A bronze statue of Harry S. Truman stands unguarded along a busy
Athens road, a reminder of Greece’s post-World War II position as a
strategic bulwark for the U.S. and Europe.
If euro-area policy makers overcome their frustration over Greek
financial brinkmanship and cough up more aid, it will be in no small
part because of that role.
“Greece’s geopolitical potential has been used as a promise, but mostly as a threat,” said Eirini Karamouzi, lecturer in contemporary history
at Sheffield University and author of a book on Greece’s relationship
with Europe during the Cold War. “There’s always been the threat of a
catastrophic spillover effect if Greece was left to its own devices or,
worse, turn into a failed state in Europe’s backyard.”
The Greeks joined NATO in 1952, three years before the Federal Republic
of Germany and
the same time as Turkey, uniting two traditional enemies
under one umbrella. The aid Greece received under the Truman Doctrine
and then the Marshall Plan bankrolled years of growth.
Greece’s
trump card historically has been its location at NATO’s southeastern
flank. As Islamic State gains to the south and east, Russia encroaches
to the north and migrants flood to Europe, the question is whether
Greece is worth more than the billions it needs to get out of its
financial hole.
While Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s government and its creditors
squabble over percentage-point differences in budget requirements,
leaders are talking security and politics.
‘Tough Decisions’
At the Group of Seven summit in Germany
this week, U.S. President Barack Obama urged greater efforts to resolve
the crisis. “If both sides are showing a sufficient flexibility, then I
think we can get this problem resolved,” he said. “But it will require
some tough decisions for all involved, and we will continue to consult
with all the parties involved to try to encourage that kind of outcome.”
Greece Ordered to Stop Gambling
German
Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and
Tsipras then huddled for two hours on the sidelines of a meeting on
Latin America on June 10 to bash out a deal before the end of the month.
With the country’s banking system on the brink, Tsipras has to
deliver economic reforms and budget fixes before getting as much as 7.2
billion euros ($8.2 billion) from the country’s existing bailout funds.
Russian Overture
Before then, though, Tsipras is scheduled to also head to St. Petersburg to attend an economic forum on June 18.
It would be the second time since he came to power in January that
he’d meet Vladimir Putin in Russia. That relationship raised eyebrows in
Berlin and Washington as the U.S. and European Union pursued sanctions
against the country over the conflict in Ukraine. Tsipras has agreed to
cooperate with Russia on a gas deal that the U.S. has criticized.
Merkel noted the strategic stakes after her first meeting with Tsipras in March.
“We have common geopolitical challenges that need to be tackled,''
she said then. Europe is a ‘‘huge peace effort that has to be carried
forward by each political generation.’’
The need to keep Greece firmly in the bosom of the West has always
underpinned decisions about its European role. Greece became the 10th
member of what’s now the EU in 1981 -- joining before Spain and Austria.
For 26 years, until Bulgaria joined in 2007, it shared no land border
with another EU member. It adopted the euro in 2001, only then to reveal
less than a decade later its finances weren’t in order.
Truman’s Warning
Merkel’s words were an echo of what Truman told Congress
in 1947. That’s when he got approval for military and economic aid to
prevent Greece from falling under the influence of the Soviet Union
during its 1946-49 civil war.
‘‘Should we fail to aid Greece and Turkey in this fateful hour, the
effect will be far-reaching to the west as well as to the east,” Truman
said. “We must take immediate and resolute action.” The reference to
Turkey doesn’t appear in the quotation on the Athens statue.
The Harry S. Truman statue in central Athens.
Photographer: Glyn Genin
The
Greeks joined NATO in 1952, three years before the Federal Republic of
Germany and the same time as Turkey, uniting two traditional enemies
under one umbrella. The aid Greece received under the Truman Doctrine
and then the Marshall Plan bankrolled years of growth.
Conflict of Needs
Greek leftists chafed at the U.S.
influence. The military regime, or junta, in 1967 to 1974 was seen as
sponsored by the U.S. Truman’s statue, erected in 1963 by grateful Greek
Americans, was defaced, attacked and toppled regularly over the years
to protest U.S. policies in Greece and the region.
As Tsipras prepared to meet Merkel in Brussels on Wednesday evening,
his foreign minister, Nikos Kotzias, told a gathering at Oxford
University that now is the time to decide whether the pursuit of
security, prosperity and freedom will prevail over the focus on numbers
and profit margins.
“Nowadays the role of geopolitics is more important than before,”
Kotzias said. “Our world is in the midst of a conflict between its
current needs and the future demands.”
The EU “needs to learn to see beyond the end of its nose, as we say
in Greece,” he said. “To manage our future not as a momentary action,
nor as a shareholders’ meeting that thinks with an horizon of quarterly
earnings.”
