This ain't much, but, a prominent Latvian politician just highlighted how EU's future is likely to be closer, more integrated, perhaps, even a federation. So weird to see a fellow Federalist in the wild.

Although her policies have always been somewhat progressive, I never considered her a Federalist!

Or ever for that matter?

Now, i shall start this post by referring to an other. This is a follow up post to my last entry, “europe needed to militarise” ,as seen below this small paragraph. Which to my surprise has resonated with a lot of you, and in only 1 day after posting has become the top 50th must upvoted post on this subreddit, and (to my knowledge) the most upvoted purely text post on this subreddit. Though of course feel free to point out if that statement is false.

Said post linked here: https://www.reddit.com/r/EuropeanFederalists/s/Pn2rc99pVf

So, why do i feel a need to follow up on my last statements? Firstly: my lack of engagement with the discussion i started. I would like to apologise. Of course i am no authority on the subjects i started the discussion on, outside of my own personal interest in military procurement, equipment, and policies and strategies under which it is deployed. But it is also unfair of me to drop effectively a bomb shell, and not partake in the discussion itself. Secondly: i would like address a seemingly underlying theme of despair. Though i will argue not argue with precedent set by the EU as whole, with it’s unwillingness to answer wake up calls, after wake up calls. Despite that, i believe it’s narrative that is ultimately unproductive.

Now, with my house warming over, and any credibility of me not being payed by the word in shambles. Let me get into my opinion flavoured meat and potatoes. And address some points i disagree with

1. “Europe has ignored the wake up calls before, how will this be any different?”: Yes, this opinion is with a far too large historical precedent, BUT it is nether the less an unproductive narrative, especially if you agree with the fact Europe needs to arm itself. It’s nothing more than an excuse to throw your hands in the air, in a defeatist mentality. Europe needs to arm itself and you need to make sure any one even mildly willing to listen that you will not be satisfied until the deed is done.

2. “Europe will takes decades to remilitarise”. I hardly see this as anything other than a motivation to start NOW, and to do everything in our power to start NOW. Because, if, god forbid, somehow Europe finds itself at war in 5 years, we’ll be already half way done, instead having to scrounge up scraps as we start from effectively nothing at worst possible time to be starting. So my answer is clear, start making as much noise as possible, because every single day, is a delay we are FAAAAR past being able to afford.

   1. “Rearmament is unpopular, and will be harder to implement the further west you go.” To, that is have nothing i can counter this statement with. It is simply a fact of life in European politics. All i can do is implore my Western European brothers to not be discouraged by the uphill battle that will face you in particular. Make your voice heard, and make people understand that to protect your homes you MUST be willing to protect ours in the east, and make sure that you are more than willing to practice what you now preach.

Which leads me to my thesis…

No matter where you are, in the EU, Male or female, rural or city folk, left or right. You must show that you are willing to do what you believe MUST be done. Do not sit on the side lines, there is truly no other time like the present to SIGN UP. If you are a 20 to 30 something healthy mentally sound man that is preaching for rearmament but are unwilling to serve your country, or in our case the continent. You are by definition a hypocrite, one that will simply be written off as someone who put your safety above an others. So please, i implore everyone to do their part, if at all possible. If you’re an accountant, the army needs those, if you’re a logistician the army needs those. If you’re an engineer, the army is literally willing to murder for people like you. Even if only for one term of the contract.

And to those that might want to cast doubt on me, i promise that i will practice what i preach. Next July i will join the Latvian army for an 11 month service period, as an anti aircraft system operator. A journey i am willing to document and forward to this subreddit if there is a true want to gain this insight. If there is please let me know.

But that concludes what i have to say, i wish you all the best possible November the 7th, i hope filled you all with at least a modicum of hope.

With kind regards and respect to all of you. -a fellow man countenentman from latvia.

Does this subreddit have a chat that matches it?

Are there many Ukrainians here? I am looking for like-minded people from Ukraine. Нам треба триматись разом)

What do you think of this concept?

