This week's D-Day commemorations recall a time when Britain was still widely viewed as a great power. Despite subsequent relative decline, Britain's sizeable political, military, and economic influence has been preserved, internationally, some 70 years after World War II ended.
Former Conservative Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd asserted in 1993 that Britain has been able to "punch above its weight." That statement is still true today -- but may now be under threat, with consequences that could undermine both the United Kingdom's political influence and economic prosperity.
Two risks jeopardize the domestic underpinnings of Britain's international success: its shaky commitment to the European Union, and Scotland's uncertain commitment to the United Kingdom.
Driven in part by the growth of Euroskepticism in Britain, the governing Conservative Party has promised that if it wins an outright majority in the May 2015 general election it will hold an "in or out" referendum on staying a part of the EU. As the recent European Parliament elections underlined, such a plebiscite could well see the United Kingdom vote to leave. Remarkably, the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) -- a party built around a policy of British withdrawal from the EU -- last month became the first party other than the Conservatives or Labour to win a national election in over 100 years, only underlining the growth of anti-Brussels sentiment in Britain.
The second, more immediate, potential earthquake is the prospect that Britain itself will break up later this year if Scotland votes for independence in September. While polls indicate that more Scottish voters want to stay in the union than leave it, surveys generally show in recent months growing support for independence.
Should Scotland secede or U.K. Euroskeptics win the day in any eventual EU membership referendum, it would represent a body blow to Britain's international influence. Moreover, the unraveling might not even end there: The continued union between England, Northern Ireland, and Wales would potentially be in jeopardy too.
And the issues could feed into each other. Scots, in general, are more favorable toward continued membership in the EU than the English -- who account for a majority of Britain's population. Thus, with polls indicating the United Kingdom as a whole may be more or less equally divided on whether to leave the EU, if Scotland does vote for independence, and thus does not participate in a subsequent EU referendum in Britain, this could tip the electoral balance in a tight vote.
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