Up to November 2014, the time the EU’s agency Frontex was given the mandate to carry on the mission of ‘Mare Nostrum’, the Europeans turned their eyes off the Mediterranean migration phenomenon. To understand the late detection of this phenomenon as a crisis and the decision to opt for common management of the crisis, the paper analyses the scenarios of the crisis in the years 2011-2016. The analysis shows that the EU institutions and governments have been late in setting up the common response; the common response met the contention of the MS governments; the effectiveness of the EU’s management of the crisis has been low. The Conclusions argue that the EU has to take the lead of the response to the migration crisis in this part of the world, and the EU leaders have to adopt the appropriate strategy and as well communicate it to the public in the appropriate way