What so do thing will happen in Europe in the EU breaks up

Switzerland a trading nation? I thought Switzerland rested on its laurels as the centre par excellence for laundering money and hiding the bank accounts of criminals from ex Nazis onwards! The country remained neutral through both World Wars so sitting in a prime economic position afterwards, the country has a strong and growing right wing, populist party and voted in a 2014 referendum to cap immigration and reintroduce quotas on EU workers, only a fudge centred on prioritising Swiss workers stopped them being ejected from the single market.
I don't for a moment think you can compare the Swiss and their position in the world economy with the UK.
I also don't believe the EU is about to break up or suddenly become a militaristic super power. The ability to mobilise against an increasingly bullish Russia might be useful though as well as a reliance on cooperative neighbours, we can all guess where Switzerland will sit were there to be such a situation in the future.

Did I mention Switzerland? How relevant is Switzerland to this discussion?

The EU has just made a huge deal with Japan for the exchange of goods and I presume the services which go with them and the technical staff which will accompany them.

What has Switzerland to do with all this? They have the fortunes of world criminals in their banks. They are a clever people and its good to work there. But using them as an example for much larger countries is hopeless. Compare like with like

Meanwhile Russian oligarchs have long been laundering money in London...

Mararet, just a direct dig at me, because I happen to have been born there. Just ignore.

MargaretX
The trade agreement between Japan and the EU is food for Japan and cars and electronics for the EU. Zero tariff, no customs union and no freedom of movement. This means that the German car industry which is running behind with it's research and in deep trouble with diesel emission's will not be happy.

This of course is good for Brexit, since it proves that if the EU want to they can do a deal with zero tariffs, no customs union and no freedom of movement. The UK now have a precedent for negotiation. It might mean that the Japan deal is meant for the Italian market to elevate mass unemployment and near Bankruptcy, and since the Italians have some skills in the car industry, it might just be useful for them.

A deal between the EU and the Japanese is the over arching agreement, the trade depends on individual businesses striking money making deals, so the actuality is yet to be seen.

Of course this deal is not exclusive, and the UK has already been in talks with the Japanese ready for when we are able to sign deals on our exit. So more electronics and car manufacturing in the UK perhaps! With a market into Japan for our services and products.

Those deals are unlikely to materialise if there is no EU deal - the Japanese embassy have given the U.K. govt a warning about it.

We had the EEC which served a valid economic purpose.
Perhaps the EU has got out of its depth by trying to be all things to all nations?

I aree Jura. The whole thing is very worrying. Especially as you say with the rise of the far right and with Trump in power I worry about another world war but this time with nuclear weapons. Plus worries about climate change which needs a global policy. . We should be cooperating not splitting up. Its the GC I worry about.

I wish I shared your optimism Allygran but I'm with Jura on this one. There are so many things our "negotiators" are brushing aside as "easy" or "unimportant" none of them seem to have a clue about the real world.

polly ...,you are worrying way too much.

Exactly Maw the EEC was fine, but not the behemoth it has turned into.

We could perhaps agree with that, to some extent.

We are now however discussing the alternative and its consequenses, for the UK, and for the EU too.

As said before, would it have been better to stay and reform from within- or not. Are you for a deal, for the Chequers deal, or for Rees-Moggs aim, no deal?

Jura2 please accept my apologies if I have upset you. I gather you were born there because of your username. These things said about Switzerland were said first publicly by Che Guevara who saw Switzerland as the root of social unrest in the world

But there again I was in Basle a month ago and saw a lot of poor people hanging about the big shops.

I live in S Germany and I love it here and Germany has to take alot of criticism especially from Brexiteers. I don’t care I'm staying here but I know you have a house in the Uk and in the end it is not easy with two homes.

The EEC was absolutely fine and a lot of us were so enthusiastic and excited all those years ago thinking we'd cracked it, it was the answer!! We believed what E Heath and others told us - a brave new world indeed! Now what it has morphed into is nothing like we thought we were signing up to all those years ago! Trading etc is one thing, but being run by the EU is quite another - No thank you!!

