Greek Civil War

This article is about the conflict between royalist and communist factions. For other uses, see Greek Civil War (disambiguation).

The Greek Civil War (Greek: ο Eμφύλιος [Πόλεμος], o Emfýlios [Pólemos], "the Civil War") took place from 1946 to 1949. It was mainly fought against the established Kingdom of Greece, which was supported by the United Kingdom and the United States and won in the end. The losing opposition held a self-proclaimed people's republic, the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece, which was governed by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and its military branch, the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE). The rebels were supported by Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union.

Greek Civil War
Part of the Cold War
QF 25 pounder gun of the Hellenic Army during the Civil War
Date 30 March 1946 – 16 October 1949 (3 years, 6 months, 2 weeks and 2 days) Location Greece (with spillover into Albania) Result Kingdom of Greece victory
Belligerents
Kingdom of Greece Hellenic Army Royal Hellenic Air Force (minor participation) Royal Hellenic Navy (limited participation in support) Royal Gendarmerie Parastatal anti-communist organizations and guerillas, including ex-members of the Security Battalions Organization X Supported by:  United Kingdom  United States	Provisional Democratic Government (since 1947) Democratic Army (since December 1946) Communist Party of Greece and allies Ex-EAM members and other Communist guerillas' local groups (March 1946 – December 1946) People's Civil Guard Supported by:^[1] Bulgaria Albania  Yugoslavia (until July 1949)  Soviet Union^[2] Other European Eastern Bloc countries^[3]
Commanders and leaders
King George II † King Paul Alexandros Papagos Themistoklis Sofoulis Konstantinos Tsaldaris Dimitrios Maximos Alexandros Diomidis Konstantinos Ventiris Thrasyvoulos Tsakalotos Ronald Scobie James Van Fleet	Nikolaos Zachariadis Markos Vafiadis Charilaos Florakis
Strength
232,500 (at peak)^[4]	26,000 (at peak, mid-1948)^[5] Total: c.100,000 men and women served, of whom: 15,000–20,000 Slav Macedonians 2,000–3,000 Pomaks 130–150 Chams^[6]
Casualties and losses
Hellenic Army, Navy and Air Force, from 16 August 1945 to 22 December 1951:^[7] 15,268 killed, 37,255 wounded, 3,843 missing, 865 deserters Hellenic Gendarmerie, from 1 December 1944 to 27 December 1951:^[8] 1,485 killed, 3,143 wounded, 159 missing	Hellenic Army claim: 38,839 killed 20,128 captured
158,000 total killed^[9]^[10]^[11]^[12] 1,000,000 temporarily relocated during the war^[13]

The war had its roots in divisions within Greece during World War 2 between the communist-dominated left-wing resistance organisation, the EAM-ELAS, and loosely-allied anticommunist resistance forces. It later escalated into a major civil war between the Greek state and the communists. Fighting resulted in the defeat of the DSE by the Hellenic Army.^[14]

The civil war resulted from a highly-polarised struggle between left and right ideologies that started in 1943. Starting in 1944, each side targeted the power vacuum resulting from the end of Axis occupation (1941–1944) during World War II. The struggle was the first proxy war of the Cold War and represents the first example of postwar involvement on the part of the Allies in the internal affairs of a foreign country,^[15] an implementation of George F. Kennan's containment policy in his Long Telegram.^[16] Greece in the end was funded by the United States (through the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan) and joined NATO (1952), while the insurgents were demoralized by the bitter split between the Soviet Union's Joseph Stalin, who wanted to end the war, and Yugoslavia's Josip Broz Tito, who wanted it to continue.^[17]

The first signs of the civil war occurred in 1942 to 1944, during the Axis occupation of Greece. With the Greek government-in-exile unable to influence the situation at home, various resistance groups of differing political affiliations emerged, the dominant ones being the leftist National Liberation Front (EAM) and its military branch, the Greek People's Liberation Army (ELAS), which was effectively controlled by the KKE. In autumn 1943, friction between the EAM and the other resistance groups started to result in scattered clashes, which continued until spring 1944, when an agreement was reached forming a national unity government that included six EAM-affiliated ministers.

The immediate prelude to the civil war took place in Athens on December 3, 1944, less than two months after the Germans had retreated from the area. After an order to disarm, leftists resigned from the government and called for resistance. A riot (the Dekemvriana) erupted, and Greek government gendarmes opened fire on a pro-EAM rally, killed 28 demonstrators and injured dozens.^[18] The rally had been organised under the pretext of demonstrating against the perceived impunity of the collaborators and the general disarmament ultimatum, signed by Ronald Scobie, the British commander in Greece. The battle lasted 33 days and resulted in the defeat of the EAM. The subsequent signing of the Treaty of Varkiza (12 February 1945) spelled the end of the left-wing organization's ascendancy. The ELAS was partly disarmed, and the EAM soon after lost its multi-party character to become dominated by the KKE.

The war erupted in 1946, when former ELAS partisans, who had found shelter in their hideouts and were controlled by the KKE, organised the DSE and its High Command headquarters. The KKE supported the endeavour and decided that there was no other way to act against the internationally-recognised government formed after the 1946 elections, which the KKE had boycotted. The communists formed a provisional government in December 1947 and made the DSE the military branch of this government. The neighboring communist states of Albania, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria offered logistical support to this provisional government, especially to the forces operating in northern Greece.

Despite some setbacks that the government forces suffered from 1946 to 1948, they eventually won largely because of increased American aid, the failure of the DSE to attract sufficient recruits, and the side effects of the Tito–Stalin split of 1948. The final victory of the western-allied government forces led to Greece's membership in NATO on 1952 and helped to define the ideological balance of power in the Aegean Sea for the entire Cold War. The civil war also left Greece with a strongly anticommunist security arrangement, one of the factors which led to the establishment of the Greek military junta of 1967–1974.

Background: 1941–1944

Origins

See also: Axis occupation of Greece, Greek Resistance, and Percentages agreement

While Axis forces approached Athens in April 1941, King George II and his government escaped to Egypt, where they proclaimed a government-in-exile, recognised by the UK but not by the Soviet Union. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill encouraged King George II of Greece to appoint a moderate cabinet. As a result, only two of his ministers were previous members of the 4th of August Regime under Ioannis Metaxas, who had both seized power in a coup d'état with the blessing of the king and governed the country since August 1936. Nevertheless, the exiled government's inability to influence affairs inside Greece rendered it irrelevant in the minds of most Greek people. At the same time, the Germans set up a collaborationist government in Athens, which lacked legitimacy and support. The puppet regime was further undermined when economic mismanagement in wartime conditions created runaway inflation, acute food shortages and famine among the civilian population.

The power vacuum that the occupation created was filled by several resistance movements that ranged from royalist to communist ideologies. Resistance was born first in eastern Macedonia and Thrace, where Bulgarian troops occupied Greek territory. Soon large demonstrations were organized in many cities by the Defenders of Northern Greece (YVE), a patriotic organization. However, the largest group to emerge was the National Liberation Front (EAM), founded on 27 September 1941 by representatives of four left-wing parties. Proclaiming that it followed the Soviet policy of creating a broad united front against fascism, EAM won the support of many non-communist patriots.

These resistance groups launched attacks against the occupying powers and set up large espionage networks. The communist leaders of EAM, however, had planned to dominate in postwar Greece, so, usually by force, they tried to take over or destroy the other Greek resistance groups (such as the destruction of National and Social Liberation (EKKA) and the murder of its leader, Dimitrios Psarros by ELAS partisans)^{[citation needed]} and undertaking a campaign of Red Terror. When liberation came in October 1944, Greece was in a state of crisis, which soon led to the outbreak of civil war.

Although controlled by the KKE, the organization had democratic republican rhetoric.^{[citation needed]} Its military wing, the Greek People's Liberation Army (ELAS) was founded in February 1942. Aris Velouchiotis, a member of KKE's Central Committee, was nominated Chief (Kapetanios) of the ELAS High Command. The military chief, Stefanos Sarafis, was a colonel in the prewar Greek army who had been dismissed during the Metaxas regime for his views. The political chief of EAM was Vasilis Samariniotis (nom de guerre of Andreas Tzimas).

The Organization for the Protection of the People's Struggle (OPLA) was founded as EAM's security militia, operating mainly in the occupied cities and most particularly Athens. A small Greek People's Liberation Navy (ELAN) was created, operating mostly around the Ionian Islands and some other coastal areas. Other Communist-aligned organizations were present, including the National Liberation Front (NOF), composed mostly of Slavic Macedonians in the Florina region. They would later play a critical role in the civil war.^[19][20] The two other large resistance movements were the National Republican Greek League (EDES), led by republican former army officer Colonel Napoleon Zervas, and the social-liberal EKKA, led by Colonel Dimitrios Psarros.

