The EU and Bible Prophecy- Daniels Fourth Kingdom- The Empire-9

13th 2008, the EU granted Morocco an “advanced association status.” It is the first special association status granted by the EU to a third country and it is meant to be a step towards fully integrating Morocco in the EU. From October 13th 2008, the Moroccan minister of Foreign Affairs would be allowed to participate in the EU Foreign Affairs Council of Ministers and in other EU institutions such as Europol, the European Police Office, and Eurojust, the EU body dealing with judicial cooperation. Israel is said to be the next candidate to obtain a “special association status” with the EU.

A single world system is not new to man. Genesis records the historical account of the Tower of Babel.
 Mankind in ancient times united their efforts to build a tower to reach into the heavens. God declared that “now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them,” and confounded their language. Give man too much power, and he becomes dangerous.

 A unified world with a single world government will be a modern-day Tower of Babel.

It is paradoxical that as the world grows more populated, it becomes more of a single unit. To date, we see the skeletal form of a one-world system, and can speculate on its continuing evolution. The world is breaking up into regional economic groupings. Pat Buchanan commented that “in the New World Order, rules are set by west and east globalists.” These policy makers think in terms of international law as evidenced by the European Union federalists. World institutions will gain more power, and govern in their respective areas with the Antichrist as head of the European Union leading the world into oneness.

A one-world government will become man’s final attempt at creating a utopian society that excludes God and deifies man. The one individual who will advocate and pursue this ideology will be man’s greatest enemy. The world federation will not “open the history of the human race,” but rather end it. The process of globalization is occurring through the natural order of events. At present, the world is fragmented. The European Union will act as the cornerstone for uniting the world, in the same way Jesus is the “chief cornerstone” of the church. None of this is coincidental; we know that the Antichrist’s empire here on earth mimics the Kingdom of God.

Former Harvard Professor Samuel Huntington speculated in the 1990’s that “the EC if it were to become politically cohesive would have the population, resources, economic wealth, technology and actual potential military strength to be the preeminent power of the 21st century.” Cornelius van der Klugt, while he chaired Philips, affirmed: “If we organize ourselves, Europe will grow faster than the US and Japan combined.” The EU is in the process of building its empire. According to Scripture, the EU will become the most powerful empire the world has ever known. EU bureaucrats purpose to transform the EU into a political world power. Former French President Francois Mitterrand stated: “From now until the turn of the millennium, we have ten years to win the race for Europeans. No institution should escape this critical examination, not the European Community, NATO, the Council of Europe or the CSCE. All should play their part.” Former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl declared: “I am convinced this is going to be the decade of the Europeans.”

One motive for European unity is to reclaim the limelight that virtually all of its member countries enjoyed during earlier periods of history. At the start of the Cold War, the US and Soviet Union became the leading world powers. Europe suffered the greatest share of the war’s destruction. America aided in the rebuilding of Europe and provided for its defense through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Although Europe and America stood alongside each other as strong allies, Europeans harbored ill feelings concerning certain American policies. Some Europeans desired a significant place on the world stage.

At the end of World War II, the European dream was reborn, and during the Cold War it crept along. Charles de Gaulle stated in his Memoirs that “Europe by confederation of its nations, can and must be for the well-being of its people, become the greatest political, economic and military and cultural power that ever existed.” From the mid- to late 1980s, a spark rekindled, and the fall of the Berlin Wall added fuel to the fire. The end of the Cold War and the beginning of the New World Order marked a new era for Europe.

The completion of the 1992 Common Market acted as the first step toward political union. The EU aimed to become an economic power on equal footing with the US and Japan. This proclamation underscores their ambition for attaining superpower status, as many of the member nations had in their history. With the completion of the 1992 program, an economically united Europe became the world’s largest market and largest trader. Edward Heath, former British Prime Minister and an ardent federalist, affirmed: “All history tells us that economic reform is followed by political reform and that political power follows economic power.” The Soviet Union and the United States demonstrated this. It will be the same with the European Community.”

