As the EU picks up steam and the countries within it jockey for position, I see some of those old hatreds starting to brew again, as this article sort of insinuates. The long-term goals of the EU is to be sort of a "United States of Europe" that would put them on equal footing with the USA politically as well as economically.
I just don't see it happening because many of these countries have historically been in conflict with each other since medieval times. All these people are set in their ways and their own traditions and so forth.
Besides, nobody seems to want to work over there. Who's going to get the work done while everybody is taking their 10 weeks of vacation in the Alps and the beaches of Monaco?
Colonialism - The European alternative to the Protestant work ethic.
I think this is one of the reasons France and Germany opposed the war against Saddam. A free Iraq is less likely to be exploited by state sponsored European corporations.