Red alert, yet again. The old French-German ’couple’ - the engine or the brakes on Europe-making, depending on one’s views - is about to autodestruct. Should we tell a few home truths to our German neighbours, who might become our masters, or start cleaning up our own backyard and accept the compromises that may escape the worst? Better, I believe, to understand what is happening by considering the European ensemble as a whole, all of whose components will either sink or save themselves simultaneously. Europe-making has stalled on budgetary constraint. It has become discredited in the eyes of the public. But that doesn’t rule out a unique political system staggering on - one which is neither national nor federal, but an amalgam of the negative effects of both and one which henceforth will mandate everything. This has become all the clearer in the light of recent developments in Italy and France.