By Nikos Mottas.
Those
who follow the political developments in Greece during the last
decade have certainly understood the rapid transformation of SYRIZA-
the ruling party in today's coalition government- from a small party
of the opportunist left into the country's major social democratic
power. In this site we have written extensively, in numerous
occasions, about the role of SYRIZA a major pillar (alongside the
center-right New Democracy party) of the bourgeois political
establishment.
In
June 2017, we were writing among other things: “During the last
seven years, SYRIZA has been proved an extraordinary case of
political deception and ideological manipulation. Foreign policy is
another field where SYRIZA and its leadership has turned black into
white. The supposed 'radical anti-imperialism' of SYRIZA as an
opposition party has been fully transformed, thus proving the real,
illusionary character of social democracy”.
In
the last NATO Summit in Brussels, on July 2018, Greece's PM Alexis Tsipras co-signed all the decisions made by the imperialist alliance,
thus certifying Athens' willingness to participate further and deeper
in the dangerous euroatlantic plans. After all, despite its small
size in terms of population, Greece comes 2nd in defense
expenditures among NATO member-states!
The
official statistics published by NATO are revealing: In 2017 Greece
spent 2.36% of GDP (appr. 4.2 billion euros) in “defense
expenditures”, outrunning countries like the United Kingdom
(2.12%), France (1.79%) and Germany (1.24%)! Alexis Tsipras'
coalition government spends billions of euros for the military
advancement of NATO (that's the truth, no matter if they call it
“defense expenditures”), while the Greek working class and the
country's popular strata face continuous austerity, antiworker
measures, cuts in wages and pensions, high unemployment and heavy
taxation.
SYRIZA
follows the pattern of the previous governments, those of New
Democracy and PASOK. It is characteristic that during the last 7
years of the capitalist economic crisis, all Greek governments
maintained military expenditures over 2%, despite any fluctuations.
Based on NATO's official statistics, during the last seven years of
the crisis, the Greek people paid almost 44 billion dollars (37.5
billion euros) in military expenditures.
The
SYRIZA-ANEL coalition government boasts about its “multi-dimensional
foreign policy” and about supposedly making Greece a “pillar of
stability” in the region. In fact, what the government of Mr.
Tsipras does is to deepen the country's involvement in the
imperialist competitions, for the sake of Greece's capitalists. Under
the leadership of Tsipras, Greece has become the standard-bearer of
NATO and EU's interests in the region of east Mediterranean.
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| Left: 1999, a young Tsipras demonstrating against Clinton's visit in Athens; Right: 2017, PM Tsipras visits U.S. President Trump at the White House. |
Tsipras
himself is a characteristic case of political opportunism and
deception. He began his political careers as a radical leftist, with
“anti-NATO” views.
As a member of the youth wing of Synaspismos
(predecessor of today's SYRIZA) in 1999 he was protesting against
Bill Clinton's visit in Athens, while in 2001 he was participating at
the large demonstrations against the G8 Summit in Genova. On May
2012, the political programme of SYRIZA was proclaiming among other
things: “Our policy includes... the closure of all the foreign
military bases in Greece. Immediate abolition of the bases in Souda
and Aktio. We want neither Greece in NATO, nor NATO in Greece and we
are fighting for its abolition”.
In
2014, during a press conference in Thessaloniki, Mr. Tsipras was stating that “in the new international situation there is no reason
for NATO's existence” and he was assuring the people that this is a
“principle position” that “will not change”. Of course, the
course of developments showed that Tsipras- like every opportunist-
was blatantly lying and that his supposed “anti-imperialism” was
a great political deception.
Since
he became a Prime Minister, on January 2015, Tsipras has done almost
anything in order to prove his loyalty to NATO and the EU. The
existing US-NATO military bases in Greece were used for various
imperialist attacks in Syria, Iraq and Libya, while new ones (e.g.
Alexandroupolis' port) began operating in order to facilitate the
imperialist plans. At the same time, Greece never stopped to
participate actively in NATO's joint military drills, as well as in
bilateral exercises with Israel.
Greece:
A “geopolitical hinge” between NATO and the EU in the region
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| Greece: A "playground" for imperialists. (Click image to enlarge) |
In many occasions, the
U.S. ambassador in Athens Geoffrey Pyatt has praised the role of the
Greek government as a stable ally of the US-NATO interests in the
region. In one of his interviews, the ambassador called Greece as a
“geopolitical hinge” between NATO and the EU, quite useful for
the promotion of Washington's plans in the Balkans and east
Mediterranean.
The choice of the U.S.
as the “honored country” in this year's Thessaloniki
International Fair (which begins today, Saturday 8 September) isn't a
random one. Monopoly and business groups from the United States have
already arrived in Greece's second largest city, in order to present
and promote their products.
Yesterday, Alexis Tsipras met with the
U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross who heads a high-level
delegation from Washington on the occasion of the International Fair.
During the meeting, Tsipras underlined the “great importance of the
historic relations between our countries and mentioned that the
US-Greek relations have also a “very significant perspective,
especially in economic relations”.
Tsipras' remarks
actually verify that his government aims to expand and deepen its
collaboration with the imperialist superpower. According to U.S.
ambassador Pyatt, the ongoing presence of american monopolies and
business groups in Thessaloniki consists “the most important
activity of the U.S. in northern Greece since the Marshall Plan”
and covers a wide range of the Greek-American relations. Ambassador
Pyatt said that Washington regards Greece as a “regional pillar”
for the U.S. intervention in Western Balkans and praised the role of
the Greek government in the “Prespes Agreement” with FYROM.
The
U.S. government could not find a better collaborator for the
promotion of its interests than Mr. Tsipras and his government.
Especially in a period when the traditional alliance between U.S.
with Turkey is facing a serious crisis, the SYRIZA-ANEL government
proves its servile- towards the imperialists- political orientation.
As
for Alexis Tsipras himself, he will remain in the history of politics
as a deplorable example of a “left-winger” who did the “dirty
job” for the bourgeois class and served the imperialists better
than any right-wing politician could ever do.
* Nikos Mottas is the Editor-in-Chief of 'In Defense of Communism'.