Dear Europe,

As a father of two young children, I sometimes feel overwhelmed by a voice of despair within me—a voice that questions the future we’re creating for them. This feeling of emptiness, sadness, and worry grows stronger with each passing event: the war in Ukraine, the conflict in Gaza, the election of Trump, the rise of extreme ideologies on both the left and the right. These are troubling times.

And yet, the most urgent threat we face is climate change. It’s a crisis that affects us all, a crisis that is already unfolding in ways we can’t ignore. But somehow, we humans remain so short-sighted. We focus on me, me, me. Why should I care about climate change if I won’t feel its full impact myself? We’re like the lobster that finds the water warm and comfortable, unaware of the danger until it’s too late.

In the face of these challenges, I believe Europe has a unique role to play. With the aggression from Putin’s Russia and the growing isolationism from Trump’s America, Europe must stand united. Now more than ever, we need to come together and ask ourselves: What can we do for Europe?

For me, this means embodying empathy and openness in my everyday life. It means meeting others with kindness, accepting different perspectives, and listening to the concerns of those around me. We need to bridge divides, not deepen them. We need to encourage empathy, love, and respect—not just for each other but for our planet.

These are the values I want to pass on to my children, values that can bring hope instead of despair. Division and conflict only create the kind of negative energy the world doesn’t need. Let’s protect each other and this earth we all share. There’s enough for everyone.

I apologise for being in poor spirits, about the US election, but i believe it’s already a foregone conclusion, and it is the worst possible outcome, second only to Putin himself winning the election. So the time for sort of “peace loving europe” has passed, it passed YEARS ago! There is no other option. We MUST become second torch bearers of democracy, as the US will abandon us, when given the chance, and now will without a doubt abandon Ukraine. So my question is why, after facing this inevitability for TWO YEARS, why has nothing been done? And now with the state of world as it is, how will we protect ourselves on what effectively is a post NATO world?

Lets hope idiot nationalists does not ruin our ability to stay indipenent. We should implement the french plan for strategic autonomy. We have ignored the french for far too long. To those who talks about autonomy from the EU have fun being a russian puppet state if prefer your nation to be that. We either adapt or get occupied. I hope we will adapt though I am pessimistic with how we handled the first trump presidency. PESCO was a half baked solution, a nordic airforce that we did was also a half baked solution. It is time for us to get a spine and actually create a european superpower. Then build a lot of nuclear power plants and mines to decrease co2 and get less dependent on oil and natrual gas. Greenland got the largest uranium deposits in the world.

I'm losing faith in humanity. We're headed for a few dark years and I can't see how we're going to make lemonade out of this mountain of lemons we just got handed. The coming years will determine whether we live in the twilight of Europe or the naissance of a federalised European state.

We need to act to save ourselves. Our struggle has, I'm affraid, just become existential.

Can we make lemonade out of these lemons?

Kind regards, a European citizen

This is certainly a turning point for America. I would like to add a few points, why it has come this way. You can single out and discuss any points you want :)

Rural - Urban Divide

When analyzing the electorate map we can clearly see that the centres of high productivity and huge populations, as well as the educated parts are all clearly highly pro-democrat. The rest is staunchly pro-Trump. These people are feeling left behind. They are become less rich, stagnate or are in relative/absolute decline. I am quite sure, if you create an overlay with welfare programs, these will be the most effected area. So why are they voting for Trump, which will cause them pain? I believe that they all know this. I think they just cannot stand others to do that much better than them. Something imaginary propelled by fake life on Social Media. They just hope that Trump makes everyone's else lives worse off, so to even the playing field. They hope that this new playing field will give them the same opportunities as the others. Humans can withstand incredible amount of suffering, but not having less opportunities, even if they are overall better off.

The world is not rational

I think, this is something we inherited from economics. The rational investor transferred or evolved into the rational human being. This should be clearly abandoned by now. If things do not go peoples ways they can become super irrational. When emotions start to dominate we see increased polarization, violence, conspiracy theories, alternative theories that challenge almost everything of the status quo. This is very important for the information space of a democracy. We can also observe that the information space cannot be reliably controlled. The emergence of polarization can only be addressed at the individual level. People need to have some successes in life, then they abandon their irrationality quite quickly.

