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The International Journal of INCLUSIVE DEMOCRACY, Vol. 11, Nos. 1/2 (Winter-Summer 2015)


A major turning point in Greece for better or worse (2nd edition)*

TAKIS FOTOPOULOS

 

(01.02. 2015)

  

Abstract: The aim of this article is to examine the real significance of Syriza’s victory in Greece, particularly in view of allegations that it represents a historic victory for the Left, as well as the prospects for the future of Greece in terms of this major, but also ambivalent, turning point in its history.

 

There is no doubt that the Greek people’s vote in the January 2015 elections was a big slap in the face of the Transnational Elite, which was represented in Greece through all these years of the economic and social catastrophe imposed on the vast majority of the population by the infamous Troika (EU, IMF, ECB), as well as by its clients in the local elite. Yet, it was the same TE and its European component (the EU elite), which has destroyed the lives of the vast majority of the population in their effort to “save” Greece from bankruptcy. However, the debt trap to which Greece entered since the 1980s, as I showed elsewhere,[1] was directly related to the very integration of Greece into the EU and the Eurozone. It was through this integration process that Greece lost a significant degree of self-reliance that had achieved in the post-war period, and a parasitic economic structure developed in which, apart from tourism and shipping, there were no other main sources of income to buy the growing imports that the open and liberalized markets of the EU Treaties imposed. The inevitable outcome was the huge balance of payment (BP) deficits which were financed by foreign lending, as well as the parallel budget deficits to finance a growing welfare state, as the local elites were not prepared to share the tax burden for its financing ― a practice which inevitably spread to society at large soon.

So, when the elites decided to integrate Greece into the Eurozone, the country not only formally lost its economic sovereignty but also borrowing (backed now by a strong currency) continued and expanded, until the entire bubble burst when foreign lending became more difficult due to the financial crisis of 2008-9. This is, in a nutshell, how Greece became a protectorate of the TE.[2]

The inevitable conclusion of such an analysis is that austerity is a symptom of the crisis, not its cause and refers to the distortion, if not dismantlement, of the production and consumption structures that the New World Order (NWO) of neoliberal globalization imposed, as part of the process of integrating countries into it, for the benefit of the Transnational Corporations which control the entire process. So, although the result of the Greek elections, directly, was a slap against the austerity policies imposed by the TE though the Troika, indirectly, it was a slap against the TE and the EU themselves. Indirectly, because of the huge attempt to disorient the people by Syriza, which won the elections on the basis of a political platform according to which the causes of the crisis were just some bad policies imposed by bad politicians and economists, so that all that was needed was to elect some good politicians and economists to force the baddies to change policies.

Yet, given that the parties which supported the continuation of the same policies (i.e. the “pure” pro EU parties ― New Democracy/ Pasok, the governing coalition, together with Potami (a new systemic party created by the elites a year ago exactly in order to promote the same line under the cover of the “incorrupt party”), gained about 40 percent of the votes, in an election in which the formal abstention rate was 40percent ― but the effective rate could be 25-30 percent, this means that, the proportion of the population determined to stay in the EU whatever the cost, at most, amounts to a third of it. Another third of the population would be prepared to stay in the EU but not unconditionally, in case the national interest is at risk (as the present governing coalition suggests (Syriza/ ANEL-Independent Greeks) and the last third does not believe that any real solution is possible within the EU. Roughly, this division coincides with a corresponding social division of the population between one third who are the beneficiaries of globalization, one third that just manages to cover its basic needs and the last third, which has been completely impoverished.

Clearly, Syriza simply succeeded to attract this middle third of the population ― the middle class that is being gradually being eliminated and the petty bourgeoisie in the private and public sectors. Most of the working class, the unemployed and the poor either abstained or, as statistics of how the vote was spread geographically show, voted mainly for the Communist Party (KKE) and the Golden Dawn Party (GD), which has clear sympathies towards the collaborators of the Nazis during the German Occupation and then to the Right in the ensuing Civil War and the military junta in the 1960s. Not accidentally, as Joaquin Flores, aptly points out,

“The GD, interestingly, calls both for nationalization of the gold industry, as well as other major industries, and the central bank. Those are among the real economic changes that would liberate Greece, and yet on the left, only the Communist Party (KKE) of Greece holds a similar position. That only the most radical parties have the most sensible and honest solutions to Greece’s present problem, presents a special problem for Greece. In Toynbee’s Study of History he develops the concept of civilizations going through stages of growth and later disintegration, as well as abortive and failed civilizations. It would seem that a hallmark of a disintegrating, abortive, or failed civilization is when the most sensible solutions are entirely marginalized and only held by those on the radical fringes.”[3]

In fact, the Communist party has long ago been marginalized, since it was banned for over a quarter of a century after its defeat in the Civil War and then was legalized following the fall of the military junta in 1974, on the condition that it will abandon any revolutionary tactics. On the other hand, Golden Dawn is effectively banned today, with most of its leadership in jail without trial and no access to the mass media ― all this with the consent of the Left, both antisystemic and reformist ― although formally it is still legal!

