"We Are Heading Into Anarchy": Official Says EU Will "Completely Break Down In 10 Days"

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/25/2016 22:45 -0500
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-02-25/we-are-heading-anarchy-official-says-eu-will-completely-break-down-10-days

Norwegian PM Erna Solberg doesn’t want to have to skirt her country’s responsibilities under the Geneva Convention and she doesn’t want to trample over human rights either, but she will if she has to.

"It is a force majeure proposals which we will have in the event that it all breaks down,” Solberg said, in an interview with Berlingske, describing new measures she believes Norway may have to take if Sweden buckles under the weight of the refugee influx which saw some 163,000 asylum seekers inundate the country last year.

Solberg is effectively prepared to turn everyone away and go into lockdown mode should everything fall apart completely, causing Europe to descend into some kind of lawless, Hobbesian, free-for-all.

If that sounds far-fetched or hyperbolic consider that on Thursday, EU migration commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos warned that the bloc has just 10 days to implement a plan that will bring about “tangible and clear results on the ground” or else “the whole system will completely break down.”

Avramopoulos also cautioned that a humanitarian crisis in Greece and in the Balkans is “very near.” Moves by countries to adopt ad hoc, state-specific measures to stem the flow are exacerbating the problem, the commissioner contends.

"We cannot continue to deal through unilateral, bilateral or trilateral actions; the first negative effects and impacts are already visible," he said. "We have a shared responsibility –- all of us -– towards our neighbouring states, both EU and non-EU, but also towards those desperate people."
By "the negative effects," of unilateral actions, Avramopoulos is likely referring to the bottlenecks that are leaving thousands stranded in the Balkans. The chokepoints are being pressured by a series of border fences that have been erected over the past six months and the problem is exacerbated by stepped up border checks. In short: we're witnessing the death of the bloc's beloved Schengen. 
"Seven European states have already reinstated border controls within the cherished but creaking Schengen free-travel zone, putting huge strain on Greece, which can no longer wave the tide of arrivals from Turkey onward through the Balkans," Reuters writes. Earlier today, Athens recalled its Austrian ambassador. "Greece will not accept unilateral actions. Greece can also carry out unilateral actions," migration minister, Yannis Mouzalas told reporters on Thursday. "Greece will not accept becoming Europe’s Lebanon, a warehouse of souls, even if this were to be done with major [EU] funding.”
On March 7, officials will attend a summit with Turkey where buy in from Ankara is critical if there's to be meaningful reduction in the flow of asylum seekers to Western Europe. Leaked documents recently showed President Erdogan is essentially attempting to blackmail Europe. "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria at any time. We can put them on busses," he was quoted as saying, during a conversation with European Commissioner Jean Claude Juncker and President of the European Council Donald Tusk on 16th November 2015 during the G20 Summit in Antalya.
In addition to the seven states that have already reinstated border checks, more countries have promised to follow suit unless Erdogan and Tsipras can figure out a way to make progress in defending the bloc's external border.
Officials fear the onset of spring will embolden still more migrants to make the journey as warmer weather will thaw the Balkan route. On Wednesday, Hungarian PM Viktor Orban called for a referendum on the propsed quota system that Brusells hoped would help distribute and place refugees. It's only a matter of time before other countries conduct similar plebiscites.
Perhaps Jean Asselborn, Luxembourg's foreign minister put it best: "The outlook is gloomy ... We have no policy any more. We are heading into anarchy."
Looks like Erna Solberg was right after all.

HISTORIC NEWS: Finally, EU Breaks Away from U.S.

Posted on September 12, 2015 by Eric Zuesse.    

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/09/historic-news-finally-eu-breaks-away-from-u-s.html

Eric Zuesse

On Saturday, September 12th, United Kingdom’s Labour Party elected as its leader and their candidate to lead the UK, Jeremy Corbyn, who has been the most vocal British critic of the UK’s serving as the lap-dog of an aggressive imperialistic United States of America.

Simultaneously, the leader of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s own Christian Social Union Party, Horst Seehofer, a man who, prior to his being appointed to be the Party-chief had been Chancellor Merkel’s Agriculture Minister, has now turned against Chancellor Merkel (who until now was the most powerful leader in all of Europe) and denounced her policy on the refugee crisis, and has now stated publicly that Germany should instead ally with Russia and against NATO on the entire Syrian war. 

This public statement, which is really a sea-change in history, was reported Friday night, 11 September, in Germany’s leading magazine, The Mirror, Der Spiegel, and it represents the breaking-point in Germany’s foreign policy, finally yielding now to the rapidly rising anti-Americanism within Germany that results from America’s prioritizing America’s war against Russia as being a more important goal than the global war against Islamic jihad, which is clearly the most pressing threat to national security not only within Germany, and not only within all Western countries, but even within Pakistan and many other countries that have majority-Islamic populations, as well as in India, China, and other nations around the world.

