Cough up, Merkel

In effect, the country that had won the Second World War was being asked to get into bed – albeit on a commercial basis – with those who had let it down, changed sides or caused mass  ruination for six years.

What possible use was such an arrangement to Britain? None, of course.

And that was the answer then, just as it is now, when German Chancellor Angela Merkel  suggests that as a condition of  financial help for eurozone countries, those countries should surrender their economies to the control of the European Union. That “surrender” word was a bad choice.

In 1946, Winston Churchill made a notable speech in Zurich, calling for a kind of United States of Europe, and this idea was well received by many as a means by which peace might be maintained after the appalling experience of two wars in Europe in less than 50 years.

Germany was quick to see that this was another way of dominating Europe, now that simple invasion had become unfashionable, and could not wait to sign up.

Many eurosceptics simply want to know why Chancellor Merkel can’t now just do the  decent thing, and pick up the cost of the collapse of the euro, as an acknowledgement that the EU and the euro only came about in the first place to prevent a repetition of her country’s historic attitude towards its neighbours.

This is an unspoken question that political correctness prevents us from asking, and in today’s times nobody actually expects Germany to cough up.

But if they did, what a real  gesture that would be from a country whose opinionated and constant self-interest has become just plain tiresome.

Malcolm Parkin

Gamekeepers Road

Kinnesswood, Kinross