'Europe is not a geographical term it is an economic term.'
He was writing in the immediate aftermath of the first attempt, since the Hapsburg's, to unify Europe (under German tutelage) in 1914. He argued that Europe had lost the world war war and that the US had won it. He was in favour, he went on, of the economic unity of Europe as the US would come to dominate Europe otherwise and because the national boundaries in Europe were too restrictive for Europes' productive forces, which would intensify friction and potentially destroy the leading role of the Continent unless dealt with. Trotsky wrote in the wake of another military and capitalist attempt to unite a significant bit of Europe's productive forces as the French Army had just marched into the Ruhr, linking the iron of Alsace Lorraine to the coal and factories of Germany's industrial heart. This also failed.
For Trotsky, his call for a United Federal Europe in 1923 of course included the nascent Soviet Union and was indelibly linked with the call for 'workers and peasant governments' across the Continent. It was a direct response to the failure to unite Europe under force of capitalist arms.
And a second failure in 1940, a direct extension of the first, caused the greatest death roll in human history.
Military means eschewed and US dominance confirmed a peaceful third capitalist attempt to unite 'economic' Europe has now reached its own apogee. The remote corruption of an alien political class dominates the politics of the 'new' Europe'. There will come to be volumes written about this period of kleptocracy in European history. So far today's critics of the EU have been fixated by the 'democratic deficit' represented by the modern EU but the reality could not be worse. Besides the absence of any democratic accountability, but of course linked to it, is the emergence of a grotesque criminal class who rule Europe. Helmut Kohl, ruler of Germany for 16 years and 'great' European, gathered 2 million euros in a personal slush fund. Across the Rhine Jack Chirac, French President for 12 years was convicted of embezzlement and abuse of office. Neither suffered any penalty. But they laid down the new European legacy for their political children.
Gerhard Shroder, Angela Merkel's predecessor, stepped into a top job in Gazprom, weeks after his government had guaranteed a 2 billion euro loan for the Baltic pipeline. Angela Merkel has seen the resignation of 2 German presidents under commercial clouds. Her Defence and her Education Ministers were recently both stripped of the Doctorates - for intellectual theft! Back over the Rhine the Socialist Minister Jerome Cahuzac has been discovered to be holding up to 15 million euros in hidden Swiss and Singapore banks. Sarkozy still stands accused of receiving 20 million dollars from Qaddafi for his 'election campaign'. Christine Lagarde, Sarkozy's ex Finance Minister who now heads the IMF is under investigation for the 'award' of 420 million euros in 'compensation' to a well known crook Bernard Tapie, a friend of Sarkozy. Sarkozy is very likely to be France's next President. And the hapless Francoise Hollande? It turns out he was using the flat of a Corsican gangster for his lover's trysts.
Blair of course stands out, even in this gallery of frauds and thieves. Never mind his latest consultancy 'fees' gathered from a South Korean gangster with an oil company embedded in the most reactionary parts of the Middle East, also 'consulting' for the Nazarbaev dictatorship in oil rich Kazakhstan this is what 'the most successful Labour Prime Minister ever' wrote about his new boss;
'Kazakhstan's achievements are wonderful. However, Mr President, you outlined new heights in your message to the nation.' If Blair is still capable of making you sick, look up the President's speech. Many New Labour Ministers followed Blair into lucrative futures.
In Spain the current Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has been caught accepting kickbacks of a quarter of a million euros from construction companies, passed to him by his party treasurer Barzanas. Barzanas is now under arrest following the discovery of a 48 million euro hoard in secret Swiss accounts.
And so it goes on and on; in Ireland; in Portugal; in Eastern European countries, and in Greece, up to January this year. As of now only one old Greek man has been goaled - for corruption in office. And European leaders, officials and general hangers on continue to lecture Africans and Asians about the need to eradicate corruption.
It seems that this latest, peaceful, iteration of a united Europe has also reached its end stage. In the last blog the EU's failure to advance the economics of Europe in the world was described. The decay and dissolution of the political leadership of Europe gives us another marker of its rot. What then remains?
It remains the case that Europe is an economic term. While our current system of economics has seen the collapse of European leadership in front of aggressive globalisation, there is nothing inevitable about such a state of affairs. Indeed a united Europe potentially stands as a much more realistic counter to the 'buying and selling of the whole world' than any individual - even developed - country. But it does seem that the experiment (tried twice) of military/capitalist domination of Europe and the experiment (tried once) of peaceful/capitalist unification of Europe, do not work. An inevitable response to the EU mess is the development of nationalist and racist currents in particular countries that try to define any sort of European unity as undermining the nation. This is an empty perspective, full of failure, defeat and anger, eyes fixed firmly on scapegoats, and inevitably productive of strong and dictatorial states, more remote than ever from their people, that have to crush their own populations to survive in the capitalist world.
But an alternative Europe is struggling into the light. In Greece and Spain new mass parties confront the rulers of Europe and their austerity. In Italy 25 years of stagnation has forced a new popular, egalitarian and anti-corruption movement into Parliament. In Ireland anti-austerity Sinn Fein could win the next Irish election. There are many other movements and parties moving in the same direction. Uniting this political force is a critical priority. It is an indelible link to the still unresolved possibility and necessity of a united Europe but this time a European unity that is based on a new political and economic principle.
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