Seehofer’s statement simply cannot be ignored by the Chancellor, because it comes from the leader of her own Party (“Christian Social Union” is the Party’s name in Munich and throughout Bavaria, but elsewhere in Germany the Party is called instead the “Christian Democratic Union”). She has mainly ignored German public opinion thus far and cooperated with U.S. President Barack Obama’s war against Russia, which Obama is waging via his proxies in Ukraine, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere. But Merkel now will have to bend; and this could end up breaking NATO itself, since NATO is the international military alliance that was originally against the Soviet Union and that then became against Russia as soon as the Soviet Union ended communism and broke up into Russia and the other nations of the former Soviet Union. That continuation of the Cold War, now against Russia alone, even without the former ideological excuse of there being communism, was initiated by U.S. President George Herbet Walker Bush himself. It was reluctantly picked up by then West-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, whose protégée was Angela Merkel. “Bush made his feelings about compromising with Moscow clear to Kohl: ‘To hell with that!’ he said. ‘We prevailed, they didn’t.’”  (This “compromise” was that NATO not expand “one inch eastward”; the promise that Bush’s own Secretary of State had made to the then-Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, and on the basis of which Gorbachev allowed the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact to end and East Germany to be taken by West Germany.)

And so, the Cold War never really ended in the West (though Gorbachev was promised that it would); but, now, it might be finally forced to end, without a nuclear war (which continues to be the U.S. threat but becomes far less likely without there being allies for that on America’s side), because the current U.S. President’s intensification of the long-suppressed ongoing U.S. war against Russia is becoming too much for Germany, and for many other countries within the NATO alliance, to continue supporting. A serious international movement to destroy all nuclear weapons might even begin now.

The only NATO member-nations that are still highly supportive of America’s ongoing war against Russia are some former member-nations of the former Soviet Union and of the Soviet Union’s equivalent of NATO, the Warsaw Pact, which broke up in 1991 when the Soviet Union itself did. Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, are among the now-NATO, former Soviet and Warsaw Pact, nations that are as anti-Russian as is the American ruling class (which President Obama represents). However, America’s former allies when the United States used to be a democracy, the West-European nations, are now starting to abandon the U.S., and so too are some of the East-European nations that were formerly under the Soviet yoke, such as Czech Republic, and Hungary.

America’s deepest control extended especially into two nations: UK, and Germany. However, the decision that George Herbert Walker Bush made in 1990, and that has been adhered to by his successors, to continue the former Cold War until Russia itself is defeated and becomes added to the America Empire, is now being increasingly abandoned by America’s formerly obedient vassal-nations. The American Empire has reached its zenith, and is now breaking apart.

—————

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of  CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.

The Unspoken Tragedy In The Upcoming Greek Bailout

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/23/2015 13:54 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-06-23/unspoken-tragedy-upcoming-third-greek-bailout
A day after Tsipras stunned both his peers at the Eurogroup summit, and not to mention his fellow parliamentarians, many of which already voiced their opposition to what has been dubbed a "capitulation" by the Greek prime minister over threats of a financial system collapse if there is no deal within the week, many questions remain:

• will the Troika come back with even more demands such as boosting the hotel and restaurant VAT even higher (economic suicide for a nation where tourism is the only viable industry)?
• will the IMF concede that the Greek proposal will ever be sufficient if it does not incorporate the demanded pension cuts?
• will the deal pass Greek parliament; will a deal come too late to save the insolvent Greek banks?
• will Greece get a debt haircut (paradoxically as demanded by the same IMF which is also demanding spending cuts instead of tax hikes, over the objections of the ECB which holds the vast majority of Greek debt and is leery of impairments)?
• will the German parliament agree to validate any deal that may end up splitting Syriza in two or more factions?

While stock markets are convinced a deal is inevitable, after all the can must be kicked as it has been for the past five years...



... that may be more problematic than the algos expect. Here are some quotes showing that despite Tsipras' capitulation, few if any are ready to follow in his footsteps:
For example Austria:

Austria's finance minister said on Tuesday there would be no agreement on new Greek budget proposals unless there was a concrete plan showing how they would be carried out. But he added: "If there is no programme for actions that says what measure will be implemented when , we will not agree to it." "It should not, cannot, must not happen that a third (bailout) programme is started so to speak through the back door," he said. (Source)

or Germany:

 Members of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition said the International Monetary Fund’s backing for a financing plan for Greece is key to German parliamentary support for a deal.  “If there’s to be a payout, we need a detailed calculation by the IMF,” Antje Tillmann, the ranking Finance Committee member from Merkel’s Christian Democratic bloc, said by phone. “It has to add up to something sustainable.”