Guerrilla control over rural areas

 

ELAS guerillas

The Greek landscape was favourable to guerrilla operations, and by 1943, the Axis forces and their collaborators were in control only of the main towns and connecting roads, leaving the mountainous countryside to the resistance.^{[citation needed]} EAM-ELAS in particular controlled most of the country's mountainous interior, while EDES was limited to Epirus and EKKA to eastern Central Greece.^{[citation needed]} By early 1944 ELAS could call on nearly 25,000 men under arms, with another 80,000 working as reserves or logistical support, EDES had roughly 10,000 men, and EKKA had under 10,000 men.^{[citation needed]}

To combat the rising influence of the EAM, and fearful of an eventual takeover after the German defeat, in 1943, Ioannis Rallis, the Prime Minister of the collaborationist government, authorised the creation of paramilitary forces, known as the Security Battalions. Numbering 20,000 at their peak in 1944, composed mostly of local fascists, convicts, sympathetic prisoners-of-war and forcibly impressed conscripts, they operated under German command in Nazi security warfare operations and soon achieved a reputation for brutality.

EAM-ELAS, EDES and EKKA were mutually suspicious and tensions were exacerbated as the end of the war became nearer and the question of the country's political future arose. The role of the British military mission in these events proved decisive.^{[citation needed]} EAM was by far the largest and most active group but was determined to achieve its own political goal to dominate postwar Greece, and its actions were not always directed against the Axis powers. Consequently, British material support was directed mostly to the more reliable Zervas, who by 1943 had reversed his earlier anti-monarchist stance.^{[citation needed]}

First conflicts: 1943–1944

See also: National Bands Agreement

The Western allies, at first, provided all resistance organisations with funds and equipment. However, they gave special preference to ELAS, which they saw as the most reliable partner and a formidable fighting force that would be able to create more problems for the Axis than other resistance movements. As the end of the war approached, the British Foreign Office, fearing a possible Communist upsurge, observed with displeasure the transformation of ELAS into a large-scale conventional army more and more out of Allied control. After the September 8, 1943, Armistice with Italy, ELAS seized control of Italian garrison weapons in the country. In response, the Western allies began to favor rival anti-Communist resistance groups. They provided them with ammunition, supplies and logistical support as a way of balancing ELAS's increasing influence. In time, the flow of weapons and funds to ELAS stopped altogether, and rival EDES received the bulk of the Allied support.

 

A member of the Security Battalions with a man executed for aiding the Resistance

In mid-1943 the animosity between ELAS and the other movements erupted into armed conflict. The communists and EAM accused EDES of being traitors and collaborators, and vice versa. Other smaller groups, such as EKKA, continued the anti-occupation fight with sabotage and other actions. They declined to join the ranks of ELAS. While some organizations accepted assistance from the Nazis in their operations against ELAS, the great majority of the population refused any form of cooperation with the occupation authorities. By early 1944, after a British-negotiated ceasefire (the Plaka Agreement), ELAS had destroyed EKKA and confined EDES to a small part of Epirus, where it could only play a marginal role in the rest of the war. Its political network (EAM) had reached about 500,000 citizens around the country.^{[citation needed]} By 1944, ELAS had the numerical advantage in armed fighters, having more than 50,000 men in arms and an extra 500,000 working as reserves or logistical support personnel (Efedrikos ELAS). In contrast, EDES and EKKA had around 10,000 fighters each^[21][22]

After the declaration of the formation of the Security Battalions, KKE and EAM implemented a pre-emptive policy of terror, mainly in the Peloponnese countryside areas close to garrisoned German units, to ensure civilian allegiance.^[23] As the communist position strengthened, so did the numbers of the "Security Battalions", with both sides engaged in skirmishes. The ELAS units were accused of what became known as the Meligalas massacre. Meligalas was the headquarters of a local Security Battalion Unit that was given control of the wider area of Messenia by the Nazis. After a battle there between ELAS and the Security Battalions, ELAS forces prevailed, and the remaining forces of the collaborators were taken into custody.^{[citation needed]}

After the civil war ended, postwar governments declared that 1000 members of the collaborationist units were massacred along with civilians by the Communists; however, that number was not matched by the actual numbers of bodies found in the mass grave (an old well in the area) of executed Security Battalion and civilian prisoners. According to left-wing sources,^[24] civilian bodies found there could have been victims of the Security Battalions. As Security Battalions were replacing occupation forces in territories the Germans could not enter, they were accused of many instances of brutality against civilians and captured partisans, and of the executions of prominent EAM and KKE members by hanging.

In addition, recruiting by both sides was controversial, as the case of Stefanos Sarafis indicates. The soon-to-be military leader of ELAS sought to join the noncommunist resistance group commanded by Kostopoulos in Thessaly, along with other former officers. On their way, they were captured by an ELAS group, with Sarafis agreeing to join ELAS at gunpoint when all other officers who refused were killed.^[25] Sarafis never admitted this incident, and in his book on ELAS^[26] makes special reference to the letter that he sent all officers of the former Greek army to join the ranks of EAM-ELAS.^[27] Again, numbers favored the EAM organisation; nearly 800 officers of the pre-war Greek army joined the ranks of ELAS with the position of military leader and Kapetanios.

Egypt "mutiny" and the Lebanon Conference

See also: Greek government in exile and Political Committee of National Liberation

 

George II during his visit to a Greek fighter station, 1944

In March 1944, EAM established the Political Committee of National Liberation (Politiki Epitropi Ethnikis Apeleftherosis, or PEEA), in effect a third Greek government to rival those in Athens and Cairo "to intensify the struggle against the conquerors... for full national liberation, for the consolidation of the independence and integrity of our country... and for the annihilation of domestic Fascism and armed traitor formations." PEEA was dominated by, but not composed exclusively of Communists.

The moderate aims of the PEEA (known as "κυβέρνηση του βουνού", "the Mountain Government") aroused support even among Greeks in exile. In April 1944 the Egypt based Free Greek Forces, many of them well-disposed towards EAM, demanded for a government of national unity to be established, based on PEEA principles, to replace the government-in-exile, as it had no political or other link with the occupied home country and that any pro-fascist elements in the Army be removed.^{[citation needed]}

The movement threatened Allied unity, angering Great Britain and the United States. British and Greek troops loyal to the exiled government moved to suppress the PEEA. Approximately 5,000 Greek soldiers and officers were disarmed and deported to prison camps. After the mutiny, allied economic aid to the National Liberation Front almost stopped. Later on, through political screening of the officers, the Cairo government created the III Greek Mountain Brigade, composed of staunchly anti-communist personnel, under the command of Brigadier Thrasyvoulos Tsakalotos.^{[citation needed]}

In May 1944, representatives from all political parties and resistance groups came together at the Lebanon Conference under the leadership of Georgios Papandreou, in hopes of forming a government of national unity. Despite EAM's accusations of collaboration made against all other Greek resistance forces and charges against EAM-ELAS members of murders, banditry and thievery, the conference ended with an agreement (the National Contract) for a government of national unity consisting of 24 ministers (6 to be EAM members). The agreement was made possible by Soviet directives to KKE to avoid harming Allied unity, but did not resolve the problem of disarmament of resistance groups.^{[citation needed]}

Confrontation: 1944

By 1944, EDES and ELAS each saw the other to be their great enemy. They both saw that the Germans were going to be defeated and were a temporary threat. For the ELAS, the British represented their major problem, even while for the majority of Greeks, the British were their major hope for an end to the war.^[28]

From the Lebanon Conference to the outbreak

By the summer of 1944, it was obvious that the Germans would soon withdraw from Greece, as Soviet forces were advancing into Romania and towards Yugoslavia, threatening to cut off the retreating Germans. In September, General Fyodor Tolbukhin's armies advanced into Bulgaria, forcing the resignation of the country's pro-Nazi government and the establishment of a pro-communist regime, while Bulgarian troops withdrew from Greek Macedonia. The government-in-exile, now led by prominent liberal George Papandreou, moved to Italy, in preparation for its return to Greece. Under the Caserta Agreement of September 1944, all resistance forces in Greece were placed under the command of a British officer, General Ronald Scobie.^{[citation needed]} The Western Allies arrived in Greece in October, by which time the Germans were in full retreat and most of Greece's territory had already been liberated by Greek partisans. On October 13, British troops entered Athens, the only area still occupied by the Germans, and Papandreou and his ministers followed six days later. The king stayed in Cairo because Papandreou had promised that the future of the monarchy would be decided by referendum.^[29]

 

Athenians celebrate the liberation, October 1944.

