I'm actually rather impressed by the EU performance in this. The strategic idea of Brexit was, to leverage the better geostrategic position of Britain compared to Ireland to make bilateral trade deals. And frankly, four years ago I would have thought that should work at least kinda Ok-ish. However Junker then did reaffirm European solidarity with the Irish at every opportunity.

Now, there are of course three reasons, why the UK will not get a good trade deal, first they don't have leverage, second they told the EU that they hate the EU, which combined with one is of course sound negotiating tactics. And last, the EU would rather like to keep Scotland.

The problem with brexit was that they decided to do it, then looked for ways it might work. That strategic idea was more of a strategic excuse...

I always saw the UK mostly dominated by the finance sector in London, but they left as soon as the Brexit was on the table. Ireland does this tax evasion thing plus protection from the Gdpr. So from a business perspective I would see Ireland in the better position from the start.

What points for the UK did I miss?

You seem to have missed that the financial sector has not left London

I was thinking that the stock exchange was heading to Frankfurt. Obviously not closing down completely but majorly

Has anything significant left?

I honestly can't answer that. Was there anything significant in the first place. I guess I just heard some rumours or rumblings in the media.

Huh... I really don't know

Almost 4 years into a process that was meant to take 2 years max, the uk government still thinks that demanding things and making rude public statements is a "relationship".

I'm not well versed on this matter... But if you read through the spin it reads as if the UK thinks they can cherry-pick sections for all the free-trade-agreements the EU have made with other countries.

Unless there is someone here who can shed more light all I can see is from way the EU members treated Greece it made it very clear the EU was never going to let the U.K. leave and profit from the deal.

"U.K. leave and profit from the deal.|

I find this unfortunately phrased. There is not much the EU can do and the EU has no intention of "punishing" the UK.

But the EU will

1. Protect its common market and the four freedoms

2. Will not give a European country the same deals as a non-European country to protect the European idea. (e.g. won't insists on freedom of movement with, let's say Japan).

Both things are hard to comprehend for many Brexiteers.

> the EU was never going to let the U.K. leave and profit from the deal.

Most economists told us that the overall economic pie after Brexit would be smaller..

So the idea that anyone would benefit seems like a fantasy.

I suspect that the author of this is not, in fact, particularly perplexed by what the EU is doing in these negotiations: they clearly see the UK as part of their sphere of influence and want to make an example of us to discourage the others. However, their public position is that they're absolutely not doing that and that this is a perfectly normal trade negotiation with perfectly normal terms that, in any case, the UK has already agreed to. This document is basically taking that public position and pointing out that it bears absolutely no resemblance to reality.

I remember reading somewhere that the EU members treatment of Greece that you're referring to could be considered both a betrayal and common sense. I guess something vaguely similar can be said about brexit, but it should be more like how the UK betrayed EU due to lack of common sense.

You seem to be blaming the EU for the choices freely made by Greece and the UK. The EU doesn't exist to coddle self-destructive nations at its own expense.

The EU is made up of two types of countries: small nations, and countries that have not yet realized they are small nations. The UK simply has much less leverage in these negotiations than does the EU, and EU will not reward the UK for leaving the common market.

Germany, France, Spain etc are small nations? What's the criteria for one then?

Germany on its own would not be on on equal footing when negotiation trade agreements with the likes of China, the US or Russia. The EU is.

Germany has more than twice the GDP of Russia. They could reasonably handle themselves. US and China are considerably larger however.