t is now a year since Britain left the EU, and less than a month since the terms of its separation were sealed, on Christmas Eve. What explains its departure from the Union half a century after joining it, and what light does this cast on the future of Europe itself? An answer to either of these questions requires a longer view than the vote on Brexit and the brief period since. In 1950, convinced of the superiority of its own economy and the strength of its ties with the US, the UK showed scant interest in the Schuman Plan, and little more in the preparations for the Treaty of Rome at Messina five years later. The future of the world, so it believed, lay in Anglo-American hegemony. It was not until after the shock of American desertion at Suez and the re-election in 1959 of a Conservative government under Harold Macmillan that this stance changed. By 1960, the poor performance of the British economy compared with those of the six countries that had created the European Economic Community (EEC) was plain and, strongly encouraged by the Kennedy administration in Washington, which saw Britain as a useful bridgehead into the Community, Macmillan applied for membership in 1962. Explaining that Britain would be little better than a Trojan horse for American domination of Europe, de Gaulle vetoed the application in January 1963.
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