Wolfgang Schäuble, Germany’s finance minister. PHOTOGRAPH BY MARTIN LEISSL BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY

As I write this, European leaders are meeting in Brussels, and Greece’s fate in the eurozone remains in the balance. But before we get onto the outcome of this latest drama, it’s worth pausing to consider the events leading up to it.

On Friday, Yanis Varoufakis, the former finance minister of Greece, published an article on the Guardian’s Web site in which he alleged that Germany—or, at least Wolfgang Schäuble, the country’s finance minister—wasn’t interested reaching a deal to keep Greece in the eurozone. “Based on months of negotiation,” Varoufakis, who resigned after last Sunday’s referendum, wrote, “my conviction is that the German finance minister wants Greece to be pushed out of the single currency to put the fear of God into the French and have them accept his model of a disciplinarian eurozone.”

Obviously, this was a controversial charge. As the negotiations between Greece and its creditors have dragged on, Germany has adopted a tough stance: that much was well known. But Schäuble’s boss, Chancellor Angela Merkel, has said numerous times that she wants Greece to stay inside the eurozone. Perhaps Varoufakis, a prickly fellow, was exaggerating. He had clashed with Schäuble for months, and it was easy to see why he might want to blame his adversary for the Greek government’s failure to strike a deal months ago, before it ran out of cash and was forced to shut down the country’s banks.

On Saturday evening, however, a remarkable document emerged that went a long way toward confirming Varoufakis’s claim. It was a one-page briefing paper from the German finance ministry, entitled “Comments on the latest Greek proposals.” (The document was first reported on by Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung and subsequently verified by the Wall Street Journal; the German finance ministry has declined to confirm its authenticity.) As its title indicated, it represented its anonymous author’s view of the Greek government’s most recent offer, which, on the face of things at least, accepted most of the creditors’ demands, including a continuation of austerity policies that have helped bring about a historic economic collapse inside the country. When the Greek offer was delivered, on Thursday night, many commentators portrayed it as a forced surrender.

Yet the offer apparently still wasn’t enough for the German finance ministry. “These proposals lack a number of paramount important reform areas to modernize the country, to foster long term economic growth and development,” the leaked document said. “Among these, labour market reform, reform of public sector, privatisations, banking sector, structural reforms are not sufficient. This is why these proposals can not build the basis for a completely new, three year ESM [bailout] program, as requested by Greece. We need a better, a sustainable solution.”

And what might that solution be?

The document suggested two options. Under the first of them, the Greek government would “improve their proposals rapidly and significantly,” and obtain another vote of approval from the Greek parliament. The “improvements” would include not just agreeing to more reforms, but the imposition of automatic spending cuts if Athens failed to hit the budget targets it had agreed to, and the “transfer of valuable Greek assets of [50 bn] Euros to an external fund like the Institution for Growth in Luxembourg, to be privatized over time and decrease debt.”

No, that wasn’t a misprint, or a bit of mischief on my part. The document proposed that Greece, in addition to accepting a new set of demands from its creditors, hand over some unidentified national assets—airports? ports? the Parthenon?—to a foreign agency, which would auction them off to the highest bidder.

Undoubtedly aware that this proposal wouldn’t go down too well in Greece, and would never be accepted by Syriza, the left-wing party, the document listed a second option: “In case, debt sustainability and a credible implementation perspective can not be ensured upfront, Greece should be offered swift negotiations on a time-out from the Eurozone, with possible debt restructuring, if necessary…over at least the next 5 years.”

You read that right, too. Greece would be booted from the eurozone, with the sweetener of a possible debt restructuring; this restructuring, the document went on to say, “would not be in line with the membership in a monetary union.” But perhaps to show that even the German finance ministry has a heart, the Greeks would be offered “growth enhancing, humanitarian and technical assistance over the next years.”

So, there you have it. Varoufakis wasn’t exaggerating, after all. Once Greece was “temporarily” ejected from the eurozone, the prospects of its being allowed back in would be slim to none. Moreover, it appears that Merkel might be backing Schäuble’s position—the Wall Street Journal reported that on this, the two are aligned.

With eurozone leaders convening in Brussels for yet another summit, we’ll probably find out later today if the other European countries, particularly France and Italy, can overcome the German desire to show Greece to the door.