Many individuals view the EU as a solely economic venture among European nations. Skeptics doubted that the EU would ever work together on an economic scale, let alone a political one. Peter Linton, a Brussels-based American consultant, warned that: “You [had] better be ready for the integration process that is moving ahead faster and farther than anyone has realized.” He added that many Americans have yet to grasp the political significance of the process, and to take it very seriously. As evidence of the magnitude of the EU’s potential for superpower status, Lester C. Thurow, MIT’s best known economist, declared: “In the past half century, the world played by rules written mostly by Americans; in the next half century, the world will play by rules written mostly by Europeans.”

While natural disasters are occurring with greater frequency, events on the international scene have experienced more dramatic changes in a shorter span of time than at any previous time in history. As a result, some experts now say that “a year is a long time in history.” In three years’ time, the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Empire collapsed, and Germany reunited, marking the end of Communism and the Cold War, and the beginning of the New World Order. For the first time, an international coalition fought a war in the Middle East. The Israeli-Arab Peace Conference began. Islamic Fundamentalism, resurgent nationalism, and many internal conflicts around the globe emerged. During this time, the European Union signed its treaty on political union.

With the rapid changes sweeping Europe, the Union decided it was time to “renew their vows, the marriage contract of the twelve.” The EU’s response to these changes was to accelerate integration within the EU itself. The revolutions in Eastern Europe turned 1992 from a time of economic reform into the beginning of a political transformation. The European Union would remain the stable, solid core around which Europe would rebuild itself. During an EU summit meeting in 1989, EU leaders declared that “at this time of profound and rapid change, the Community is and must remain a point of reference and influence. It remains the cornerstone of a new European Architecture.”

In 1990, former European Commission President Jacques Delors told the European Parliament that the Community would move fast toward full political union, a full-fledged EU foreign policy, and deep institutional reform. He felt that events in the East and the danger of resurgent nationalism underscored the need for closer EU political integration. Delors believed that these events made it “impossible.to separate the Community’s economic role from its political one.”

Those in the Union feel that the EU is “now perceived as a major power and is expected to be a big- league player.” During Jacques Delors, EU Commission presidency, he took advantage of every opportunity to strive for the unification of Europe. Concerning the Gulf Crisis, he commented, “It is a unique change for this Community to make the new qualitative leap which will make (it) the cornerstone of the greater Europe of tomorrow and.an actor of stature equal to its responsibilities on the world stage.”

It seemed that whatever the event, European Union leaders called for the EU to take a greater political role in the world. These proclamations underscored their ambitions and role within the Union to help it evolve into a leading superpower. This was after all their intentions from early on in the Union’s formation.

“One thing is certain, when this Europe … has a common currency from Copenhagen to Madrid and from The Hague to Rome, when more than 350 million people live in a common space without border controls, then no bureaucrat in Europe is going to be able to stop the process of political unification.”

Former French President Francois Mitterrand declared: “With a single currency (and other factors), Europe will have the means to affirm itself as the world’s main power…It is not that we have ambitions to dominate, but together, we are already nearly the main commercial power in the world…together, on all markets in the world we will be at least as strong as the United States or Japan.”

In 1979, the European Monetary System began to function. The EMS kept EEC currencies within a fixed exchange rate structure. At the same time, the twelve member nations strengthened and coordinated their economic and monetary policies. European leaders decided in 1989 that all currencies will join the exchange rate mechanism (ERM) of the European Monetary System (EMS) on July 1, 1990.

The EU bears striking similarities to the Old Roman Empire and added one more by having their own currency. The Economist even noted: “So Europe’s future lies with monetary union? Perhaps, but this also a step back to the past. The Roman Empire remember had a single currency.”

In 1987, the Belgians minted the first silver coins, aimed at the collectors’ market only. Imprinted on the coins were twelve stars, symbolizing the nations of the European Union, and the bust of Emperor Charles V. He was born in the Belgian town of Ghent, and was crowned head of the Holy Roman Empire in 1519. Europeans chose Charles V for the first ever European Currency Unit (ECU) because of the striking geographical similarity between the Common Market and the Holy Roman Empire.

