Over two millennia ago, Greece was the center of European civilization. Then came Romans, who annexed Alexander’s conquests, before moving their center of operations to Constantinople. A thousand years later, Crusaders raped, pillaged and plundered their way through the remains of the Byzantine Empire. This made it easy for Ottoman Turks to seize Constantinople and the rest of Greece in 1453. It took nearly 400 years for Greece to gain her independence. Then came the Germans.
Proud of her democratic roots, Greece refused to join Nazi Germany during World War II. An enraged Nazi Germany committed horrible atrocities against the people of Greece and their infrastructure (destroying bridges and schools and plundering archeological sites and treasures.) In 1942, the Greek Central Bank was forced by the occupying Nazi regime to loan 476 million Reichsmarks at 0 percent interest to Germany.
In 1953 the Western Allies forgave Germany of all debts owed. Greece was not part of this agreement. In 1960, Greece accepted 115 million marks as compensation for Nazi crimes. Nevertheless, past Greek governments have insisted that this was only a down payment, not complete reparations. On April 7, 2015, the Greek government claimed that Germany owes at least $279 billion.
Germany is at the heart of a European reserve banking system (euro) that is granting no quarter concerning debt payments. Greece has already made concessions that have resulted in a 60 percent youth unemployment rate.
The West, led by Germany, is about to destroy the birthplace of democracy in Greece.
Eric Teegarden
Brier
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