Under these circumstances, Syriza’s gamble clearly succeeded, despite the fact that its program did not even question Greece’s membership of the EU and the Eurozone and did not even include any radical measures to nationalize banks (including the Bank of Greece) and any key industries, as well as any real controls on the markets for commodities, capital and labor. However, the lack of such controls (not permissible under the EU Treaties) makes impossible any radical program to re-create a productive base, with the aim of self-reliance. No wonder the implementation of their economic program was left to postmodern technocrats like the present “pop Tsar of the economy” who obviously has no clue about globalization and still believes in some sort of Keynesian solutions to the present crisis. On this matter, that sort of orthodox economists, found good company in some Paleolithic Marxists in Syriza, who share the same ignorance of globalization, although even this kind of Marxists should have at least a better understanding of History and not make silly and a-historical proposals about the Greek debt, based on the 1953 London Agreement on German External Debts. Even people with a rudimentary idea of the Marxist theory of History should be able to understand that this was a clear ploy by the Western elites, at the moment that the Cold War was intensifying, to boost their client regime in West Germany, with the ultimate aim to achieve the dismantlement of the Soviet bloc and the creation of the present unipolar world. For such an analogy to be valid today, the West (i.e. the TE) should be concerned that unless such an arrangement can be made with Greece, the country will leave the NWO. But, such an idea is not included even in the wildest dreams of the SYRIZA leadership and (thanks mainly to their own disorientation of the people on the matter) even among the majority of the people!

Yet, in one sense, even this first inadequate step that the Greek people took in ostracizing the political parties of the elites, was a victory. Not “a historic victory of the Left” in Greece (or for some more enthusiastic commentators and analysts “of the liberal Left in Europe and beyond”) but in the sense that it marked a turning point in the usual submission of the people to the dictates of the elites. A turning point which, potentially ― but only potentially ― could lead to radical developments in the future, as long as the self-contradictory theories and policies suggested by the liberal Left are overcome. This, because the people sooner or later will realize why the policies suggested by the strange mix of neo-Keynesian/Marxist economists, in fact, aim to square the circle and will dismally fail in bringing about any real solutions to the critical situation created by Greece’s integration into the NWO. Clearly, all those economists and politicians have not yet realized (or at least pretend so) that Keynesianism has been dead and buried since the rise of globalization, as it was based on sovereign nation-states that today are being phased out together with economic sovereignty ― and therefore national sovereignty. So, at most, what parties like Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain can achieve, as I tried to show above, is to stick some plasters on the deadly wounds created by the crisis, in the form of a few billion Euros, to re-appoint some of those sacked in the public sector and to cover the essential needs for food, health, energy etc. of the very poor. But, all “reforms” introduced by the Troika aiming to make labor more “flexible,” capital to move without any constraints and cheap commodities from abroad to crowd out domestic products, will of course remain intact. 

The main developments that followed the election of Syriza are fully compatible with the above analysis, particularly as regards the composition of the new government that is full of the kind of politicians and economists I just described. Yet there are also two developments which could potentially have a double meaning, one compatible with the above analysis and another one that may imply at least the possibility of a radical change in the future.

The first is the composition of the governing coalition itself. Syriza had a choice, either to have a coalition with a party created by the elites just a few months ago (Potami ― whose main condition was that the country’s orientation with the EU and the Eurozone will never be challenged!), or with the nationalist party of independent Greeks (ANEL) which is fiercely anti-austerity and does not have any qualms about setting conditions to the Troika that might potentially lead to a break.  Syriza has chosen the latter and its choice could simply be interpreted as an action to avoid losing all credibility, as it would have been the case had it supported a coalition with perhaps the most systemic party in Greece at the moment, given that the only other alternative choice Syriza in fact had was KKE, which had already declined, rightly, any coalition with SYRIZA, mainly on the basis of the fundamental differences between the to parties on the EU issue. Alternatively, it could be interpreted as a choice imposed by some forces within the party that do not rule out a conflict with the EU, in case the Euro-elites finally show unwilling to make any significant compromises to keep Greece on board. Unsurprisingly, however, this choice was not liked at all by the TE, its media and the “Left” controlled by it, which began a smear campaign against ANEL as a fascist, anti-Semitic and racist party. Of course ANEL is not a fascist party as well known Leftist-patriots were elected under its flag, while its “anti-semitism” consists in the fact that its leader stated that Greek Jews pay less taxes than the Greeks ― a factual statement which is either true, or not, in which case it will be one of the silly unsubstantiated statements political leaders of all colors often do. As regards racism, ANEL’s policy on immigrants is that illegal immigrants arriving in Greece should be allowed to move to Western Europe, which is well known that it is their real final destination, but Greece is not allowed to do so by the EU Dublin Treaty it signed! No wonder a vicious attack by the “Left” began against ANEL, led by Daniel Cohn-Bendit ― this is the “red Danny” who, once he “matured,” became one of the main organs of the TE that supported enthusiastically all its criminal wars), as well as all the transnational mass media (Guardian etc.). Even Michael Albert of Znet (a well known network for directly or indirectly supporting the Arab “revolutionaries” on Libya and Syria[4]) had this to say about the Syriza coalition with ANEL: 

