Yeah, we are back to the old "will the crooked liars at EASA really pull off their aggressive proposal for grounding nearly the whole N-reg community in April 2012" question
My view has not changed in that I think they won't. I think the chief GA centres in Europe (UK, Germany, France) will implement the 2014 extension option and after that, if EASA has not collapsed amid the general meltdown of the EU around us, they will continue to implement "extensions".
What the smaller countries will do I don't know. On the one hand they are mostly spineless, and the new EU members busily brown-nose every EU official they can get close enough behind, and on the other hand the EU is not going to take any action for disobedience when there are somewhat bigger issues at stake, like the meltdown of Greece, which if it happens will be followed by a meltdown of a few other countries, which if it happens will melt down many EU banks...
As they say, we live in interesting times
I have still decided to embark on the JAA IR and have ground my way through 4 exams of near-total bollox so far. 3 more near-total-bollox exams to go
Then 15hrs somewhere, before April 2012. Then I will write it all up, with various options around Europe
I don't know what exactly the French IR will be. It has to be fewer than the present 7 exams otherwise almost nobody will be doing it, as at present. But France will always get its way. From the latest EASA doc they have salvaged their Brevet de Base