{"id":5444,"date":"2015-02-08T09:38:06","date_gmt":"2015-02-08T14:38:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=5444"},"modified":"2015-02-08T09:38:06","modified_gmt":"2015-02-08T14:38:06","slug":"war-and-default-in-europe-pose-merkels-biggest-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=5444","title":{"rendered":"War and Default in Europe Pose Merkel\u2019s Biggest Challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

War and Default in Europe Pose Merkel\u2019s Biggest Challenge<\/span><\/a><\/h3>\n

(Bloomberg) — After almost a decade as German chancellor, Angela Merkel faces a moment of truth as a resurgent Russia and fed-up Greeks challenge her blueprint for Europe\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

As bloodshed in eastern Ukraine escalates and the new Greek government rejects austerity championed by Merkel, her deliberate leadership style may be reaching the limit of its effectiveness.<\/p>\n

With Europe\u2019s post-Cold War order and its unifying currency at stake, the weight of global and domestic expectations is pushing Merkel out of her comfort zone and into two direct confrontations. Both adversaries and allies have repeatedly underestimated Merkel\u2019s determination as she rose from obscurity in an East German lab to become the world\u2019s most powerful woman.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt underscores how much Germany is really the pivotal power in Europe and Angela Merkel is the pivotal leader,\u201d Daniel Hamilton, head of the Center for Transatlantic Relations at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, said in an interview. \u201cMuch of it has to do with Germany\u2019s success, but much of it also has to do with default by other powers. It\u2019s not like she or Germany aspires to this role.\u201d<\/p>\n

Merkel\u2019s status as Europe\u2019s go-to leader will be on display when President Barack Obama hosts her at the White House on Monday. In the run-up, she\u2019s resisting pressure by U.S. politicians to send arms to Ukraine\u2019s government.<\/p>\n

The biggest risk for Merkel is if either crisis spiraled out of control. At that point, she would have failed to address \u201cGerman concern about stability,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

War and Default in Europe Pose Merkel\u2019s Biggest Challenge (Bloomberg) — After almost a decade as German chancellor, Angela Merkel faces a moment of truth as a resurgent Russia and fed-up Greeks challenge her blueprint for Europe\u2019s future. As bloodshed in eastern Ukraine escalates and the new Greek government rejects austerity championed by Merkel, her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5],"tags":[1890,149,195,200,281,284,1167,690,694,821,862],"class_list":["post-5444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-geopolitics","tag-angela-merkel","tag-cold-war","tag-debt","tag-default","tag-europe","tag-european-union","tag-greece","tag-risk","tag-russia","tag-ukraine","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5445,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5444\/revisions\/5445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}