The United Kingdom was and is independent!! All talk of 'no control over our own borders' is tosh - the government could deport any EU citizen who had not found gainful employment within 3 months of arriving, but CHOSE/CHOOSES not to do so. And the rules that the EU sets - we AGREED to them all!

Like Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia? Go read up on the Battle of Britain. Also, all of these 'former Warsaw Pact nations' are now part of NATO - should we leave that?

And it is largely because of the EU that we haven't had to do so since 1945!!

The usual EU canard. The EU was formed after the Soviet Union collapsed (Maastricht Treaty, 1993). You could argue an effective date of 1986 (Single European Act).

If you substitute NATO for the EU in your statement, it might make sense, but NATO has many non-EU members, including the most powerful member by far.

But enough of Brexit intrusion.....

You forget that NATO includes Turkey which invaded Cyprus, which at that time was under the effective control of NATO member Greece.

No EU (or its pre-1993 or 1986 iterations) member state has ever gone to war with another EU member state. Fact.

No worries on the Brexit intrusion, it's important stuff.

Fact.

Love that little witticism when the FACTS are presented.

Ref. A Compendium of Witticisms

We do? Why? GPS has been operational since 1990, any particular hurry?

Also a fully independent navigation system will require about 24 satellites. How many operational frontline aircraft are there again? Just to compare one thing against the other...

Lascaille wrote: Not forgetting all the GNSS receiver modificaton needed to receive such an absurd BritNav folly.... As well as the command and control infrastructure, launch sites etc. etc.

They dn't spend enough on their armed forces to go to war with each other.

They dn't need to spend enough on their armed forces to go to war with each other - fixed it for you.

And that's largely because of the EU.

An interesting situation.
Due to the high-pitched UK Political stance on this, I suspect that the implications for UK Mil / UK tech are somewhat extreme. The reality of "going it alone" costs are considerable. My guess is UK will have to suck it up and crawl on knees to POTUS. UK tech will take a hit.
The further implications for NATO cohesion are grave. The Donald is intent on ruling the roost and putting Europe back in it's box. :ooh:

OAP

iron & steel community 1951
treaty of rome 1956
we applied to join in 1962

I dont know where you get 1986 from as its the same organisation,staffed by the same people and located in the same place for 67 years........

It gives us a fair inkling of how the UK military, security and intelligence organisations will be treated post-exit. It seems absurd that any EU NATO member would vote-out another NATO member on the basis of operational security, let alone pocketing a quick £Billion.

I think the French desire for a strategic military partnership with the UK is utterly DOA. No doubt one Brussel's based organisation is rather pleased with the broken furniture today but I doubt the other Brussel's based organisation will see it in the same way - especially with the dwindling support in the current US administration for all things NATO. Still, Stu Peach is know for his political correctness, superficial analysis and light-touch style of leadership so I am sure he will play nice.

Anybody else now view the eastern fringe of NATO as sacrificial buffer states rather than a trip-wire?

What's absurd is the UK being surprised that the rules that it helped write up and which it fully agreed to are being enforced. Leaving the EU means the UK is making itself a third-country, and so is excluding itself in accordance with the rules and regulations that it helped draft and implement.

Brexit means Brexit, folks. Own it.

Depending upon circumstances, there could conceivably be security advantages of going solidly with the USA. I suspect that the USA have far better policing capabilities in space for a start. It would also not surprise me if the EU did some other weird political contortion with the Galileo system in the future.

OAP

Somewhere on my computer at home (I am in Spain for a while), I have a copy of a book written
by Jean Monnet, K Adenaur & others outlining the path to European Unification. Published about 1933, I think.
"Change things a little at a time until there is no going back" comes to mind.
Their plans were interrupted a bit by WW2.

We could have access to any system we want, including Galileo. The point is, that as a third-country to any of them we will have to pay. Do you think that the current US administration is minded to give us mates rates?

Read up a bit on Galileo (and argued with some former mates). Galileo seems to be a bit of a vanity
project aimed at cycling taxpayers money around EU Aerospace companies. Some satellite hardware problems,
so costs will go up. PRS service is full of could/should/might statements. Is the present spat just a storm in a teacup ?

Time to give the Airbus space asset exclusivity contract a firm fisting up the backside, fingers spread!

the one they got cos they build the satellites in the UK and employ about 3,000 people in the space sector in England... talk about cutting your nose off to spite your face.

Public level accuracy <1m and PRS accuracy allegedly at 1cm. It has a lot of applications. Now unavailable, thanks to Brexit, for a whole host of game changing technologies.

As someone said, for those that wanted Brexit, the whole country try is now enjoying the benefit.