Thread by @pmdfoster

FWIW on the @anandMenon1
@Mij_Europe debate over an 'inflexible' Brussels/EU taking a self-defeating approach to #Brexit, I fear both analyses are right - which is precisely why prospects for phase two are so bleak, since Brexit gets so binary, so quickly. 1/Thread

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe First the macro point Anand is making is right - and it is privately often shared by more sane EU diplomatis and prime ministers.

I have multiple conversations which go: "we must look back in 15 years and ask 'how did we end up so far apart, when we have so much in common?' /2

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe This is not just platitudinous - I recall Dutch PM Mark Rutte giving a press conference last April in which he defended decision to extend Article 50 (against French grandstanding/pressure) on precisely this basis.../3

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe He argued persuasively that a disorderly #Brexit sends an extraordinarily negative message about Europe's ability to manage itself at a time when it is under threat from Russia, China and also, sad to say and in a different way, from the Trumpian United States /4

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe As @BorisJohnson showed at Biarritz G7, the UK really does share EU interests on views on a host of fundamental global issues - climate, Iran JCPOA, trade wars, Ukraine, global taxes - and yet raw the politics of the divorce risk driving a strategic wedge between us. Why? /5

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe @BorisJohnson Well, @Mij_Europe provides the answer from a logical, process point of view doesn't so much address why - given all the above, which is recognised in the EU (certainly in Berlin/Hague/Rome) - the EU couldn't find a way to be more flexible? /6

@anandMenon1 @Mij_Europe @BorisJohnson I fundamentally agree with Mij that the UK was it's own worst enemy - @theresa_may performance at Salzburg was dreadful; the Chequers Plan (replete with all its customs unicorns) was an accident waiting to happen... his full thread is here /7

https://twitter.com/Mij_Europe/status/1197056373734940674

And this is not me writing with hindsight...I did a long read earlier this year for @prospect_clark @prospect_uk looking at why May failed. The title "Fiasco: the inside story of the Brexit talks" tells you all you need to know. /8

prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/peter…

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk But Anand acknowedges the UK failings in his piece, so can #Brexit - or the future of EU-UK relations - really come down to a childish game of "well, they started it?" "but he pushed me first sir!" - which the UK did, starting with May 2016 Conference Speech. I hate to say... /9

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk ...there is a very solid chance that that is exactly where things end up, because when you get into the realities of the negotiation, it gets pretty binary, pretty quickly.

It's the 'pullover' argument as set out by @JenniferMerode here.../10

threadreaderapp.com/thread/1196835…

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode Every straggly fibre that you tug at when it comes to creating a unique UK-EU relationship risks 'the great unravelling' - or that is what the EU tells itself, because it creates a self-sustaining political narrative. /11

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode The only way to preseve the cohesiveness of both the internal market and internal intra-EU politics (which will be tested further in an EU-UK trade negotiation) is what I call a 'highest common denominator' negotiating position...self-defeating or not. /12

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode I don't know if the EU side had much choice...and @MichelBarnier no doubt feels he did a 'good job for the Union'...but to say the EU 'bent over backwards' to do a deal with UK is stretching it. It trashed May's unicorny Chequers Plan when it could have left doors open /13

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier May was her own worst enemy, but the EU helped to toxify a deal which - as the PD2018 noted - sought to 'build on an improve' the single customs territory of the conjoined twin backstop; it was clearly moving to a high-alignment relationship. But too late now../14

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier Note that when Johnson came up with his equally unicorny 'two border for four years plan' the EU soft-peddled - precisely because it could see it would lead to the NI-only backstop they wanted, with some lipstick applied. But it opens the door to a deeper confrontation /15

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier Again, this is not to attribute blame, but really to despair.

Johnson's route to Number 10 was to subscribe to a "buccaneers'" Brexit that has no foundation.

We'll run to stand still, all the trade Anglos+BRIICS = 0.2%-0.4% GDP uplift over a decade v -5% GDP for hard FTA /16

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier But Johnson is stuck with the narrative; the EU will 'win' the next phase..he'll have to cave on fishing right, but also - if trade negotiating competences are really to be repatriated - accept barriers Dover-Calais that see UK companies facing friction for little fruit /17

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier And as I tried to illustrate with this story about eggs and egg-farmers, that choice on regulatory orientation gets pretty binary, pretty quickly...and its very hard to see how the EU internal logic that @Mij_Europe elucidates doesn't repeat itself

https://twitter.com/pmdfoster/status/1196389726732869632?s=20

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier @Mij_Europe Perhaps there is a *tiny* window where Johnson gets a big majority and creates political space to take a longer view - but I wouldn't bet on it. Senior pols in Westminster tell me he'll just ask likely want to "frontload" the pain - 'get it done' quickly /18

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier @Mij_Europe Is it possible that the EU will take a cooler approach - now that money/citizens/NIreland is agreed in WA? I doubt it. Why not repeat the 'winning' formula of 2017-2019. The argument, ironically, will be that a 'clean break' will be easier for the EU. /19

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier @Mij_Europe What will be left of the strategic relationship once this face-off is over, I don't know.

@EmmanuelMacron seems to think he can have the Brits in his Intervention Initiative while screwing them to the table on fish and finances. Let's see how the bromance survives that... /20

@prospect_clark @prospect_uk @JenniferMerode @MichelBarnier @Mij_Europe @EmmanuelMacron In short, the phase one #Brexit dynamics look set to repeat themselves in phase two.

Both sides are trapped by their own compelling political imperatives, and the best anyone can say is 'but they started it'.

ENDS