A behind-the-scenes look at what went on at ‘the point where the eurozone could have exploded … To the astonishment of almost everyone in the room, Angela Merkel began to cry.’

Greece was imploding politically; Italy, a country too big to bail out, appeared just days away from being cut off from global financial markets; and Ms Merkel, try as Mr Sarkozy and Mr Obama might, could not be convinced to increase German contributions to the eurozone’s “firewall” – the “big bazooka” or “wall of money” they believed had to grow dramatically to fend off attacks by panicking bond traders.

A great read from the the Financial Times (gated, but can be read with a free registration): How the euro was saved