Engdahl: 'Greek Bailout Terms Remind of Hitler Epoch'

Source: RT

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is urging her lawmakers to support the new rescue package for Greece. This despite worries that Athens will need even more cash in the future, and suggestions from Germany's Interior Minister that it's time Greece left the Eurozone altogether. The 130-billion euro bailout was agreed in principle last week after months of tense discussions among the Eurozone leaders. Germany, as Europe's richest economy, has to contribute the majority towards it. But there is a sense of unease in Berlin that it will have to keep coughing up cash to prevent a Greek debt default. It's the second bailout in a little over 18 months would ensure Athens can pay its debtors for the time being. To discuss the possible outcome of this package, RT is joined by political analyst William Engdahl.

Germany and France Push for Fiscal Union

Source: AFP

German Chancellor Angela Merkel kicked off a crunch week of talks on saving the euro by laying out a vision Friday for a “fiscal union” in Europe, ahead of a pivotal summit of EU leaders.

A day after French President Nicolas Sarkozy said that Europe needed to be “refounded” in response to a crisis that has threatened the very existence of the EU, Merkel insisted that progress had been made.

Speaking in a hotly awaited speech in the German parliament, Merkel said Europe was “on the verge” of creating what she called a “stability union” for the 17-nation eurozone, with greater budgetary discipline and control.

“Anyone who had said a few months ago that we, at the end of 2011, would be taking very serious and concrete steps toward a European stability union, a European fiscal union, toward introducing (budgetary) intervention in Europe would have been considered crazy,” she said.

She said she would be holding talks with “almost everyone” in the run-up to a summit in Brussels next Friday that many commentators have dubbed the last chance to save the single currency, introduced with such euphoria a decade ago.

And she confirmed she would be heading to Paris for talks with Sarkozy on Monday to thrash out a joint Franco-German position on changing the EU founding texts ahead of the summit.

Highlighting the challenges that face Europe’s leaders, around 17,000 people demonstrated in Athens on Thursday in a bid to force the new government to abandon austerity measures.

The sixth general strike this year in Greece shut down public services and crippled train and ferry services.

The Coming European Superstate That Germany Plans to Cram Down the Throats of the Rest of Europe

Source: The Economic Collapse

A lot of people were puzzled about what German Chancellor Angela Merkel meant when she recently stated that the ultimate solution to the financial crisis in the EU would "mean more Europe, not less Europe".  Well, now we are finding out.  A leaked internal German government memo entitled "The Future of the EU: Required Integration Policy Improvements for the Creation of a Stability Union" actually proposes the creation of a "European Monetary Fund" which would be given the power to run the economies of troubled European nations.  This "stability union" would be quickly followed by the creation of a full-fledged "political union".  Essentially, this leaked memo proposes the creation of a "European Superstate" which will be crammed down the throats of the rest of Europe whether they like it or not.  National sovereignty would be a thing of the past and European bureaucrats would run everything.  Of course this will never be accepted by the people of Europe until they feel the bitter pain of the coming financial collapse, but we are starting to see that there is already a clear plan for what the Germans wish to implement in the aftermath of the coming crisis.

A lot of people have just assumed that if there is a massive financial collapse in Europe and the euro crashes that it will mean that end of the euro and potentially the breakup of the EU.  But that is not what the Germans have planned at all.

An article in the Telegraph has posted details about the leaked internal German government memo mentioned above.  It really is startling to see that a full-fledged "political union" in Europe is being discussed at the highest levels of the German government....

The six-page memo, by the German foreign office, argues that Europe’s economic powerhouses should be able to intervene in how beleaguered eurozone countries are run.

The confidential blueprint sets out Germany’s plan to tackle the eurozone debt crisis by creating a “stability union” that will be “immediately followed by moves “on the way towards a political union”.

It will prompt fears that Germany’s euro crisis plans could result in a European super-state with spending and tax plans set in Brussels.

Can you imagine what Europe would look like under such a plan?

National sovereignty would be a thing of the past.

