The point is that the U.S PtB hope that Brexit will allow them to have their cake and eat it..and that is a major reason why the issue here is so vexed...a lack of European narrative (something I call the, "Euromerta"), has massively enabled the Brexit crisis...the wider Europe is NATO's Europe its as simple as that and until the old world grows up and stops dressing as lamb the situation will continue..we are experiencing an appallingly unattractive second-childhood right now...but such is the market-driven Zeitgeist..