Since independence in 1826 the country has spent ~50% of the time in a Sovereign default. Looks like they will be adding to this from Wednesday onwards.
They should have defaulted and devalued back in 2010, but with their financial record would it have really made much difference? 190 years of living beyond your means and being bust for ~50% of the time as a result, can hardly be called a prudent country living within its means.
Where it will make a difference is that all the EU taxpayers are picking up the bill, rather than in 2010 when it would have been mainly the greedy French and German banks who were happy to lend Greece Government money, so they could retire at 50 on generous pensions and also Greek consumers so they could buy their BMWs and Renaults etc.
Now it will be all those that contributed to the IMF (much of the world, including very generous amounts by Gordon Brown on behalf of UK taxpayers), ECB (Eurozone countries) and EU (most EU countries, again Gordon Brown was very generous with our money in 2010, days before he was kicked out of no. 10) bailout funds. The reality which has been obvious from 2010 is that Greece is bust and all that has happened for 5 years is that the fools running the IMF, ECB and EU have been tapped up to keep the Greek lifestyle plates spinning a bit longer. Yes, the Greeks have suffered and they get my sympathy for all of 2 seconds, until you realise that 80% want to stay in the Euro, in other words to have their cake and eat it, at the rest of the world's, EU's and Eurozones expense.
The most sensible country has been Finland who made Greece pledge assets against their loans, that they can foreclose on (in theory), to cover any default losses.
Where the fun may well really begin is if/when Greece refuses to honour their TARGET 2 commitments, which would result in Germany suffering over a €1tn loss. Wars have been started, fought, won and lost over less.
The reality is that Greece has been given longer than the likes Spain, Portugal and Ireland to reform their economy and, unlike the latter countries that are recovering, have done very little to do so. The EU austerity medicine has been a very poor route to adjusting Eurozone competitiveness (as a substitute for exchange rates and capital transfers) and this has been made worse by Germany cheating on Eurozone agreed, money expansion, inflation and wage targets, to obtain a competitive advantage.
Add in the arrogant gobshites who form the current Greek government, who think they can dictate unreasonable terms to their creditors and they won't foreclose and this means, IMO, you can add stupidity to the current Greek Government's list of non-achievements. As a negotiating tactic this is about as likely to work as playing ABBA as background music, while trying to negotiate, with an overly sensitive OOF admin, the return of your post count.
Has Greece got a plan B? Yes, and it will involve Putin, but where Russia also has major financial problems, I think they will end up disappointed with what they manage to tap him up for, while they play at being his useful geopolitical fools. Don't be surprised if Greece is also the first country to be also forced out of the EU and maybe even NATO.