But the White House made one thing clear. There could be no talk of debt restructuring. “We cannot have another Lehman,” Obama emphasized. Whether Greece’s debts were sustainable was not America’s concern. Washington’s priority was containing financial contagion. Restructuring could not be contemplated until the Europeans had found a way to stabilize bond markets and were ready to push through wholesale recapitalization of Europe’s banks. And given the Franco-German deadlock, no such agreement seemed likely.
