by Guest Author Richard Barber
7. Security:
Brexiteers: Leaving the EU would insulate Britain from the movement of people around the world and we’d be less open to Paris-style terrorism (IDS)
The EU is a significant part of the West’s foreign and security structure alongside NATO. For all its flaws, the EU is a bulwark for a vital principle of international security, namely that a ruler cannot threaten and dismember a sovereign state through subversion or aggression. Milosevic’s case shows how easily this can happen again within our own frontiers. It would be a triumph for Putin if British diplomacy and influence became unhinged from the EU’s.
We live today in a world plagued with more uncertainties than most of us have known in our lifetimes. These are desperately dangerous days and we need more than ever to be part of the EU’s security role in confronting the dangers that face us, especially the network of ISIS: “it takes a network to defeat a network” and Europol is Europe’s network (access to databases, watchlists, passenger details, the European arrest warrant etc).
Our EU membership is a positive decision to build a stronger unit with which to confront the difficulties ahead. We need to intensify, not reduce, our cooperation with our EU partners; this is not the time to turn our back on them. The threat is a collective one which we shall tackle best by working together. The EU provides an extra layer to our own border controls. Remaining inside the EU but outside Schengen area gives us the right balance of security.
At the moment our defence and security rests on NATO, not on the EU, but the EU adds to that security…The EU can do things that NATO cannot. ”It is through the EU that we exchange criminal records and passenger records and work together on counter-terrorism…We need the collective weight of the EU when dealing with Russian aggression or the terrorism of ISIS. It is vital that we are part of these big partnerships”.
Brexit would also have heavily adverse implications for:
- the Anglo-Irish Treaty since border controls would have to be re-introduced between North and South and free trading access between the UK and Ireland would be in doubt.
- The integrity of the UK, since the Scots would insist on another referendum on Scottish independence
- Gibraltar, since the Spanish have said that they would vigorously renew their claim to the Rock.
8. Stability
Brexiteers: Brexit would have no impact on the stability of the EU.
Every economic and political problem today relies on cooperation between nations and a Brexit could set in motion an implosion of the EU — and therefore of the Euro.
This issue is far more than one of trade and investment. The economic consequences for the UK “pale into insignificance” besides the biggest risk that might arise from Brexit: that of a wider collapse of the EU itself. That is not beyond the realms of possibility. The EU is already struggling to forge common responses to its multiple economic and migration challenges in the face of mounting nationalism across the continent. Eurosceptics everywhere are watching our referendum closely: if the UK were to walk away, those nationalist pressures could become impossible to contain.
So Brexit would significantly weaken the EU — and if it did, the Euro could be the ultimate casualty, leading to a potential economic crisis on a world scale at a time when the EU is faced today by a perfect storm of crises, including:
- migration
- Syria
- Ukraine
- the growing menace from Russia in central and eastern Europe
- instability in the Mediterranean neighbourhood
- the eurozone debt crisis
- and rising political instability across the EU.
Summary
A major British business leader, Sir Charles Dunstone has succinctly summarised the situation:
“With Brexit we are being asked to take a monumental risk with our economy and our standing in the world on the basis of little more than vague patriotic sentiment. We have had months for the Brexit campaign to set out a clear, detailed explanation of why these risks are worth it and how we will come through on the other side. But no one can tell us because nobody knows…..
Risk is something you never take without knowing what weather you are heading into. I find it strange that many who would regard someone like me as a serial risk-taker are happy to embark on a project of such extreme and unknown risks.”
The EU would see Brexit as a self-inflicted wound by a prime minister who has gambled Europe’s stability for internal party reasons on a single question on a single day, in the context of events over which he has no control. Should he fail to win the referendum, it will be hard to prevent that frustration spilling over into outright bitterness. And that, as President Hollande has said, ‘will undoubtedly have consequences’”.
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