There was little to prevent the ELAS from taking full control of the country. With the German withdrawal, ELAS units had taken control of the countryside and most cities. However, they did not take full control because the KKE leadership was instructed by the Soviet Union not to precipitate a crisis that could jeopardize Allied unity and put Stalin's larger postwar objectives at risk. The KKE's leadership knew so, but the ELAS's fighters and rank-and-file Communists did not, which became a source of conflict within both EAM and ELAS. Following Stalin's instructions, the KKE's leadership tried to avoid a confrontation with the Papandreou government. The majority of the ELAS members saw the Western Allies as liberators, although some KKE leaders, such as Andreas Tzimas and Aris Velouchiotis, did not trust them. Tzimas was in touch with Yugoslav communist leader Josip Broz Tito and disagreed with ELAS's cooperation with the Western Allied forces.

The issue of disarming the resistance organizations was a cause of friction between the Papandreou government and its EAM members. Advised by British ambassador Reginald Leeper, Papandreou demanded the disarmament of all armed forces apart from the Sacred Band and the III Mountain Brigade, which had been formed following the suppression of the April 1944 Egypt mutiny, and the constitution of a National Guard under government control. The communists, believing that it would leave the ELAS defenseless against its opponents, submitted an alternative plan of total and simultaneous disarmament, but Papandreou rejected it, causing EAM ministers to resign from the government on December 2. On December 1, Scobie issued a proclamation calling for the dissolution of ELAS. Command of ELAS was KKE's greatest source of strength, and KKE leader Siantos decided that the demand for ELAS's dissolution must be resisted.

Tito's influence may have played some role in ELAS's resistance to disarmament. Tito was outwardly loyal to Stalin, but had come to power through his own means and believed that communist Greeks should do the same. His influence, however, had not prevented the EAM leadership from putting its forces under Scobie's command a couple of months earlier in accordance with the Caserta Agreement. In the meantime, following Georgios Grivas's instructions, Organization X members had set up outposts in central Athens and resisted EAM for several days, until British troops arrived, as their leader had been promised.

The Dekemvriana events

Main article: Dekemvriana

 

Unarmed EAM protesters lying dead or wounded on 3 December 1944 in front of the Greek Parliament, while others are running for their lives; moments after the first shootings that left at least 28 dead and signalled the beginning of the Dekemvriana events

According to the Caserta Agreement all Greek forces (tactical and guerillas) were under Allied command. On December 1, 1944, the Greek government of "National Unity" under Papandreou and Scobie (the British head of the Allied forces in Greece) announced an ultimatum for the general disarmament of all guerrilla forces by 10 December excluding the tactical forces (the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade and the Sacred Squadron);^[30] and also a part of EDES and ELAS that would be used, if it was necessary, in Allied operations in Crete and Dodecanese against the remaining German army. As a result, on December 2 six ministers of the EAM, most of whom were KKE members, resigned from their positions in the "National Unity" government. The EAM called for a general strike and announced the reorganization of the Central Committee of ELAS, its military wing. A demonstration, forbidden by the government, was organised by EAM on December 3.

 

An order of General Scobie signed and printed on the government's newspaper "Η ΕΛΛΑΣ" (December 6), enforcing the government's ultimatum (December 1) for the immediate disarmament of all guerrilla forces

The demonstration involved at least 200,000 people^[31] marching in Athens on Panepistimiou Street towards the Syntagma Square. British tanks along with police units had been scattered around the area, blocking the way of the demonstrators.^[32] The shootings began when the marchers had arrived at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, above the Syntagma Square. They originated from the building of the General Police Headquarters, from the Parliament (Βουλή), from the Hotel Grande Bretagne (where international observers had settled), from other governmental buildings and from policemen on the street.^[33][34][35]

Among many testimonies, N. Farmakis, a member of the Organization X participating in the shootings, described that he heard the head of the police Angelos Evert giving the order to open fire on the crowd.^{[citation needed]} Although there are no accounts hinting that the crowd indeed possessed guns, the British commander Christopher Montague Woodhouse insisted that it was uncertain whether the first shots were fired by the police or the demonstrators.^[36] A total of 28 protesters were killed by the Greek police that day, and hundreds were injured.^[18] This signaled the beginning of the Dekemvriana (Greek: Δεκεμβριανά, "the December events"), a 37-day period of full-scale fighting in Athens between EAM fighters and smaller parts of ELAS and the forces of the British army and the government.

 

Pamphlet calling workers from different neighbours of Athens to fight against the Greek Government and its British support

At the beginning the government had only a few policemen and gendarmes, some militia units, the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade, distinguished at the Gothic Line offensive in Italy, which, however, lacked heavy weapons, and the royalist group Organization X, also known as "Chites", which was accused by EAM of collaborating with the Nazis. Consequently, the British intervened in support of the government, freely using artillery and aircraft as the battle approached its last stages.

In the early morning hours of 4 December, ELAS reservists began operations in the Athens–Piraeus area, attacking Grivas' X forces.^[37] In the evening, a peaceful demonstration by EAM members cum funeral procession took place. Government forces took no action but the procession was attacked by Chites led by Colonel Grivas, with over 100 dead.

On December 4, Papandreou gave his resignation to Scobie, who rejected it. By December 12, ΕΑΜ was in control of most of Athens and Piraeus. The British, outnumbered, flew in the 4th Indian Infantry Division from Italy as emergency reinforcements. Although the British were openly fighting against the EAM in Athens, there were no such battles in the rest of Greece. In certain cases, such as Volos, some RAF units even surrendered equipment to ELAS fighters.^{[citation needed]} However, the units of the ELAS in Central Greece and Epirus attacked Napoleon Zervas's units of the EDES forcing them to flee to the Ionian islands.

Conflicts continued throughout December with the forces confronting the EAM slowly gaining the upper hand. ELAS forces in the rest of Greece did not attack the British. It seems that the ELAS preferred to avoid an armed confrontation with the British forces initially and later tried to reduce the conflict as much as possible although poor communication between its very independent units around the country might also have played a role.^{[citation needed]} That might explain the simultaneous struggle against the British, the largescale ELAS operations against Trotskyists and other political dissidents in Athens and the many contradictory decisions of EAM leaders. Also, KKE's leadership, was supporting a doctrine of "national unity" while eminent members, such as Leonidas Stringos, Theodoros Makridis and even Georgios Siantos were creating revolutionary plans. Even more curiously, Tito was both the KKE's key sponsor and a key British ally, owing his physical and political survival in 1944 to British assistance.^[38]

Churchill in Athens

This outbreak of fighting between Allied forces and an anti-German European resistance movement while the war in Europe was still being fought was a serious political problem for Churchill's coalition government of left and right. It caused much protest in the British press and the House of Commons. To prove his peacemaking intentions to the public, Churchill went to Athens on December 25 to preside over a conference in which Soviet representatives also participated, to bring about a settlement. It failed because the EAM/ELAS demands were considered excessive and so rejected. The conference took place in the Hotel Grande Bretagne. Later, it became known that there was a plan by EAM to blow up the building, aiming to kill the participants, and the conference was finally cancelled.

 

British paratroopers of the 5th Battalion, Parachute Regiment during the battle

Meanwhile, the Soviet Union remained passive about developments in Greece. True to their "percentages agreement" with Britain relating to Greece, the Soviet delegation in Greece neither encouraged nor discouraged EAM's ambitions, as Greece belonged to the British sphere of influence. The delegation's chief gained the nickname "sphinx" among local Communist officers for not giving any clues about Soviet intentions. Pravda did not mention the clashes at all. It is speculated that Stalin did not interfere because the Soviet Union would profit no matter the outcome. If EAM rose to power, he would gain a country of major strategic value. If not, he could use British actions in Greece to justify similar actions in countries in his own sphere of influence.^{[citation needed]}

By early January, EAM forces had lost the battle. Despite Churchill's intervention, Papandreou resigned and was replaced by General Nikolaos Plastiras. On January 15, 1945, Scobie agreed to a ceasefire in exchange for ELAS's withdrawal from its positions at Patras and Thessaloniki and its demobilisation in the Peloponnese. Despite the severe defeat, ELAS continued to exist, and the KKE had an opportunity to reconsider its strategy.^{[citation needed]}

KKE's defeat in 1945 was mainly political but the exaltation of terrorism in the whole country made a political settlement even more difficult. The hunting of "collaborators" was extended to people who were supporting the Greek government.^{[citation needed]} The brutal treatment by the Organization for the Protection of the People's Struggle (OPLA) and other minor communist groups of supposed collaborators (including policemen, professors and priests) during the events greatly increased anticommunist sentiment. In the area of ULEN refineries, hundreds of supposed collaborators were executed. In the village of Feneos, OPLA turned a nearby monastery into a concentration camp and killing ground for those they deemed "reactionaries". It is believed that hundreds were killed.^[39] In addition, several Trotskyists had to leave the country in fear for their lives (Cornelius Castoriadis fled to France). As a result of the fighting in Athens, most of the prominent noncommunists of EAM left the organization, and KKE support declined sharply. After the ceasefire, ELAS under the leadership of Siantos left Athens, taking thousands of captives.^{[citation needed]}

Interlude: 1945–1946

See also: Greek legislative election, 1946 and Greek referendum, 1946

 

Nikos Zachariadis

In February 1945, the various Greek parties signed the Treaty of Varkiza, with the support of all the Allies. It provided for the complete demobilisation of the ELAS and all other paramilitary groups, amnesty for only political offenses, a referendum on the monarchy and a general election to be held as soon as possible. The KKE remained legal and its leader, Nikolaos Zachariadis, who returned from Germany in April 1945, said that the KKE's objective was now for a "people's democracy" to be achieved by peaceful means. There were dissenters such as former ELAS leader Aris Velouchiotis.^{[citation needed]} The KKE disavowed Velouchiotis when he called on the veteran guerrillas to start a second struggle; shortly afterwards, he committed suicide surrounded by security forces, but some think that the Soviet NKVD killed him.

