> the latest being the Australian submarines, but also our interests in Iran

Good point.

I think Europe is the only continent that can oppose to colonialistic empires like US and China, but needs to have a single voice, France, Germany, Spain, Italy etc. alone are insignificant in the scenario.

The problem is that each of th eEU countries is a country. With its own interests, culture, history.

We are eons from a country such as the USA, which highlights how federal it is. It is still one country, with one president, one army etc.

We (in the EU) are countries that love or hate other for over 1000 years. Some of the dislike is deep, some is surprisingly different now (France and Germany for instance, forever enemies and now counties that are really close to each other thanks to the post-war efforts).

But when it comes to money and politics, we are often each for its own.

that's true, but in my opinion younger generations feel they are European more than anything else.

Even I, in my middle 40s, consider myself European before being Italian.

And I am proud to be from Europe, more than I am proud of my country (which I am not for so many things).

it's unlikely to be the norm, most people are most likely consider themselves to be a part of the group that they hear most about from their favorite source(like tv host or YouTuber)

do you think for most people its a "group of Europeans"

France weighs very heavily. With Germany, they led the move earlier this year for the investment deal with China. The decision was made to become reliant on China, and the pandemic significantly worsened this dependency because China's faster recovery essentially mitigated the economic effect of the pandemic.

But it was a choice. Germany's politics appears to have been totally compromised at the highest level by Russia and China (Scholz seems to have been hand-picked by China, his positions on China couldn't be more worrying regardless of what he has said in the past month). France is moving in the same direction, although it is hard to separate this from the profound weakness of Macron.

There is no equivalence with the US either. The French position (and German) position on Iran makes no sense, it is the equivalent of: pretend the problem doesn't exist, and it won't exist (again, with policy being led by business interests). The interests of the US overlap totally with the EU, the US has been funding European defence for decades to the tune of tens of trillions but, of course, France and Germany will continue to nuzzle up to Iran, China, and Russia because they waved their chequebook in front of exporters in economically weak regions.

The only saving grace has been the EU which has effectively counterbalanced France and Germany in these areas (they stopped the investment deal with China). But, again, the policy positions of France and Germany are incomprehensible. It is not that France is insignificant but that their policy is totally at odds with the US and the EU. The reason they aren't opposing China is because there is a strong desire to support China.

> The French position (and German) position on Iran makes no sense, it is the equivalent of: pretend the problem doesn't exist, and it won't exist (again, with policy being led by business interests).

We had contracts in Iran and had to break them because US warned of retaliation. We are weaker and had to back off.

The US obsession with Iran (driven by religious organizations), instead of staying with the US, was broadcasted to all countries which had to show their vassal position.

We did not like it, as you can imagine.

> The interests of the US overlap totally with the EU,

in Iran?

> the US has been funding European defence for decades to the tune of tens of trillions but, of course, France and Germany will continue to nuzzle up to Iran, China, and Russia because they waved their chequebook in front of exporters in economically weak regions.

Ah - here you are right. And the normal reaction of the US should have been "since you support our enemy, we are withdrawing from NATO and the money we pour into Europe". But then so many US military companies would loose contracts (less production) so this is obviously not the right thing to do.

The US is a bully, and proud to be one. We do not like to be bullied but are the small child in th eplayground so we suffer in silence, hoping that oone day we will be able to respond (a day that will not come)

adding to your metaphor, US is afraid that China that has been both a bully and a weaker bullied child, now has grown up almost to the point where they can be the biggest bully around. The same applies to Iran with their nuclear program.

EU itself is not really a bully, but most EU members are, and always were.

So Isn't it's a smart thing to do for EU to make other bullies to fight each other?