German/French/Greece Trivia

[Lokki 7]

German/French/Greece Trivia (source: GaveKal)

Question: Who is the third biggest arms importer in the world, behind India and
China?
Answer: Greece

Question: If Greece had spent the EU average on defence over the past 10 years (1.7%) of GDP rather than spending 4% of GDP, how much money would it have saved?
Answer: 52% of GDP or Euro150billion

So why are France and Germany not demanding that Greece cuts its defence
spending; a residual fear of the Turk or perhaps there is another reason...?

Question: In the period 2006-2010 which country was Germany’s largest market
for munitions?
Answer: Greece, which accounted for 15% of total German arms sales.

Question: In the same period, what country was France’s largest arms export
market in Europe (third largest overall)?
Answer: Greece

Question: In 2010 (last year data is available) social spending in Greece was
cut by 1.8bn Euros, how much did military spending change?
a) Decreased by Euro 900 million
b) No change
c) Increased by Euro 900million

Answer: C


Corruption - It works.

 

[SK1NT]

Interesting... Never would have thought Greece would be big Arms importers.

 

[Lokki 7]

By Karin Matussek
Dec. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Ferrostaal AG was fined 140 million
euros ($183 million) today by a Munich court in a bribery case
related to the conduct of two former employees.
The fine is the result of an agreement between the company,
prosecutors and the judges, court spokeswoman Margarete Noetzel
said in an e-mailed statement. The sanction was issued as part
of a verdict in the trial of two former company managers accused
of paying bribes in Greece and Portugal.
Ferrostaal said at the beginning of the trial on Dec. 15
that it was willing to pay the fine, which was the result of
“intensive negotiations.” The company said in a statement
today that it would bear the consequences and pay the fine.


I mean seriously, how big is the bribe if the fine is €140m??!!! Where can I get involved in this European corruption racket it sounds like fun?

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Interesting... Never would have thought Greece would be big Arms importers.

They have to keep them protestors down somehow. Better to be tooled up with well engineered and reliable German kit I suppose?

 

[SeagullSongs]

Been on holiday to the Greek islands several times, one memorable thing happened in Kos (so close to Turkey you can see it):
We were just walking past some restaurants near lunch time and 2 military jeeps pulled up and 3 guys jumped out stopping the traffic at each exit of a roundabout, then a few seconds later this huge lorry carrying what looked to be hundreds of artillery shells drove straight through without stopping. The guys jumped back in the jeeps and 5 seconds later it looked like nothing had happened.
Weird, and unusual to see something Greek organised so well