Posted on 04/15/2015 7:48:25 AM PDT by C19fan
The depth of Greece's financial woes have been laid bare as official figures showed the country has fallen further into the red following the election of its Leftist government. Greece's primary budget surplus, which excludes its debt interest payments, shrunk to just over €1bn during January and February, compared to €3.17bn over the same period in 2014, according to figures from the Ministry of Finance.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
backed by? wishful thinking?
It is a corrupt government that can not be trusted regardless of currency. There has to be a purge of moochers.
England has never wanted the European Union ( EU) to fail. Its their biggest trading partner. The UK view was that the EU would be a free trade area which would compete with the US and Japan - and now China. They tried linking their currency pre the Euro via the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) and John Major's administration got badly burned. They even suggested a "Hard Euro" to compete with the national currencies, which would have been a much better arrangement than abolishing the national currencies. The idea that you can have monetary union without fiscal and political union, which the UK was not willing at the time, to do is farcical.
As for the UK media try reading the Economist ( a self described UK newspaper), which is the most pro European paper in existence.
If Greece exits the Euro the "New Drachma" will go south in a hurry, nobody will want to hold it absent structural reforms in Greece.
As for the Brits parking hardware in Greece they already have two sovereign bases in Cyprus, which they already probably can't afford with their defence cuts.
They need to, some of the German banks and the Eropean Bank are up to their eyeballs in Greek debt ( as are Italian and Spanish banks ). If Greece goes down it will take a number of others with it.
Side note: why is TU not impeding ISIS?
I wish I had access to all INTEL like I did 35 yrs ago. Stuff is happening, and it looks REALLY BAD. Not just the ME, but all over the globe.
5.56mm
Yes, but the political and social cost of doing that is too great.
Turkey has an Islamic government that has rejected the secular legacy of Kemal Ataturk. Its mainly Sunni (over 70%), as is ISIS which is led by Generals in Saddam's old military.
The group with the most to gain from the defeat of ISIS is the Kurds who populate a large part of Eastern Turkey and have always been a problem for the Ankara government. If the Kurds manage to establish a De Jure state in northern Iraq look for the Kurds in Eastern Turkey to try and join them.
I do see a future in cruise ship and other tourist revenue, if they keep the crazies out. So many of the regular stops aren't safe anymore.
The Russians have to be careful. The Turks control the Bosphorous, the entrance to the Black Sea and the reason Putin annexed the Crimea. There's no love lost between the Greeks and the Turks. If the Russians cozy up to the Greeks the Turks may not be too thrilled about that.
Also Greece could become the Florida of Europe, the retirement location for northern Europeans fed up with northern winters. But, as you say, only if they control their crazies.
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