http://www.city-journal.org/html/northern-alliance-14647.html
In the above article Gunnar Heinsohn of Bremen, is proposing a northern
alliance of the U.K., Ireland, Flanders, the Netherlands, Denmark,
Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia, along with the
German states of Schleswig-Holstein and Hamburg. I much more idly
thought of the U.K. in a looser alliance with the U.S. Canada, Australia
and New Zealand. But Heinsohn's proposal has the advantage of
proximity. Also, if the UK were in an alliance with the U.S. it would
be the (relatively) poor relation, but in Heinsohn's Northern Alliance
the UK would be the strongest member.
I was also interested in Heinsohn's comment, ". . . no one would accuse
Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein’s 4.5 million Germans of heading back
into a dark and dangerous past. With independence from Germany, they
would be a minority within a larger federation, with no nationalist
ambitions. They could pursue their dreams of economic success and
prosperity without being shamed or slandered by the /nomenklatura/ who
rule in Brussels. Though historical comparisons have their limits, one
can’t help but think of the ethnically German Baltic cities of Danzig,
Elbing, and Thorn that, in 1454—and for nearly 350 years thereafter—took
shelter under the crown of the Polish-Lithuanian Rzeczpospolita to
escape the exploitation and violence of their compatriots, the Teutonic
Knights."
I've been reading Steven Ozment's /A Mighty Fortress, A New History of
the German People. /Ozment remarks in his introduction, ". . . there is
a popular opinion, even within Germany, which appears to believe that
Germans have always been cryptofascists, if only the surface of their
history is scratched deeply enough."
In another article
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/14/i-wish-it-was-a-joke-european-leaders-furious-at-boris-johnsons/?WT.mc_id=e_DM140020&WT.tsrc=email&etype=Edi_FPM_New_AEM_Recipient&utm_source=email&utm_medium=Edi_FPM_New_AEM_Recipient_2016_07_14&utm_campaign=DM140020
Boris Johnson was criticized for, among other things, saying "the EU was
an attempt by other means to unify Europe in a manner attempted by Adolf
Hitler
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/14/boris-johnson-the-eu-wants-a-superstate-just-as-hitler-did/>."
Lawrence
