> It was literally called the european coal and steel community originally... It very much was about trade.

It was not. You can read the thing and all the political arguments on why making countries interdependent was the means to the end of European peace and union (again, from the times of Schuman and Adenauer, so widely known well before the vast majority of the current member-states joined). Some well-known quotes:

" World peace cannot be safeguarded without the making of creative efforts proportionate to the dangers which threaten it."

"Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan. It will be built through concrete achievements which first create a de facto solidarity. The coming together of the nations of Europe requires the elimination of the age-old opposition of France and Germany. Any action taken must in the first place concern these two countries.

With this aim in view, the French Government proposes that action be taken immediately on one limited but decisive point.

It proposes that Franco-German production of coal and steel as a whole be placed under a common High Authority, within the framework of an organization open to the participation of the other countries of Europe. The pooling of coal and steel production should immediately provide for the setting up of common foundations for economic development as a first step in the federation of Europe, and will change the destinies of those regions which have long been devoted to the manufacture of munitions of war, of which they have been the most constant victims."

There is nothing in that even alluding to the fact that it was "only trade". And it's not some political fluff distinct from what the member-states signed up for: the language is just as explicit in the treaties of Paris (without an official English translation) and Rome. The coal and steel community had a high authority (with the same role as the European Commission now), a Common Assembly (same as the European Parliament), and drew resolution binding the member states.

> It still is! Not nessacarily a bad thing but it's not like it has an army or conducts other forms of foreign policy right now.

It does not have a foreign policy because its members-states don't want it to have one (well, in this case, mostly France, but others are quite happy about that as well).

> It's a common market first and foremost, with most of its laws being product and workplace standards

That's a profound misunderstanding. It is a political union first and foremost. The regulations are just a byproduct of this and the common market is the logical consequence.

> The prior commenter wasn't saying it currently has an army, and you know that. If you've been paying any attention at all to the news you'd know about the discussions of a common army, especially regarding Macron.

If you've been paying any attention at all, you'd have noticed that this did not happen and that he changed his stance. Do you know why? Because there won't be enough member-states in favour and there is no way the council reaches an agreement. Because fundamentally, all European political decisions are the result of the consensus of the member states and if they want to operate as coordinated national armies instead of an integrated European one, this is exactly what will happen. What won't happen is the Commission deciding one day that the EU has an army.

> 414 Tankbataljon in Netherlands was created as a sort of test, staffed with german and dutch soldiers. The French used to be opposed to this because they wanted their independant army, nuclear force, same with UK.

Are you aware that France and Germany have a very similar common brigade since 1986? So how on Earth do one come to the conclusion that France is hostile to this sort of things? What they don't want is lose their ability to take initiatives.

> UK left and french president thinks differently, it's suddenly a lot more likely.

There is no way in hell France gives up its control on its nuclear weapons. This is outside the scope of all of the European Army hypotheses that have been under discussion.

> again, I'm convinced you're building a strawman here, nobody claimed its like this now, but its definately going in that direction. There is a ton of discussion around EU federalism, again surrounding macron. I used to be active in a political organisation that supported it, but im not that much of a fan personally nowadays because im disillusioned because of how undemocratic EU is up close.

Well, plenty of people claim this. In any case, it is not going to that direction at all. How many federalist parties are there right now in the European Parliament? How many governments are talking about giving up their national sovereignty? And even if some of them wanted, no EU institution has any way of forcing that on the member states.

Macron is not a federalist at all. He wants more integration in some areas (notably military spending and procurement, true). But if you believe he wants to give up things like industrial strategy, foreign policy or the ability to intervene militarily without having to convince the whole European Council, then you haven't been paying attention that much.

Federalism is nothing new, it predates all the European Communities. It fell out of favour significantly after the 1980s, though. It is not a significant force nowadays and if anything, the EU as a single country is all but impossible now after the last rounds of enlargement.

> Those reasons are both related to instances of personal corruption I have seen but also to how I don't agree with the dual parlimentary setup, where elected positions hold much less importance in the lower house, and can't propose legislation. The upper house is entirely unelected and can propose legislation. Sure its members are appointed by in theory elected national governments but I don't think thats a good way to go about things, imo national elections style democracy is already a tenuous way to get the will of the people and each step away from elected positions is progressively worse. I see many people in european parliment patting themselves on the back and laughing about how silly they think american system of electors is while doing an imo even worse system.

I am not going to claim that the EU is perfect; it very much is not. The parliament is more legitimate now than it used to be (direct election of the MEPs is an improvement according to your criteria), but it lacks power and the Commission has too much freedom to ram regulations through parliament. But it has enough flaws and there is no need to make it look worse than it is. All the points the parent mentioned (the single country, the army, the "it's only supposed to be about trade", etc) are populist talking points that are false and dishonest in the mouth of all politicians who ought to know better. People resorting to them uncritically without understanding how absurd they sound is quite annoying.

> There are significant benefits to being a member no doubt, but that doesn't mean its a good system

It'd have to be really, really bad to be worse than what we had before. At the end of the day, if a country is better in it than outside, then it is a good system. Probably not a perfect one, but then no system is.