for first time in the Greek modern history .. ARMY officers from all UNITS

inter armas silent leges

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I hope the protests works and the government collapses. Let Greece be an example to all of the entire country standing on its own two feet and sorting out the countries problems rather than sit back and wait for everyone else to pump money into them. Power to the workers! Once they are in charge we won't get into these messes again.

unfortunately, being my suspicion, a country such as greece would likely see some form of military dictatorship arising should the government collapse and the requsite chaos ensue.

While all in favor of the Greeks deciding what they want to do all by themselves I am afraid too many of us misunderstand the true nature of their debt crisis.

For sovereign entities the problem is not EXISTING debt but whether or not they can obtain future loans and whether or not they can survive very well without them. That's the reason the lenders can set harsh terms.

The Greeks do NOT have to agree to those harsh terms, they can even repudiate the (existing) debt. But then how will they borrow in the future? (who will lend to them). The people of Greece have to choose between evils, good luck to them.

For whatever questionable reasons, globally the banks were enjoying a boom. That all collapsed. But, the banks had committed, structurally, to a series of future profits for their shareholders. That commitment remains, despite the collapse and so, the banks are desparately engineering a crisis.

The crisis is this: we will sell you credit to finance the future profit commitments we have already made. Take it or leave it.

The Greek people - just like the Icelandic people - are in the process of calling the bluff of the Banking system. The British people should do the same - the proposed "government cuts" that all parties are clamouring to sign up to are simply falling down to the engineered crisis.

The crisis is this: the Banks have nothing. The Greek people have the assets that every business proclaims to be "their" greatest asset: people. The Banks can try to sell the product of Credit to the Greek people - but the price (15%) is not one the market wants to bear.

That crisis is this: Banking has been exposed as the non-productive con trick that critics of left and right have pointed out for decades - centuries, even. It is not rioting and striking, it is aggressive bargaining.

Bing and Bong, you touch on good points, and are quite right between you to say that Greece should be both hard left and hard right, given it's history.

Greece is quite capable of heading leftwards and could easily have become communist after WW II, and at various points since. Right now the people of Greece have the balls to get out on the streets, even teachers tried to gatecrash the Finance Ministry over recent days.

On the other hand they do seem to have had more than their fair share of life under a right-wing Military Junta.

The reason the widespread popular support for left wing government was met with hard right government is explained very well in a chapter of this book, which everyone should read for many many reasons:

NATO's Secret Armies: Operation GLADIO and terrorism in Western Europe (ISBN-10: 0714685003 ISBN-13: 978-0714685007).

To put it simply, following WW II the USA was not prepared to see any country turn to communist government and used NATO and the CIA to enforce this. This in practice went much further than most people are aware of, and included undermining even mild socialist political parties in Western Europe, the British Labour Party included, which is why the Labour Party is no longer socialist.

Anyway I digress. Some European countries, Italy and Greece in particular has such popular support for Communist government that more extreme measures were needed, and in Greece's case the USA installed a Junta to ensure pro-USA government and to brutally crush the left wing. The current Greek Prime Minister is the son and grandson of Greek prime-ministers who saw NATO and the CIA impose the Junta and he will be very aware of the dangers Greece faces.

In the event that rioting on Greek streets escalates to the collapse of the Greek political system, expect to see NATO warships on the scene to ensure Greece remains in the USA sphere of influence, quickly followed by a hard-right government installed by the USA, and following that a very unpleasant purge of Greek Socialists, Anarchists, and anyone else prepared to voice their opinions.