“I can only hope it has no lasting meaning regarding Syriza’s views on social issues like immigration, etc. Perhaps the logic is, these guys are so reactionary they are obviously not going to have any effect at all on Syriza’s views or choices ― whereas an alliance with a group that was less reactionary might be misread in that way.”[5]

However, the very fact that the Syriza government did not express any protest when Martin Schulz, the European Parliament President, made the first official visit by the Euro-elite after the election of Syriza and behaved like a new Gauleiter, is highly indicative. This insolent guy, whom Farage, the leader of UKIP, rightly resembled to a concentration camp guard, deliberately offended the leader of the coalition party (ANEL), by not visiting him during his official visit immediately after the elections, (as it is the usual diplomatic protocol for coalition partners) and, instead, visiting the leader of Potami in a clear attempt to promote even more this super-systemic party,[6] for which the elites have high hopes to play the role of the kingmaker in any future political crisis. Then the Syriza leadership allowed this new Gauleiter to blatantly intervene in domestic affairs and say to the Potami leader, in front of all cameras, that Syriza should had a coalition with his party rather than with the Independent Greeks! Tsipras, who supposedly was elected to restore the wounded pride of the Greek population ― following the continuous humiliations of the last few years when some of its lenders did not have any qualms about suggesting that Greece had to sell the Parthenon to repay the loan ― instead of kicking out this representative of the Euro-elites who treated, yet again, Greece as a protectorate of the TE, was seen embracing him like an old friend! 

The second development was the public display of disagreement by the governing coalition against the EU elites’ obvious intention to ignore Syriza in their decision to blame the pro-Russia rebels (and indirectly Russia itself) for the recent attack on Mariupol and threaten new stricter sanctions against Russia. In the event, when the meeting of EU foreign ministers took place at the end of January to discuss the sanctions, the Greek foreign minister “forgot” all the objections to sanctions, in principle, made in the past by both Tsipras and himself and accepted the continuation of sanctions, provided that the matter will be discussed again in September (instead of next year as it was the original proposal!) And of course, as Federica Mogherini, the European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs said after the meeting in Brussels, “we have shown that the EU is ready to take further measures and to prepare further measures in the weeks to come if the situation doesn’t improve.”[7] In other words, if the EU elite, at any moment in the next few weeks, are informed by their puppets in Ukraine that “things are not going well for them,” the plan for much stricter sanctions will be back on the table and this time it will be voted by everybody, including the pseudo-rebel Greek Foreign Minister. This is in fact an utterly opportunistic politician, who, as the Financial Times reported, “has espoused increasingly nationalist positions, developing a relationship with Alexander Dugin, the Russian nationalist philosopher, during several visits to Moscow, according to a colleague who declined to be identified”[8] (as it is well known Dugin is one of the pioneers of the original conception of the Eurasian Union). Yet, the same guy, at the EU Foreign Ministers meeting, fully endorsed the western line on Ukraine. Thus, at the very day Panagiotis Lafazanis, the Energy Minister and leader of the Left faction within Syriza was declaring that “We are against the embargo that has been imposed against Russia...We have no differences with Russia and the Russian people,” here is what Kotzias was doing at the meeting, revealed by the Guardian and the Daily Mail:

According to Italy’s foreign minister, Kotzias announced to the meeting: “I am not a Russian puppet.” He signed up to a sharply worded statement that declared Moscow responsible for the violence in eastern Ukraine and demanded it halt its backing for the separatists…”We are not against every sanction,” Kotzias said later. "We are in the mainstream, we are not the bad boys."”[9]

