Re: Would you vote differently now?
Seeing this anti-French rhetoric made me dig out my old history book on 20th century American foreign policy.
The best thing about the EU is we don't go to war with other EU nations. The US is responsible for this. As an economic bloc it's roots were originally to prevent the spread of communism (the domino effect) and contain the Soviet Union.
So it was not just NATO which was originally formed of Belgium, Canada,
Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States, but the
Marshall Plan which laid the foundations of the modern EU.
As Ambrose and Brinkley write in "Rise to Globalism" :
"As one step Bullitt advocated a "European Federation of Democratic States" in order to "face up to Russia"....there was general agreement in the American government that communism thrived on chaos and poverty; the way to respond to it was to promote stability and properity through economic aid".....While in Europe, Marshall had been shaken by the seriousness and urgency of the plight of Western Europe, where economic recovery from the ravages of war had been slow.....
Stalin, Marshall had concluded, wanted the European economy to come crashing down...."
The other motivation was to revive and create a long term market for the US economy.
Anyone who questions foreign aid needs to understand the following and how it might apply to us in the post-EU economic model :
"American exports were $16 bn a year, imports at less than $8bn. Most of the exports went to Europe. If the Europeans were to pay for them, they had to have dollars, which they could only get by producing goods America could import. Otherwise, America's export market would dry up. "
The other side was to prevent war :
" Militarily, only with a healthy economy could Europe support the troops necessary to stop the Red Army. The key was Germany. To get European production rolling again, Germany's coal mines and steel mills had to be worked at maximum capacity. "
So IMO based on history,
economic unity in Europe as initiated by the Marshall plan, is a key factor in maintaining peace between nations that had been slaughtering each other in ever more brutal wars since their inception.