The Treaty of Varkiza transformed the KKE's political defeat into a military one. The ELAS's existence was terminated. The amnesty was not comprehensive because many actions during the German occupation and the Dekemvriana were classified as criminal, exempting the perpetrators from the amnesty. Thus, the authorities captured approximately 40,000 Communists or ex-ELAS members. As a result, a number of veteran partisans hid their weapons in the mountains, and 5,000 of them escaped to Yugoslavia although that was not encouraged by the KKE's leadership.

 

Anticommunist poster during the referendum in favour of George II:"This is what they fear! Vote for the King!"

Between 1945 and 1946, anticommunist forces allegedly killed about 1,190 communist civilians and tortured many others. Entire villages that had helped the partisans were attacked. The anticommunist forces are claimed to have admitted that they were "retaliating" for their suffering under ELAS rule.^{[citation needed]} The reign of "White Terror" led many ex-ELAS members to form self-defence troops without any KKE approval.^[40]

The KKE soon reversed its former political position, as relations between the Soviet Union and the Western Allies deteriorated. With the onset of the Cold War, communist parties everywhere moved to more militant positions. The change of political attitude and the choice to escalate the crisis derived primarily from the conclusion that regime subversion, which had not been successful in December 1944, could now be achieved. The KKE leadership decided in February 1946, "after weighing domestic factors, and the Balkan and international situation", to go forward with "organization of a new armed struggle against the Monarcho-Fascist regime". The KKE boycotted the March 1946 elections, which were won by the monarchist United Alignment of Nationalists (Inomeni Parataxis Ethnikofronon), the main member of which was Konstantinos Tsaldaris's People's Party. A referendum in September 1946 favored the retention of the monarchy, but the KKE claimed that it had been rigged. King George returned to Athens.

The king's return to Greece reinforced British influence in the country. Nigel Clive, then a liaison officer to the Greek Government and later the head of the Athens station of MI6, stated, "Greece was a kind of British protectorate, but the British ambassador was not a colonial governor". There were to be six changes of prime ministers within just two years, an indication of the instability that would characterise the country's political life.

Civil War: 1946–1949

Crest: 1946–1948

 

The band of Alexandros Rosios (second from right) attacked the police station in Litochoro, the night of the March 1946 elections.

 

Democratic Army deployment in 1948

Fighting resumed in March 1946, as a group of 30 ex-ELAS members attacked a police station in the village of Litochoro, killing the policemen, the night before the elections. The next day, the Rizospastis, the KKE's official newspaper, announced, "Authorities and gangs fabricate alleged communist attacks". Armed bands of ELAS' veterans were then infiltrating Greece through mountainous regions near the Yugoslav and Albanian borders; they were now organized as the Democratic Army of Greece (Dimokratikos Stratos Elladas, DSE) under the command of ELAS veteran Markos Vafiadis (known as "General Markos"), operating from a base in Yugoslavia and sent by the KKE to organize already existing troops.^{[citation needed]}

The Yugoslav and Albanian communist governments supported the DSE fighters, but the Soviet Union remained ambivalent. The KKE kept an open line of communication with the Soviet Communist Party, and its leader, Nikos Zachariadis, had visited Moscow on more than one occasion. No evidence exists of mercenaries, although the guerrillas received various types of assistance from their Balkan communist neighbours.^[41] One example of an international volunteer joining the ranks of the DSE is Turkish communist Mihri Belli.^[42]

 

Markos Vafiadis

By late 1946, the DSE was able to deploy about 16,000 partisans, including 5,000 in the Peloponnese and other areas of Greece. According to the DSE, its fighters "resisted the reign of terror that right-wing gangs conducted across Greece". In the Peloponnese especially, local party officials, headed by Vangelis Rogakos, had established a plan long before the decision to go to guerrilla war under which the numbers of partisans operating in the mainland would be inversely proportional to the number of soldiers that the enemy would concentrate in the region. According to the study, the DSE III Division in the Peloponnese numbered between 1,000 and 5,000 fighters in early 1948.^[43]

Rural peasants were caught in the crossfire. When DSE partisans entered a village asking for supplies, citizens were supportive (in previous years, EAM could count on two million members across the whole country) or did not resist. When government troops arrived at the same village, citizens who had supplied the partisans were immediately denounced as communist sympathizers and usually imprisoned or exiled. In rural areas, the government also used a strategy, which had been advised by US advisers, of evacuating villages under the pretext that they were under direct threat of communist attack. That would deprive the partisans of supplies and recruits and simultaneously raise antipathy towards them.^[44]

 

DSE fighters during mortar training

The Greek Army now numbered about 90,000 men and was gradually being put on a more professional footing. The task of re-equipping and training the army had been carried out by its fellow Western Allies. By early 1947, however, Britain, which had spent £85 million in Greece since 1944, could no longer afford this burden. US President Harry S. Truman announced that the United States would step in to support the Greek government against Communist pressure. That began a long and troubled relationship between Greece and the United States. For several decades to come, the US ambassador advised the king on important issues, such as the appointment of the prime minister.^{[citation needed]}

Through 1947, the scale of fighting increased. The DSE launched large-scale attacks on towns across northern Epirus, Thessaly, Peloponnese and Macedonia, provoking the army into massive counteroffensives, which met no opposition as the DSE melted back into the mountains and its safe havens across the northern borders. In the Peloponnese, where General Georgios Stanotas was appointed area commander, the DSE suffered heavily, with no way to escape to mainland Greece. In general, army morale was low, and it would be some time before US support became apparent.

Conventional warfare

 

Organisation and military bases of the "Democratic Army", as well as entry routes to Greece (legend in Greek)

In September 1947, however, the KKE's leadership decided to move from guerrilla tactics to fullscale conventional war despite the opposition of Vafiadis. In December, the KKE announced the formation of a Provisional Democratic Government, with Vafiadis as prime minister; that led the Athens government to ban the KKE. No foreign government recognized this government. The new strategy led the DSE into costly attempts to seize a major town as its seat of government, and in December 1947, 1200 DSE fighters were killed at a set battle around Konitsa. At the same time, the strategy forced the government to increase the size of the army. With control of the major cities, the government cracked down on KKE members and sympathizers, many of whom were imprisoned on the island of Makronisos.

 

Military trial of communists during the war. In many cases the punishment was the death penalty.

Despite setbacks, such as the fighting at Konitsa, the DSE reached the height of its power in 1948, extending its operations to Attica, within 20 km of Athens. It drew on more than 20,000 fighters, both men and women, and a network of sympathizers and informants in every village and suburb.

Among analysts emphasising the KKE's perceived control and guidance by foreign powers, such as the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, some estimate that of the DSE's 20,000 fighters, 14,000 were Slavic Macedonians from Greek Macedonia.^{[45][better source needed]} Expanding their reasoning, they conclude that given their important role in the battle,^[46] the KKE changed its policy towards them. At the fifth Plenum of KKE on January 31, 1949, a resolution was passed declaring that after KKE's victory, the Slavic Macedonians would find their national restoration within a united Greek state.^[47] The alliance of the Democratic army with the Slavic Macedonians caused the official Greek state propaganda to call the communist guerillas Eamovulgari (from EAM plus Bulgarians), and the communists were calling their opponents Monarchofasistes (Monarch Fascists).

The extent of such involvement remains contentious and unclear; some emphasize that the KKE had in total 400,000 members (or 800,000, according to some sources) immediately prior to December 1944 and that during the Civil War, 100,000 ELAS fighters, mostly KKE members, were imprisoned, and 3,000 were executed. Supporters emphasise instead the DSE's conduct of a war effort across the country aimed at "a free and liberated Greece from all protectors that will have all the nationalities working under one Socialist State".

