"Exactly 40 years ago, President John F. Kennedy - while visiting Frankfurt - suggested that ties between the United States and Europę were so close and so essential that both sides should consider not only economic cooperation, but possibly even a political union between these two pillars of the West. He said that “we - Americans - do not regard a strong and united Europę as a rival but as a partner.” He even proposed that a declaration of interdependence be made between what he described as “the new union emerging in Europę and the old American union”."(...)