Events have rudely exposed the illusion that Greece's people will submit quietly to a decade of colonial treatment and debt servitude.

As matters stand, it is more likely than not that a defiant Alexis Tsipras will be the elected prime minister of Greece by late January. His Syriza alliance has vowed publicly and persistently that it will overthrow the EU-IMF Troika regime, refusing to implement the key demands.

A view has taken hold in EU capitals and the City of London that Mr Tsipras has resiled from these positions and will ultimately stick to the Troika Memorandum, a text of economic vandalism that pushed Greece into seven years of depression, with a 25.9pc fall in GDP, longer and deeper than Europe's worst episodes in the 1930s.

Mr Tsipras is a polished performer on the EU circuit. He can no longer be caricatured as motorbike Maoist. But the fact remains that he told Greek voters as recently as last week that his government would cease to enforce the bail-out demands "from its first day in office".

The logical implication is that Greece will be forced out of the euro in short order, unless the EU institutions capitulate. Syriza's deputy, Panagiotis Lafazanis, is plainly willing to take this risk, warning in October that the movement must "be ready to implement its progressive programme outside the eurozone” if need be. His Aristeri Platforma holds 30pc of the votes on Syriza's central committee.

Mr Tsipras also knows it. He is gambling that EU leaders - meaning Germany's Angela Merkel and Wolfgang Schauble - will yield. His calculation is that they will not dare to blow up monetary union at this late stage, and over a relative pittance,

David Fuller's view

Here is a PDF version of the article.

It may not be pleasant reading but I commend the rest of this article to you.  What has transpired in the EU is quite shocking.