DSE divisions conducted guerrilla warfare across Greece; III Division, with 20,000 men in 1948, controlled 70% of the Peloponnese politically and militarily; battalions named after ELAS formations were active in northwestern Greece, and in the islands of Lesvos, Limnos, Ikaria, Samos, Creta, Evoia and the bulk of the Ionian Islands. Advisers, funds and equipment were now flooding into the country from Western Allies, and under their guidance a series of major offensives were launched into the mountains of central Greece. Although the offensives did not achieve all their objectives, they inflicted serious defeats on the DSE.

Communist removal of the children and the Queen's Camps

See also: Political refugees of the Greek Civil War

 

Map showing the distribution of refugees from Greece after the civil war

The removal of children by both sides was another highly emotive and contentious issue.^[48] About 30,000 children were forcefully taken by the DSE from territories they controlled to Eastern Bloc countries.^[49] Many others were moved for protection to special camps inside Greece, an idea of Queen Frederica.^[50][51] The issue drew the attention of international public opinion, and a United Nations Special Committee issued a report, stating that "some children have in fact been forcibly removed".^[52]

The communist leadership claimed that children were being gathered to be evacuated from Greece at the request of "popular organizations and parents".^[53] According to other researchers, the Greek government also followed a policy of displacement by adopting children of the guerrillas and placing them in indoctrination camps.^[54]

According to Kenneth Spencer, a UN committee reported at that time, "Queen Frederica has already prepared special 'reform camps' in Greek islands for 12,000 Greek children...."^[55] According to the official KKE story, the Provisional Government issued a directive for the evacuation of all minors from 4 to 14 years old for protection from the war and problems linked to it, as was stated clearly according to the decisions of the Provisional Government on March 7, 1948.^[56] According to non-KKE accounts, the children were abducted to be indoctrinated as Communist janissaries.^[57] Several United Nations General Assembly resolutions appealed for the repatriation of children to their homes.^[58] After 50 years, more information regarding the children gradually emerged. Many returned to Greece between 1975 and 1990, with varied views and attitudes toward the communist faction.^[59][60]

During the war, more than 25,000 children, most with parents in the DSE, were also placed in 30 "child towns" under the immediate control of Queen Frederika, something especially emphasised by the left.^{[citation needed]} After 50 years, some of these children, given up for adoption to American families, were retracing their family background in Greece.^{[61][62][63][64][65][66][67]}

End of the war: 1949

The insurgents were demoralised by the bitter split between Stalin and Tito.^[17] In June 1948, the Soviet Union and its satellites broke off relations with Tito. In one of the meetings held in the Kremlin with Yugoslav representatives, during the Soviet-Yugoslav crisis,^[68] Stalin stated his unqualified opposition to the "Greek uprising". Stalin explained to the Yugoslav delegation that the situation in Greece has always been different from the one in Yugoslavia because the US and Britain would "never permit [Greece] to break off their lines of communication in the Mediterranean". (Stalin used the word svernut, Russian for "fold up", to express what the Greek Communists should do.)

 

Alexandros Papagos was appointed Commander-in-Chief in early 1949.

Yugoslavia had been the Greek Communists' main supporter from the years of the occupation. The KKE thus had to choose between its loyalty to the Soviet Union and its relations with its closest ally. After some internal conflict, the great majority, led by party secretary Nikolaos Zachariadis, chose to follow the Soviet Union. In January 1949, Vafiadis himself was accused of "Titoism" and removed from his political and military positions, to be replaced by Zachariadis.

After a year of increasing acrimony, Tito closed the Yugoslav border to the DSE in July 1949, and disbanded its camps inside Yugoslavia. The DSE was still able to use Albanian border territories, a poor alternative. Within the Greek Communist Party, the split with Tito also sparked a witch hunt for "Titoites" that demoralised and disorganised the ranks of the DSE and sapped support for the KKE in urban areas.

In summer 1948, DSE Division III in the Peloponnese suffered a huge defeat. Lacking ammunition support from DSE headquarters and having failed to capture government ammunition depots at Zacharo in the western Peloponnese, its 20,000 fighters were doomed. The majority (including the commander of the Division, Vangelis Rogakos) were killed in battle with nearly 80,000 National Army troops. The National Army's strategic plan, codenamed "Peristera" (the Greek word for "dove (bird)"), was successful. A number of other civilians were sent to prison camps for helping Communists. The Peloponnese was now governed by paramilitary groups fighting alongside the National Army. To terrify urban areas assisting DSE's III Division, the forces decapitated a number of dead fighters and placed them in central squares.^[43] Following defeat in southern Greece, the DSE continued to operate in northern Greece and some islands, but it was a greatly weakened force facing significant obstacles both politically and militarily.

 

The leadership of the National Army after the successful operations in Grammos sector (Operation Pyrsos/Torch). Thrasyvoulos Tsakalotos is at the front.

At the same time, the National Army found a talented commander in General Alexander Papagos, commander of the Greek army during the Greco-Italian War. In August 1949, Papagos launched a major counteroffensive against DSE forces in northern Greece, codenamed "Operation Pyrsos/Torch". The campaign was a victory for the National Army and resulted in heavy losses for the DSE. The DSE army was now no longer able to sustain resistance in pitched battles. By September 1949, the main body of DSE divisions defending Grammos and Vitsi, the two key positions in northern Greece for the DSE, had retreated to Albania. Two main groups remained within the borders, trying to reconnect with scattered DSE fighters largely in Central Greece.

These groups, numbering 1,000 fighters, left Greece by the end of September 1949. The main body of the DSE, accompanied by its HQ, after discussion with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and other Communist governments, was moved to Tashkent in the Soviet Union. They were to remain there, in military encampments, for three years. Other older combatants, alongside injured fighters, women and children, were relocated to European socialist states. On October 16, Zachariadis announced a "temporary ceasefire to prevent the complete annihilation of Greece"; the ceasefire marked the end of the Greek Civil War.

Almost 100,000 ELAS fighters and Communist sympathizers serving in DSE ranks were imprisoned, exiled, or executed. That deprived the DSE of the principal force still able to support its fight. According to some historians,^{[citation needed]} the KKE's major supporter and supplier had always been Tito, and it was the rift between Tito and the KKE that marked the real demise of the party's efforts to assert power.

Western anti-Communist governments allied to Greece saw the end of the Greek Civil War as a victory in the Cold War against the Soviet Union. Communists countered that the Soviets never actively supported the Greek Communist efforts to seize power in Greece. Both sides had, at differing junctures, nevertheless looked to an external superpower for support.

Postwar division and reconciliation

The Civil War left Greece in ruins and in even greater economic distress than it had been following the end of German occupation.^{[citation needed]} Additionally, it divided the Greek people for ensuing decades, with both sides vilifying their opponents. Thousands languished in prison for many years or were sent into internal exile on the islands of Gyaros and Makronisos^{[citation needed]}. Many others sought refuge in communist countries or emigrated to Australia, Germany, the US, the UK, Canada and elsewhere^{[citation needed]}.

The polarization and instability of Greek politics in the mid-1960s was a direct result of the Civil War and the deep divide between the leftist and rightist sections of Greek society. A major crisis as a result was the murder of the left-wing politician Gregoris Lambrakis in 1963, the inspiration for the Costa Gavras political thriller, Z. The crisis of the Apostasia followed in 1965, together with the "ASPIDA affair", which involved an alleged coup plot by a left-wing group of officers; the group's alleged leader was Andreas Papandreou, son of George Papandreou, the leader of the Center Union political party and the country's prime minister at the time.

 

The military prison camp of Makronisos opened during the civil war for communist or left-sympathizer soldiers aiming to force their compliance. It was closed after the end of the military junta in 1974.

On April 21, 1967, a group of rightist and anti-communist army officers executed a coup d'état and seized power from the government, using the political instability and tension of the time as a pretext. The leader of the coup, George Papadopoulos, was a member of the right-wing military organization IDEA ("Sacred Bond of Greek Officers"), and the subsequent military regime (later referred to as the Regime of the Colonels) lasted until 1974.

After the collapse of the military junta, a conservative government under Constantine Karamanlis led to the abolition of monarchy, the legalization of the KKE and a new constitution, which guaranteed political freedoms, individual rights and free elections. In 1981, in a major turning point in Greek history, the centre-left government of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) allowed a number of DSE veterans who had taken refuge in communist countries to return to Greece and reestablish their former estates, which greatly helped to diminish the consequences of the Civil War in Greek society. The PASOK administration also offered state pensions to former partisans of the anti-Nazi resistance; Markos Vafiadis was honorarily elected as member of the Greek parliament under PASOK's flag.

