The Greeks had a word for it. Omphalos. Meaning, essentially, navel. Signifying, importantly, the centre. Once upon a time, Greece – Hellas! – was the centre of the world, the fountainhead of ‘western’ ‘civilisation’. Today, like the famous Greek (Spartan) king-general Leonidas’ brave band of 300, Greece – alas! – has come to a strategic [...]

The Sunday Times Sri Lanka

Of Greece, Germany, and the Omphalos Syndrome

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The Greeks had a word for it. Omphalos. Meaning, essentially, navel. Signifying, importantly, the centre. Once upon a time, Greece – Hellas! – was the centre of the world, the fountainhead of ‘western’ ‘civilisation’. Today, like the famous Greek (Spartan) king-general Leonidas’ brave band of 300, Greece – alas! – has come to a strategic pass… there is no retreat from it – and Greece (like Leonidas’ soldiers) has come home not with, but on, its shield.

In a defiant move that brought bittersweet tears to the eyes of many Greeks and tears of anger to the eyes of many Europeans (mainly Germans, we’d wager), the Hellenes voted “No!” to the austerity measures that their democratic offspring would have had foisted on them. Like Olympians shaking off the tyranny of the Titans, the Greeks shook their fists in the face of the EU (read Angela Merkel and her mercurial finance minister) and waved the Germans goodbye.

This would be all Greek to anyone who hasn’t followed Hellenistic happenings of late. To cut a very long story short and to the point for those who aren’t high finance pundits: Greece owed the EU a lot of money; Germany in the person and work of its “Iron Lady”/“Iron Chancellor” wanted the Greeks to shape up and pay up (by taking a ‘handout’ ‘bailout’ package) – or ship out of the EU in what has been called a shameful “Grexit”; other power-players in the 19-member Eurozone – especially in the form of Dutch Uncle and French President Francoise Hollande have been trying to soften the blow so that the ‘Cradle of Western Civilisation’ can remain in the EU; with pressure from the ‘Prussians’ mounting, Greece turned to a referendum in which it turned up its nose at its northern cousins / spiritual children and voted a resounding “Nein!” to the proposed austerity package; via-media EU players like France’s Premier Manuel Valls are falling over themselves to broker a deal between Germany and the Eurozone’s central bank, whereby Greece gets to stay in the EU “because Greece’s place is in Europe”; but Merkel GmBH of Germany AG remains unmerciful. Which brings me neatly to two sides of the Greek coin…

In the left field, there are the tender-hearted philosophers who feel that Europe owes Greece a great deal more grace than Germany and the hard-helmets in the EU are presently disposed to dispense to it. They argue, interestingly enough, mainly along historical lines that implicate Germany. After WWII (the argument goes) it was the Allies’ mercy – and the Americans Marshall Plan – that saved Germany from receiving insult over injury when the losing side was bailed out to the tune of billions of dollars. And it was from the clemency of the victors’ vision for a new Europe that Germany, the mighty fallen 1,000-year Reich that lasted only 12 years, emerged like a Phoenix from the ashes of war and Auschwitz to become the EU’s strongest nation. So Germany must remember its not-so-illustrious past, and cut cornered Greece some slack. It is good sense, economically, and good manners, enormously more importantly.

On the right side, Germany seems less than inclined to remember the lessons of history not too long past, and roll out the carpet of largesse and or the rug of leniency. It is backed by tough-minded advocates of hard realities who point out that Germany’s gracious rescue by the Allies in 1953 and Greece’s failure to shift for itself 60 years later are light-years removed, in substance and spirit. Germany was, is, and will always be industrious and accountable; Greece is almost a Third World country in terms of its work ethic and economic culture.

Thus Greece – and the EU, with Germany at the helm – have come to this pass. Thermopylae it isn’t. Posterity will not sing of German chancellor Merkel’s magnanimity or Greek premier Tsipras’s spirited defence and defiance, and ultimately defeatist realignment. Rather, it will remember that in the rise and fall of nation-states, continents, and civilisations, the zeitgeist is human folly, hubris, unforgiving economics, and self-aggrandising chest-thumping and finger-pointing. The Greeks gave it a local habitation and a name… ‘The Omphalos Syndrome’.

In his 2007 treatise, “Are We Rome: The Fall of an Empire and the Fate of America”, writer C. Murphy argues that many world empires suffer from the illusion that global political prominence and strong economic currency secure nation-states the most importance places of position and power in the world. He was evidently referring to the United States of the post-WWII era, but more surely, perhaps, the post-9/11 hegemony of Uncle Sam in the military field as much as mind-spheres of thought leadership. It will not be the only world-empire to have harboured and nurtured such misguided notions of self-referencing privilege. From Assyria to Babylon, from China to Egypt, from the Persian through the Roman to the Ottoman, no empire has been entirely free of the Omphalos syndrome. Greece of old had outbursts of this particular hubris in the works of its democrats and demagogues alike, from tyrants like Alcibiades to continent-conquerors such as Alexander. Germany of late has exhibited the same hamartia, the same fatal flaw; and if we’re honest, in more incarnations than sensitive Teutonic types would care to countenance: the Holy Roman Empire, Bismarck’s Prussia, Hitler’s Nazi Germany, Merkel’s EU.

Don’t get me wrong, meine Damen und Herren! Germany as a great present nation and a dominant historical entity has my heart (for its culture and classical perfection) and my mind (for its clarity and sharpness and punctuality) captive for decades. And Greece in its presently perceived avatar (rundown, lacklustre, unaccountable) lacks some of the sterling character (acuity of mind, nobility of spirit, probity of conduct) that makes it so appealing to students of Western Classics. But Greece is the mother of all us democracy-embracing polities. It deserves more grace and mercy than the vice-like grip of iron chancelleries and the mantles of unfeeling exchequers. Merkel would do well to move over a smidge, meine gnädige Frau, and let Dutch Uncle Hollande, et al., melt the heart of the EU as Germany was once enfolded in America’s ample bosom – whatever Marshall’s motivation may have been: compassionate or commercial. While Germany may be the paterfamilias of the new Europe, Greece is her mother; and a Europe without Greece would be like a machine with a mind and muscle and sinews, but no spirit or spirituality. Not even Blut und Eisen (‘blood and iron’) Angela could want that. Not when Germany herself is the biggest debt defaulter in Europe.

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