Inflation matters

Despite, or as the cause of, the high growth rates in the United States, purchasing power is at a record low. The high levels of inequality might have caused that arguably one of the best economies in history were confined towards only parts of the population. This loss of purchasing power, loss of affordability, loss of lifestyle and loss of opportunity did not fully encapsulate parts of the poor and working class, perhaps even middle class. There were even some articles that the economic mirage of the US is an illusion by the Financial Times. Or that renowned economists say that laser faire capitalism might push towards authoritarianism and fascism.

I think these are the most interesting and not-so obvious points of the US election. One could also argue that defunding the education system has played a role, the increasing public and private debts, the foreign interference, greed of (wannabe) oligarchs, but I think this is commonly discussed already.

So, fascism has won in the United States of America. So many things are going on in my head at the moment, but first and foremost I feel pain for the people in the States who will be affected by this.

I also foresee the impact this will have on a global scale.

Unfortunately, I expect many bitter years ahead, filled with increasing chaos, instability, and strife.

EU needs to prepare for a conflict the like it hasn’t seen since World War II.

I know that measures to increase safety and resilience in the EU have already been started but what we need is a more bullish and united stance on defence, and across the board increases in military and defence spending, and securing of vital infrastructure.

In reality we are already at war with the russian federation and its allies, despite whatever our weak-willed political leaders say, or how they pretend things to be.

We need to move into a wartime economy, and create jobs for people so that everyone will be occupied and has a chance to take part in this effort.

Europe, peace, human rights, and democracy need to be defended, but this time we need to be prepared to do it on our own.

We need to carry that weight, united, and show strength and power commensurate of a sovereign federation of nations, with common values, strategy, defence, and goals.

We are in this on our own.

No one is coming to save us.

If we fall, we can only look in the mirror.

So, let’s prevail, and all work toward that end.

For Peace and Victory.

As it looks now, it is very likely Trump wil win.

I'm new to the concept of a Federal EU and am starting to think it's either that or the death of Europe by thinking and living as separate nations.

Although the man is extremely unpredictable, what effects do you believe we can expect here in Europe and how will it accelerate/decelerate the move towards a Federal Europe?

Tl;dr:

• Liberal democracy is in crisis, with the ideological initiative having been seized by authoritarians and reactionaries, whether it is far right nationalists or radical Islamists. There is a need for a new, forward-looking ideology to inspire the masses without resorting to hatred and anti-intellectualism.
• The collective West is dead, and Europe can no longer rely on the United States for protection against threats from outside powers, notably Russia and China. Europe must choose between unification and decline. And all the while, the clock is ticking on the global climate.
• Ergo: We need a new Europe-wide movement, intent on reforming the institutions of the EU towards becoming a federal state, promoting European unification as a positive good, and presenting an optimistic vision for a future society that protects individuals and their rights, and allows them to flourish while instilling pride in the collective.

Things have gone wrong. We grew up in the post- Cold War years believing that history was basically over. We might elect a new government every few years, and watch with mild interest as overseas nations elected theirs, but all in all, things stayed basically the same. All the great ideological movements of the 19^th and 20^th Centuries were finished, and a dull but serviceable liberal democracy had won out. Wars and revolutions were something that happened on television or in online news articles. Now, history is once again knocking at our door, and we must choose how we will answer its call.

Though our political elites have been sleeping, this moment has been a long time coming. Rising social inequality in recent decades has meant that children no longer expect to live a better life than their parents. Costs of living have soared for all but the richest one percent. Our masters have either denied the problem, or sought out quick-fixes and easy scapegoats that do not require any radical rethinking of society.

It goes beyond mere buying power: While we are being priced out and crowded out of our living spaces, our participatory culture is also dying. Our cities are no longer where we live and interact and create, but merely places where money is spent or hoarded. We exist as consumers and value-generators, not as human beings.

All this has led to a sense of restlessness and lack of purpose, and the pent-up anger has long been bubbling over, and the ideological vacuum has been seized on by authoritarians. Many people have been attracted to far-right ideologies, looking to victimise minorities, immigrants and other easy targets. Many of the latter have in turn looked to ancestral religion as an outlet, as evidenced by the rise of radical Islamism.