“For us, the IMF’s verdict is the benchmark for a credible, acceptable solution,” said Joachim Poss, deputy caucus leader in the lower house for the Social Democrats, Merkel’s junior coalition partner. (Source)

Or the IMF:

The IMF is still unhappy with key aspects of Greece’s new economic proposals and German officials were irritated by the speed with which the commission welcomed them, warning that much work needs to be done... IMF representatives have told European officials that they are also not satisfied yet by Greece’s broader economic overhaul plans beyond its budgetary promises. The IMF sees a wider, business-friendly shake-up of Greece’s economy as essential if the country is to improve its long-term economic growth. (Source)

Or impartial third parties:

“Very large problems remain for a solution,” said Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. “The Greek government -- somewhat surprising for a self-professed reform and anti- austerity government -- seems to have merely agreed to impose a lot more austerity through higher taxes, but offers relatively little commitment to genuine economic reform.” (Source)

And certainly Greece:

“Personally, I cannot support such an agreement that is contrary to our election promises,” Dimitris Kodelas, a Syriza lawmaker associated with former Maoists, said in an interview. “I do not care about the consequences of my decision.” (Source)

The litany continues, and yet, somehow, we expect that in the next 48 hours, the machinery will be again in motion to kick the can once again for third time.
What happens then is basically a precursor to a third bailout package, one which according to previous reports, will be about €35 billion if and when a deal gets done.
At which point, assuming the funds are wired to Greece, the Athens government can congraulate itself on a job well done, even though, as some critics above pointed out, it "merely agreed to impose a lot more austerity through higher taxes, but offers relatively little commitment to genuine economic reform."
One can ask: why didn't any of the previous government impose higher taxes in the past 5 years? The answer is they did, and nobody paid them. And this is why this latest pre-bailout will also be a failure, followed perhaps by bailout #4, #5 and so on.
All of this is known to everyone.
What isn't, or perhaps merely needs refreshing, is that assuming all of the above is resolved in a satisfactory matter, what will be the use of funds of this latest and greatest bailout of Greece.
Sadly, the answer is also well known. We showed it first back in 2011 when we asked, rhetorically, "where does the Greek bailout money go?"
So for those who don't recall, here is a refresher from Macropolis, which a few months ago showed that of the €226.7 billion euros disbursed to Greece since the first Greek bailout, an equivalent to almost 125% of Greece 2014 GDP, "the combined allocation to the Greek state’s operating needs was just 11 percent of the total funding, at circa 27 billion euros."


That's right: hundreds of billions "spent" to rescue Greece... with the vast amount of proceeds used to promptly repay the very sources of these funds: the IMF and the ECB.
So will this time be any different, and will the Greeks receive anything extra? Alas no, because here are the near-term Greek debt interest and maturity payments...



... and the longer term.

So to emphasize, just in case there is any confusion: whatever money Greece receives as part of its third pre-bailout, followed by another full-scale bailout which according to SocGen will amount to another €60-80 billion or more, followed by another... until all Greek collateral - including its gold - finally runs out, will be used first and foremost to satisfy Troika, pardon, creditor claims.
Which means that of this widely touted €35 billion, Greece will be lucky to pocket a little over €3 billion. However, considering that is how much the Greek government has already extracted out of various public pensions and municipalities as part of its quasi-capital controls unrolled previously to preserve the illusion of solvency, after the hard fought "deal" finally is inked, the Greek population will be left with...
€0.
And that, sadly, is the unspoken tragedy in the upcoming Greek bailout. Because while it is one thing to bend over backwards to Troika interests if one at least gets something out of the deal, we completely fail to see why the Syriza government is risking its entire reputation, and doing what it is doing when in the end the Greek population which elected the "radical leftist" party with such wild hope and optimism has absolutely nothing to show for it.

Greece Just Blew Up the Empire’s Death Star of Debt

Posted on February 2, 2015 by Charles Hugh Smith

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/ 

The Greek Elites and kleptocrats are terrified of the discipline that leaving the euro will impose, but the general public should welcome the transition to an economy and society that has been freed from the shackles of Imperial debt and the kleptocracy that has bled the nation dry.
Although the financial media is blathering about negotiations and gamesmanship, the truth is Greece just blew up the Empire’s Death Star of debt. There’s nothing left to negotiate except the official admission that the Imperial Death Star of debt, the most fearsome threat in the galaxy, has been blown to smithereens.

