For a fleeting moment last spring, it was possible to believe that Europe's economic crisis had turned Angela Merkel into a true believer in the European cause. Three days after putting up the biggest chunk of a €750 billion (around $1 trillion) package to save Europe's common currency from the Greek financial contagion, the German chancellor gave voice to a set of pro-European musings straight out of the post-World War II dream factory. European unity, she said in a May 13 speech, is the "most tantalizing, magnificent, auspicious idea." Not only must Europe forge a genuinely integrated economy, she declared, but it needs "a common European army."
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