Another article in the Telegraph says that the leaked memo proposes that immediately a "European Monetary Fund" should be set up that would have the power to take over and run the economies of European nations that get into too much debt.  But according to the memo this would just be an intermediate step toward a full "political union"....

The six-page German foreign ministry paper sets out plans for the creation of a European Monetary Fund with a transfer of sovereignty away from member states.

The fund will have the power to take ailing countries into receivership and run their economies. Even more controversially, the document, entitled The future of the EU: required integration policy improvements for the creation of a Stability Union, declares that the treaty changes are a first stage “in which the EU will develop into a political union”. “The debate on the way towards a political union must begin as soon as the course toward stability union is charted,” it concludes.

As the crisis in Europe has gotten worse, the Germans have become more aggressive about throwing their weight around.  At this point, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is the most important politician in Europe and she has been taking the lead in responding to this financial crisis.

As I have written about previously, there have been persistent rumors that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have been "secretly plotting" to create a "new eurozone" that will fundamentally change the way that Europe is run.

Towards Economic Collapse: Europe’s Debt Crisis has Spiraled out of Control

Source: The International Forecaster
Bob Chapman

As Chancellor Merkel and PM Sarkozy search for a solution that doesn’t exist they continue to lose credibility. Nothing of substance has been agreed upon that is legal and can be implemented. At the IMF Christina LeGarde is frantically waving her arms like a cheerleader telling anyone that will listen that if the six sovereigns in financial trouble are not aided the euro will fail and peace in Europe will disappear. The elitists are frantic because they cannot find a solution. LeGarde says without help there will be ten years of depression. She obviously hasn’t done her homework. Try 30 or more years. Sarkozy, Merkel and Jans Weidmann council member of the ECB has said the ECB cannot bail out governments by printing money. He is also head of the Bundesbank and said a key lesson of what is being proposed is the hyperinflation in Weimer Republic, which followed WWI. Over in Italy PM Berlusconi, who looks and acts like Benito Mussolini has been unseated and as a result the Italian bond market is on the edge of collapse. There is big pressure downward in stock and bond markets as a result and the US Treasury again attacks gold and silver hoping they can keep gold from breaking about $1,800. The PPT’s ability to achieve this is more than questionable.

At Cannes PM Sarkozy and President Obama discuss what a liar Israel’s PM Netanyahu is. Their candor was accidentally picked up by a supposedly muted speaker. What is now realized is that euro zone government bonds contain unexpected credit risks. All the European politicians and bureaucrats want to save the euro, but their promises and solutions are not worth the paper they are written on. They are so believable that China won’t lend them money. These characters have been kicking the can down the road since last spring with little or no long-term solutions, and no solutions to affect a recovery and create jobs. Austerity has replaced growth and that is expediting a failing economy, even in Germany. If economies don’t grow tax receipts fall and the ability to service debt is impaired. Big euro zone banks are broke just as their counterparts in NYC are. As this proceeds we ask how long can the ECB buy Italian and Spanish bonds?

In Greece a coalition has been made and Mr. Samaras has shown his true colors by backing Trilateral-Bilderberg Lucas Papademos, as interim PM. We hope Greek citizens realize that Papademos will sell them out. It is only a matter of when. The debt deal will probably be ratified, but at what price? Will it bring revolution or a coup? Who knows, but under the circumstances anything goes. 60% to 65% of Greeks oppose the bailout, but 71% want to stay in the euro, which is impossible.

Germany and France Begin Talks to Break Up Eurozone

Source: The Guardian
Larry Elliott, Heather Stewart and John Hooper

Fears that Europe's sovereign debt crisis was spiralling out of control have intensified as political chaos in Athens and Rome, and looming recession, created panic on world markets.

Reports emerging from Brussels said that Germany and France had begun preliminary talks on a break-up of the eurozone, amid fears that Italy would be too big to rescue.

Despite Silvio Berlusconi's announcement that he would step down as prime minister once austerity measures were pushed through parliament, a collapse of investor confidence in the eurozone's third-biggest economy sent interest rates in Italy to the levels that triggered bailouts in Portugal, Greece and Ireland.