I can't really see how they could achieve that without the UK. Aside from the UK, only France really has any viable independant defence capabilities. Most European states generally only maintain a token defence force, and do not have nuclear deterrents. Without the UK, other European states would have to increase their defence spending significantly.

I think that European defence spending would suffice (especially were it better coordinated - e.g. JAS39 Grippen, Rafalle (sp?) and Eurofighter/Typhoon: at least one too many), as long as it is actually used for defence. I, as European (though not yet 'EU-ean' ), don't have ambitions for my continent to be a global empire - just to be able to fend off other assorted empire builders. Sadly, some American official's babbling about 'justified' use of nuclear weapons in Iraq makes one consider at least token strategic deterrent* necessary. (Isn't this terrible: I am at the moment actually more concerned about American WMD than, say, North Korean...)

Besides, perhaps we could forge some useful defence alliance with Russia and some other CIS countries relatively cheaply.

That said, I would, of course, like UK to realize that Atlantic is much wider than, ahem, La Manche (sp?) .


*) Note that nuclear weapons is called 'deterrent' if it is ours, 'WMD' if it is not.