1/ I don't get why World War 2 is such a strong point of reference for them there Brexitons.

Nominally, we won. Yeah.

But to all intents and purposes it was a seminal moment marking British decline.

Clearly, the US and the USSR won.

In any analysis, we didn't.

WW2 was the death knell of an inherently multipolar system.

A system of which we happened to be a major pole.

Indeed, many would argue WW1 started that process, evidencing US industrial power.

And issuing UK power with notice.

We stood alone, we resisted fascism admirably.

Thousands of Brits were maimed and killed fighting evil. Rightly so.

And we, along with our Allies, eventually prevailed over evil.

But in the process bipolarity became the new norm.

The Cold War had its scary moments, no doubt.

But it was stable. Mutually assured destruction meant both sides had too much to lose.

That gave Western Europe the space to think.

The room to understand its petty differences had to be consigned to history.

Time to cooperate. Space to forgive and to forget.

Meanwhile, Britain was skint, unable to sustain or defend the Empire.

To withstand Communist influence on domestic politiucs, we introduced things like universal healthcare.

We mollified a restive public with what many would describe as a social democratic political settlement.

We grew pretty well but our power and influence declined.

A permanent seat on the UN Security Council - a hangover from old realities - did little more than mask it and feed a delusion.

Meantime, Western Europeans extend the bounds of their cooperation.

Don't get me wrong. The garden wasn't all roses in a Europe caught in the middle.

But old differences had been swallowed.

Cooperation trumped adversity.

And the UK understood it was the way forward in a rapidly globalising world economy.

The Cold War was never going to last.

The Soviets were overreaching. It was only a matter of time.

America could finance its hard power. The basket case USSR economy could not.

But other poles were emerging.

We joined one of them. And we helped shape it.

Enormously.

Thatcher changed the political settlement in the UK to be somewhat more neoliberal.

That much is true.

But her government also helped sculpt the EU as it is today.

The Single Market blah blah.

So, it's strange her ideological progeny resist it so.

The norms established by the EU - the free movement of stuff, for example - are so ingrained in our lives that millions don't realise what could be lost.

We live in a globalised world economy. I can get almost anything from almost anywhere. From my phone.

It's easy.

But that globalised world, that global village, is increasingly multipolar.

China, India, the US, Russia, Brazil, South Africa, the list goes on.

And it includes the EU.

That multipolar world is more unstable. That's an historical fact.

Yet, despite that instability, we want to witihdraw.

Somehow we persist under the delusion we can prosper in isolation.

Immune to 21st century reality. Protected from the big fish out there.

Bulletproof. Sunlit uplands and all that.

And one of the big motifs employed to convince us of this sham - emotive rubbish around WW2 - is the moment our country actually lost its historic standing.

We are no better or more deserving than any other country. And we are in no position to dictate to others.

We're on the brink of relegating ourselves to minnow status.

We're about to impose economic sanctions on every one of us.

Let's face it, this country is in chaos.

But this was sold as an opportunity. Freedom from the yoke of European oppression.

The reality is further decline and therefore peril.

Peril for our union.

Peril for our long-term security.

And peril for millions of our livelihoods and our standard of living.

Are you proud of Britain?

We won the war.