EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - By 2025, the European Union will be a "hobbled giant" crippled by internal bickering and a eurosceptic citizenry. Eastern European organised crime could dominate one or more member state governments, and the bloc will likely be kowtowing to Moscow after having failed at all attempts to wean itself from Russian energy supplies. The EU will have completed its institutional reforms, but will remain weak on the world stage, warns the NIC This is the rosy view for Europe's future mapped out by the United States National Intelligence Council (NIC), Washington's main intelligence body. This agency of agencies, formed in 1979, brings together analysis from each of America's multiple intelligence organisations to develop mid- to long-term strategic thinking for the country's security community. Every four years, the NIC peers into its crystal ball and produces a global trends review - a prediction of what the world will look like in around 15 years' time. This year's report, Global Trends 2025: A World Transformed, foresees the EU in 2025 as likely having completed its institutional reforms and consolidated itself as a political entity, but infighting between member states with competing domestic interests and a European public alienated by a perceived democratic deficit will leave it a "hobbled giant", with massive economic heft but little genuine international power.
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - By 2025, the European Union will be a "hobbled giant" crippled by internal bickering and a eurosceptic citizenry. Eastern European organised crime could dominate one or more member state governments, and the bloc will likely be kowtowing to Moscow after having failed at all attempts to wean itself from Russian energy supplies.
The EU will have completed its institutional reforms, but will remain weak on the world stage, warns the NIC
This is the rosy view for Europe's future mapped out by the United States National Intelligence Council (NIC), Washington's main intelligence body. This agency of agencies, formed in 1979, brings together analysis from each of America's multiple intelligence organisations to develop mid- to long-term strategic thinking for the country's security community.
Every four years, the NIC peers into its crystal ball and produces a global trends review - a prediction of what the world will look like in around 15 years' time.
This year's report, Global Trends 2025: A World Transformed, foresees the EU in 2025 as likely having completed its institutional reforms and consolidated itself as a political entity, but infighting between member states with competing domestic interests and a European public alienated by a perceived democratic deficit will leave it a "hobbled giant", with massive economic heft but little genuine international power.
A new Global Trends report by the National Intelligence Council (NIC), Washington's main intelligence body, paints a bleak picture of the EU in 2025 with internal bickering, economic pressure and crime hobbling the bloc. Europe will have completed its institutional reforms by 2025, but will remain weak on the world stage while the economic and political clout of the United States will decline, the spread of nuclear weapons and cyber-terrorism will emerge as the most potent global threats, and new wars are likely to be fought over water and food scarcity. This is the bleak assessment of the NIC's 120-page "Global Trends 2025" report released on Thursday, Nov. 20. The report takes a long-term view of how key issues are likely to develop over the next few years. According to the report, the European Union will be a "hobbled giant" crippled by internal bickering and a euroskeptic citizenry by 2025.
Europe will have completed its institutional reforms by 2025, but will remain weak on the world stage while the economic and political clout of the United States will decline, the spread of nuclear weapons and cyber-terrorism will emerge as the most potent global threats, and new wars are likely to be fought over water and food scarcity.
This is the bleak assessment of the NIC's 120-page "Global Trends 2025" report released on Thursday, Nov. 20. The report takes a long-term view of how key issues are likely to develop over the next few years.
According to the report, the European Union will be a "hobbled giant" crippled by internal bickering and a euroskeptic citizenry by 2025.
2020 Although the challenges ahead will be daunting, the United States will retain enormous advantages, playing a pivotal role across the broad range of issues - economic, technological, political, and military - that no other state will match by 2020. (...) The US economy will become more vulnerable to fluctuations in the fortunes of others as global commercial networking deepens. US dependence on foreign oil supplies also makes it more vulnerable as the competition for secure access grows and the risks of supply side disruptions increase.
Although the challenges ahead will be daunting, the United States will retain enormous advantages, playing a pivotal role across the broad range of issues - economic, technological, political, and military - that no other state will match by 2020.
(...)
The US economy will become more vulnerable to fluctuations in the fortunes of others as global commercial networking deepens. US dependence on foreign oil supplies also makes it more vulnerable as the competition for secure access grows and the risks of supply side disruptions increase.
But it's a useful clue to the inner mood of the Beltway and its simmering pot of fears and prejudices.
The answer to that question is easy: Euchina Ce n'est pas un chef d'État européen qui unira l'Europe. Ce sont les Chinois. (de Gaulle?)
Some of our preliminary assessments are highlighted below: The whole international system--as constructed following WWII--will be revolutionized. Not only will new players--Brazil, Russia, India and China-- have a seat at the international high table, they will bring new stakes and rules of the game. The unprecedented transfer of wealth roughly from West to East now under way will continue for the foreseeable future. Unprecedented economic growth, coupled with 1.5 billion more people, will put pressure on resources--particularly energy, food, and water--raising the specter of scarcities emerging as demand outstrips supply. The potential for conflict will increase owing partly to political turbulence in parts of the greater Middle East.
