Letter: UK forgetting noble vision behind Europe

Sir: Britain must not be allowed to destroy the European Union ("How come they got it so wrong over Europe?", 4 December). The whole purpose of the Coal and Steel Community, the Common Market, the Community and the Union was to try to prevent 1914 and 1939 happening again. If Britain persists in her efforts to convert the Union into a purely commercial organisation, then she must quietly be told to go.

The Netherlands and Spain, whose empires disappeared as Britain's has done, have been resurrected as part of a greater European whole, but Britain's future will become that of a small offshore island. America does not want Britain as the 51st state.

But if this happens, I hope, speaking as a Scotsman, than an independent Scotland will become again the European nation it was before 1603 and 1707.

Dr JOHN SLEIGH

Monmouth, Wales