Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
the monarchist Popular Party, culminating in defeat at the polls in March 1933. The new
government was preparing for the restoration of the monarchy when Venizelos and his
supporters staged an unsuccessful coup in March 1935. Venizelos was exiled to Paris,
where he died a year later. In November 1935 King George II reassumed the throne (by a
likely gerrymander of a plebiscite) and he installed the right-wing General Ioannis
Metaxas as prime minister. Nine months later, Metaxas assumed dictatorial powers with
the king's consent, under what many believed to be the pretext of preventing a
communist-inspired republican coup.
On 25 November 1942, a coalition of Greek resistance groups, aided by the British, blew
up the Gorgopotamos railway bridge near Lamia in Sterea Ellada, sabotaging for weeks
German supply routes through the country.
WWII
Metaxas' grandiose vision was to create a utopian Third Greek Civilisation, based on its
glorious ancient and Byzantine past, but what he actually created was more like a Greek
version of the Third Reich. He exiled or imprisoned opponents, banned trade unions and
the recently established Kommounistiko Komma Elladas (KKE, the Greek Communist
Party), imposed press censorship, and created a secret police force and fascist-style youth
movement. But Metaxas is best known for his reply of ohi (no) to Mussolini's ultimatum
to allow Italians passage through Greece at the beginning of WWII, thus maintaining
Greece's policy of strict neutrality. The Italians invaded Greece, but the Greeks drove
them back into Albania.
A prerequisite of Hitler's plan to invade the Soviet Union was a secure southern flank
in the Balkans. The British, realising this, asked Metaxas if they could land troops in
Greece. He gave the same reply as he had given the Italians, but then died suddenly in
January 1941. The king replaced him with the more timid Alexandros Koryzis, who
agreed to British forces landing in Greece. Koryzis committed suicide when German
troops invaded Greece on 6 April 1941. The Nazis vastly outnumbered the defending
Greek, British, Australian and New Zealand troops, and the whole country was under
Nazi occupation within a few weeks. The civilian population suffered appallingly during
the occupation, many dying of starvation. The Nazis rounded up more than half the Jew-
ish population and transported them to death camps.
Numerous resistance movements sprang up. The dominant three were Ellinikos Laïkos
Apeleftherotikos Stratos (ELAS), Ethnikon Apeleftherotikon Metopon (EAM) and the
Ethnikos Dimokratikos Ellinikos Syndesmos (EDES). Although ELAS was founded by
communists, not all of its members were left-wing, whereas EAM consisted of Stalinist
 
Search WWH ::




Custom Search