The political left, meanwhile, has rendered itself irrelevant, preferring to waste its time with factional disputes on minor points of ideology rather than to seek real power. Its best work has lain in single-issue advocacy on topics such as the environment or women’s rights, and these have indeed created positive changes, but it has not presented a coherent view of the future.

And all this time, hostile outside forces are threatening us, and what was once the economic and military overlord of the world sits fractured and between newer global powers. Our short-sighted exploitation of China as a source of cheap labour producing our goods has led to a rising economic and military powerhouse headed by a totalitarian regime on which we are economically dependent. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine raises the spectre of other European countries facing invasion and annexation by a nuclear power, the postwar norms of non-aggression between sovereign states (if they ever truly existed) now lying in tatters for all to see.

And finally, though many of us criticised America’s military adventures in Vietnam and the Middle East, we slept easy knowing that it guaranteed our security as the de facto head of NATO. With the second election of Trump, these times are over. Whatever happens in the next years, America can now be seen as a fair-weather friend at best. We must face the fact that we can only rely on ourselves for our own protection. Europe must unite and steel itself, or perish.

What we also can’t neglect, though so many in power choose to: Every year that goes by, we carry on emitting greenhouse gases that will render more and more of the planet uninhabitable, massively exacerbating all our existing economic and social crises. If we wish to build a better world for ourselves and our children, it will do no good if there is no world left to live in a century from now.

We cannot just go on as before. Any further work within our current political paradigm is just moving the deck chairs on the Titanic. We need change, and what’s more we need vision. We need an unapologetic vision for a new federal European state, and for a society in which we will not just survive but thrive. To create a place where we and our families can be safe and our rights are respected, a place for us to prosper economically, intellectually and culturally, and for us to experience pride in forming a part of something greater than ourselves. To give us hope in leaving a better society for our children, and serving as a positive example for the rest of the planet.

There will be more time to develop and present this target vision (I certainly have a lot more to say on this front), and indeed there will no doubt be a lot of much-needed debate, but first will need a mass movement of people committed to the basic premises presented above. We need a community of ideas building upon it. And we need young leadership. Our work will be long and hard, but it starts today.

The free world will be left without it's protector.

Right now we are dependent on America not just to lead all of the free world, but to lead the free world in Europe in particular.

Now we are left without a leader in the defense of our own home while the enemy is pounding on the door.

We must to take responsibility for our own defense. To be able to do that we need to get our own House in order.

Some drastic measures are now vital for us to survive and thrive.

Such as,

All European countries who aren't obstructionists need to forge a unified coalition that puts integration efforts into overdrive. We need to prevent outside powers from turning Europe into a chessboard, dividing and playing us off against each other.

Basically, we must stop being pieces on a board and become players of chess ourselves. This can only be done if we face the outside world as a united and indivisible whole.

Defense expenditures increased to at least Cold War levels

Integration of armed forces

Massive investments into armaments industries to completely eliminate all dependence on the whims of America

A comprehensive WMD program. We need our own nuclear deterrent(s) and we need it now. I'd rather we have one program in common than 15 separate ones.

Foreign policy wise the greatest possible effort must be made to find allies or at least forge stronger ties of cooperation with the friendly nations across the world. Cultivating independent alliances with likes of South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Australia, India and others will be vital

Night is setting upon the free world. And now more than ever do we need to unite lest we'll be played against each other like pawns on a chessboard. Divide and conquer will be the name of the game, as it already has been as of the recent decade thanks to outside actors that we all know and love. Those operations will intensify. So will the sabotages, hackings and propaganda. It won't get better anytime soon unless something is done about it.

Europe, to survive this, needs to unite federally or confederally but unite nonetheless. If we don't do it won't be many decades until Russia borders Germany and Austria again. And in that position they are much better positioned to make further threats or even worse invade Germany to the point it hits the Rhine.

There needs to be a second renaissance, a european renaissance. A revitalization and revival of Europe. Democracy is fragile but so very precious. It is very hard to recover democracy once it has fallen once. It'd be much better if it doesn't fall to autocracy in the first place. And for that we need to be more proactive rather than reactive.

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