Former Commission President Jacques Santer made monetary union a priority while he was president- elect in 1994. Despite the skeptics’ negative views, Santer showed no signs of wavering. He firmly stated: “EMU is coming as decided and planned…. euro would be a strong currency. European countries can only be sure of making themselves heard on world monetary affairs if they have a single currency as powerful as the dollar and the yen.”

Santer believed that the “euro will be a counterweight to the US dollar in the international financial system.” Santer was convinced that the euro will give the Union political status; he stated that “in the years ahead it will be interesting to see how the euro will reinforce the European Union externally.”

 THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK AND THE LAUNCH OF THE EURO

EU leaders determined that the launch of the euro would occur in three stages. The first stage occurred in 1990 when currencies joined the exchange rate mechanism (ERM) of the European Monetary System (EMS) in, 1990. The second stage two called for the creation of the European Central Bank. Based on the German Bundesbank, it is now one of the most important central banks and is responsible for monetary policy covering the 16 Member States of the Eurozone. The EU established it in 1998.

On January 1, 1999, the euro became legal tender. On July 1, 2002, national currencies ceased to be legal tender. Euro bills and coins became the traded currency. Andrew Crockett, while he was general manager of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basel, stated: “Monetary union in Europe holds the promise of profound change in international finance. The economies sharing the euro could face the world as the largest single currency area and the largest trading bloc.”

Fred Bergsten, a leading US international economist who heads the Washington-based Institute for International Economics, believes that the “single currency in monetary union will become a fully equal partner of the United States in all economic terms.” US finance officials are beginning to worry about how the single currency will affect the dollar’s role as the world’s dominant currency. Bergsten predicted that because the euro belongs to the world’s second largest economy, “it will thus immediately become the world’s second key currency.”

In 2002 China’s finance minister Xiang Huaicheng, commented that his government should consider buying more euros as soon as possible, so as to not be overly reliant on the US dollar in its foreign exchange reserves. China considers the euro important, and believes that it will someday be on equal footing with the US dollar. Xiang Huaicheng stated that “it is inevitable that the euro will become some countries’ reserve currency.” The euro has already become a key currency for trade. The euro will increase the Union’s clout in world markets. The euro will develop into a global reserve currency, and will alter the power relationship between the US and Europe on monetary and fiscal issues. It will challenge the dollar’s role as the world’s key currency eventually overtaking it.

In April 1990, France and Germany launched the idea of a new Treaty on Political Union that would include foreign policy. That month, after a one-day summit meeting in Dublin, “The Community firmly, decisively, and categorically committed itself to political union,” stated Charles Haughey, the Irish Prime Minister at the time. On December 15, 1990, the Council of Ministers met in Rome at an Intergovernmental Conference on Political Union (IGC). One year later in December 1991, at Maastricht, the Netherlands, the conference convened.

Maastricht’s most solid achievement was the firm commitment to establish economic and monetary union (EMU) involving a single currency governed by a European Central Bank by 1999, which it accomplished. Along with monetary union, the treaty established the beginnings of a common defense component which would evolve with later treaties. Article J.4 of the Treaty on European Union added: “The common foreign and security of the Union, including the eventual framing of a common defense policy, which might in time lead to a common defense.”

It paved the way to the creation of a distinct political identity. The Maastricht agreement marked the first step in adding a political dimension to the EU, and transforming it from an economic venture into a political reality. An objective of the Maastricht Treaty was for the EU to “assert its identity on the international scene. through the implementation of a common foreign and security policy.” The Maastricht Treaty, a 189-page document, allowed the EU to forge common foreign and defense policies for the first time. Former French President Mitterrand affirmed: “For the first time in their history, the Union will act together in foreign policy.”

Prior to Maastricht, the EU acted in the area of foreign policy through European Political Cooperation (EPC). This was the EU’s process of consultation and common action among its members in the field of foreign policy. An EPC meeting brought together the Member States’ highest officials, their foreign ministers, and the EU Commission. The confidential telex system (coreu) linked the twelve foreign ministries of the Member States, the EPC secretariat, and the Commission. It provided rapid and secure communications, and reduced the need for holding special ministerial meetings. Through its single, coherent approach, EPC aimed to maximize its influence in international affairs. Maastricht turned EPC into something more than a consultation club; it laid the foundation for a real government. The 1992 Maastricht Treaty changed the name of the European Communities to the European Union and gave the EU the formal title of “Union.”

