Europe is in British hearts. Our neighbours should know that fact — and Brits should never forget it — in the months and years of bitter Brexit negotiations that lie ahead.
It is not Europe we are leaving. It is the European Union...
Tony Parsons Europe is in the hearts of most Brits… it’s just the European Union we hate
After the week that our decision to leave the EU became official our European neighbours need to understand this is nothing personal
By Tony Parsons, Sun Columnist
1st April 2017
The Sun
THE British people love Europe but despise the European Union.
After the week that our decision to leave the EU became official, our European neighbours need to understand this is nothing personal.
Brexit became official when Theresa May signed and sealed Article 50
The average Brit has only affection and admiration for European culture. We love German cars, French wine and Spanish sunshine.
Millions of us have fond memories of Paris, Venice, Barcelona, Berlin or Amsterdam that we will treasure for ever. Our bonds with Europe are strong and deep.
There were 16 Polish squadrons in the RAF during World War Two, including the legendary 303 Polish Squadron, which fought from the Battle of Britain to the collapse of Nazi Germany.
Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk have warned about implications over Britain leaving EU
The only foreign holidays my family ever took when I was growing up were in Norway, where my mum’s brother Alfie had settled after falling in love with a Norwegian girl — my Auntie Bjorg — when Uncle Alfie was kicking the Nazis out of Norway.
The best times of my childhood were the ones I spent with my two Norwegian cousins in a log cabin up in the mountains. Fishing in fjords, shooting air rifles, running free under the midnight sun. Glorious.
Jean-Claude Juncker has made a series of thinly veiled threats over Britain's exit
And I would bet my last euro that you have your own precious memories of happy times in Europe.
Europe is in British hearts. Our neighbours should know that fact — and Brits should never forget it — in the months and years of bitter Brexit negotiations that lie ahead.
It is not Europe we are leaving. It is the European Union.
We will not be the last nation to leave the failed, undemocratic, job-destroying EU — I fancy Euro-hating Italy to be next — but no other nation had the self-confidence to be the first.
Adolf Hitler attempted to break Britain's spirit during World War 2
The British love Europe but we have always been separate from the Continent.
This is partly to do with the English Channel. But our feelings of separation are underpinned by history. If the British have always been more sensitive about our national independence than other EU nations then it is because nobody has been able to take it away from us for a thousand years.
I visited Eastern Europe when it was a grim satellite of the Soviet Union, Spain when it was under Franco’s Fascist boot and Greece when a military junta was in power.
There are still people in Germany who well remember the Red Army arriving and pensioners in France who recall Nazis sipping cafe au lait on the Champs-Elysees.
But the British have not been invaded for ten centuries. And that does something to a nation.
All the signs are that the European Union wishes to viciously punish us for having the nerve to leave the EU.
This is a toxic cocktail of petty spite — Brexit confirms that their federalist experiment has failed — but also hard-hearted pragmatism.
If the British do not suffer for leaving, then everyone will be packing their bags.
The Spanish tried to invade Blighty and failed after sending 130 ships in August 1588
Soon we will be presented with a divorce bill of around £52billion — the diplomatic equivalent of revenge porn.
And that will be just the start.
It seems insane that the peevish, jumped-up little nobodies of the European Union are reacting with scorn and threats to Theresa May’s attempts to make this a civilised separation.
But much bigger and much badder dudes than Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk have tried and failed to bully the British.
The Spanish Armada, Napoleon, Hitler, the IRA and Islamist terrorists have all tried. And look what happened to them.
Our Prime Minister will not be pushed around and neither will her people.
But the signs are that things are going to get very nasty, very quickly.
The UK will inevitably become more pro-Brexit when we see the true face of the hateful, small-minded, money-grabbing cabal we are leaving.
Brussels has no respect or affection for the British, let alone love. Good riddance to EU rubbish.
But never let the spite of small men disguise the fact that the British love Europe.
