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Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain speaking in London on Wednesday.
LONDON — Prime Minister David Cameron promised Britons a decisive referendum within five years on membership in the European Union — provided he wins the next election — in a long-awaited speech on Wednesday whose implications have alarmed the Obama administration and are likely to set the markers for an intense debate in Britain and across Europe.
“It is time for the British people to have their say. It is time to settle this European question in British politics,” he told an audience in London, raising fears in capitals as distant as Washington that a ballot could lead to Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union.
His pledge drew a sharp response from European leaders who accused Mr. Cameron, in the words of a senior German politician, of trying to “cherry-pick” the economic benefits of E.U. membership without subscribing to the broader European project. Politicians in France and Germany said Britain could not have “Europe à la carte.”
The United States has been unusually public in its insistence that Britain, a close ally, stay in the union, fearing its departure would heighten centrifugal forces that would weaken Europe as a diplomatic, military and financial partner.
President Obama recently told Mr. Cameron by telephone that “the United States values a strong U.K. in a strong European Union, which makes critical contributions to peace, prosperity and security in Europe and around the world,” a spokesman said.
Mr. Cameron coupled his promise of a referendum with an impassioned defense of continued membership in a more streamlined and competitive European Union, built around its core single market underpinning the body’s internal trade. But he acknowledged the risks, saying any exit from the European Union “would be a one-way ticket.”
“I know there will be those who say the vision I have outlined will be impossible to achieve. That there is no way our partners will cooperate. That the British people have set themselves on a path to inevitable exit. And that if we aren’t comfortable being in the E.U. after 40 years, we never will be,” he said. “But I refuse to take such a defeatist attitude — either for Britain or for Europe.”
“And when the referendum comes,” he said, “I will campaign for it with all my heart and soul.”
The speech was a defining moment in Mr. Cameron’s political career, reflecting a belief that by wresting some powers back from the European Union, he can win the support of a grudging British public that has long been ambivalent — or actively hostile — toward the idea of European integration.
“We have the character of an island nation — independent, forthright, passionate in defense of our sovereignty,” he said. “We can no more change this sensibility than drain the English Channel.”
Coming a day after the leaders of France and Germany met in Berlin to celebrate a half-century of sometimes uneasy partnership, Mr. Cameron’s plea for acknowledgment of British distinctions seemed to reflect some of the deepest political and philosophical differences between London and Continental Europe on integration.
France wants Britain to stay in the European Union, both as an ally in security matters and as a counterweight to Germany. But France is also outspoken in its refusal to allow Britain to pick and choose its obligations. Paris objects not so much to a British refusal to take on new obligations, especially since Britain does not use the euro, as to any effort to repatriate powers already ceded to Brussels.
The French concern, shared by many others in and out of the euro zone, is that Britain will undermine one of the great, if unfinished accomplishments of the European Union, the single market in goods and services.
“You cannot do Europe à la carte,” said Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius of France. “Imagine the E.U. was a soccer club: once you’ve joined up and you’re in this club, you can’t then say you want to play rugby.”
Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, who is often sympathetic to Mr. Cameron’s criticisms of European Union excesses, said she and her country viewed Britain as “an important part and an active member” of the European Union. The E.U., she said, “has always meant that we should find fair compromises.”
Cameron Promises Britons a Referendum on E.U. Membership
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