However, this was not the end of the utter opportunism of Syriza and its government. Following the above FT report, the new “Left” Greek Foreign Minister (who is well known for his specialization in political opportunism, having moved from a communist cadre in KKE to the crooks of PASOK and Giorgakis Papandreou to SYRIZA) had no qualms about proceeding to a clear self-ridicule, with the obvious aim to make himself pleasant to his bosses in the EU and the TE elites. Thus, not only in a statement next day he denied that he ever went to Moscow to meet Dugin but he went on to declare that he never invited Dugin in one of his lectures at the University and that, in effect, Dugin invited himself to give a lecture on April 12, 2013![10] Of course, anybody who has taught at a university is fully aware of the impossibility of somebody inviting himself to give a lecture, at the time allotted to another lecturer, with no permission given by either him and/ or the University.

Yet, the EU Foreign Ministers meeting was a unique opportunity for the SYRIZA government to express a negative stand on sanctions, effectively vetoing them. Such an action would have been a very serious blow to the TE at a moment when its attack against Russia has sharply intensified, with the puppet regime’s parliament in Kiev demanding from the UN, NATO etc. to declare Russia an “aggressor state”[11] and the British establishment paper The Times promoting the view (in a first page report) that Putin is “nothing more than a common criminal dressed up as a head of state”![12] Clearly such an attack, accompanied by the classifying of RT in the same league as ISIS,[13] shows an obvious TE intention to demonize Russia and its leadership, in exactly the same way as it did with Iraq and Saddam or Libya and Gadhafi, just before the launching of the brutal attacks against them. So, it seems that the initial hostile Greek reaction on sanctions referred only to the procedure about taking a decision on them rather than to the substance of the issue itself. In this sense, Flores’ comment on the matter was again on the spot, that is, that all the fuss was because Syriza just attempted a tactical move,  so that “they can leverage the threat of going along with the Russia-Turkish gas line (South stream 2.0/ Nabucco Revisited) in order to get permission from the Troika (European Commission, International Monetary Fund, European Central Bank) to use more debt in order to mitigate austerity.”[14]  Once however, European Parliament President Martin Schulz, who was visiting Athens on the same day threatened Tsipras not to use the issue of sanctions as a leverage, the latter did an about turn on the sanctions issue and toed the EU line!

In conclusion, there are two main options available to the new Greek Government:

a) either the road of submission to the demands of the TE and the EU, with some concessions granted by the elites in exchange (e.g. on the conditions of repayment of the debt or perhaps even the haircut of part of it), which will not however affect the main structural reforms already imposed. Namely, the opening and liberalization of markets and the consequent completion of the process of depriving Greece of the capability to regain any economic sovereignty in the future, from controlling its own currency up to controlling its fiscal policy ― and consequently its national sovereignty. The inevitable outcome of this effective about turn by Syriza will be to simply perpetuate the present economic and social catastrophe and lead to the death of the Left in Mediterranean Europe, following the death of it in the rest of Europe. Inevitably, in this case, the gap will be filled either by the nationalist anti-EU parties or by Popular Front governments.

b) or the road of resistance, which involves the immediate unilateral exit from both the EU and the Eurozone that will allow the introduction of strict capital controls and the re-introduction of the national currency, the nationalization of all banks including the Bank of Greece, the socialization of all key industries covering basic needs, as well as those involving the social wealth (oil, lignite, gold etc.). Needless to add that the geopolitical orientations of Greece should also change drastically, so that it will not be the subject of a new “coup from below,” like the one the TE successfully engineered in Ukraine. For this purpose, the exit from the EU should be accompanied by a parallel application to join the Eurasian Union, so that in case Cyprus and Turkey also join it (as it is highly likely), all of them, as equal sovereign states, will be able to take part in negotiations to sort out rationally and in the spirit of solidarity all geopolitical and economic problems between them. Namely, all those problems which, up to now, have been used by the West and later the TE in order to divide the peoples in this part of the Mediterranean, so that they could better control them, while at the same time they could continuously expand their highly profitable sales of weapons to them. In this way, the foundations for a new truly democratic community of sovereign nations will be created, in place of the present criminal New World Order.

