I love this headline in Pakistan’s Daily Times:

PIA To Buy Airbuses To Appease EU, UK

Do you remember the A380 Airbus? It was launched to much fanfare in 2005 as the symbol of the coming Euro-imperium. Giant double-decker QE2s of the air would be looming over cities around the world. You’d be fumbling for a match and saying, “Funny, I don’t remember the almanack saying anything about a total eclipse today” only to realize that the vast shadow over the landscape was the Air France A380 coming in to land at LAX, assuming they’d had the runways lengthened in time.

It doesn’t seem to be working out quite like that: these days the headlines are mostly about delays in delivery and lost customers – “UPS To Cancel A380 Order“ – or threats of strikes by French and German workers and lost jobs in the less obstreperous branch offices of the Euro consortium – “Airbus To Cut 1,600 Jobs In Britain.”

So it’s grand news for Euro-investors that at least Pakistan’s national carrier has been successfully strongarmed into buying the White Euro-elephant of the skies, after pressure to deny landing rights to the existing PIA fleet on “safety grounds”. Now twice as many jihadists will be able to fly from Waziristan to Heathrow in one go! (The Airbus can carry 800 passengers, or a thousand if your child bride goes in the hold.)

The A380 is indeed a poignant symbol of the European Union: far too big and never actually taking flight. However, it may well prove useful for large-scale population evacuations circa 2015.