Horst Reichenbach, again and Kohl und Merkel

It may have been a bad idea to send a German. And his name certainly didn’t help matters.

When Horst Reichenbach arrived in Athens recently to head a new European Union task force to help the country deal with its debt, the Greek media instantly dubbed him “Third Reichenbach.”

Globalpost 15/11 2011

The Greeks are not alone in harboring suspicions toward Germany, which occupied the country during World War II. The British conservative press is up in arms. The Daily Mail went so far as to accuse the Germans of attempting to use the euro crisis to “conquer Europe” and establish a “Fourth Reich.

Rise of the Fourth Reich, how Germany is using the financial crisis to conquer Europe

Schäuble suggested delaying Greek elections

I presume  that Mr Schäuble has been well-briefed on the explosive political mood in Greece, so one can only view such a demarche as deliberate provocation 

– like the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia in 1914 (a miscalculation, as it later turned out, since "contagion" from Serbia could not be contained).  Ambrose 16/2  2012

"The way to European unity is irreversible," Mr. Kohl declared to a special session of Parliament

 Chancellor Helmut Kohl asserted to a special session of Parliament that accords signed by European leaders in Maastricht would ultimately lead the Continent to political union

Clive Crook, Bloomberg 16 February 2012

 "The challenge of our generation is to finish what we started in Europe, and that is to bring about, step by step, a political union,"
Merkel told the party congress in the east German city of Leipzig,  

CNBC 14 Nov 2011

Horst Reichenbach, We’re not occupiers, says Greek task force
Rolf Englund blog 2011-11-26