On the basis of Syriza’s actions in the first 100 hours (no need for one to wait 100 days!) it is absolutely safe for one to conclude that (a) is the option chosen by the disorienting reformist Left that took over in Greece! Furthermore, during the same short period of the first 100 hours they showed all the deception they used to seize power. A few months ago Tsipras and Syriza were declaring their intent to tear down the “memorandum” (as the bailout agreement is known in Greece). Then, 48 hours after their victory in the January elections, Giannis Dragasakis, the deputy prime minister, who is expected to oversee negotiations with the EU and International Monetary Fund, stated that “the memorandum is over for us. We will present our own programme,”[15] clearly meaning that the Government would renegotiate with the Troika the terms of the bailout agreement. Then, before another 48 hours have passed came the final climbdown. As Yanis Varoufakis (the newly appointed “pop” finance minister, with an upper middle class backround perfectly fitted to the “caviar Left” he represents), stated:

“We’re not in the business of entering into a tug of war with Europe. We don’t even want to negotiate with our European creditors. We just want to deliberate.”[16]

Of course, this is hardly surprising as both the EU elites and Syriza share a common aim: to keep Greece inside the EU and, if possible the Eurozone as well.  What the EU and the TE in fact dread is not any economic damage which might be caused by Grexit (this is absolutely manageable at present) but the fact that, in case Greece in the future follows radical policies involving the break with the NOW, this will set an example to all other peoples in the world suffering from globalization and the TNCs ― something they could hardly afford. No wonder that at the time of writing they have already accepted structural reforms i.e. all reforms to increase competitiveness (most of which are based on the maximization of the role of the private sector and the minimization of social controls aiming to protect society from the markets (as Polanyi has put it), as well as the principle of balanced budgets with a “small” surplus ― a basic tool of austerity policies. The final outcome of all this saga, which is promoted by the TE media as some sort of “David vs. Goliath” struggle, is in fact predetermined and described well by the flagship of the capitalist financial press, the Wall Street Journal:

“Publicly, Syriza has demanded a major restructuring of Greece’s bailout loans, but in private, Greek officials say they are hoping for a repetition of concessions Europe has previously made: extending loan maturities and trimming and postponing interest payments. That would allow Greece to spend a little more and tax a little less than under previous plans, giving its depressed economy some oxygen. European officials say Syriza will still have to curtail some of its spending promises.”[17]

 

P.S.

At the time of writing news came in about the press conference given by the “pop Tsar of the Economy” in Paris, following his discussions with the French Finance Minister Michel Sapin. It is now obvious that a huge disorienting campaign has been launched by the Greek government, in association with the EU elites and the TE elite, to promote the forthcoming Greek climbdown. It seems that a compromise is in the offing, which would include “the refinancing of the government and the Greek banking system, ending austerity and placing the focus on growth.”[18] Of course, given that everybody concerned in the TE, from the Euro-elites up to Obama, set as a basic precondition for any bargain the strict implementation of structural reforms, this implies that what the “rebel” Greek government aims at the moment is the implementation of the same measures as before (perhaps in a milder form) under different names. Instead of a “Troika,” there may be some sort of supervisory committee representing again the same institutions (IMF, EU, ECB) and having more or less the functions of the Troika, and instead of austerity, the overall aim will now be growth. Yet, for growth to be achieved in a market economy in which public investment has to be minimised, private investors (foreign and local) have to undertake the task to make the economy more competitive. That means the state has to assist their effort by even more structural reforms to make labor more competitive, less corporate taxes and, at the same time, “small budget surpluses” to repay the lenders presumably though more privatizations, and/or public sector cuts. In other words, all this fuss was about fooling the Greek people in accepting more or less the same measures as before, packaged differently! No wonder the “pop Tsar” stressed during the same interview that “Europe comes first,”[19] while showing at the same time his deep ignorance on the development problems created in an economic union of members at unequal levels of development. Every economist, even second year students in Economics, know that even within the same country there are huge regional differences within a market economy, let alone within a Union like the Eurozone, for which it was noted that “so wildly different are Europe’s economies that one study found it would have been more logical to create a currency union between countries beginning with the letter “M” than between the current members.”[20] Yet, the “charismatic” Mr Varoufakis argued today that any one raising the matter of “Southerners” vs. “Northerners” within the EU is an anti-European. All this was of course music to the elites’ ears, especially coming from a representative of the first “far left” government in Europe…


 

* This is an expanded version, in view of new developments, of the article below. “A major turning point in Greece for better or worse” (29.01.2015).


[2] See Takis Fotopoulos, Greece as a Protectorate of the Transnational Elite (Athens: Gordios, 2010)-in Greek.

[3] Joaquin Flores, Meaningful Economic Reforms Could Come Through BRICS and Russia?,” Global Research (27/1/2015).  

[4] see for evidence, Takis Fotopoulos, Subjugating the Middle East, Vol. II (to be published later in the year by Progressive Press).

[5] Michael Albert & Tom Vouloumanos “SYRIZA, Greece & the American radical left,” Znet (28/1/2013).  

[6] Schulz: “Potami is preferable than ANEL for a coalition with Syriza” Naftemporiki (29.01.2015).   (in Greek).

