Schäuble insists that "pacta sunt servanda". Yet treaty obligations may be waived or redefined, and there is no shame in recalling past examples to underline the fact. In particular, recalling that, in the postwar years, there were two plans for Germany. One, promoted by Morgenthau, was the utter punishment of Germany by the destruction of the industrial economy and a return to agrarianism. The other, which won out, was the re-establishment of an industrial economy by means of debt forgiveness and an economic aid programme. The West German "economic miracle" of the 1950s was built on that.

It is not "nationalistic blabbing" to wish that Germans would remember those facts somewhat more clearly than, we are told, they remember hyperinflation in 1923.