In 1989, the coalition government between Nea Dimokratia and the Coalition of Left and Progress (SYNASPISMOS), in which the KKE was for a period the major force, suggested a law that was passed unanimously by the Greek Parliament, formally recognizing the 1946–1949 war as a civil war and not merely as a communist insurgency (Συμμοριτοπόλεμος Symmoritopolemos) ( Ν. 1863/89 (ΦΕΚ 204Α΄) ).^[69][70][71] Under the terms of this law, the war of 1946–1949 was recognized as a Greek Civil War between the National Army and the Democratic Army of Greece, for the first time in Greek postwar history. Under the aforementioned law, the term "communist bandits" (Κομμουνιστοσυμμορίτες Kommounistosymmorites, ΚΣ), wherever it had occurred in Greek law, was replaced by the term "Fighters of the DSE".^[72]

In a 2008 Gallup poll, Greeks were asked "whether it was better that the right wing won the Civil War". 43% responded that it was better for Greece that the right wing won, 13% responded that it would have been better if the left had won, 20% responded "neither" and 24% did not respond.^[73]

List of abbreviations

Abbrev.	Expansion	Translation
DSE	Δημοκρατικός Στρατός Ελλάδας	Democratic Army of Greece
EAM	Εθνικό Απελευθερωτικό Μέτωπο	National Liberation Front
EDES	Εθνικός Δημοκρατικός Ελληνικός Σύνδεσμος	National Republican Greek League
EKKA	Εθνική και Κοινωνική Απελευθέρωσις	National and Social Liberation
ELAN	Ελληνικό Λαϊκό Απελευθερωτικό Ναυτικό	Greek People's Liberation Navy
ELAS	Ελληνικός Λαϊκός Απελευθερωτικός Στρατός	Greek People's Liberation Army
HQ	Headquarters
KKE	Κομμουνιστικό Κόμμα Ελλάδας	Communist Party of Greece
NATO	North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Nazi		National-Socialist; National Socialist German Workers' Party
NOF	Народно Ослободителен Фронт	National Liberation Front (Macedonia)
OPLA	Οργάνωση Προστασίας Λαϊκών Αγωνιστών	Organization for the Protection of the People's Struggle
PASOK	Πανελλήνιο Σοσιαλιστικό Κίνημα	Panhellenic Socialist Movement
PEEA	Πολιτική Επιτροπή Εθνικής Απελευθέρωσης	Political Committee of National Liberation
UN	United Nations
USSR	Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
YVE	Υπερασπισταί Βορείου Ελλάδος	Defenders of Northern Greece

See also

• Air operations during the Greek Civil War
• Nikos Belogiannis
• Nikos Ploumpidis
• Proxy war
• The Travelling Players

Notes

1. Pelt, Mogens (2006). Tying Greece to the West: US-West German-Greek Relations 1949–1974. Museum Tusculanum Press. p. 129. ISBN 9788772895833. Nevertheless, during the Greek Civil War, Greek Communists did receive aid, including weapons and ammunition, from Albania, Bulgaria and, in particular, Yugoslavia.
2. Απόρρητη αναφορά του Μολότοφ στον Στάλιν δείχνει ότι η ΕΣΣΔ προμήθευε με όπλα το ΚΚΕ στον Εμφύλιο, Proto Thema 24/01/2022
3. Μαραντζίδης Νίκος, Το «παιδομάζωμα» στον Εμφύλιο, Η Καθημερινή, 12.08.2012
4. The Struggle for Greece 1941–1949, C.M.Woodhouse, Hurst & Company, London 2002 (first published 1976), p. 237
5. Νίκος Μαραντζίδης, Δημοκρατικός Στρατός Ελλάδας, 1946–1949, Εκδόσεις Αλεξάνδρεια, β'έκδοση, Αθήνα 2010, p. 52
6. Νίκος Μαραντζίδης, Δημοκρατικός Στρατός Ελλάδας, (Kayluff a hoe)1946–1949, Εκδόσεις Αλεξάνδρεια, β'έκδοση, Αθήνα 2010, pp. 52, 57, 61–62
7. Γενικόν Επιτελείον Στρατού, Διεύθυνσις Ηθικής Αγωγής, Η Μάχη του Έθνους, Ελεύθερη Σκέψις, Athens, 1985, pp. 35–36
8. Γενικόν Επιτελείον Στρατού, p. 36
9. Howard Jones, "A New Kind of War" (1989)
10. Edgar O'Ballance, The Greek Civil War : 1944–1949 (1966)
11. T. Lomperis, From People's War to People's Rule (1996)
12. "B&J": Jacob Bercovitch and Richard Jackson, International Conflict : A Chronological Encyclopedia of Conflicts and Their Management 1945–1995 (1997)
13. Γιώργος Μαργαρίτης, Η ιστορία του Ελληνικού εμφυλίου πολέμου ISBN 960-8087-12-0
14. Nikos Marantzidis and Giorgos Antoniou. "The Axis Occupation and Civil War: Changing trends in Greek historiography, 1941–2002." Journal of Peace Research (2004) 41#2 pp: 223–231.
15. Chomsky, Noam (1994). World Orders, Old And New. Pluto Press London.
16. Iatrides, John O. (2005). "George F. Kennan and the Birth of Containment: The Greek Test Case". World Policy Journal. 22 (3): 126–145. doi:10.1215/07402775-2005-4005. ISSN 0740-2775.
17. Robert Service summarizes Soviet vacillations: Service, Robert (2007). "22. Western Europe". Comrades!: A History of World Communism. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. pp. 266–268. ISBN 9780674025301. Retrieved 2016-10-28. After the German forces withdrew in October 1944, the Greek Communist Party found its armed force – ELAS – subordinated to the British army with Moscow's consent. But the Greek Communist Party soon opted for insurgency. Clashes occurred between the communists and the British, together with the forces of the new British-backed Greek government. Stalin at the time, however, needed to maintain good relations with the United Kingdom for strategic reasons [...] Without outside help, [...] the revolt petered out. Then Stalin changed his mind, hoping to play off the Americans and British over Greece. [...] By 1946 [the Greek communists] were eager to resume armed struggle. [...] Zachariadis [...] needed support from communist states for military equipment, and he gained the desired consent on his trips to Belgrade, Prague and Moscow. [...] But Stalin changed his mind yet again and advised emphasis on political measures rather than the armed struggle. [...] Tito and the Yugoslavs, however, continued to render material assistance and advice to the Greek communists. [...] Stalin reverted to a militant stance after the announcement [1947] of the Marshall Plan and ceased trying to restrain the Greek Communist Party. Soviet military equipment was covertly rushed to Greece. A provisional revolutionary government was proclaimed [24 December 1947]. But it became clear that the Greek communists as well as their Yugoslav sympathisers had exaggerated their strength and potential. Stalin felt he had been misled, and called for an end to the uprising in Greece. [...] The Yugoslav communists objected to Stalin's change of policy. [...] Bulgarian communist leader Traicho Kostov urged that Soviet aid be sent to the Greek insurrectionists. [...] This had disastrous consequences for the Soviet-Yugoslav relationship; it also brought doom to Kostov, who was executed [16 December 1949] with Stalin's connivance at the end of 1948. Stalin himself continued to waffle on the Greek question in the following months [...] but in the end he ordered the communists under Nikos Zachariadis and Markos Vafiadis to end the civil war. [...] Yet, despite being deprived of supplies from Moscow, they refused to stop fighting royalist forces. [...] Ultimately the communist insurgency stood no chance of succeeding. By the end of 1949 the communist revolt had been crushed and the remnant of the anti-government forces fled to Albania.
18. Pritchard, Stephen (28 March 2015). "The readers' editor on … Athens, 1944". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 March 2022.
19. Incompatible Allies: Greek Communism and Macedonian Nationalism in the Civil War in Greece, 1943–1949. Andrew Rossos", The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 69, No. 1 (Mar., 1997) (p. 42^{[permanent dead link]})
20. History of National Resistance 1941–1944, v. 1
21. The Greek Civil War 1944–1949, Edgar O'Ballance, 1966 p. 105
22. The Greek Civil War 1944–1949, Edgar O'Ballance, 1966 p. 65
23. Kalyvas 2000, pp. 155–156, 164.
24. Ksiarchos S., The truth regarding Meligala
25. Werth, Nicolas; Karel Bartošek; Jean-Louis Panné; Jean-Louis Margolin; Andrzej Paczkowski; Stéphane Courtois (1999). The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression. Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-07608-7., noted at . Archived from the original on 2002-10-31. Retrieved 2007-04-02.
26. Ο ΕΛΑΣ, Στέφανος Σαράφης
27. History of the National Resistance 1941–1944, v. 2
28. Lars Baerentzen, "Occupied Greece," Modern Greek Studies Yearbook (Jan 1998) pp. 281–286
29. Sossa Berni Plakidas (2010). Anatoli. Xulon Press. p. 19. ISBN 9781609571337.
30. Ζέτα Τζαβάρα, "Ο Δεκέμβρης του 1944 μέσα από την αρθρογραφία των εφημερίδων της εποχής"; Μαργαριτης Γιώργος; Λυμπεράτος Μιχάλης (2010). Δεκέμβρης '44 Οι μάχες στις γειτονιές της Αθήνας (in Greek). Ελευθεροτυπία. p. 77. ISBN 978-9609487399. Retrieved 2012-06-14.
31. Newspaper "ΠΡΙΝ", 7.12.1997, http://nar4.wordpress.com/2008/12/03/δεκέμβρης-44-αυτά-τα-κόκκινα-σημάδια-εί/
32. Κουβαράς, Κώστας (1976). O.S.S. Mε Την Κεντρική Του Ε.Α.Μ. Αμερικάνικη Μυστική Αποστολή Περικλής Στην Κατεχόμενη Ελλάδα (in Greek). Εξάντας. Retrieved June 14, 2011.
33. Kessel Album, Athens 1944.
34. Spyros Kotsakis, Captain in ELAS First Army (1986). December 1944 in Athens, Athens, Synhroni Epochi.
35. Daniele Ganser (2005). NATO's Secret Armies. Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe, London, Franck Cass, pp. 213–214 (his quote).
36. C.M. Woodhouse, Modern Greece, Faber and Faber, 1991, p. 253.
37. Charles R. Shrader, The Withered Vine: Logistics and the Communist Insurgency in Greece, 1945–1949, Praeger, 1999, p. 39.
38. Britain's support for Tito^{[dead link]}
39. Stylianos Perrakis (2006). The Ghosts of Plaka Beach: A True Story of Murder and Retribution in Wartime Greece. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. pp. 144–. ISBN 978-0-8386-4090-6.
40. Kostopoulos, Tasos (2016-12-11). [The gang-ification of the state]. Η Εφημεριδα των Συντακτων (in Greek). Athens. Archived from the original on 2016-12-11. Retrieved 2016-12-11.
41. Nachmani, Amikam (1990). "Civil War and Foreign Intervention in Greece: 1946-49". Journal of Contemporary History. 25 (4): 497. doi:10.1177/002200949002500406. ISSN 0022-0094. JSTOR 260759. S2CID 159813355.
42. Maria Katsounaki (4 August 2009). "The Turk in the Greek ranks". I Kathimerini.
43. The Civil War in Peloponnese, A. Kamarinos
44. Nam, The True Story of Vietnam, 1986
45. Ζαούσης Αλέξανδρος. Η Τραγική αναμέτρηση, 1945–1949 – Ο μύθος και η αλήθεια (ISBN 960-7213-43-2).
46. Speech presented by Nikos Zachariadis at the Second Congress of the National Liberation Front (NOF) of the ethnic Macedonians from Greek Macedonia, published in Σαράντα Χρόνια του ΚΚΕ 1918–1958, Athens, 1958, p. 575.
47. KKE Official documents, vol 8
48. The Paidomazoma: Tough Times for the Children of Greece, New Histories October 30, 2011
49. C. M. Woodhouse, Modern Greece, Faber and Faber, 1991, 1992, pp. 259.
50. "Greece Civil War – Flags, Maps, Economy, Geography, Climate, Natural Resources, Current Issues, International Agreements, Population, Social Statistics, Political System". Workmall.com. 2007-03-24. Retrieved 2014-02-28.
51. . Archived from the original on 2015-09-24. Retrieved 2007-01-24.
52. Lars Barentzen, The'Paidomazoma' and the Queen's Camps, 135–136
53. Lars Barentzen, The'Paidomazoma' and the Queen's Camps, 130
54. Myrsiades, Cultural Representation in Historical Resistance, 333
55. Kenneth Spencer, "Greek Children," The New Statesman and Nation 39 (January 14, 1950): 31–32.
56. KKE, official Documents v. 6 1946–1949, pp. 474–476
57. Richard Clogg, A Concise History of Greece, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 141.
58. Ods Home Page^{[permanent dead link]}
59. Dimitris Servou, The Paidomazoma and who is afraid of Truth, 2001
60. Thanasi Mitsopoulou "We brought up as Greeks", Θανάση Μητσόπουλου "Μείναμε Έλληνες"
61. "Βήμα" 20.9.1947
62. "Νέα Αλήθεια" Λάρισας 5.12.1948
63. "Δημοκρατικός Τύπος" 20.8.1950
64. Δ. Κηπουργού: "Μια ζωντανή Μαρτυρία".- D. Kipourgou " A live testimony"
65. The'Paidomazoma' and the Queen's Camps, in Lars Baerentzen et al.- Λαρς Μπαέρεντζεν: "Το παιδομάζωμα και οι παιδουπόλεις"
66. Δημ. Σέρβου: "Που λες... στον Πειραιά" – Dimitri Servou "Once upon a time...in Piraeus"
67. Politiko-Kafeneio.gr. "Politiko-Kafeneio.gr". Politikokafeneio.com. Retrieved 2014-02-28.
68. Djilas, Milovan (1962, 1990) Conversations with Stalin, pp. 181–182
69. Dead URL (archive date = December 30, 2007) (access date = July 31, 2008)
70. enet.gr/online/online_fpage_text 2008-12-11 at the Wayback Machine
71. (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-07-22. Retrieved 2014-01-07.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
72. Article 1 of the Law 1863/1989
73. . News.kathimerini.gr. 2013-10-29. Archived from the original on 2013-06-07. Retrieved 2014-02-28.