[8] Sam Jones et al., “Alarm bells ring over Syriza’s Russian links,” The Financial Times (28/1/2015).

[9] Robin Emmott and Pavel Polityuk, “EU wins Greek backing to extend Russia sanctions, delays decision on new steps,” Mail Online (31/1/2015).  

[11]Ukrainian MPs call on UN, NATO & PACE to recognize Russia as ‘aggressor state’,” RT (27/1/2015).

[12] Deborah Haynes, “Litvinenko was to expose ‘criminal’ Putin,” The Times (28/1/2015).

[13]Head of US state media put RT on same challenge list as ISIS, Boko Haram,” RT (23/1/2015).

[14] Joaquin Flores, “Meaningful Economic Reforms Could Come Through BRICS and Russia?”

[15] Kerin Hope et.al., “Alexis Tsipras to hold talks in Athens with eurogroup chairman,” The Financial Times (29/1/2015).

[16] Anthee Carassava, “We don’t want tug-of-war over debt, Greeks tell EU,” The Times (30/1/2015).

[17] Marcus Walker, Stelios Bouras and Nektaria Stamouli, “As Greece and EU Clash, Clues on Deal Emerge,” Wall Street Journal (31/1/2015).

[18] Wolfgang Münchau, “Grexit is an avoidable catastrophe for the Eurozone,” The Financial Times (1/2/2015).

[19]  “Greece Finance Minister Varoufakis: ‘Europe comes first’,” BBC News (1/2/2015).

[20] Camilla Cavendish, “Have a heart Mrs Merkel. After all, Berlin helped write this Greek tragedy,” The Sunday Times (1/2/2015).

 

 


A major turning point in Greece for better or worse*

TAKIS FOTOPOULOS

(29.01.2015)

 

Abstract: The aim of this article is to examine the real significance of Syriza’s victory in Greece, particularly in view of allegations that it represents a historic victory for the Left, as well as the prospects for the future of Greece in terms of this major, but also ambivalent, turning point in its history.

 

There is no doubt that the Greek people’s vote last Sunday was a big slap in the face of the Transnational Elite (TE ― the elites based in the G7 countries), which was represented in Greece through all these years of the economic and social catastrophe imposed on the vast majority of the population by the infamous Troika (EU, IMF, ECB), as well as by its clients in the local elite. Yet, it was the same TE and its European component (the EU elite), which has destroyed the lives of the vast majority of the population in their effort to ‘save’ Greece from bankruptcy. However, the debt trap to which Greece entered since the 1980s, as I showed elsewhere,[1] was directly related to the very integration of Greece into the EU and the Eurozone. It was through this integration process that Greece lost a significant degree of self-reliance that had achieved in the post-war period, and a parasitic economic structure developed in which, apart from tourism and shipping, there were no other main sources of income to buy the growing imports that the open and liberalized markets of the EU Treaties imposed. The inevitable outcome was the huge BP deficits which were financed by foreign lending, as well as the parallel budget deficits to finance a growing welfare state, as the local elites were not prepared to share the tax burden for its financing ― a practice which inevitably spread to society at large soon. When the elites decided to integrate Greece into the Eurozone, the country not only formally lost its economic sovereignty but also borrowing (backed now by a strong currency) continued and expanded until the entire bubble burst when foreign lending became more difficult due to the financial crisis of 2008-9. This is, in a nutshell, how Greece became a protectorate of the TE.[2]

The inevitable conclusion of such an analysis is that austerity is a symptom of the crisis, not its cause that refers to the distortion, if not dismantlement, of the production and consumption structures that the NWO of neoliberal globalization imposes as part of the process of integrating countries into it, for the benefit of the Transnational Corporations which control the entire process. So, although the result of the Greek elections, directly, was a slap against the austerity policies imposed by the TE though the Troika, indirectly, it was a slap against the TE and the EU themselves. Indirectly, because of the huge attempt to disorient the people by Syriza, which won the elections on the basis of a political platform according to which the causes of the crisis were just some bad policies imposed by bad politicians and economists, so that all that was needed was to elect some good politicians and economists to force the baddies to change policies. Yet, given that the parties which supported the continuation of the same policies (i.e. the ‘pure’ pro EU parties ― New Democracy/Pasok, the governing coalition, and Potami, a new systemic party created by the elites a year ago to promote the same line) gained about 40 percent of the votes, in an election in which the formal abstention rate was 40percent ― but the effective rate could be 25-30 percent ― this means that, at most, a third of the population is determined to stay in the EU whatever the cost. Another third of the population would be prepared to stay in the EU but not unconditionally, in case the national interest is at risk (as the present governing coalition suggests (Syriza/Independent Greeks) and the last third does not believe that any real solution is possible within the EU. Roughly, this division coincides with a corresponding social division of the population between one third who are the beneficiaries of globalization, one third that just manages to cover its basic needs and the last third, which has been completely impoverished.

