Call the European Union anything you want: an organization, an association, a community, etc. But the EU is a state just like Russia, China or any other. The main difference between the EU and Russia is that the European Union is a confederation, whereas Russia is a federation. Interestingly, a confederation is a very unstable entity; it eventually either falls apart or becomes a federation.
For confirmation, consider what’s happening in the EU and its problem with Greece. Europe is facing a choice. Its countries can either shout, “Every man for himself,” and withdraw into their national burrows, or they can pull together, i.e., tighten up discipline and hold to a uniform policy superseding Germany’s economic interests.
The EU is a young state. Young people want to express themselves, show their originality and generally shock the public. That’s understandable. For the first time in Europe’s long history, which is replete with the most heinous war crimes and incredible cruelty, Europe’s nations actually managed to unite quietly and peacefully with parliamentary methods rather than at the point of Napoleon’s bayonets or under the treads of Nazi tanks. European Commission Vice-President Viviane Reding said, “The European project is not held together by military force, but by the rule of law and fundamental rights for 500 million citizens.”
It was obviously that understanding that inspired the EU’s leaders to award the Nobel Peace Prize to the organization they govern.
Thus, Council of Europe Secretary General Thorbjørn Jagland, who is also the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, recently announced that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2012 had been awarded to the European Union. According to Jagland, the EU deserves it because it has been acting in the best interests of democracy and human rights in Europe throughout the 60 years that have passed since the signing of the Treaty of Paris.
There’s just one subtle point to be made. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which is located in the Storting (the Norwegian Parliament), and it both chooses the candidates and makes the final decision. I repeat — the chairman of the Committee is Thorbjørn Jagland, the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. It would seem that Europe has a severe personnel shortage and many of its senior leaders have to hold several jobs.
European Parliament President Martin Schulz responded to the news that the EU had been awarded the Nobel prize by saying he was “deeply moved” by the award and “honored” by the prize. The news took Schultz by complete surprise, of course.
The reaction of politicians and the international media to the Nobel Committee’s decision has been mixed. For example, Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa said the decision to award the Nobel Peace Prize to the European Union was “absurd.” He thought it ridiculous to award a Nobel Prize to that bureaucratic institution, but he said everybody knows about the power games they play at those rarefied heights.
Czech President Vaclav Klaus called the award “a tragic mistake.” He admitted, “I really thought it was a [journalistic] hoax, a joke. I couldn’t imagine even in a dream that someone could be serious about it.”
“It’s unexpected, to put it mildly,” Leonid Slutsky, Russian Peace Foundation head and PACE vice speaker, said at a recent press conference. He believes that the Nobel Committee made a “strange move” because “peacekeeping is a secondary aspect of EU activities.”
So, henceforth the EU is the most peaceable state in the world and the only one that has been awarded a Nobel Prize. And the United States is governed by the most peace-loving president on the planet.
I have to ask: If the European Union is a peace-loving organization, why are its soldiers involved in the occupation of Afghanistan? For example, ISAF Regional Command North includes military personnel from Germany, Hungary, Sweden and Norway. Regional Command West has soldiers from Italy and Spain, and Regional Command East includes troops from the Czech Republic and Poland. To a man, they 