The Economist, commenting on the treaty, stated: “Believers in a federal Europe insist that the treaty lays down the main elements, if only in embryo, of a future European government, a single currency, common foreign and defense policy, a common citizenship and a parliament with teeth. It is just a matter of waiting they believe, for history to take its course.”

Alan Sked, who chaired the Anti-Federalist League, made similar observations and brought out additional points. He stated in The European, a European newspaper that existed during the 1990s and provided excellent coverage of the evolving European Union, that after Maastricht:

The Commission is preparing to become the government of Europe, with Jacques Delors or his successor as executive president. He himself proposed such a scheme to the European Parliament in January 1990, and on June 4, 1992 the former Italian Foreign Minister, Emilio Columbo, introduced an outline Constitution for the European Union, drawn up by four professors. Chapter 4 of this simply stated: The Commission is the government of the Union….The Community is almost a state already. It has its own flag, its own anthem, its own driving license, its own diplomatic service, its own parliament, and its own supreme court. Maastricht will give it its own bank, currency, police force, data bases and army. A Committee of the Regions will be set up to help suppress nation states. All of Europe’s leaders know exactly what is being planned: the creation of a centralized superstate. The EU leaders agreed to meet again in 1996, to work out a second treaty on political union. They hoped that the next treaty would complete the process that Maastricht started.

THE AMSTERDAM TREATY: In the summer of 1996, EU leaders met and concluded the intergovernmental conference that led to the signing of the Amsterdam Treaty. The treaty did not accomplish what many had hoped. US leaders could not agree on the issues that needed reorganization. This treaty was supposed to make many internal changes so that the Union could enlarge to include new members. The treaty created a representative to speak for the Union on foreign policy issues; the High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy which acted as a junior foreign minister. The Treaty of Amsterdam, signed on October 2, 1997, entered into force on May 1, 1999. It amended and renumbered the EU and EC Treaties, and EU leaders looked forward to meeting again immediately after the turn of the millennium. The Amsterdam Treaty strengthened Union’s powers in foreign policy and judicial cooperation.

THE NICE TREATY: EU leaders met and negotiated the Treaty of Nice and signed it on February 26, 2001, as an amendment to the existing treaties. The Nice Treaty overhauled the institutions of the European Union in preparation for a union of twenty-seven Member States rather than fifteen.

This treaty also provided the EU with a military structure and staff. Most of the changes agreed upon at Nice concerned power sharing within the European institutions as the Union expands. The treaty, capped the number of seats in the European Parliament and the size of the commission, two of the European Union’s leading institutions. The next chapter discusses them in further detail. The Treaty of Nice prepared for enlargement and added more competencies for the EU including employment policy and a common foreign and security policy to cement the Union’s political union.

THE LAEKEN DECLARATION: On December 14 and 15, 2001, the European Council met in Laeken with the purpose of providing impetus to increase the momentum of integration. They adopted a declaration of their intention to achieve a simpler union, and one that would have more presence in the world. They initiated a convention run by Federalists V. Giscard d’Estaing, G. Amato, and Jean-Luc Dehaene to write the Constitution of the Union-which, unlike the US Constitution, would become the final treaty, encompassing all of the previous treaties. By October of 2002, the convention presented a draft treaty for the Union. Laeken addressed the transition to euro coins, enlargement, internal market issues, the September 11 attacks, and the Union’s policies on combating terrorism, including their actions in Afghanistan and a declaration of their position in the Middle East. The Laeken Declaration asked: “What is Europe’s role in this changed world? Does Europe not, now that it is finally unified, have a leading role to play in the new world order, that of a power able both to play a stabilizing role worldwide and to point the way ahead for many countries and peoples?” Laeken also issued its “Declaration on the Operational Capability of the Common European and Security and Defense Policy,” and provided teeth to the military structure organized at Nice.

