Cue to a bunch of clueless European tourists haggling about a refugee deal with carpet bazaar ace Ahmet Davutoglu - Turkey's Prime Minister and grand vizier of Sultan Erdogan. Much more than clinching a sleazy deal, the EU may end up selling what's left of its allegedly humanitarian and democratic «principles», a.k.a. soul, to the carpet man. Did neither of these Eurocrats ever read Goethe's Faust?
So let's recap what the EU will get from Ankara's masterful extortion racket. Instead of paying 3 billion euros for the refugee «carpet», it will pay 6.6 billion euros. It will facilitate visa-free travel for what's left of the Schengen space to 75 million Turks. It will accelerate the bureaucratic road map for Turkish pre-accession to the EU. And it will comply with Ankara's demand that for every Syrian re-expelled from Greece back to Turkey - over 2,000 arrive everyday as we speak - one Turk will be allowed to settle in the EU's austerity purgatory.
This is what the Mob usually dubs «an offer you can't refuse».
A bunch of European tourists
The Eurocrats thought they had a deal - part of the so-called EU-Turkey Action Plan - before a fateful Brussels summit early in the week, on March 7. EU - and mostly German - absolute desperation was already set in stone; without a deal with Ankara the alternative is the collapse of Schengen (which has already happened anyway) and the erosion of public trust in the EU's institutions (also already happened).
In Chancellor Merkel's words, because of the war in Syria and the «geostrategic» situation, a deal with Turkey is «absolutely in Europe's interest». European Commission President, devious operator Jean-Claude Juncker, added, «this is a real game-changer».
Well, it was a game-changer for the Turks, for sure. Ankara was so dismissive of that bunch of sissy European tourists they raided Zaman, the country's largest newspaper, took it over, tear gas included, turned it into a pro-AKP rag, and got away with it. Sanctions? That's for Syria - and Iran. Turkey smashes a newspaper and is rewarded with negotiations on turbo mode for EU membership. So much for «press freedom» and an independent judiciary.
Behaving as absolutely lousy students of history, the Eurocrats were convinced the Sultan and his vizier would take the initial deal because they badly needed EU help in their self-created, nasty confrontation with Russia; extra support along the Turkish-Syrian border (the Sultan's famous «safe zone» dream); and would be further mollified by NATO ships being used for coast guard patrols.
But then the carpet man pulled a master gambit, and invited his top customer for dinner.
Picture wily Davutoglu running rings around Merkel at the Turkish embassy in Brussels on Sunday evening, March 6. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte - holding the rotating EU presidency - was the other invited tourist.
Davutoglu unrolled a magic carpet ride. Nothing, absolutely nothing that had been discussed for weeks applied anymore. Ankara had a new, much more elaborate «offer you can't refuse», and the EU summit was scheduled for the day after.
The only thing left for a poor, livid Chancellor was to wake up early on Monday and try to convince everybody else on short notice this was a steal. All hell predictably broke loose. Delegations from quite a few nations openly blamed the Chancellor's naiveté. In the end there was no consensus, just the Chancellor meekly, vaguely promising that a deal was near.
Grapes of Wrath, the Balkan remix
Brussels has up to the end of next week to seal the deal, during another EU summit. It will be a wild ride. This thing is set to open a can of legal worms/juridical nightmares.
To start with, the «principled» EU may be facing some sort of mass deportation of refugees to countries where they most certainly will enjoy shaky legal protection. So count on EU lawyers to find a loophole; they will elevate Turkey to the status of a «safe third country». Amnesty International is already furious - but who cares?
The one-refugee-for-one-Turk exchange is even more slippery - and there are no loopholes. Only a miracle from Valhalla will convince, among others, the Baltic nations, Hungary, Poland, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Slovenia to accept further refugee relocation inside their own borders. The Balkan Route for all practical purposes went six feet under when Slovenia closed it down. What is Berlin to do? Reopen it with a blitzkrieg?
Moreover, only a miracle from Zeus will convince Greece as well as Cyprus - not to mention France and Italy - that opening the EU doors to Turkey is the right price to pay to ease the crisis.
So assuming a deal is clinched it will open yet another chapter in one of the great tragedies of our time; next it will be a Grapes of Wrath scenario, lost souls plying the Balkan Route - including many families - fighting with their lives not to be deported back to Turkey.
And another «mystery» will remain unsolved; how this mass of refugees got there in the first place.
First they had to sneak around western Turkey - a highly indented coast, with few major cities and only a few local bus lines - on their way to a smatter of Greek islands, mostly Mytilini and Kos but also Chios and Kastellorizo. They would have traveled more than 1000 kilometers from the Turkish-Syrian border - where many had been languishing.
They left because Ankara told them to. They may have even had enjoyed direct and indirect access to some Ankara «help» to get on bus after bus after bus. Picture the Sultan's network shipping their massive overland blackmail cargo by bus, delivered right on the doorstep of smuggling rings with the right connections, ready to ferry them across the Aegean to Greece.
Talk about a precious cargo. And this cargo is about to make Ankara handsomely profit to the tune of 6.6 billion - plus immense fringe benefits. And still those sorry Eurocrat tourists believe they are clinching the deal of the century; the «carpet» they are taking home is as rotten as they come.
My wife and I lived in Benghazi 2010, later to move to Sanjour in Tripoli. On the way to the southern desert at Ajdabiya as far as the eye could see were 30 to 40 story apartment buildings being constructed as housing for families. At marriage Kadafi would give every young married couple $ 50,000. There were subsidies on gasoline, cost us about 46 cents per gallon. A 40 gallon canister of Propane was $ 1.00 US Dollar, bread was a cheap as sand. Employment was almost non existent.
However, the people in Benghazi hated Kadafi, and thought their tribe could rule Libya better. These people were hard core Muslim. Libya, prior to the bloodless coup in 1969 by the CIA, which put Kadafi into power, was ruled by three tribes of Benghazi, Sabha and Tripoli. It was Kadafi who united Libya. The people of Tripoli Loved Kadafi.
I was the Operations General Manager for the Tatanaki Family, Challenger Limited, One of the largets Libyan National Oil and Gas Drilling Contractor there, and was also over the GMR or Great Man Made River Project. We were the drillers of the water wells into the aquifer. KADAFI called it the eighth wonder of the world, and I believe he was right. It was spectacular. The Brits and American experts said it could not be done, but they were so wrong, it was a marvel, a feat, what a country could do with no wars to forever deal with. 12’ diameter concrete pipeline to transfer the water from Ghadamis to Tripoli, down to Sabha and all cities and towns, back up to Sirte and over to Benghazi, to south desert Sarir, and eats from Benghazi to Tubruq.
The Liars and the Murderers, destroyed that Marvel, Lying and saying the pipe line was underground tunnels to transport troops to terrorize their own Libyan people.
I tried to warn as many there as I could, when Gadafi un-nationalized the oil….I told the people the western liars and murderers led by the jews wanted their central banks there, and it had nothing to do with the oil, the Big five already controls the oil of the earth.
When the Al queida (CIA) began their coup against Kadafi, our Government of the USA was the only one which did not attempt to get American Ex-pats out of the country. My wife and I were certain to die their after 12 days of the NATO Destruction. It was Kadafi himself who gave us transportation and save passage from the country to Tunisia. Where we barely survived from Feb. 2011 until May with very little money, finally to beg our family for money to get home…….and our wretched federal reserve took their monetary system and robbed our money in the banks there…………The Libyan people were a wonderful people, we miss them dearly. Oh how I despise this murdering anti-God country we live in now.
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