NSA Leak Reveals Both Merkel And Schauble Saw Greek Debt As Unsustainable Even After Haircut

- NSA Leak Reveals Both Merkel And Schauble Saw Greek Debt As Unsustainable Even After Haircut
by Tyler Durden, www.zerohedge.com
Several days ago, we posted a NSA cable leaked by Wikileaks, in which then French finance minister Moscovici (currently a European commissioner) was admitted that the French economic situation was “worse than anyone [could] imagine and drastic measures [would] have to be taken in the next two years.” It has not improved since then.
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Overnight, in another perhaps even more relevant to the current quagmire in Greece leak, Wikileaks has released another intercepted NSA communication between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her personal assistant reveals that not only Merkel, but Schauble, were well aware that even with a debt haircut (which took place in 2012 but only for private creditors and whose impact was promptly countered with the debt from the second bailout) Greek debt would be unsustainable. Technically, she did not use that word: she said that “Athens would be unable to overcome its problems even with an additional haircut, since it would not be able to handle the remaining debt.”
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She was right. And yet here she is, telling Tsipras and the Greek people that all Greece needs is to comply with the existing program when she knows well by her own admission that Greece is insolvent in its current state – precisely what Syriza is arguing and demanding be part of any deal.
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Because why bother making a deal if Greece will once again be in default a few months down the line, just as Varoufakis said earlier today.
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But where it gets really humorous is where the cable notes that even “Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble alone continued to strongly back another haircut, despite Merkel’s efforts to rein him in… with IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde described as undecided on the issue.”
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read more.
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