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher referred to the decisions made at Nice and Laeken as “one of the most ambitious political projects of our times.” It should be noted that this “ambitious political project” began at the moment of the EU”s inception, for the primary aim of EU leaders has always been a political one, and those who viewed the EU as nothing more than an economic bloc are uninformed.

THE LISBON TREATY: In 2003, the EU drafted its Constitution and in 2004-2005, the EU Council approved the European Constitution (Treaty) and the Member States voted on it and rejected it. The European Council met in Lisbon for a new EU reform treaty (instead of a European constitution.)  In 2007, EU leaders signed the Lisbon Treaty, which entered into force on December 1, 2009. The European Constitution merged into the Lisbon Treaty. The Lisbon Treaty amended previous EU treaties and is more modest than the previous constitutional project. The Charter of Fundamental Rights, which covers freedom and speech and religion, will legally bind 25 of the 27 EU Members. Britain and Poland obtained an opt-out.

Lisbon made changes to the EU institutions. The European Central Bank gained official status of being an EU institution along with the Council of Europe and the euro became the official currency of the Union. The Lisbon Treaty also renamed leading institutions. The High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy created by the Amsterdam Treaty was promoted to Vice President and Foreign Minister of the Union along with other changes to help the 27 member union run smoothly, efficiently and to move it forward politically.

In order for the EU to become the powerful world empire outlined in the Scriptures, it must have a militia. The Antichrist’s army conquers and treads down parts of the world. It lays siege to Israel, and assists in killing all who do not pay homage to the Antichrist.

Since 1946, several European nations have attempted to create military alliances. In 1948, the Brussels Treaty Organization (BTO) formed, but was absorbed by NATO in late 1950. In 1952, the newly established European Defense Community (EDC) attempted too much too soon, and it collapsed. In 1948, European leaders signed the Brussels Treaty-a modification of the EDC. It resulted in the Western European Union, which came into being in Paris on October 23, 1954, and ratified by all members in London on May 6, 1955. Its members included Britain and the six members of the EU. The WEU underwent significant changes.

In 1984 the European defense and foreign affairs ministers agreed to “reactivate” the WEU and harmonize the members’ views on key issues. In 1987, the WEU Council adopted a “Platform on European Security Issues” and declared its intention to develop a “more cohesive European defense identity.” During the 1987 oil shipping crisis in the Gulf, the WEU dispatched military forces-a sign that its vision of a cohesive identity had, in fact, become reality, due to the speed of world events, the WEU gained renewed interest. The end of the Cold War caused German unification, the end of the Warsaw pact, and uncertainty regarding NATO’s role.

Prompted by the crisis in the Gulf and by German unification, which meant a larger, more powerful Germany and an uncertain NATO, the EU members decided that their union should include defense. Other potential threats include international terrorism, political instability in North Africa, and threats from the USSR, China, and the Middle East. Some suggested that the WEU merge with the EU.

At the time, Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jacques Poos argued that the Gulf Crisis illustrated the urgent necessity of establishing a common European foreign and security policy. A spokesman for former French president Mitterrand advocated: “Whatever the problem, our answer is the same, more Europe.”

The WEU admitted a host of new members in the mid 1990’s. These included Greece and the non-EU, NATO member countries of Iceland, Norway, Turkey, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria, Finland, and Sweden. The European Council met in Cologne in June of 1999 and decided on a common policy on Russia which was the first use of the Common Foreign and Security Policy and adopted the declaration on Kosovo.

In relation to the European Security and Defense Policy, the Council declared that the EU must have the capacity for autonomous action, backed up by credible military forces, the means to decide to use them, and a readiness to do so, in order to respond to international crises without prejudice to actions by NATO.” In 2000, the European Council at Nice established the decision making bodies (Political and Security Committee and a Military Committee reinforced by a Military Staff) and a crisis reaction force of sixty thousand soldiers.

