“If the period of 2015 had to be summed up, the phrase that would describe it is ‘we dodged it by a hair’.” With these words, former European Commission Vice President Margaritis Schinas explained on Direct with Giorgos Evgenidis how he personally experienced the SYRIZA government’s negotiation, on the occasion of Alexis Tsipras’s book Ithaca.

In his interview, Mr. Schinas describes the summer of 2015 in detail, noting that the referendum “blew everything up” and that the European Commission, although it never assumed Greece would exit the euro, was forced to prepare an emergency plan for a “nightmarish scenario.”

As he said, that summer was the peak of a “nightmarish period,” with Greece reaching “the edge of the abyss,” while the political cost of the rescue had become unbearable.

Referring to the negotiation, Schinas noted that “there was no strategy at all” on the Greek side. He described the six-month period as “an escalation of desperate stages,” not a substantive negotiation, but rather “tactical moves that were going nowhere.”

The former Vice President of the Commission said that “there was a large reserve of goodwill” to help Greece, but that “it found no response.”

He described the Giannis Varoufakis period as “an inexhaustible show of narcissism,” and recalled that Greece became the first country to refuse to repay an IMF installment, emphasizing that “only Gambia hadn’t paid; we were the second.”

During the most critical moments, he said, “the climax of the drama did not show strategy, but narcissism and lack of political backing.” He stressed that the negotiating team “did not know Europe’s software,” and characterized the referendum as “a move to shift responsibility onto the shoulders of the Greek people.”

In this context, he also referred to the role of Jean-Claude Juncker, who, as he said, “got involved from the first week after SYRIZA’s victory.” According to Mr. Schinas, Juncker was “a genuine and selfless friend of Greece,” knew the workings of the Greek state well, and “never polarized the climate,” even when he saw things that disappointed him. The announcement of the referendum, he said, “wounded him deeply,” which is why he made an emotional intervention in a press conference calling on citizens to vote “yes.”

He also made special reference to the “nightmarish scenario” of Grexit, noting that although in the Commission “no one had ever built a prospect of Greece leaving the eurozone,” there was an obligation to prepare an emergency plan. As he revealed, “the darkest moment” was when he realized that in a room next to his office the plan was being prepared, concerning “medicine supplies, border controls, fuel,” a full management plan for the consequences “of a nuclear explosion.” He said he “refused to look at it,” and estimated that Juncker did not read it either, “but he knew what it contained.”

After the referendum, he said, “the situation was politically easier to manage,” as the “somersault” — a term that, as he noted, “entered the European political vocabulary” — created conditions with no room for surprises, something that ultimately showed in the markets. Parliament supported the program in August, providing “great political backing” that reassured those who were worried.

When asked whether he has read Alexis Tsipras’s book, Schinas replied that “he doesn’t need to read it” because he lived through the events. He stressed that “charisma is not enough for someone to become prime minister” and that “administrative competence and knowledge” are required, noting that the major problem of that period was “complete ignorance of the situation” and lack of preparation. As he said, the leadership at the time “gave the image of a school field trip,” boarded “a bus with no sense of destination,” and “had not worked through the issues in depth.” In his view, the book “implicitly acknowledges this.”

Speaking about the country’s current trajectory, he said that Greece resembles “the student who got up from the last desk and sat in the front,” as Moreto used to say, noting that Europe recognizes that “the country is getting its house in order.” However, he warned that although “the bottom of the barrel has been reached,” the deep problems remain.