EU Nations Head Into Tough Budget Summit Everyone's drawing lines in the sand, but the leaders are so far apart they might as well be on different beaches. The European Union heads into a critical summit Thursday to hammer out a €1 trillion ($1.28 trillion) budget through 2020 - and it promises to be one of its most bitter fights in years. Finding hard cash to prop up European unity has become a political quagmire for leaders facing angry, crisis-weary citizens at home. Complicating the task is that any one of the member states can veto a deal, giving each tremendous negotiating clout, with even small Denmark able to thwart heavy-hitters Germany or France. "There is a whole bunch of Tarzan-like chest-beating," said Finland's European Affairs Minister, Alexander Stubb. It all leaves little hope for a quick solution. "Now, it looks very unlikely that an agreement will be reached," said Claire Dheret, a policy analyst at the European Policy Center. At stake is a plan to divvy up the EU spending budget from 2014 to 2020. So far the EU's executive commission has proposed a ceiling of just over €1 trillion, while EU president Herman Van Rompuy is already seeking the cooperation of spending-shy countries like Britain by offering €80 billion short of that mark. "With less money, we cannot do the same as before," Van Rompuy wrote in the invitation letter he sent to the 27 leaders on Tuesday. French President Francois Hollande, right, and his Polish counterpart Bronislaw Komorowski review the guard of honor during the welcoming ceremony in Warsaw, Poland, Friday, Nov. 16, 2012. Hollande came to Poland for a one day official visit. Britain, ever the halfhearted EU member, wants to cut even deeper if possible - arguing that its beleaguered taxpayers shouldn't have to shoulder the rest of Europe's woes. "If there isn't a deal that is good for Britain, if there isn't a deal that is available," said British Prime Minister David Cameron, "then there won't be a deal." Leaders from Copenhagen up north to Madrid and Rome down south are already threatening vetoes for often opposing reasons, and the EU has said the summit might go three days and three nights. "Budget negotiations have always been very intense," Dheret said in an interview. The problem is that the climate of the negotiations has changed because of austerity. If agreement cannot be reached this week, there will be other opportunities before 2014. But that's flexibility of the kind that may prove poisonous for the bold leadership Europe needs to turn itself around. "Let there be no mistake: the absence of an agreement would be harmful for all of us," Van Rompuy wrote Tuedsay. Already the Germans are hinting that foot-dragging may be the least harmful solution. "If it turns out that Europe still needs a bit more time for discussions, that wouldn't be so bad," said Steffen Seibert, the spokesman of Chancellor Angela Merkel. If the summit fails to find a compromise, the issue could spill over into a new meeting next month, or into next year. There is no set deadline for a deal but the closer it gets to 2014, the tougher it will be for a smooth introduction of new programs. If there is no deal up to 2014, there would be a rollover of the 2013 budget plus a 2 percent increase accounting for inflation. At the heart of the budget fight are the conflicting vantage points of rich EU countries and poor. Wealthy nations like Germany, Britain, Sweden and the Netherlands are becoming increasingly stingy about contributing to the common cause, especially if that means bailing out countries like Greece and Spain, which feasted on EU development funds before collapsing under piles of debt.