timdiggerm said:

Re: Stalin: he didn't found the Soviet Union, and the post-Stalin USSR was very different (de-Stalinization took place).

This is only true to a point; Stalin was actually one of the founders of the USSR and played a key role in the 1917 revolution. Also it was 15 years after Stalin died when the USSR (with the obligatory help of other Warsaw Pact members) invaded my country to stop us from changing our political system to democracy, so the USSR didn't exactly become mellow after Stalin's death.

I can totally see the post-Stalin USSR situation happening to the Empire - the Empire would denounce the Emperor but continue to rule oppressively and a lot of political infighting would take place between the lower-ranking officials (and this is actually what happened in Rome after Caesar died as well). And this is pretty much what the EU describes and it seems like a perfectly logical and historically sound approach, so saying that the Empire would fall immediately and using history as an argument is in my opinion erroneous.