In November 2011 I wrote on this blog, "I can't see any way in which Greece will still be in the Euro by the end of 2012".
So that prediction went well.
What I had not then realised is that those who get to the top in the Game of Euros are by definition committed to the Project. They'll do pretty much anything to keep the show on the road. So the bail-outs, the interminable conferences, the late night agreements, the postponement of appointments with reality, the can-kicking forever and ever.
But in the last four years I have become wiser and thus am not terribly surprised this morning, 14th July 2015, to find that Greece is still in the Euro, 48 hours after its premier Mr Tsipras finally caved in to the Eurogroup's demands and agreed to take them back to Athens for ratification by the Greek parliament.
At the heart of this shambles is a problem of democracy. The Greeks desperately want to be in Europe - Tsipras said he had a mandate for rejecting European demands but not for leaving the single currency. The German government on the other hand answers to an electorate which is fed up of paying for Greek failure.
The electorates of both countries are deluded. The Greek people don't seem to have noticed that it's being in the Euro which is one of the prime causes of their troubles, or that you don't have to be in the Euro to be part of Europe (look at Britain). The German electorate on the other hand doesn't seem to have realised that not every country can be like theirs - not every country can have a strong economy whose exports have benefited enormously from having a currency lowered by its association with weaker economies like Greece - and that for every creditor nation there must by definition be a debtor nation.
Both Mrs Merkel and successive Greek leaders have lacked the guts to tell their electorates the truth.
And the consequence of all this? Greece has had it. It has apparently signed up for outside supervision and interference in the running of its economy. It must run a surplus. If it doesn't run a surplus it must cut spending further, thus guaranteeing its economic nosedive will steepen. It must find 50 bn Euros of state assets to sell, and put the money into a fund beyond Greek control to pay off its debts. And if it jumps through all these successive hoops then there might in future be a discussion of debt relief, at least in the form of extended maturities.
There seems absolutely no prospect of this plan working. Greece owes too much money. Some of it needs writing off. And while we wait for conclusive proof that the plan isn't working Greeks face a future of bleakness unimaginable to Britons.
What does this tell us about Europe? Firstly, that Germany is boss. Even though France apparently wanted kinder terms, their ridiculous bespectacled penguin of a leader was unable to face the Germans down. It tells us that all the talk about the club of nations, about solidarity, about co-operation is just so much flannel. It tells us that Euro area is not a currency union at all, but merely a hard currency peg from which smaller nations slip at their peril. The ECB, remember, pulled the plug on funding Greek banks a couple of weeks ago in what may well be a breach of its duty to ensure financial stability. That was a political act as much as an economic one.
None of the European leaders come out of this well. Mr Tsipras overplayed his hand. He gambled the Germans would give ground. They didn't. He made no preparations for a return to the drachma and when the banks had to close he had nowhere left to go. He ended up with a deal significantly worse than he and Varoufakis could have got five months ago, and significantly worse than the one his countrymen roundly rejected in a referendum.
That's what happens when you put the cool people in charge.
On a superficial analysis Mrs Merkel got what she wanted. But the plan she wanted won't work and we'll be back here again, perhaps within months. And that's even if the Greek parliament ratifies the deal. Moreover the watching world has learned things about the dynamics of Europe and the Eurozone which are exceptionally unpalatable. Essentially its partners were willing to let Greece go to the wall rather than face down their own electorates.
After so many earlier failures I am wary of making predictions. Better leave it to others. And here's a stonking great hostage to fortune. Two days ago Simon Schama wrote on Twitter, "If Tsipras was wearing the crown of King Pyrrhus this time last week, Merkel is wearing it now. Her ultimatum beginning of end of EU".
That's a big claim.
