Europe and the world are concerned by your vote

June 17th 2016

Dear British friends

In my last letter that begged you not to leave the European Union, I put forward all the economic risks that could result in a "Brexit" for the UK and for the EU. But you seem to pay no attention, sure that Britain can once again pull together and find arrangements with the EU and the others, which is possible but far from certain.

Today I want to emphasize the responsibility you have on June 23 towards other European peoples. You cannot make a decision without considering the dramatic consequences of a Brexit for other European nations, and even the whole world.

The thunderclap that represent secession of the United Kingdom would result in turn of its shock wave exit requests from a number of EU countries, to which the UK is the indispensable upholder of a democratic Europe, not technocratic, liberal and dynamic. Member countries such as the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, where the populist and nationalist outbreaks are very strong, would not want to end up with the Franco-German couple as their sole partners and could be tempted to also make it alone, with the risk of not being able to find a viable solution to the problems that threaten us and that can only be resolved if united.

You also would take the risk of strengthening all secessionist tendencies that are developing in Europe. You know very well that Scotland and Northern Ireland are much more attached to Europe than England. Would you take the risk to break the unity of the Kingdom for the sole pleasure of saying "shit" to Europe?

Have you realized the dramatic evolution in the developed world for some time? Don’t you see that the clowns, the dividers, promising miracles, and the dream merchants multiply and put a far higher threat on democracy than do the "Brussels technocrats "? That violence is now spreading over everywhere, with, as sole antidote, simplistic ideas of building walls and repelling foreigners that will solve nothing? That populism is growing everywhere: in the United States, with the Trump wave, unthinkable even a few months ago; in Italy, who will deliver Rome to Beppe Grillo’s 5 Star Movement; in Austria, which escaped by very little to elect as president a nationalist maverick? Are you not aware of the morbid fascination for Putin in many European countries, notably Orthodox, but not only - including France? And in Britain, for the first time since 1900, an MP has been slaughtered because she was against the Brexit !!! By deciding this referendum for purely internal political reasons, David Cameron has opened a Pandora box from which are letting out all the devils that Europe has tried to ward off for sixty years. Ad one of these has already killed Jo Cox.

None of the European countries can face all these dangers alone. Britain no more than anybody else. It is only if we stay united that we can avoid radicalization, populism, violence, terrorism. You think you will do better by yourselves? May be. But it is far from certain. What is certain is that without UK, Europe will unravel and become again this dangerous continent, unstable, torn between nationalism and the appetites of the big American and Chinese trusts. The two wars that ravaged Europe in the last century came from its disunity, its rivalries, its blindness and its selfishness. These dangers are back. This is not the time to let them free rein.

For goodness’ sake! Stay in the Union! This is the only way to ward off the devils that are once more threatening Europe. We need you in!