The Greek tragedy continues

The final act of the Greek tragedy being played out in Brussels, Berlin and Athens has not yet ended. It is most unlikely to be much applauded. Perhaps there will be some hollow laughter and sighs as well as groans. Even before the curtain goes down the reviewers are sharpening their pencils to damn the performance.

The leading player, Greek Prime Minister Alex Tsipras, has already been the target of many brickbats and much scorn for his performance so far. As the drama began to unfold many in the European audience had sympathy for the plight of the Greek chorus in their down-at-heel costumes and with their hungry looks, but their leader seemed determined from the opening of the drama to do all he could to alienate the audience and to irritate and insult the other European players.

Tsipras behaved like a spoiled adolescent. He seemed to think that by sucking up to Russian President Vladimir Putin he would show the Europeans that Greece had other friends even if they had nothing in their pockets to give him.

In speaking with European leaders and officials he wasted valuable time by preaching half-baked socialist ideas and refusing to listen to the advice of the experts in the European commission and the International Monetary Fund. Although he was an inexperienced new boy he treated experienced senior European leaders with arrogance.

When he and his Marxist finance minister did not get what they wanted in Brussels they returned to Athens in a huff and called a referendum whose terms left many Greek voters (members of the chorus in this tragedy) bemused.

When, as advised by their chorus master, a majority voted against the European union's offered terms Tsipras returned to Brussels ostensibly to renegotiate the deal, but proceeded to accept considerably harsher terms as unless he did so Greece could not remain in the single currency, which the Greek people wanted.

European sympathy for the Greek people did not wholly disappear, but the governments and legislators in many European countries were exasperated by the Greek government's posturing. They objected to lending more money to Greece to prop up a bloated public sector and maintain a pensions system which was seen as more generous than in some other European countries.

The package offered to Greece of €86 billion is dependent on approval by all states in the eurozone. The German Parliament has given its grudging consent, but antagonism between Greece and Germany has intensified. Other eurozone countries states will probably follow the German lead, but without enthusiasm.

The Greek Parliament for its part "with a gun to its head" has passed resolutions to implement the terms of the bail-out, although Tsipras and his government clearly do not think the terms sensible or fair. Hardly anyone in Europe expects Greece to implement fully the reforms its government and parliament have approved. Trust is a commodity in short supply.

The basic problem with the package so far tentatively agreed on is that while it provides a lifeline for the Greeks, who are "drowning" in debt, it does not provide the means for them to get back safely to land and work their way into solvency.

The Greek national debt is likely to reach over 200 percent of Greek gross national product. As the IMF has pointed out, Greece, which has no real foreign exchange reserves, is unlikely ever to be able to repay its debts unless the Greek economy not only recovers but also prospers. With unprecedented levels of unemployment and a paralyzed banking system recovery seems remote. Some part at least of Greece's debt will surely have to be written off and ways found to get the Greek economy moving.

Foreign tourism is a major sources of foreign exchange for Greece. But the banking crisis and social unrest in Greece have led to a fall off in tourist bookings. The increases in value added tax imposed as part of the package will hardly encourage tourism.

Greece also has an important shipping industry, which should be a valuable source of revenue, but shipping is notorious for the way in which it exploits tax havens.

A basic problem for Greece is that its system of tax collection is widely thought to be both inefficient and open to corruption.

While Tsipras is the leading figure in this tragedy, the other European participants deserve at best grudging approval. Politics is the art of the possible and politicians have to take account of European public opinion, which at this stage would not agree to a wholesale write-off of Greek debt. Countries like Spain, Portugal and Ireland, which have been compelled to adopt reforms and austerity measures, would not stomach specially favorable terms for Greece, which is seen by many as largely responsible for its own failures.

One of the more serious effects of this Greek tragedy is the increase in ill-feeling and friction between a fractious Greece and an irritated European community. This is as much a political as an economic threat to European unity. It comes at a bad time when there are grave suspicions of Russian intentions in Ukraine and toward Eastern European countries, when Greece is receiving a flood of refugees and economic migrants from the Middle East and when the threat of Islamic extremism is growing.

People in other countries share Greek opposition to austerity, by which is meant cutting government expenditure and increasing taxes. The argument against austerity is that without increased spending there can be no prosperity and therefore the prospects of debt repayment recede.

While there is some truth in this argument, increased spending depends on the ability to borrow and the existence of lenders at an interest rate that the borrower can afford.

Japan can run up a very large deficit because it has large reserves and Japanese people are prepared to lend ever-increasing sums to their own government. This is a luxury not available to Greece.

In another famous tragedy, that of Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Polonius notoriously advised his son "neither a borrower, nor a lender be." Sage advice but unfeasible for countries in the modern world.

Hugh Cortazzi served as Britain's ambassador to Japan from 1980-1984.