The countries of the Balkans are at their wit‘s end. The reactions of the EU institutions are chaotic. Leading countries like Germany stand confounded in the face of the refugees flooding into Europe, as if a period of migration of the peoples is upon us – this is the note on which the week came to an end.

A note that leaves a bitter aftertaste. Uncertainty may trigger panic. I hope that the steps the Bulgarian administration has been taking these past few days will prove to beforward-looking rather than a knee-jerk reaction and will, at least to some extent, dispel this uncertainty. Just as putting up a fence along the border with Turkey to keep refugees from Syria out that started two years ago, proved to be a forward-looking decision.

The latest step the government took on Friday was to dispatch thousands of troops as well as military hardware which, as Interior Ministry Chief Secretary Georgi Kostov put it: “will perform routine border control actions“ to assist the border police. This news was taken up by world media to be interpreted in all kinds of ways. To this we should add the statement by Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov that: “we need a broad coalition, including Russia to cope with the refugee crisis.” Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova on her part declared that: “we will not use force against the immigrants,” and that it was advisable that the additional refugee quota of 1,600 Bulgaria should take in from Greece and Italy be “families from Syria.”

Against the backdrop of all this, Sofia is once again raising the question of the country’s entry into the Schengen area. Some Schengen countries had been saying that Bulgaria is not ready for Schengen, but now it seems their own borders are being breached around the clock and the authorities there have frantically been reinforcing border control. In fact, to talk of Schengen and free movement at this time is beginning to sound ludicrous. Each of the 28 members has been crawling back into its own shell to calculate losses or gains from the migration crisis.

The wave of refugees sweeping over Europe started out from the countries of North Africa and the Middle East after they were destabilized. I would like to believe that the intentions of USA were noble when it started out changing the status quo in those countries, imposing its own model of democracy by way of the “spring revolutions”. But even if the intentions were good, the end result is appalling, putting at risk the whole of Europe – not just the members of the EU. What Washington is now doing is sitting back and watching the show. And the first operation of destabilization Shock and Awe against Iraq so many years ago is now having a boomerang effect, though not on USA but on Europe. I do hope I shall not play the role of prophet of doom, but the wealthy European countries are yet to be “shocked and awed” by the refugee wave that may, as some observers predict, very soon turn into a devastating tsunami. For many years they have, along with USA, been sucking these regions dry of their resources, leaving the local population to live in dire poverty. I wouldn’t be surprised if the time has now come for them to foot the bill.