Bibliography

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• Close, David H. The Greek Civil War (Routledge, 2014).
• Close, David H. (ed.), The Greek civil war 1943–1950: Studies of Polarization, Routledge, 1993 (ISBN 041502112X)
• Gerolymatos, André. Red Acropolis, Black Terror: The Greek Civil War and the Origins of Soviet-American Rivalry, 1943–1949 (2004).
• Goulter, Christina J. M. "The Greek Civil War: A National Army's Counter-insurgency Triumph," Journal of Military History (July 2014) 78:3 pp: 1017–1055.
• Hondros, John. Occupation and resistance: the Greek agony, 1941–44 (Pella Publishing Company, 1983)
• Iatrides, John O. "Revolution or self-defense? Communist goals, strategy, and tactics in the Greek civil war." Journal of Cold War Studies (2005) 7#3 pp: 3–33.
• Iatrides, John O., and Nicholas X. Rizopoulos. "The international dimension of the Greek Civil War." World Policy Journal 17.1 (2000): 87–103. online
• Iatrides, John O. "George F. Kennan and the birth of containment: the Greek test case." World Policy Journal 22.3 (2005): 126–145. online
• Jones, Howard. 'A New Kind of War' America's Global Strategy and the Truman Doctrine in Greece (1989)
• Kalyvas, S.N. The Logic of Violence in Civil War, Cambridge, 2006
• Karpozilos, Kostis. "The defeated of the Greek Civil War: From fighters to political refugees in the Cold War." Journal of Cold War Studies 16.3 (2014): 62–87. online^{[dead link]}
• Koumas, Manolis. "Cold War Dilemmas, Superpower Influence, and Regional Interests: Greece and the Palestinian Question, 1947–1949." Journal of Cold War Studies 19.1 (2017): 99–124.
• Kousoulas, D. G. Revolution and Defeat: The Story of the Greek Communist Party, London, 1965
• Marantzidis, Nikos. "The Greek Civil War (1944–1949) and the International Communist System." Journal of Cold War Studies 15.4 (2013): 25–54.
• Mazower. M. (ed.) After the War was Over. Reconstructing the Family, Nation and State in Greece, 1943–1960 Princeton University Press, 2000 (ISBN 0691058423)
• Nachmani, Amikam. "Civil War and Foreign Intervention in Greece: 1946–49" Journal of Contemporary History (1990) 25#4 pp. 489–522 online
• Nachmani, Amikam. International intervention in the Greek Civil War, 1990 (ISBN 0275933679)
• Plakoudas, Spyridon. The Greek Civil War: Strategy, Counterinsurgency and the Monarchy (2017)
• Sarafis, Marion (editor), Greece – from resistance to civil war, (Bertrand Russell House Leicester 1980) (ISBN 0851242901)
• Sarafis, Marion, & Martin Eve (editors), Background to contemporary Greece, (vols 1 & 2, Merlin Press London 1990) (ISBN 0850363934, 0850363942)
• Sarafis, Stefanos. ELAS: Greek Resistance Army, Merlin Press London 1980 (Greek original 1946 & 1964)
• Sfikas, Thanasis D. The Greek Civil War: Essays on a Conflict of Exceptionalism and Silences (Routledge, 2017).
• Stavrakis, Peter J. Moscow and Greek Communism, 1944–1949 (Cornell University Press, 1989) excerpt.
• Tsoutsoumpis, Spyros. "The Will to Fight: Combat, Morale, and the Experience of National Army Soldiers during the Greek Civil War, 1946–1949." International Journal of Military History and Historiography 1.aop (2022): 1-33.
• Vlavianos. Haris. Greece, 1941–49: From Resistance to Civil War: The Strategy of the Greek Communist Party (1992)

