RE: GZG Timeline

Interesting, as the US news focuses on France/Germany disagreements of
an EU vision.

Continuing the wild speculation:
Given both are large powers even for core members, which the second
gathering protested, do you have a sense which might be closer to the
former Eastern Bloc countries? There might still be an NSL out of that.

Doug

-----Original Message-----
From: Gzg [mailto:gzg-bounces@firedrake.org] On Behalf Of Phillip
Atcliffe
Sent: Friday, July 1, 2016 11:57 AM
To: gzg@firedrake.org
Subject: Re: GZG Timeline

And the similarities keep on coming -- albeit not exactly.

Interesting news item in the paper a couple of days ago. The "core" EU
countries -- the original six founding members -- had a meeting in
Berlin to discuss the future of the Union and how to head off other
protest votes in the future. Meanwhile, there was a rival meeting in
Warsaw headed by Poland and Hungary, who are not happy with the way in
which the core members are dominating the discussion of the
post-UK-departure structure of the Union (they weren't invited to the
Berlin summit), and how the EU has been handling the "Brexit crisis" in
general. Nine member states attended, and there have been calls for a
"new-style" EU.

What is most interesting is the map of the two blocs. With the exception
of Spain, the dividing line between the two is the eastern borders of
Germany and Italy (and a little of Switzerland), and it makes for a very
neat split between east and west Europe. It's not the FSE and the NSL,
but I found it interesting that there is a political grouping of former
Warsaw Pact allies known as the Visegrad Group that makes ujp the vocal
core of the eastern bloc; it wouldn't take too much to see the EU
fragment along that divider. Spain would be the odd one out, but it's
been in that position before (shades of the Hapsburgs!) and the whole
thing is incredibly reminiscent of the FSE-NSL split even though several
countries would be on the other side of the divide.

Interesting times, indeed...

Phil