Hacker News Reader

Comment by shubb | Hacker News Reader

>> UK has a political crisis, based on an identity crisis, for which there is no foreseeable solution on the horizon. Needs a miracle breakthrough technology (graphene? quantum computing?) - a literal moonshot - to reverse this decline

The conclusion of your first sentence would be the solution is in the cause - the end in the beginning. If the UK can resolve its identify crisis and understand its reality as a medium sized country in europe then it can begin to make rational decisions.

For instance, if it sublimated its defence to the EU or NATO, it would not need to have a first class army. If it re-integrated with europe (via the EEA, I don't think an EU re-entry will be possible on either end for a long time) then a battery factory in France still enables a UK car industry.

It would take a miracle to align the UK's reality with its self image, but aligning the self image with reality just requires a more honest media.

View on HN

The UK is a very powerful country *in Europe*. Their defenses are already sublimated to NATO, they’re wounding their economy unnecessarily by decoupling from Europe but as a member of the EU they were the second biggest economy and a huge financial and military hub. They could be again if they opened their economy back up

The EU and NATO are dependent on militaries of constituent countries. The US complaint is that UK has cut military too much to contribute as they should to NATO. If UK rejoined EU, they would be required to contribute more as one of the larger powers. OTOH, rejoining the EU would help the economy and make military less of an issue.

EU has become less important militarily. Partly because UK left but mainly because Ukraine war has energized NATO. Sweden and Finland wanting to join NATO will get rid of potential conflict that only EU could respond to.

> EU has become less important militarily. Partly because UK left but mainly because Ukraine war has energized NATO.

I cannot parse this. US is part of NATO, but so are countries (even if not all) in the EU. So NATO being revitalized can also revitalize EU, or the US, or both, in different degrees.

The EU wants to be a military power independent of NATO, hence the EU army that Remain campaigners insisted wasn't a real thing, was misinformation and would never happen (reality: it was the primary topic of discussion at the first EU leaders meeting after the Brexit vote).

The EU army isn't very plausible post-Brexit because only the UK and France had decent militaries but it's technically still EU policy.

>For instance, if it sublimated its defence to the EU or NATO, it would not need to have a first class army.

The army has been hollowed out along with everything else:

https://news.sky.com/story/us-general-warns-british-army-no-...

> If the UK can resolve its identify crisis and understand its reality

So basically, not much chance of this happening in the UK without substantial pain.

I'm serious, the pollical class clings desperately to these illusions and will not give them up easily if at all.

Market forces will teach them a bitter lesson which will help them to understand. It has already started with their bonds.

It would take a lot of pain to overcome the tendency to "Blame the EU for the UK's decisions". This line of thinking is encouraged by politicians and tabloid media.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com