Britain has forced the Europhile nations to drag it along.

That position is poised to change. “I think we have to accept that greater eurozone integration is necessary to make the single currency work and that is very much in our national interest,” Osborne said in an interview with the Financial Times (FT) published on July 20. “We should be prepared to let that happen.”

Cameron made the same point in an interview with the Spectator. The eurozone, he said, will have to move “towards much more single economic government.”

This reverses centuries of British foreign policy. The primary objective of its foreign policy has been to prevent a single power from dominating the Continent. By taking its foot off the brake, Britain will be encouraging the rise of a German-led united Europe.

Maximizing British Independence

As Europe begins to speed toward integration, Cameron indicated that Britain may take the chance to turn around and head the other way—creating not so much a two-speed Europe as a two-directional one.

If the eurozone makes major changes to the way it is run, Britain will have the chance to veto those changes—even if it is not affected by them. But Cameron hinted he may allow the eurozone to head toward greater integration in exchange for the EU allowing Britain to head the other way.

As the eurozone integrates, “there will be opportunities for Britain to maximize what we want in terms of our engagement with Europe,” he said.

While Germany will be building a new European empire, Britain will go its own way—just as the Trumpet has forecast for years.

In fact, the economic crisis is hardening British opposition to the EU. Fifty percent of Britons would vote to leave the European Union if given the option in a referendum, according to a YouGov@Cambridge and Politics Home poll published July 13. Only 33 percent would vote to stay.

Thirty-four percent said that the Greece financial crisis had made them more favorable toward a British withdrawal from the EU.

Britain’s opposition to the EU apparently hasn’t changed much: A YouGov poll last September found that 47 percent would vote to leave the EU and 33 percent to stay. But the more recent poll does suggest that opposition to the EU has been hardened by the crisis.

Britain’s Parliament is also moving against Europe, passing a law July 13 requiring the nation to hold a referendum before transferring any significant powers to Brussels. The government left itself some wiggle room, however, as it can decide exactly what powers count as significant. But this law does stop Britain from taking major strides down the road to integration.

Stratfor’s Peter Zeihan wrote, “The British are feeling extremely thoughtful. They have always been the outsiders in the European Union, joining primarily so that they can put up obstacles from time to time” (July 26). With Germany taking control of Europe using financial powers outside of EU structures rather than votes, Britain cannot use its veto to slow down its plans, he said.

“Just as the Germans are in need of a national debate about their role in the world, the British are in need of a national debate about their role in Europe,” he wrote. “The Europe that was a cage for Germany is no more, which means that the United Kingdom is now a member of a different sort of organization that may or may not serve its purposes.”

A Dangerous Assumption

As Herbert W. Armstrong pointed out at the time, Britain’s entry to the EU was a mistake. “Britain is going to look back on Monday, Jan. 1, 1973, in all probability, as a most tragically historic date—a date fraught with ominous potentialities!” he wrote at the time.

For years, Britain’s freedom and economy have been stifled by the EU. But Britain’s newly emerging strategy of disengagement from Europe could be just as dangerous. As FT’s chief foreign affairs commentator Gideon Rachman pointed out, one of the main reasons Britain is reversing its policy “is that Britain no longer fears invasion from continental Europe.”

“The very idea seems almost unimaginable in the modern world,” he writes. “So the idea of a united Europe is no longer a question of national security, as it was in the age of the Kaiser or Napoleon. These days, the worries are much more prosaic—simply that Britain will lose influence in the European Union and will no longer have much influence over the third Horse Box directive, or whatever other nonsense happens to be coming out of Brussels.”

This assumption—that history is over, and that world events will now be completely different to the way they have been for thousands of years—is a deeply dangerous one that constantly plagues mankind.

Every time there is a financial bubble, people say, “This time it’s different: This time there won’t be a crash.” And then the crash hits.

In the same way, in the good times before war hits, people always believe that this time it is different, mankind has finally banished major wars for good. Before World War i, people believed, according to Winston Churchill, that the “interdependence of nations in trade and traffic, the sense of public law, the Hague Convention, liberal principles, the Labor Party, high finance, Christian charity, common sense have rendered such nightmares impossible.” Sound familiar? In the 18th century, people argued that modern weapons and enlightened thinking would render devastating battles a thing of the past.

In both joining the EU and in turning away from it, Britain makes the same mistake. It is trusting in other nations instead of God. It joined the EU depending on its European allies; now as it encourages European integration, it trusts that its former enemies will always remain friendly.

Hosea 7:11 warns Britain (biblical Ephraim; see our free book The United States and Britain in Prophecy for proof) of its danger: “Ephraim also is like a silly dove without heart: they call to Egypt, they go to Assyria.” As Trumpet columnist Brad Macdonald explained: “In Old Testament times, both Egypt and Assyria posed significant threats to Ephraim. Hosea was lamenting Ephraim’s proclivity to act like a foolish dove by flocking to its enemies. Regarding this verse, the Matthew Henry Commentary says that the dove is ‘easily enticed by the bait into the net, and has no heart, no understanding, to discern her danger, as many other fowls do.’”

Britain does not discern its danger. Hosea 5:4 states: “They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God ….” The Bible reveals that Britain relies on foreign “lovers” instead of turning to God.

As long as Britain seeks other nations above God, it will not solve its problems. The EU isn’t the root cause of Britain’s problems—the refusal to trust God is. Withdrawing from the EU will cut the British off from stifling European regulation. It will not, however, save them from the rising German empire.

But Hosea also has good news for Britain. Hosea 5:15 states, “I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.”

Britain will learn its lesson, but only after it suffers great affliction.