Washington ( CNN ) -- Once again , a swelling chorus is calling on Germany to finally take action . `` Start the engines , Angela , '' reads the colorful headline of a piece whose authors seem to assume that Chancellor Merkel commands the horsepower to save the euro , save the British and American recoveries , and -- as a throw-in -- save the Obama presidency . If only the Germans showed more leadership and found it in them to roll out `` decisive policies , '' argues Harvard historian Charles Maier , the everlasting eurocrisis could be ended . It is true that Germany is the pivot in the euro game . Nothing happens if Germany does not consent . But the reverse is not true . If Germany wants something , it does not necessarily happen . That 's where the problem of German leadership starts . While much of the world looks at Germany as an ascending economic power within a declining continent , thereby shifting the regional balance of power in its favor , Germans themselves ( and certainly their current elected leader ) are keenly aware of the limits of German power . History has taught them painful lessons . Since Germany 's emergence as an industrial economy , it has been too big to be one of many in Europe and too small to dominate the continent . The latter proposition has been tested time and again and has usually ended in blood and tears somewhere in Russia . Among Germans , this experience has produced an ingrained skepticism toward the notion of German dominance , even if it comes in the form of a benevolent hegemony , based on the consent of the neighbors and transfer of wealth to them . Germans will be quick to point out that Germany is too small to take much of the rest of Europe onto its back . The German economy accounts for only 27 % of the eurozone 's output . The debt-to-GDP ratio hovers around an unhealthy 80 % and might jump to around 100 % given the commitments and guarantees to other European nations . Nobody in Germany has forgotten the enormity of the task to bail out , reform and integrate East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall . To this very day , 3 % to 4 % of GDP are spent on transfers to the former East . In 1989 , East Germany accounted for roughly a fourth of the population of West Germany and no more than a fraction of its economic output . Compare that to ailing Spain and Italy , whose combined economies rival Germany 's today . Therefore , it is a fantasy to assume that Germany alone can be Europe 's white knight . Given these constraints , Merkel 's willingness to lead Europe is remarkable . She has found a strategy to leverage Germany 's limited power . First , Merkel internationalized the European bailouts ; second , she broke down the effort into small steps to make them palatable to domestic constituencies in multiple countries ; third , she resurrected the French-German alliance as an engine for progress ; and , most importantly , she made the markets her friend and ally . In her assessment , no reform will happen in southern Europe without pressure from the markets . And there will be no pressure from the markets without limits to German largesse . Unlimited and unconditional help would take away any incentive to reform . That is the reality in a monetary union without political union because the sovereign who bails out is different from the sovereign who reforms . Merkel 's strategy is paying initial dividends . Structural reforms in southern Europe are well under way . But Merkel 's leadership has come at a price . Aligning herself with the markets has meant maintaining relentless pressure on the southern countries while keeping the crisis simmering . That has resulted in costly and dangerous brinkmanship and created the myth that the pain of structural adjustment has to be borne by the southern Europeans alone . And it has created a diplomatic challenge . Even Germany 's best friends do n't understand why the country opens its purse only at the last moment , but not a second earlier . They mistake strategy for passivity and a realistic assessment of Germany 's wealth and power for stingy disciplinarianism . With the crisis coming to a head , the German approach will be put to the ultimate test . The markets seem to have concluded that no bazooka will end this crisis alone . They now bet on a so-called banking union as a first step toward centralizing power in Brussels . They seem to regard this form of minimal federalism as solution to the crisis . Merkel endorses core-federalism , at least in principle , but she certainly can not deliver it alone . Germany may be a reluctant leader , but its followers are even more reluctant . Merkel needs to persuade France , the most sovereignist country in continental Europe , to trade its Gaullist vision of Europe for a more centralized version with some sovereignty moving from Paris to Brussels . She needs to reassure smaller nations that core-federalism is not the equivalent of neo-colonialism . She needs to convince the southern periphery that joint debt and joint risk in Europe will mean joint control over the budget process , thereby limiting the reach of the nation state . And , finally , she needs to win over the Brits to play along with ( rather than obstruct ) a more centralized system of governance among the eurozone and even the EU countries that the Brits themselves likely will never join . Rather than being made the villain , Merkel could use a little help from her friends across the Atlantic . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff .
Many are callling on Germany to take effort to save the Euro . Thomas Kleine - Schmidt says there are limits to what Germany can do , given scope of action . He says Germany is too big to be just another nation but too small to dominate the continent . Germany : Angela Merkel has taken positive action to save Euro , but needs help from others .