"Europe has forgotten that history is fundamentally tragic," said Manuel Valls, the French prime minister. "If Europe can't protect its own borders, it's the very idea of Europe that could be thrown into doubt. It could disappear — not Europe itself, not our values, but the European project, the concept we have of Europe, that the founding fathers had of Europe."
The European Union — 28 countries and 500 million people — is not really going to disappear just because it cannot agree on how to deal with one or two million refugees. But one of the great symbols of its unity, the Schengen treaty that allowed its citizens to move around without passports or border checks, is being suspended, perhaps forever.
Schengen doesn't cover every single EU country. The United Kingdom and Ireland remain outside the Schengen zone, and Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria and Cyprus, all new EU members, are still waiting to join. Switzerland, Norway and Iceland are part of the Schengen zone although they are not EU members. But it does include over 400 million people.