Germany Owes Greece €185 Billion In WWII Reparations, Say German Researchers

Does Germany owe Greeks billions of euros in World War II reparations for the damages and the enforced loan during the occupation of the country by the Nazis? So far, Berlin has vehemently rejected any Greek claims.

However, as Keep Talking Greece reports, two German researchers, who dug into the documents of the dispute, have discovered and calculated that the German state owes Greece 185 billion euros.

Of this not even a 1% has been paid to Greece.

In their book “Reparation debt. Mortgages of German occupation in Greece and Europe” publishers Karl Heinz Roth, a historian,  and Hartmut Rübner, a researcher, unfold the documents of the dispute and come to the conclusion that the reparations issue was not solved in 1960, as Berlin has been claiming.

According to the book review published in German conservative daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung, Roth and Rübner have researched German documents only and came to the conclusion that:

US allies and “the power elites of West Germany” have systematically ignored Greece’s demands for WWII reparations.

In SZ article “Athens – Berlin: Open Bill, Open Wounds” it is said among others that:

At the Paris Reparations Conference in 1946, the Greek government presented a damage record of $ 7.2 billion – eventually earning a share of $ 25 million.

The leitmotiv of the book is that an alliance between the US and the “West German power elite” has systematically ignored Greek demands for decades.

“Undeniable, however, is the diplomatic arrogance with which the Federal Republic rejected the Greek demands for decades. If you do not believe it, you are welcome to make your own impression in Hartmut Rübner’s carefully edited extensive documentary appendix,” SZ notes.

In the first part of the book, Roth analyzes the decades-long efforts of Athens to receive reparations.  

When the Wehrmacht withdrew from Greece in October 1944 after three and a half years of occupation, it literally left behind “scorched land”: the economy, currency and infrastructure were completely destroyed.

The health of the surviving population was catastrophic – by the end of the war about 140,000 people had died as a result of malnutrition. And finally, the Germans had sown the seed for the civil war between communist and monarchist-conservative groups, which became bloody after the liberation.

However, the selection of the documents Roth/Rübner used is almost exclusively limited to German documents, so that no insight can be gained into the interior of Greek diplomacy and its share in the failed reparations policy. For a long time, the Greek government relied on a special relationship with the Federal Republic, which, however, was based on asymmetric power relations.

On this bilateral route, Athens only achieved failures, except for a total compensation of 115 million marks in 1960, based on London Treaty of 1953. However, the compensation came about through a joint action with other West European former war opponents of Germany.

The authors make a special reference to former Chancellor Helmut Kohl who managed to avoid reparation payments when the two German states were reunified in 1990 and the 2+4 Treaty.

Before the reunification, Kohl was claiming that reparation demands were premature. After the reunification, he claimed they were too late.

Roth and Rübner now plea for the recognition of the German “reparations debt” towards Greece.

So far, Greece has tabled two proposals: one referred to 287billion euros, and one, the official one to 162 billion euros.

Perhaps Germany allowing Greece to write off its TARGET2 net claims would be a good start...

More on Greece-Germany dispute on WWII reparations here.

"Couldn't Hit An Elephant" - Over-Confident NATO Generals & Russian Retaliation

Authored by Jeff Thomas via InternationalMan.com,

“They couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance.”

Those are purported to be the last words of General John Sedgwick, spoken as he observed distant Confederate troops during the 1864 Battle of Spotsylvania in Virginia. (Historians debate as to whether these were his very final words or amongst his final words, but there is no debate as to whether he then received a mortal bullet wound to his face.)

Going back a bit further, British Prime Minister Lord North commented in 1774, with regard to the rebellious American colonies, “Four or five frigates will do the business without any military force.”

Later, in August of 1914, Kaiser Wilhelm II (the last German emperor and king of Prussia) stated to German troops, “You will be home before the leaves fall from the trees.” He wasn’t alone. The phrase “The war will be over by Christmas” was a common one in Britain in 1914, often repeated by journalists and politicians.

Recently, US Lieutenant General Ben Hodges ordered over 60 US tanks to fire their guns in Poland. He later announced,

We"re serious - this is not just a training exercise. It’s to demonstrate a strategic message that you cannot violate the sovereignty of members of NATO… Moscow will get the message - I"m confident of it.

The general has reason to be confident. It can be said with relative certainty that, if the US sends scores of tanks halfway around the world to a country that borders Russia, then begins firing the guns, the Russians will indeed interpret that as a warning that their sovereignty is no longer respected by the US.

Of course, they already have ample reason for concern, as, in recent years, the US tradition of détente has been dropped in favour of continual blackguarding of both Russia in general and its leader in particular. Every prominent television news programme in the US has kept up a steady stream of invective against Russia, often reporting stories that oppose what most of the world recognises as the truth.

As to the generals, history is full of stories of military leaders who have demonstrated overconfidence and even eagerness to attack other sovereign nations. Do they seek to fight a great war in order to leave behind a legacy of their own personal greatness, or are they simply delusional—imagining their opponents to be imminently defeatable and their own army to be undefeatable?

It matters little either way. The attitude has existed for thousands of years and countless military and political leaders have made the exact same mistake in every era.

Interestingly, one consistent trait that we can observe is the blind confidence that accompanies the bluster and bravado. Leaders have a tendency to picture the glory of the destruction that they desire and rarely, if ever, anticipate a devastating pushback from their opposite number.

This of course results in a very dangerous course of events - charging ahead without taking proper measure of what the opponent might do.

Virtually every war in recent history has taken far longer to undertake than was originally expected. With few exceptions, wars that were intended to take a few months at best have dragged on for years. In many, there was no truly positive outcome—a cessation of aggression rather than a clear “victory” for one side or the other.

But, in the bargain, countries (even empires) have had their populations decimated and their economies destroyed as a result of the dramatic drain in wealth that’s a by-product of warfare.

All the more vexing then, that grown-up schoolyard bullies that make careless threats against other countries often succeed in setting off the spark that leads to war.

At one time, these self-possessed blusterers often needed to carry the public willingness to fight under their own steam. Today, however, they have the extensive support of the media. Every major television news programme can be counted on to offer supportive commentary by retired generals, who often are employed by the military-industrial complex. Further, the news anchors themselves add to the rhetoric like trained chimpanzees, hooting in support.

It all makes for exciting theatre, but, ultimately, it’s always the people of the nation that pay the price.

The next time a general effectively claims that Iran or Russia couldn’t hit an elephant, his bluster may, as has occurred so many times in history, prove to be the flash point for the next major war.

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There’s a good chance the US could back its way into a major war soon. But war or no war, New York Times best-selling author Doug Casey and his team think the US is on the brink of a major crisis. That’s why they are sharing this time-sensitive video. It’s packed with critical information on the looming economic meltdown. Click here to start watching now.