The memorandum of 135 billion euros, which was signed by the government of G. A. Papandreou with the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank in May 2010, effectively placed Greece under full and strict American-European supervision.

This is not the first time that the country has lost its national independence. For half of its modern history, the Greek state has been in a state of immediate or indirect external payment default. However, it has never experienced internal bankruptcy like the last eight years.

The country went bankrupt after it abandoned its national currency, the drachma, in 2002, and accepted the euro (which is essentially the German mark at an exchange rate of 170 drachmas). Since then, while it has lost 35% of its competitiveness, the country has borrowed over 250 billion euros, resulting in total debt (both private and public) reaching 442 billion euros, or 192% of the Gross National Product of 2009.

The entire Greek debt is now owed to foreign creditors. At the levels it has reached, it is unsustainable, even if it were to be cut (haircut) by 50%. Under conditions of shrinking national income, it does not generate the necessary resources of 75 billion euros annually to service the external debt.

Consequently, a renegotiation of the debt repayment with foreign creditors is necessary, over a period of 35 years, with the reinstatement of the drachma and the recovery of national monetary and fiscal policy, that is, the lost national sovereignty. Only in this way can the widespread unemployment, the nation-destroying emigration, and social conflict be avoided.

[Excerpt from the text on the back cover of the edition]