The Berlin Bulldozer and the Sack of Athens

[GliderGuider]

The Berlin Bulldozer and the Sack of Athens

When finalizing my book European Spring last year, I hesitated before describing the Eurozone as a “glorified debtors’ prison.” After this weekend’s brutal, vindictive, and short-sighted exercise of German power against Greece, backed up by the Frankfurt-based European Central Bank’s (ECB) illegal threat to pull the plug on the entire Greek banking system, I take it back. There is nothing glorious about the Eurozone: it is a monstrous, undemocratic creditors’ racket. Greece’s submission to the conditions that Germany demanded, merely to start negotiations about further funding to refinance its unsustainable debts, may stave off the prospect of imminent bank collapse and Greece’s exit from the Eurozone.

But far from solving the Greek problem, doubling down on the creditors’ disastrous strategy of the past five years will only further depress the economy, increase the unbearable debt burden, and trample on democracy. Even Deutsche Bank, one of the German banks bailed out by European taxpayers’ forced loans to the Greek government in 2010, says Greece is now tantamount to a vassal state. But this is much bigger than Greece. It is clearer than ever that Europe’s dysfunctional monetary union has a German problem, too. As creditor-in-chief in a monetary union bereft of common political institutions, Germany is proving to be a calamitous hegemon. Paris may have tempered Berlin’s petulant threat to force Greece out of the euro, but German Chancellor Angela Merkel undoubtedly calls the shots.

The deal that Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras capitulated to mirrored German demands, not the proposals he drafted with French help last week. By pointing out the futility of resistance if Greece wished to remain in the euro, Paris has, in a sense, acted as Berlin’s agent in securing Athens’ acquiescence. Yes, small countries such as Slovakia and Finland agreed with Germany. But their voices are hardly decisive. From Berlin’s perspective, they are the useful idiots who provide cover for its narrow interests. Remember that, through their loans to Greece, Finns and Slovaks bailed out German banks, not Finnish and Slovak ones. It is naïve to think that Berlin wouldn’t bulldoze them if they stood in its way.

Let’s be clear. What Berlin and Frankfurt have done to Greece, they can – and will – do to others. In 2010, they blackmailed the Irish government into imposing €64 billion in bank debt on Irish taxpayers. In 2011, they forced out the elected prime minister of Italy, Silvio Berlusconi. They would surely hammer a future Portuguese government, itself flirting with insolvency. And yes, they’d bully Slovakia and the others currently cheering them on.

[Igel]

1. People have a strange view of democracy.

They joined. It was a democratic decision. It was debated. Their elected leaders--elections have consequences--made decisions, which were also debated. They were represented in the legislature. The populace didn't like how some events went and how their decisions led to consequences, some of which they had no control over, and they saw that their decisions, coupled with events and how the rest of the Union is going, will lead to more unpleasantness. A loss of rights, fiscal calamity. Some view it as a plot to subjugate and take over, an infringement on guaranteed rights. Others, as immoral, not meeting the obligations that civilized societies should rise to.

Which side you take seems to depend less on that and more on your sense of honor and obligation. Some still argue for state's rights, while others argue that being in the Union meant giving up some of those rights. Well, that battle was won and the South lost.

It's clear enough what it means to give up some sovereign rights and live up to moral obligations when it's a fight 150 years old and you're on the winning side. The arguments, the role of democracy in doing something bad is to be ignored--obligations are obligations, and we can be very, very hardline and judgmental. It's rather harder when it's many of the same arguments but the side you favor is suddenly on the losing side of the arguments. Then suddenly it's all state rights and what does the local population want, not "you've joined and yielded some of your sovereignty."

Now a democratic union means you have to abide by the rules you accepted and deal with limits on sovereignty; now a democratic union means that when things are uncomfortable you're given a pass and nobody should sit in judgment. What "democracy" really seems to have as its operational definition is "it's what it takes to get what I think is right--now it means conquest and eliminating self rule, now it means ignoring agreements and prior commitments."

Here's a capriccio for your amusement.

[closeupready]

2. The people of Greece, where democracy was born, have strange views

of democracy? Uh, ok.

[Octafish]

4. Like the referendum where they voted 'No' means 'Yes.'

Right is Right, after Money.

[sadoldgirl]

3. There is really no "Union".

At least not as we understand it. I have no doubt that
sooner or later the Euro will collapse. It was a very risky
and in my mind stupid enterprise.

In Germany, since a few years, a new party has formed
Its only purpose is to get rid of the Euro. Thus it is quite
possible that Germany itself will quit the Euro, which
would lead to its collapse.

By the way, don't blame Merkel too much. She hates to make
any decisions, and always hopes that if ignored problems
go away. Her party is another story.