Not upset me at all Margaret- it is hard to fight stereotypes.
Take care, Tschüssi

Did I mention Switzerland? How relevant is Switzerland to this discussion

Does it matter?

I don’t think any offence was intended by anybody’s reference to Switzerland any more than any U.K. resident might be offended by references to the U.K., Margaret by references to Germany or Mamie by references to France!
Certainly not to be interpreted as
Just a direct dig at me because I happen to have been be born there

The dangers of allowing a discussion to take a personal direction have been all too apparent today already.
It IS interesting and relevant to look at the situation in European countries who are not members of the EU and Switzerland is one of them.

jura2
As said before, would it have been better to stay and reform from within- or not

Unfortunately the EU is so factious now that internal reform would be almost impossible. Reform has been talked about for a number of years but has not occurred because there are vested interests which are not based on social or economic reasons but for political manouvering. Some of the poorer countries have gained spectacularily from membership, yet other poor countries have suffered.
If an action is detremental to one country yet two, three or more other countries benefit what chance does the lone country have in facilitating change?
David Cameron tried, I understand that the referendum was as a result of his failure to instigate change.
Concensus is growing towards the idea of an eventual break-up of the EU and the formation of smaller, like minded trading organisations.

Trading organisations would be very welcome. Part of a federal states of Europe run by Brussels? NO! Not forty years ago and not now!

Please re-read the question. This thread is not to discuss the past, nor the UK- but what will happen

TO THE EU - what are the liekly scenarios and the possible consequenses.

You have to learn from the past though don’t you?

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
(George Santayana, philosopher, essayist and poet born 16 December 1863 died 26 September 1952 in Rome)

Here is the report of the deal Cameron went to the EU to ask for and the deal they came to. He actually did quite well but the press decided to show it in another light.

www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35622105

Indeed- the UK had a better deal than any other EU country ...

Of course we learn from the past - but I was hoping we would respond to the question in the OP - we are where we are (and it has nothing to do with Switzerland ... unless we talk about the Feb 2014 Referendum, which has not yet been implemented, and probably never will, because it has been shown to be too damaging).

The question is, what will happen to the EU, in the EU - post Brexit? And if we look at the divisions of the past- as we have learnt from them indeed, it could be quite a difficult situation- and possibly dangerous.

WE were worried that Germany would be left alone trying to put the EU together again but now we have been joined by Macron. There is a lot of discussion and worry about other countries leaving but we have to see how the UK manages.

We can't split the rules of the Single market and movement of goods and peoples, and for the Uk to insist ad nauseum that the EU is being selfish or bullying is ridiculous.
Rules are rules and to change them we woud have to have a referendum ourselves.
When I left the UK known as GB then in 1968 I felt as if was was leaving a sinking ship and since then it has improved but
there was always the feeling that things were better in the wartime, when our boys won battles and these battles are still being celebrated. A country with such a mind set can't enjoy being in the EU- for that you have to be forward looking so I think the time has come to put it all to the test and the UK will probably drag us all down with it.
I do feel sorry for the educated young. DD2 is a scientist and they get a lot of EU young graduates working with them on EU projects
She told me they feel quite desperate and can't understand the world anymore.

Margaret
You cannot be serious?
When I left the UK known as GB then in 1968 I felt as if was was leaving a sinking ship and since then it has improved but there was always the feeling that things were better in the wartime, when our boys won battles and these battles are still being celebrated. A country with such a mind set can't enjoy being in the EU- for that you have to be forward looking so I think the time has come to put it all to the test and the UK will probably drag us all down with it

I simply can’t agree with your assessment of the mindset in today’s U.K.
Backward looking?
Living in the past?
“Our boys winning battles”
I assume you have been back regularly and are in touch with the media and what people say? Because frankly I don’t recognise the country I live in.
Battles? Our boys? For remembering battles go to France, to Normandy in June of any year to experience the D-day celebrations, there it is not merely history but a living memory.
I was still a student in 1968 and the U.K. was not yet a member of the EEC, (not yet EU) but as I said, 50 years on, I do not recognise your description one little bit.