ABSTRACT
These remarks encapsulate the essence of de Gaulle’s thinking on Europe throughout the period of his presidency (1959-69), and are consonant with his pronouncements on the future of Europe from as early as the 1940s.2 They express clearly his unshakeable belief in the nation state as the only legitimate source of political authority and his hostility to European integration on the supranational model envisaged by Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman, which found widespread support in European post-war thinking. Those ‘more or less extra-or supranational bodies’ which serviced the European Community (EC) might have their ‘technical value’, de Gaulle conceded, but since they lacked an authentic political mandate, they could not provide effective fora for decision making on important issues.3
