In my career I gave little thought to Europe. If I thought of it at all, I saw the small nations of Europe as jagged shapes in a cracked mirror that had somehow, miraculously, repaired itself.

It was Henry who introduced me to the political reality of that process and to the great men who were its architects, tough, intelligent visionaries, — Monnet, Schumann, Adenauer. 

“I will arrange for you to see the EU in action,” Henry said.

Jean-Eric took me into a cafeteria sounding with every phoneme under the sun. 

That second I knew this was somewhere important, to me at least, – like the moment when the silhouettes of the Manhattan towers emerged from the mist as I stood holding the handrail of a liner.

Jean-Eric took me into the circular Parliament. Above the tiered seats, all around, I could see the interpreters, in glass covered cubicles.

Later Jean-Eric said: “I have an idea. There are projects out to tender in the area of news and media. They often need advisers with practical experience. Would you like it if I mentioned you to one of them?”

“The British make good consultants. They are very pragmatic. But generally too expensive.”

So, I became an advisor to a group of consultants. In fact they brought me into a second project also.

One was about how European films could be helped to succeed in other European countries. The other was about whether the implementations in different countries were in compliance with the media directive and how the directive could be modified to stay abreast of the technologies of changing media distribution systems.

What was obvious right away was the tension in the system, the tension between the “union” and the “nations”: while a directive existed to set the rules for cross-border trade, the nations were passionate about protecting their identities and cultures.

In the past there were nation states and there were empires. There were alliances in times of war. But not assemblages of nation states, not partnerships of nations states.

The European Union is a partnership of nation states, drawn together by sharing a single market. It is an evolution of the nation state. 

One of the projects took us to Hamburg, a place where our family lived just after the Second World War and I have some very early memories.

My childhood memory is of broken buildings everywhere and knots of people wandering uncertainly or peering at the ground, as if trying to find a path home.

Now this place: so solid, so sedate, so rich.

It was a cloudless, sunny autumn day when I flew home and the great waterways of northern Europe were glinting in the sun.

Our two countries. Our different lives.

I realised something at that moment. I know America well. I admire it. But it was never my home.

Maybe it’s because we share a common failure and that makes us want to ensure that rivals never go to war again – and that we can only advance that objective if we work together, recognising that we are still tribal animals.