A Dinner with Helmut Schmidt
A Dinner with Helmut Schmidt 1 On 6 February 2010, I organized a remarkable diner with Helmut Schmidt and some influential political leaders in Europe. The animated discussion was an inspiration for us all and was recorded for the records of history. This is the transcript. At the dinner have ave participated: 1. Hemut Schmidt 2. Guy Verhofstadt, MEP, former Prime Minister Belgium 3. Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, MEP, former Prime Minister Denmark 4. Stefan Collignon 5. Christian Paul, Député, Assemblée Nationale, Paris 6. Angelika Schwall-Düren, Member of Bundestag 7. Danuta Huebner, MEP, former European Commissioner 8. Koert Debeuf, Liberal Foundation, Bruxelles Photography by: Peter Cunningham His wisdom and outspokenness will be missed by all Europeans. Stefan Collignon 10. November 2015 2 . After the initial presentations and small talk, the discussion quickly went to the heart of Europe’s problems. Danuta Hübner asked: Do we suffer from lack of leadership? Helmut Schmidt: Actually, the Europeans do lack good leadership, yes, but on the other hand it is more important that we do not see the European edifice blowing up overnight, so to speak. I have known Jean Monnet since 1947-1948, and one of his concepts, at least in those years, was: “Let Europe grow gradually, one step after the other”. So, it took us twenty years from 1952 until the early Seventies to grow from six Members to nine. More than twenty years. And it took us another ten years to grow from nine to twelve. And another decade from twelve to fifteen and then these very intelligent Foreign Secretaries of the European countries let the whole thing explode overnight.
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