00:00Faced with the U.S. withdrawal, the EU 27 are taking their security back into their
00:10own hands.
00:13The member states have approved a plan to rearm Europe with a budget of 800 billion
00:17euros.
00:18However, on the left, some contentious voices are raised against European rearmament.
00:25Europe's rearmament is the next great folly of the European Union.
00:29It's going to make us less safe.
00:32It will make life nastier, more brutish, shorter in Europe.
00:36It will certainly dissolve what social fabric we have left after 20, 30 years of crisis.
00:44It is a way to weaken Europe in the name of making it stronger.
00:50The European Commission has proposed that member countries deviate from the EU's rules
00:54of budgetary orthodoxy to finance their defense spending.
00:59For his part, the future German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has opened the door to an
01:03end to the debt break to enable Germany to finance its own rearmament.
01:09This represents a 180-degree turnaround for this prudent state, which was notably in favor
01:14of restructuring Greek debt during the 2009 crisis.
01:20The former Greek finance minister welcomes this paradigm shift with some reservations.
01:26Of course I welcome the end of this debt break, but there is no silver lining here
01:32because Mr. Merz, the way he's announcing it, it is clear that what he wants to do is
01:35he wants to indulge in military Keynesianism.
01:37Instead of investing in life, he's investing mostly in death.
01:42And that, even if you look at it from a realistic economic, macroeconomic point of view, it's
01:47not going to generate the growth where it is necessary.
01:54When asked whether pacifism might be similar to giving Vladimir Putin a blank check to
01:58invade neighboring countries, he replies that pacifism is never a good response to invasion,
02:04but that opting for endless war isn't rational either.
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