The Annexation of Alsace-Lorraine

On 18th January 1871, Wilhelm I was proclaimed German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles, and the Treaty of Frankfurt ended the Franco-German War in May 1871.

For centuries, Alsace-Lorraine was a play ball between France and Germany. Both countries claimed the fertile, rich Rhine region and region's lucrative coal mining.

A specific Franco-German issue: remembering contemporary conflicts in Alsace-Moselle

In 75 years, the people of Alsace and Lorraine-Moselle lost four wars (1871, 1918, 1940 and 1945) and yet each time found themselves in the victor's camp. This sums up the situation of a region on the margins of France and Germany, which was the focus of ongoing disputes between 1870 and 1945. Alsace-Lorraine, later renamed Alsace-Moselle, nevertheless ended up becoming the symbol of reconciliation between the two "hereditary enemies", in the context of a European Union with one of its capitals in Strasbourg.  

So Strasbourg remains a symbol of reconciliation, not division.

Forerunner were the BeNeLux countries formed in 1944 as a customs union became the Benelux Economic Union in 1958.

Major contribution to peace the Schumann Declaration in May 1950. Should have been a blueprint for the Russian speaking districts of Eastern Ukraine. America does not compromise, ... social democracy is not a term in the glossary of pure capitalism.

The Schuman Declaration was presented by French foreign minister Robert Schuman on 9 May 1950. It proposed the creation of a European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), whose members would pool coal and steel production.

The ECSC (founding members: France, West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg) was the first of a series of supranational European institutions that would ultimately become today's "European Union".

In 1950, the nations of Europe were still struggling to overcome the devastation wrought by World War II, which had ended 5 years earlier.

Determined to prevent another such terrible war, European governments concluded that pooling coal and steel production would - in the words of the Declaration - make war between historic rivals France and Germany "not merely unthinkable, but materially impossible".

It was thought - correctly - that merging of economic interests would help raise standards of living and be the first step towards a more united Europe. Membership of the ECSC was open to other countries.

Following the advent of the European Union (EU) in 1993, the treaty that had established the EEC remained one of the EU's core documents, though the EEC itself was renamed the European Community (EC), and the EC was embedded into the EU. With the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty in 2009, the EC was eliminated, and the Treaty of Rome that had established it was formally renamed the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

Monetary policy of single currency Euro was established in 1999 with the treaty of Maastricht. The Euro nearly collapsed during the financial and banking crisis in 2008-09. Germany had already printed a supply of Deutsche Mark to save the German economy from the Euro debt crisis. See yesterday's publication of Draghi's report on the Future of the EU and necessary further integration. At the time of the Brexit crisis more nations were discussing an exit from the EU ... even new NATO scout Mark Rutte preferred NeXit to join his AngloSaxon friends ... see also PolXit and FreXit.

My diary ... Europe's Four Freedoms

During the MAGA years the EU has become quite unstable ... see the surge of populism and extreme right fascism. Hungary used to be viewed an economic miracle as a model accension nation ... democracy takes some generations to take root, especially in the former Soviet satellite states.

The rapid expansion of the EU was a planned design to expand NATO into the Russian sphere of influence. The seat of the EU lies in Washington DC nowadays. The benefits of trade and sanctions are theirs, not the individual European states.

Building an economic foundation under a new, not so democratic Europe.

On April 3, 1948, President Truman signed the Economic Recovery Act of 1948. It became known as the Marshall Plan, named for Secretary of State George Marshall, who in 1947 proposed that the United States provide economic assistance to restore the economic infrastructure of postwar Europe.

• The Colonels' Coup and the American Embassy

  A Diplomat's View of the Breakdown of Democracy in Cold War Greece

• Dutch FM Max van der Stoel, his scathing report for the Greek colonels led to the regime's exclusion from the Council of Europe

Peace? ☮️ No one talks peace in Europe anymore.

'Sapere aude'