In May of 2001, leading members of the EU’s newly established military organizations, high-ranking officials and military personnel from the various Member States, and members of several European military and political think-tanks met in Berlin for a colloquy where they established the EU’s security concepts and risks. Over four hundred participants from over thirty countries attended and all discussed security issues that would affect Europe and the EU’s development of its own military. Professor de Wijk of the Royal Military Academy in Breda summed up the colloquy’s purpose when he stated: At the same time, the US must accept the EU as an equal partner. We may have different views, but in the final analysis we share the same historical and cultural background and seek to protect the same values and interests. Moreover, only a military capable EU can help defend common EU-US interests.

Indeed, as the EU has global interests, the EU should develop capabilities with a truly global reach. I am very much against a division of labor where Europe sees to Europe and the USA sees to the rest of the world. For that reason, the security concept of the European Union must contain guidance for the development of power projection capabilities which can be deployed worldwide. In practice, a EU security concept should deal with the following questions: how to link the EU’s military capabilities to its political objectives? Where and when the EU will make use of its military capabilities? What kind of operations will be conducted? How these operations will be conducted? What kind of military forces are required to conduct these operations?

Although the Amsterdam Treaty gave the WEU an integral role in giving the EU an independent defense capability,  playing a major role in the Petersburg tasks in November 2000, WEU Ministers met in Marseille and agreed to begin transferring the organization’s capabilities and functions to the European Union, under its developing Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP).

In January 2002, the WEU’s Security Studies Institute and the Satellite Centre transferred to the EU and became the European Union Institute for Security Studies and the European Union Satellite Centre. The Nice Treaty removed the role given to the WEU in the Amsterdam Treaty. The European Defense Agency is a continuation of the work of the Western European Armaments Organization (WEAO) and the Western European Armaments Group (WEAG). It represents the transference of their functions from the WEU and to the EU framework, and thus continues the decommissioning of the WEU.

The European Defense Agency (EDA) is an agency of the European Union headquartered in Brussels. Set up in July 2004, it is a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) body set which reports to the Council of the European Union.

The Lisbon Treaty scrapped the WEU and kept the mutual defense clause of the Treaty of Brussels as a basis for EU mutual defense arrangement. The Treaty of Lisbon states the following: “The common security and defense policy shall include the progressive framing of a common defense policy. This will lead to a common defense, when the European Council, acting unanimously, so decides.”

In February of 2009, the European Parliament voted in favor of the creation of Synchronized Armed Forces Europe (SAFE) as a first step towards a true military force. An EU directorate will direct SAFE with training standards and operational doctrine. SAFE created an EU “Council of Defense Ministers” and a European statute for soldiers governing training standards, operational doctrine and freedom of operational action. SAFE is based on voluntary participation and will lead to the synchronization of the European forces. SAFE aims to develop an integrated European security structure. There will be civil and military capabilities in the member countries’ reach.

According to the November 17, 2009, Times Online, Italy will push for the creation of a European Army after the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty. According to the article, Franco Frattini, the Italian Foreign Minister, said that the Lisbon Treaty established “that if some countries want to enter into reinforced co- operation between themselves they can do so.” This agreement existed with the euro and the Schengen accords on frontier-free travel, and a “common European defense” will take the same approach. Mr. Frattini suggested that if there was a European army one nation can send planes, another tanks and another armored cars. He said this is the idea of a European army.

The EU’s army continues to evolve and will evolve into the eventual powerful military the Scripture’s forecast. The Lisbon Treaty added the necessary foundation for the EU’s military evolution.

MEDIA INSIGHT (MACLEANS.CA)

KATIE ENGELHART: NOW IS THE TIME TO MOUNT A EUROPEAN ARMY, LEADERS CONCLUDE

“Later this year, the leaders of European Union nations will meet in Brussels for their annual European council. On the agenda: a discussion of Europe’s military might. At the summit, it’s likely that two equally bold visions for European defense will be put forward. One would see the union’s 27 member states pool military resources as never before-with an eye to eventually building a bona fide EU army. …In London, it is talk of a potential pullout from the EU that dominates. But elsewhere, calls for a pan-European military are growing-with France and Germany leading the charge. In September, a group of EU foreign ministers spelled it out directly, weighing, in a controversial report, the possibility of a European army…Today, supporters of the still-elusive EU army insist that pooling military might is the only way for the Continent to keep its fists up. …And they argue there are already precursors to an EU army.