Las sucesivas, cada vez más desesperadas oleadas de refugiados que llegan a Europa desde Grecia (pasando primero por Turquía) están generando cierta agitación en los cerebros semicomatosos de la dirigencia europea. Si, chicos, hasta la casta de inútiles de Bruselas ha comenzado a preguntarse si la vida en piloto automático bajo la tutela del Imperio es lo más conveniente después de todo. En fin; lo que sigue es una oportuna nota de Pepe Escobar para Strategic Culture Foundation:
Título: Europe’s
Slow Motion Debacle
Texto: From a
failed attempt to clear the Calais jungle to the appalling situation at the
Greek-Macedonian border, the EU crumbles under the strain of a massive refugee
crisis. Even the Kafkaesque Brussels Eurocrat construct admits it – off the
record, because official EU must always project a mythical image of unity: «We
are on the edge of an abyss».
Across the EU and
amidst Russian intellectual elites, scenarios proliferate on the imminent
collapse of Western civilization, as a huge number of refugees cannot be
properly assimilated. In Russia, this process is examined with extreme concern
because it happens not far from Russia’s western borderlands, and involves what
the Kremlin traditionally defines as «our partners».
But what if this
European slow motion debacle was not enacted as a Mad Max dystopia, but rather
brought about by a tsunami of Muslims ultimately displaced by
Western-engineered wars?
Behold Fortress
Europe
It was only six
months ago that Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government took a huge gamble in
adopting a so-called «humanitarian» refugee policy; call it the civilized face
of the otherwise politically tainted R2P («responsibility to protect») concept,
which was ruthlessly manipulated for the invasion and destruction of Libya.
Six months later,
we have swarms of refugees stranded all along the Balkan Route – and
progressively encircled/trapped by strict border controls, the disappearance of
social benefits, creeping fences and walls, and the practical extermination of
the Schengen accords. The Merkel gambit is over; Fortress Europe is back with a
vengeance.
Can you hear the
sound of a basket of myths crumbling? Here are a few. The notion of «European
solidarity» – not to mention egality and fraternity. The notion that EU members
would accept a sensible, harmonious, proportional distribution of refugees. The
notion that Europe would not reject, deport and repatriate people fleeing from
war zones. The notion that Turkey would «protect» the EU from the crisis.
The Balkan Route,
for all practical purposes, is now sealed off to refugees while Ankara, for its
part, is slowly building a wall along stretches of the Turkish-Syrian border –
not as much to really contain them (after all Ankara must keep open the Jihadi
highway), but as a propaganda coup.
Germany’s
humanitarian refugee policy is in tatters and corroded by self-doubt; only two
weeks ago Chancellor Merkel was wondering whether she should pursue «our
European-Turkish approach» or whether the EU should order the absolute sealing
off of the Greek-Macedonian border, pure and simple.
And that leads us
close to the heart of the matter – which is of course Turkey.
The majority of
German conservative politicos want Merkel to seal off German borders to
refugees, while Merkel still believes in the Hand of Providence; help from
«European partners» – which won’t come – and most of all from Ankara.
And that’s
exactly where Turkey’s Sultan Erdogan wants her to be; as a supplicant, not as
the leader of the number one European economic power.
Ankara’s power
play
One of the key
myths of the whole refugee crisis is that Erdogan’s AKP government is doing all
it can to «contain» it.
Nonsense. The
crisis itself was engineered by Ankara in 2015 – when refugees were «released»
from their holding camps in Turkey under threat that they would not be cared
for anymore. The refugee flood was not a «spontaneous» creation, as Syrians,
Iraqis and/or Afghans suddenly decided to flee to the EU; it was directly
instigated by Ankara. And Erdogan from the start was already contemplating the
Big Prize; to bribe the EU, especially Merkel, to pay – at least 3 billion
euros – so most refuges remain not on Turkish soil, but on one of his own
neo-Ottoman sub-plots; a «safe zone» to be built inside Syrian territory.
Extra evidence
pointing to Ankara’s plotting is the fact that Turkey has not increased patrols
on its Mediterranean coast – the departure point for scores of refuges to try
their luck by boat on their way to safety of the Greek islands. The priority
for Ankara was to «close» the Turkish-Syrian border. Not really «close» it, as
safe passage remains guaranteed for selected «moderate rebels».
The Warsaw-based
European border control agency Frontex is absolutely convinced that the
Turkey-EU refugee power play will continue. Diplomatically, Frontex’s director
Fabrice Leggeri advances that «Turkey
has to make it more difficult for the migrant smugglers».
Yet that won’t
happen. And Germany – and the EU as a whole – will continue to be hostages of
Ankara’s political maneuvering.
A EU-Turkey
summit was held in November 2015. At the time, Erdogan promised there would be
more security in the Aegean coast and more raids on migrant smugglers. Too little,
too late. Turkey's Aegean coast is 2,800 kilometers long. Ankara does not have
the resources to police it properly.
So smuggling on a
massive scale proceeds unabated. Smuggling rings with the right «contacts» –
within Turkish police and AKP-related politicians – only need to pay roughly
3,000 euros for each group of refugees to clear the border and hit the sea.
In parallel,
Ankara is clearly at war in Southeast Anatolia against the PKK Kurds. This is
the number one priority, not smuggling of refugees, not to mention fighting
ISIS/ISIL/Daesh. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu could not be more
straight to the point when he visited Berlin late last year: the
Erdogan/Davutoglu Plan A is to «annihilate» the PKK Kurds. There is no Plan B.
Chaos, created
then applauded
No one in
Brussels will do it. So Frau Merkel ultimately would have to be the only EU
leader to confront Erdogan and read him the riot act. It’s not only a matter of
politely requesting Ankara to reduce refugee numbers. It’s to order him to do
so; question him on why he released them en masse in the first place last year;
and withhold any future financial rescue package, including the building of
refugee camps inside Syrian territory.
The stark fact is
that the whole refugee crisis – an existential crisis for Europe – is being
used by Ankara as a bargaining chip for an elaborate extortion racket. Erdogan
wants a tsunami of EU cash; and he wants a tsunami of concessions regarding
Turkey’s negotiations for accession to the EU.
Meanwhile,
there’s no concerted EU refugee policy to be seen. Not even a balancing act
between humanitarian concerns and «deterrence», altruism and realpolitik. No EU
political «leader» will confront the responsibility of NATO’s wars (with
petrodollar GCC «support») crafting the whole crisis. The absolute majority of
refugees are Syrians, Afghans and Africans who depart the continent via
NATO-destroyed Libya.
Polls
consistently show that a majority of EU citizens don’t want to «welcome»
refugees anymore. As Belgium-based Jean Bricmont, author of Humanitarian
Imperialism has correctly stressed, EU citizens who «were never consulted on
the issue of refugees and who are constantly asked to make sacrifices because
‘there is no money’ understandably do not accept this moral discourse» anymore.
Bricmont is among
the very few in Europe to connect the dots: «The same people who encouraged
‘humanitarian’ interventions and ‘support’ for armed insurrections abroad, that
have led to perpetual wars, generating a constant flow of refugees, are now
demanding that the population of our countries ‘welcome the refugees’. They
first generate chaos there, then they applaud chaos here».
Well, that’s the
whole logic of the Empire of Chaos in a nutshell.
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