British role

• Alexander, G.M. The Prelude to the Truman Doctrine: British Policy in Greece 1944–1947 (1982)
• Chandler, Geoffrey. The divided land: an Anglo-Greek tragedy, (Michael Russell Norwich, 1994) (ISBN 0859552152)
• Churchill, Winston S. The Second World War
• Clive, Nigel. A Greek Experience: 1943–1948 (Michael Russell, 1985.)
• Frazier, Robert. Anglo-American relations with Greece: the coming of the Cold War 1942–47 (1991)
• Goulter-Zervoudakis, Christina. "The politicization of intelligence: The British experience in Greece, 1941–1944." Intelligence and National Security (1998) 13#1 pp: 165–194.
• Iatrides, John O., and Nicholas X. Rizopoulos. "The International Dimension of the Greek Civil War." World Policy Journal (2000): 87–103. in JSTOR
• Myers, E.C.F. Greek entanglement (Sutton Publishing, Limited, 1985)
• Richter, Heinz. British Intervention in Greece. From Varkiza to Civil War, London, 1985 (ISBN 0850363012)
• Sfikas, Athanasios D. British Labour Government and The Greek Civil War: 1945–1949 (Edinburgh University Press, 2019).

Historiography

• Lalaki, Despina. "On the Social Construction of Hellenism Cold War Narratives of Modernity, Development and Democracy for Greece." Journal of Historical Sociology (2012) 25#4 pp: 552–577. online
• Marantzidis, Nikos, and Giorgos Antoniou. "The axis occupation and civil war: Changing trends in Greek historiography, 1941–2002." Journal of Peace Research (2004) 41#2 pp: 223–231. online
• Nachmani, Amikam. "Civil War and Foreign Intervention in Greece: 1946–49." Journal of Contemporary History (1990): 489–522. in JSTOR
• Plakoudas, Spyridon. The Greek Civil War: Strategy, Counterinsurgency and the Monarchy (2017) pp 119–127.
• Stergiou, Andreas. "Greece during the cold war." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies (2008) 8#1 pp: 67–73.
• Van Boeschoten, Riki. "The trauma of war rape: A comparative view on the Bosnian conflict and the Greek civil war." History and Anthropology (2003) 14#1 pp: 41–44.

Primary sources

• Andrews, Kevin. The flight of Ikaros, a journey into Greece, Weidenfeld & Nicolson London 1959 & 1969
• Capell, R. Simiomata: A Greek Note Book 1944–45, London, 1946
• Clive, Nigel. A Greek experience 1943–1948, ed. Michael Russell, Wilton Wilts.: Russell, 1985 (ISBN 0859551199)
• Clogg, Richard. Greece, 1940–1949: Occupation, Resistance, Civil War: a Documentary History, New York, 2003 (ISBN 0333523695)
• Danforth Loring, Boeschoten Riki Van Children of the Greek Civil War: refugees and the politics of memory, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2012
• Hammond, N.G.L. Venture into Greece: With the Guerillas, 1943–44, London, 1983 (Like Woodhouse, he was a member of the British Military Mission)
• Matthews, Kenneth. Memories of a mountain war – Greece 1944–1949, Longmans London 1972 (ISBN 0582103800)
• Petropoulos, Elias. Corpses, corpses, corpses (ISBN 9602110813)
• C. M. Woodhouse, Apple of Discord: A Survey of Recent Greek Politics in their International Setting, London, 1948 (Woodhouse was a member of the British Military Mission to Greece during the war)
• Woodhouse, C. M. The Struggle for Greece, 1941–1949, Oxford University Press, 2018 (ISBN 1787382567)

Greek sources

The following are available only in Greek:

• Ευάγγελος Αβέρωφ, Φωτιά και τσεκούρι. Written by ex-New Democracy leader Evangelos Averoff – initially in French. (ISBN 9600502080)
• Γενικόν Επιτελείον Στρατού, Διεύθυνσις Ηθικής Αγωγής, Η Μάχη του Έθνους, Ελεύθερη Σκέψις, Athens, 1985. Reprinted edition of the original, published in 1952 by the Hellenic Army General Staff.
• Γιώργος Δ. Γκαγκούλιας, H αθέατη πλευρά του εμφυλίου. Written by an ex-ELAS fighter. (ISBN 9604261878)
• "Γράμμος Στα βήματα του Δημοκρατικού Στρατού Ελλάδας Ιστορικός – Ταξιδιωτικός οδηγός", "Σύγχρονη Εποχή" 2009 (ISBN 978-9604510801)
• "Δοκίμιο Ιστορίας του ΚΚΕ", τόμος Ι. History of the Communist Party of Greece, issued by its Central Committee in 1999.
• Φίλιππος Ηλιού, Ο Ελληνικός Εμφύλιος Πόλεμος – η εμπλοκή του ΚΚΕ, (The Greek civil war – the involvement of the KKE, Themelion Athens 2004 ISBN 9603103055)
• Δημήτριος Γ. Καλδής, Αναμνήσεις από τον Β' Παγκοσμιο Πολεμο, (Memories of the Second World War, private publication Athina 2007)
• Αλέξανδος Ζαούσης, Οι δύο όχθες, Athens, 1992
• Αλέξανδος Ζαούσης, Η τραγική αναμέτρηση Athens, 1992
• Α. Καμαρινού, "Ο Εμφύλιος Πόλεμος στην Πελοπόνησσο", Brigadier General of DSE's III Division, 2002
• "ΚΚΕ, Επίσημα Κείμενα", τόμοι 6,7,8,9. The full collection of KKE's official documents of this era.
• Μιχάλης Λυμπεράτος, Στα πρόθυρα του Εμφυλίου πολέμου: Από τα Δεκεμβριανά στις εκλογές του 1946–1949, "Βιβλιόραμα", Athens, 2006
• Νίκος Μαραντζίδης, Γιασασίν Μιλλέτ (ISBN 9605241315)
• Γιώργος Μαργαρίτης, Ιστορία του Ελληνικού εμφύλιου πολέμου 1946–1949, "Βιβλιόραμα", Athens, 2001
• Σπύρος Μαρκεζίνης, Σύγχρονη πολιτική ιστορία της Ελλάδος, Athens, 1994
• Γεώργιος Μόδης, Αναμνήσεις, Thessaloniki, 2004 (ISBN 9608396050)
• Γιώργου Μπαρτζώκα, "Δημοκρατικός Στρατός Ελλάδας", Secretary of the Communist organization of Athens of KKE in 1945, 1986.
• Μαντώ Νταλιάνη – Καραμπατζάκη, Παιδιά στη δίνη του ελληνικού εμφυλίου πολέμου 1946–1949, σημερινοί ενήλικες, Μουσείο Μπενάκη, 2009, ISBN 978-9609317108
• Περιοδικό "Δημοκρατικός Στράτος", Magazine first issued in 1948 and re-published as an album collection in 2007.
• Αθανάσιος Ρουσόπουλος, Διακήρυξης του επί κατοχής πρόεδρου της Εθνικής Αλληλεγγύης (Declaration during the Occupation by the chairman of National Solidarity Athanasios Roussopoulos, Athens, published Athens 11 July 1947)
• Στέφανου Σαράφη, "Ο ΕΛΑΣ",written by the military leader of ELAS, General Sarafi in 1954.
• Δημ. Σέρβου, "Που λες... στον Πειραιά", written by one of DSE fighters.

Other languages

• Anon, Egina: Livre de sang, un requisitoire accablant des combattants de la résistance condamnés à mort, with translations by Paul Eluard, Editions "Grèce Libre" c. 1949
• Comité d'Aide à la Grèce Démocratique, Macronissos: le martyre du peuple grec, (translations by Calliope G. Caldis) Geneva 1950
• Dominique Eude, Les Kapetanios (in French, Greek and English), Artheme Fayard, 1970
• Hagen Fleischer, Im Kreuzschatten der Maechte Griechenland 1941–1944 Okkupation – Resistance – Kollaboration (2 vols., New York: Peter Lang, 1986), 819 pp

External links

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Greek Civil War.

• A full referenced history of DSE
• Greek Civil War Archive at marxists.org
• Andartikos – a short history of the Greek Resistance, 1941–5 on libcom.org/history
• Dangerous Citizens Online online version of Neni Panourgiá's Dangerous Citizens: The Greek Left and the Terror of the State ISBN 978-0823229680
• Report from globalsecurity.org
• (only in Greek) Εφημερίδα ΤΟ ΒΗΜΑ-Δεκέμβρης 1944:60 χρόνια μετά
• Battle of Grammos-Vitsi The decisive battle which ended the Greek Civil War