It’s a best seller before it’s even released. The reason for her memoirs Angela Merkel entitled “Freedom”. Sold out and her first live interview at the historic Deutsches Theater in Berlin, at the official launch of the book. A theatre, which she loves, where she has been going since she was a child and it was her personal choice.

A book, in which you actually read what you assumed about Merkel as a politician and as a person. It’s just that now they’re written in the first person: She’s a moderate, a realist, more like a diplomat than a politician, steeped in ideology and direct enemies.

She maintains a balance, perhaps necessary, because most of her interlocutors during her chancellorship are still alive and many in office: Trump, Putin, Mertz, Soltz, etc. Big “absent” of course is Wolfgang Schäuble, the sub. Economist who identified his name – in Greece – with the “Grexit” plan. He defends her political positions and gives her own side for a period of German, European and international politics. who determined the destinies of countries and people: the period of 16 years he spent in chancellorship.

For Papandreou and the first shadows in the Greek case

In her memoirs, Angela Merkel Speaks for everyone and everything in the period mainly from 2005 to 2021. She also talks in detail about the euro crisis, the Greek crisis with references to the Greek prime ministers of the period. A look at just a few first excerpts about her contacts with her Greek counterparts, sympathies, surprises, serious disagreements and convergences:

Starting from 2009 and the then Prime Minister George Papandreou, he says: “Papandreou told us that he needs time. I found his reaction inconceivable. On the one hand, there was a lot of pressure, he had to do something, but on the other hand he seemed to have all the time in the world on his side (…) We spoke to each other intensely, English, French German. The interpreters barely whispered what they were hearing.”

Regarding the difference of opinion regarding the management of the Greek debt crisis, which had already begun to appear in the period of 2009 and 2010, Angela Merkel observes:

“We recognized that all Eurozone members shared responsibility for the economic and financial stability of the Euro and agreed on five points. Among them we called on Greece to fulfill its debt reduction obligations. We asked the sub. Economy and Finance of the EU to meet on February 16, 2010 (…) and by then Greece would approve proposed measures to reduce the deficit. The Commission would supervise their implementation with the ECB and would make use of the experience of the IMF. The contribution of the IMF was important to me, its staff was experienced and would evaluate the Greek proposals more impartially than the European institutions. My concern was that the latter would be too lenient with Greece.”

For Tsipras and a little Samara

Going through the whole period of the crisis, she stands in her book especially in the -almost-fatal 2015, SYRIZA and Alexis Tsipras. Looking back at the election of Tsipras as prime minister at the beginning of 2015, he also makes a reference to his predecessor, Antonis Samaras:

“Tsipras’s victory is due to the anger of many Greeks against the Euro bailout programs. In his election campaign he promised to free the country from the yoke of the troika, as he said. His predecessor Antonis Samaras failed to implement what was agreed in the second bailout program.”

Regarding her first personal meeting with Alexis Tsipras at the chancellery in early 2015, she says the following: “I was curious and excited, what kind of personality he had, I would get to know him better. He was twenty years younger than me.” And he notes: “Until then we had spoken twice on the phone with interpreters and had gone to Brussels. We had only been there briefly for two sessions of the European Council. I liked him there, but I couldn’t say more” he says about their first official meeting at the chancellery and continues:

“As far as I remember, I emphasized in the conversation with Tsipras that I had every intention of Greece remaining a member of the Eurozone. In the summer of 2012 I had already thought a lot about the arguments of those who wanted Greece to leave the Eurozone. They couldn’t convince me.”

For the historic “Wir schaffen das” (We’ll make it)

Without a doubt, for Chancellor Merkel the most pivotal year in her political tenure was 2015. It started with the height of the Greek crisis and the political and financial thriller until the final bailout of Greece by staying in the Eurozone after the July referendum ( and the “no” that became “yes) and ended with the refugee drama in Europe, starting again from its shores Aegean until the German border. To this day, Angela Merkel seems convinced that her choice to keep the borders open to the nearly one million refugees was the right one:

“Wir schaffen das (s.s. We will make it). No other proposition has turned on my ears as much as this one in my entire political career. For me it was a simple proposal” he says from the preface.

“It was the expression of an attitude to life. You can call it faith in God, self-confidence or just determination to solve problems, overcome dead ends, will for something new. We can succeed and where we encounter obstacles, we must try. That’s what I said then at that press conference on the refugee issue on 31/08/2015. That’s how I did politics. This is how I live (…)”