Therefore, Syriza simply attempted to attract this middle third of the population ― the middle class that is being gradually being eliminated and the petty bourgeoisie in the private and public sectors. Most of the working class, the unemployed and the poor either abstained or, as statistics of how the vote was spread geographically show, voted mainly for the Communist Party (KKE) and the Golden Dawn Party (GD), which has clear sympathies towards the collaborators of the Nazis during the German Occupation and then to the Right in the ensuing Civil War and the military junta in the 1960s. Not accidentally, as Joaquin Flores, aptly points out,

“The GD, interestingly, calls both for nationalization of the gold industry, as well as other major industries, and the central bank. Those are among the real economic changes that would liberate Greece, and yet on the left, only the Communist Party (KKE) of Greece holds a similar position. That only the most radical parties have the most sensible and honest solutions to Greece’s present problem, presents a special problem for Greece. In Toynbee’s Study of History he develops the concept of civilizations going through stages of growth and later disintegration, as well as abortive and failed civilizations. It would seem that a hallmark of a disintegrating, abortive, or failed civilization is when the most sensible solutions are entirely marginalized and only held by those on the radical fringes.”[3]

In fact, the Communist party has long ago been marginalized, since it was banned for over a quarter of a century after its defeat in the Civil War and then was legalized following the fall of the military junta in 1974, on the condition that it will abandon any revolutionary tactics, while Golden Dawn is effectively banned, with most of its leadership in jail without trial and no access to the mass media ― although formally it is still legal!

Under these circumstances, Syriza’s gamble clearly succeeded, although its program did not even question Greece’s membership of the EU and the Eurozone but also did not include any radical measures to nationalize banks (including the Bank of Greece) and any key industries, as well as any real controls on the markets for commodities, capital and labor. However, the lack of such controls (not permissible under the EU Treaties) makes impossible any radical program to re-create a productive base, with the aim of self-reliance.

Yet, in one sense, even this first inadequate step that the Greek people took in ostracizing the political parties of the elites, was a victory. Not “a historic victory of the Left” in Greece (or for some more enthusiastic commentators and analysts “of the liberal Left in Europe and beyond”), but in the sense that it marked a turning point in the usual submission of the people to the dictates of the elites. A turning point which potentially, but only potentially, could lead to radical developments in the future, as long as the self-contradictory theories and policies suggested by the liberal Left are overcome. This, because the people sooner or later will realize why the policies suggested by the supposedly ‘clever’ politicians and the strange mix of neo-Keynesian/Marxist economists in fact aim to square the circle and will dismally fail in bringing about any real solutions to the critical situation created by Greece’s integration into the NWO. Clearly, the fact that all those economists and politicians have not yet realized (or at least pretend so) that Keynesianism has been dead and buried since the rise of globalization, as it was based on sovereign nation-states that today are being phased out as economic sovereignty (and therefore national sovereignty) are things of the past. So, at most, what parties like Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain can achieve, as I showed in another article,[4] is to stick some plasters on the deadly wounds created by the crisis in the form of a few billion Euros to re-appoint some of those sacked in the public sector and to cover the essential needs for food, health, energy etc. of the very poor. But, all ‘reforms’ introduced by the Troika aiming to make labor more ‘flexible,’ capital to move without any constraint and cheap commodities from abroad to crowd out domestic products, will of course remain intact.

The main developments that followed the election of Syriza are compatible with the above analysis, particularly as regards to the composition of the new government that is full of the kind of politicians and economists I just described. Yet there are also two developments which could have a double meaning, one compatible with the above analysis and another one that may imply at least the possibility of a radical change in the future.

The first is the governing coalition itself. Syriza had a choice, either to have a coalition with the party created by the elites (Potami) whose main condition was that the country’s orientation with the EU and the Eurozone will never be challenged, or with the nationalist party of independent Greeks which is fiercely anti-austerity and does not have any qualms about setting conditions to the Troika that might lead to a break. Syriza has chosen the latter and unsurprisingly has been condemned for its choice by the Transnational Elite and the Zionists (see e.g. Daniel Cohn-Bendit’s vicious attack in the Euro parliament; this is the ‘red Danny’ who is one of the main organs of the TE that supported enthusiastically all its criminal wars), as well as all the transnational mass media. Syriza’s choice could simply mean that it did not want to lose all credibility by supporting a fully systemic party but it could also mean that some forces at least within it are prepared even to clash with the EU.

