A year has gone by since that daylong trip of German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Athens on the 9th of October 2012. Since memory can be a bit hazy, it is worth remembering how that visit was evaluated by the government: it was celebrated as the end of the contemporary Greek tragedy. The front-page pictures revealed the climate: Greece finally “made it” and with the support of Germany it would remain in the Eurozone and, ultimately, recover…
In the summer of 2012 Greece championed its complete submission to Berlin – what appeared to be an inescapable necessity became ideological politics. A year later, what has remained of all this?
It is true that Greece did not leave the euro. A series of eponymous central witnesses however point out the obvious, that Berlin’s decision had nothing to do with Greece. It was all about the euro: the Germans were convinced that the cost would be insurmountable, which means that Greece could, if it dared, to negotiate. And it didn’t.
On the contrary, Greece made a promise to fully implement everything that was imposed. The end result? A neo-Nazi party has gained mainstream popularity, the rate of unemployment is 30%, new measures have been imposed and above all, Berlin is categorically ruling out a new haircut of the Greek debt while discussions are under way.
Furthermore, based on IMF documents, it appears that everybody was already aware that the Greek program was doomed to fail from the start and that the true goal was – chillingly – to save the European banks and stabilize the euro. With the full active support of its government, Greece became not only the guinea pig but also bore the brunt of an exhaustive policy with ulterior motives rather than a so-called “salvation”.
The bitter irony is that the program is being doubted in full. It is a fact that the debt viability is a pipe dream and new measures are necessary despite the political assurances for internal consumptions. The fact that the Golden Dawn case monopolizes the media, justifiably to an extent, is the only thing that keeps the discussion of the program’s failure and the new measures to come “under control”.
In this year, where Greece became further and completely dependant on the demands of German politics, many more things happened: The Greek farce about the reparations that was trumped up by the government died out, followed by the admission of “errors” to the program; the Germans made billions of profit from the Greek crisis and then everyone fell for the fairytale that things would get better in Greece after the German elections – a fairytale that was only successful because the aforementioned memory is hazy…
As expected, the Greek drama did not come to an end. The Germans took exactly what they wanted, without any resistance. On the contrary, the reality in Greece is unbearable and leads nowhere. Despite what is being said in public, everybody knows that it can only lead to catastrophe.
Giorgos P. Malouchos