And no matter how vicious it gets with the EU, we always will.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/32330...st-brits-its-just-the-european-union-we-hate/
It is not Europe we are leaving. It is the European Union...
Tony Parsons Europe is in the hearts of most Brits… it’s just the European Union we hate
After the week that our decision to leave the EU became official our European neighbours need to understand this is nothing personal
By Tony Parsons, Sun Columnist
1st April 2017
The Sun
THE British people love Europe but despise the European Union.
After the week that our decision to leave the EU became official, our European neighbours need to understand this is nothing personal.
Brexit became official when Theresa May signed and sealed Article 50
The average Brit has only affection and admiration for European culture. We love German cars, French wine and Spanish sunshine.
Millions of us have fond memories of Paris, Venice, Barcelona, Berlin or Amsterdam that we will treasure for ever. Our bonds with Europe are strong and deep.
There were 16 Polish squadrons in the RAF during World War Two, including the legendary 303 Polish Squadron, which fought from the Battle of Britain to the collapse of Nazi Germany.
Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk have warned about implications over Britain leaving EU
The only foreign holidays my family ever took when I was growing up were in Norway, where my mum’s brother Alfie had settled after falling in love with a Norwegian girl — my Auntie Bjorg — when Uncle Alfie was kicking the Nazis out of Norway.
The best times of my childhood were the ones I spent with my two Norwegian cousins in a log cabin up in the mountains. Fishing in fjords, shooting air rifles, running free under the midnight sun. Glorious.
Jean-Claude Juncker has made a series of thinly veiled threats over Britain's exit
And I would bet my last euro that you have your own precious memories of happy times in Europe.
Europe is in British hearts. Our neighbours should know that fact — and Brits should never forget it — in the months and years of bitter Brexit negotiations that lie ahead.
It is not Europe we are leaving. It is the European Union.
We will not be the last nation to leave the failed, undemocratic, job-destroying EU — I fancy Euro-hating Italy to be next — but no other nation had the self-confidence to be the first.
Adolf Hitler attempted to break Britain's spirit during World War 2
The British love Europe but we have always been separate from the Continent.
This is partly to do with the English Channel. But our feelings of separation are underpinned by history. If the British have always been more sensitive about our national independence than other EU nations then it is because nobody has been able to take it away from us for a thousand years.
I visited Eastern Europe when it was a grim satellite of the Soviet Union, Spain when it was under Franco’s Fascist boot and Greece when a military junta was in power.
There are still people in Germany who well remember the Red Army arriving and pensioners in France who recall Nazis sipping cafe au lait on the Champs-Elysees.
But the British have not been invaded for ten centuries. And that does something to a nation.
All the signs are that the European Union wishes to viciously punish us for having the nerve to leave the EU.
This is a toxic cocktail of petty spite — Brexit confirms that their federalist experiment has failed — but also hard-hearted pragmatism.
If the British do not suffer for leaving, then everyone will be packing their bags.
The Spanish tried to invade Blighty and failed after sending 130 ships in August 1588
Soon we will be presented with a divorce bill of around £52billion — the diplomatic equivalent of revenge porn.
And that will be just the start.
It seems insane that the peevish, jumped-up little nobodies of the European Union are reacting with scorn and threats to Theresa May’s attempts to make this a civilised separation.
But much bigger and much badder dudes than Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk have tried and failed to bully the British.
The Spanish Armada, Napoleon, Hitler, the IRA and Islamist terrorists have all tried. And look what happened to them.
Our Prime Minister will not be pushed around and neither will her people.
But the signs are that things are going to get very nasty, very quickly.
The UK will inevitably become more pro-Brexit when we see the true face of the hateful, small-minded, money-grabbing cabal we are leaving.
Brussels has no respect or affection for the British, let alone love. Good riddance to EU rubbish.
But never let the spite of small men disguise the fact that the British love Europe.
And no matter how vicious it gets with the EU, we always will.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/32330...st-brits-its-just-the-european-union-we-hate/
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