The second is the public displays of disagreement within the governing coalition against the EU elites’ decision to ignore Syriza in their decision to blame the pro-Russia rebels (and indirectly Russia itself) for the attack on Mariupol and demand new stricter sanctions against Russia. In the event, Syriza keeps the same stand in the forthcoming EU meeting and rejects any new sanctions against Russia, effectively vetoing any proposal to this effect, this will be a very serious blow to the TE at a moment when its attack against Russia has sharply intensified, with the puppet regime’s parliament in Kiev demanding from the UN, NATO etc. to declare Russia an ‘aggressor state’[5] and the British establishment paper The Times promoting the view in a first page report that Putin is “nothing more than a common criminal dressed up as a head of state”![6] Clearly such an attack, accompanied by the classifying of RT in the same league as ISIS,[7] shows an obvious TE intention to demonize Russia and its leadership, in exactly the same way as it did with Iraq and Saddam or Libya and Gadhafi, just before the launching of the brutal attacks against them. Again, this may be just a tactical move by Syriza so that “they can leverage the threat of going along with the Russia-Turkish gas line (South stream 2.0/Nabucco Revisited) in order to get permission from the Troika (European Commission, International Monetary Fund, European Central Bank) to use more debt in order to mitigate austerity.”[8] However, it may also indicate that some forces within Syriza are seriously pondering on the crucial issue of the new geopolitical relations needed for a break with the EU to be effective

In conclusion, there are two main options available to the new Greek Government:

a) either the road to submission to the demands of the TE and the EU, with some concessions granted by the elites in exchange, as regards the conditions of repayment of the debt (and perhaps even the haircut of part of it) that will not however affect the main structural reforms already imposed. Namely, the opening and liberalization of markets and the consequent completion of the process of depriving Greece of the capability to regain any economic sovereignty in the future: ― from controlling its own currency up to controlling its fiscal policy ― and consequently its national sovereignty. The inevitable outcome of this effective about turn by Syriza will be to simply perpetuate the present economic and social catastrophe and lead to the death of the Left in Mediterranean Europe, following the death of it in the rest of Europe. Inevitably, in this case, the gap will be filled either by the nationalist anti-EU parties or by Popular Front governments, as I showed elsewhere.[9]

b) or the road to resistance which involves the immediate unilateral exit from both the EU and the Eurozone, which will allow the introduction of strict capital controls and the re-introduction of the national currency, the nationalization of all banks including the Bank of Greece, the socialization of all key industries covering basic needs, as well as those involving the social wealth (oil, lignite, gold etc.). Needless to add that the geopolitical orientations of Greece should also change drastically, so that it will not be the subject of a new ‘coup from below,’ like the one the TE successfully instigated in Ukraine. For this purpose, the exit from the EU should be accompanied by a parallel application to join the Eurasian Union, so that in case Cyprus and Turkey also join it (as it is highly likely), all of them, as equal sovereign states, will be able to take part in negotiations to sort out rationally and in the spirit of solidarity all geopolitical and economic problems between them, which, up to now, have been used by the West and later the TE in order to divide the peoples in this part of the Mediterranean. In this way, the foundations for a new truly democratic community of sovereign nations will be created, in place of the present criminal New World Order.


 

* This article is being published simultaneously by Pravda.ru. It has been edited by Jonathan Rutherford.

 


[2] See Takis Fotopoulos, Greece as a Protectorate of the Transnational Elite (Athens: Gordios, 2010)-in Greek

[3] Joaquin Flores, Meaningful Economic Reforms Could Come Through BRICS and Russia?”, Global Research (27/01/2015).

[4] see Left mythology and neoliberal globalization: Syriza and Podemos”, The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Vol. 11, Nos. 1/2 (Winter-Summer 2015).

[5]Ukrainian MPs call on UN, NATO & PACE to recognize Russia as ‘aggressor state’,” RT (27/01/2015).

[6] Deborah Haynes, ‘Litvinenko was to expose ‘criminal’ Putin, The Times (28/01/2015).

[7]Head of US state media put RT on same challenge list as ISIS, Boko Haram,” RT (23/01/2015).

[8] Joaquin Flores, “Meaningful Economic Reforms Could Come Through BRICS and Russia?”

[9]The imperative need for popular fronts of national and social liberation in the globalization era,” The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Vol. 10, Nos. 1/2 (Winter-Summer 2014).

 

 

 

 

 

 

source: http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/vol11/vol11_no1_A_major_turning_point_in_Greece_for_better_or_worse_2nd_edition.html