There are three fundamental points that need to be emphasized, mostly because they’ve been lost in handwringing, fearmongering and the ceaseless chatter of propaganda shills.
1. Impaired debt and defaults result from imprudent underwriting and lender incompetence/greed. Since when did it become accepted policy to reward imprudent lending, incompetence and greed?
Classical Capitalism is very clear on what should happen to lenders who ignored risk management; they get destroyed. As imprudently issued loans default, the losses pile up and the lender become insolvent. At that point, Capitalism kicks in and the management is fired, the stock goes to zero, the lender’s assets are auctioned off and the creditors are issued whatever remains after wages, taxes, accounts payable, etc. are paid.
There’s nothing complicated about it: Capitalism requires the discipline of losses being taken by those responsible, the firing of incompetents and the destruction of imprudent lenders.
Yet somehow the dominant narrative has reversed this essential core of Capitalism into blaming the borrower for the losses.
Look, if someone offers to loan me a billion dollars with no collateral and no assessment of the risks that I might not be able to pay the interest or principal, then who’s the fool? The idiot who wants to give me $1 billion without any risk assessment, or the borrower who takes the “free money” being offered?
Yes, no one should borrow money that they can’t pay back, blah blah blah, but theprimary fiduciary responsibility is on the lender to not offer loans to marginal borrowers and those at high risk of defaulting on their debts.
Yet the official line on debt is “the lenders are blameless, the borrowers are at fault and should pay.” The borrowers were imprudent to take on debt they couldn’t service, but it is the lenders who made the bad loans who are ultimately are at fault and who should suck all the losses.
Let’s set aside the propaganda for a moment and get real: anyone with the slightest knowledge of Greek finances and the power structure of the Greek economy/society knew it was insanely risky to loan Greece billions of euros. No one can deny this, yet somehow the lenders deserve to be paid for their avarice, stupidity, incompetence and total disregard for the standards of prudent lending? No, they deserve to be destroyed–closed down and their assets auctioned off.
2. Greece will not be wiped out by leaving the euro currency–it will be freed to rebuilt itself with prudent fiscal management and policies that reward investment and penalize risky borrowing, speculation and corruption.
Here’s the thing about Greece issuing its own fiat currency–it will force fiscal discipline in a way that the euro did not and could not. This is why the Greek Status Quo is quivering with fear–the gravy train of irresponsibility enabled by the euro is ending, and they are terrified of living within their means and having to face the discipline that the market will impose on the Greek fiat currency.
If there’s one thing Greece needs more than anything, it’s the discipline and the rewards of the market. Any nation that issues its own fiat currency has a choice: it can exercise fiscal prudence and enforce policies that reward entrepreneurism, prudent lending, savings, wise investments, fair taxation, etc., or it can try to prop up its bloated, corrupt kleptocracy by printing rivers of fiat money.
If it chooses the Dark Side and prints money in excess, it will soon drive the value of that currency to near-zero. The kleptocracy that hoped to benefit from money-printing is impoverished or forced to move their capital elsewhere.
In other words, Greece returning to being responsible for its own currency is a good thing. The new currency will be valued cheaply relative to other currencies at first, and this is also a good thing, as imports will be unaffordable for all but the wealthy (kiss BMW sales in Greece good-bye) and everything produced in Greece becomes a bargain globally.
This will attract capital seeking places where it can make a profit and is treated fairly, and it will enable Greece to rebuild its export sector and boost its substantial tourist trade.
The promise that marginal borrowers would be transformed into sterling-credit borrowers by adopting the euro was always a fantasy–and a painfully visible fantasy at that. Anyone with their eyes even partially open could see that the vast differences in productivity, credit, risk and culture between the eurozone nations made the euro unworkable from the start.
It was equally visible that the eurozone’s inept policies and loose lending standards would obscure these fundamental differences until the damage would be too great to hide–which is exactly what transpired.
3. The hundreds of billions of euros in so-called bailouts did not help Greece–all they did was bail out imprudent lenders and Euroland Elites. Virtually none of these vast sums helped the Greek nation or its people; what little did stay in Greece flowed to the kleptocrats that continued to rule Greece.

The harsh reality of misrule and corruption was recently spelled out in Misrule of the Few: How the Oligarchs Ruined Greece:

“Greece has failed to address (rising wealth/income inequality) because the country’s elites have a vested interest in keeping things as they are. Since the early 1990s, a handful of wealthy families — an oligarchy in all but name — has dominated Greek politics. These elites have preserved their positions through control of the media and through old-fashioned favoritism, sharing the spoils of power with the country’s politicians. Greek legislators, in turn, have held on to power by rewarding a small number of professional associations and public-sector unions that support the status quo. Even as European lenders have put the country’s finances under a microscope, this arrangement has held.”

Greece just blew up the Death Star of debt, and now the threat has been lifted from other debtor nations suffering from the yoke of Imperial misrule. The Greek Elites and kleptocrats are terrified of the discipline that leaving the euro will impose, but the general public should welcome the transition to an economy and society that has been freed from the shackles of Imperial debt and the kleptocracy that has bled the nation dry.