> the UK being between France and Germany ... was a stabilizing influence.

I don't see that at all. The EU was a Franco-German project. De Gaul kept the British out as long as he could because he thought they'd be destabilising, and he was correct.

The UK was always a bit of an odd man out in the EU in that for them it was always "The EU is doing this or that" whether good or bad. For the central European countries it's "We are doing this or that" because they ARE the EU. If only the UK could have seen themselves as part of it. Your comment follows a similar vein, they're not going to turn on each other so easily. Not yet. The European project means far too much to the French and Germans, far more than it ever did the the British.

I'm ex-pat British, I've lived in Europe, although I now live elsewhere. I personally think brexit was a bad move, but I don't really believe it had much to do with the EU anyway. It's discontent because things aren't working well for a lot of people at the moment, and nobody in politics is offering a path to anything better.