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Comment by Uberphallus | Hacker News Reader

> but in the modern era the Catalan form of independentism [...] is an aspiration to be an independent country still tightly integrated within the EU

Yes, but that's why it's dreaming: if Catalonia unilaterally left Spain, Spain would veto the Catalan entry in the EU (and not only Spain, any country with separatism, e.g. France/Corsica). That would force them indeed to put up walls and borders, develop a military, extend all the missing police force, and get systematically the short end of the stick in any trade deal because of its very little leverage.

An unilateral leave of Catalonia from Spain is not far from Brexit in shortsightedness.

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> Yes, but that's why it's dreaming: if Catalonia unilaterally left Spain, Spain would veto the Catalan entry in the EU (and not only Spain, any country with separatism, e.g. France/Corsica).

Only out of spite, though. If Catalonia were to be independent, Spain would gain from it joining the EU.

Their commitment to keeping them out of the EU is there to deter them from leaving Spain in the first place, which likely would be bad for Spain.

Spain is working much harder to make a believable deterrent than other "countries with separatism". You don't have France, Denmark or the UK refusing to recognize Kosovo, for example.

> You don't have France, Denmark or the UK refusing to recognize Kosovo, for example.

Of course not. They, the UK in particular, were essential in creating it and actively encouraged it from ceding from Serbia. It's their baby. Why would they not recognise it? There is at least 9 Albanian children from Kosovo and Metohija, southern Serbian province, who have been named "Tonyblair" (no, not misspell). In the honour of Tony Blair. See: http://albanmuja.blogspot.com/2011/11/tonys.html

Spain were also involved, at least in the bombing campaign against Serbia. It's pretty easy for a government to take one point of view when creating a problem and the other when addressing it. You might as well ask why the US would try to undermine the Taliban.

> Only out of spite

Not really, it's basic diplomacy. Spain has interests, investments, and assets in all regions. Catalan nationalists wanted to leave without defining a process of retribution at all, but defining very well that they wanted Catalans to keep Spanish nationality (and related benefits) on top of Catalan one. So they could suck the tit of two states, in an unilateral fashion. It was overall a dick move (Naive? Delusional? Exercise for the reader), and being a grown up you assume the consequences, you aggravate a party then don't complain they get the long end of the stick when they have the upper hand.

It's even dumber than Brexit if you think about it. Do you also think EU stance on Brexit is also "out of spite"?

> Do you also think EU stance on Brexit is also "out of spite"?

The EU is probably better off with the UK in it, which is a difference there. But yes, cutting the UK off from various forms of "soft Brexit" or "a la carte membership" is mostly a tactic to discourage others from leaving rather than strictly about the current deal.

I don't think we disagree.

> The EU is probably better off with the UK in it

Personally I don't agree. I think they are better in the EEA, but not in the EU. The UK has traditionaly blocked, what I believe to be, important matters such as EU defense proposals, laws blocking tax dodging, etc. The UK has always had, what I believe to be, a different agenda to the rest of the Europeans. Keeping the UK out of EU decision making will be beneficial to the rest. Having the UK in the EEA will be beneficial to everybody.

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