With the recent speculation, in some quarters, suggesting that the Greek military might step in,
I decided to look back and find out how the last Greek military coup
came about and, as I was interested myself, and presuming others might
be also, write a brief history. However, each time I looked for a
starting point, an historical moment which needed little explanation of
itself, I was driven further back in time. 20th Century Greek
political history is so complicated, that I came to the conclusion that
it could only be understood by someone who actually lived through it, so
little sense it made to me. Nevertheless, never one to be put off
writing on a topic I am, hitherto, completely ignorant of, I have
stitched together a very brief overview of Greece’s history over the
last century.
To understand modern Greece one must understand it’s ancient history and it’s Geography.
The Golden era of ancient Greece was rarely Pan Hellenic, with the
legendary exception of King Menelaus’ expedition and siege of Troy, the
brief cooperation during the war against King Xerxes of Persia, and
perhaps Alexander the Great’s domination of what is now Greece, it has
predominantly been the glorious histories of city states. And it’s
geography is crucial, it has always been thought to stand as the
boundary between East and West, whether you consider the ‘East’ to be
Persia, the Ottoman Empire, or Communist eastern Europe it is best to
understand that Greece’s eastern frontiers have never been an impassable
barrier, infact Greece’s porous frontiers have ebbed and flowed with
fickle fate and capricious fortune. As a consequence Greece is one of
the most polarised nations on the planet.
Eleftherios Venizelos
It must seem to many Greeks reviewing their own history that the
First World War actually began in Oct 1912, almost 100 years ago in the
reign of King George I. Greece was then being led by a young
Cretan politician called Eleftherios Venizelos who had become Prime
Minister in 0ct 1910 after a military coup in 1909. Crete was
then part of the Ottoman Empire, as was Macedonia at that time,
Venizelos had caught the attention and imagination of the military by
declaring union with Greece.
By the Spring of 1912, Venizelos had helped form the ‘Balken League’,
a series of bilateral treaties between Greece, Serbia, Montenegro, and
Bulgaria and in October 1912 they declared war on the Ottoman Empire.
After striking decisively, led by the Crown Prince Constantine, at the
Ottomans in Macedonia (modern north east Greece) and then Epirus (modern
north west Greece) the combined Greek army and navy looked to the
Ottoman ruled islands in the Aegean and Ionian seas.
In March 1913 King George I was assasinated by an anarchist and King Constantine I, war hero, succeeded to the throne.
King Constantine I
The war with the Ottomans was concluded in June 1913 but soon after
hostilities broke out between Greece and her former allies over the
partition of Macedonia.When this too was concluded in August of that
year Greece had gained southern Epirus, the southern half of Macedonia
(including Thessaloniki), Crete and the Aegean islands, except for the
Dodecanese, under Italian occupation, These gains nearly doubled
Greece’s area and population.
The Greeks managed briefly to stay out of WW1 but in 1915 the western
allies offered Cyprus in exchange for help against the Ottomans, Prime
Minister Venizelos was in favour but the German educated King
Constantine I, brother-in-law to Kaiser Wilhelm, insisted
on neutrality. Venizelos resigned, was re-elected, invited the western
forces onto Greek soil, was fired by the King and then, following another military coup in Thessaloniki, formed a separate government which governed over all the territory taken in the last couple of years.
The western allies ignored the neutrality of the ‘Old Greece’ which
King Constantine still ostensibly ruled. Royalist supporters rioted
against the Venizelos supporters in Athens. When King Constantine’s
cousin Tsar Nicholas was removed by the Bolsheviks, Russian protection
was removed and he was forced to flee, without ever abdicating, along
with most of his family. In June 1917 Venizelos theoretically then led a united Greece and officially joined WW1, he
saw to it that Alexander, King Constantine’s second son, was crowned
king but the country was now completely polarised between the royalists
and the republican Venizelos supporters, the ‘National Schism’.
‘King’ Alexander
At the conclusion of WW1, Venizelos secured, as reward, Western
Thrace, Eastern Thrace, and a zone around Smyrna, but not Cyprus. On his
return from these relatively successful negotiations Venizelos was
almost assasinated by former royalist army officers. Venizelos then
lost the elections in 1920 which was then followed by a referendum,
following the ‘sudden’ death of ‘King’ Alexander, which saw the return
of King Constantine I from exile. Venizelos prudently left the country
Meanwhile, in Turkey, a nationalist movement led by Mustafa Kemal was
growing in popularity and fought to restore some of the territory lost
to Greece. Following King Constantine’s return, Greece lost the support
of the main European mediterranean powers, France and Italy, and by 1922
had been defeated by Turkey. In the Treaty that followed Turkey
gained back Smyrna, Eastern Thrace and the islands Imbros and
Tenedos. Both countries agreed a compulsory population exchange in
which 1.5 million Christians and 0.5 million Muslims were forcibly to
moved.
The humiliating defeat and the economic deprivation, in part caused
by a 25% increase in population due to refugees, exacerbated the
difficult political situation and Army officers, who supported Venizelos, brought about yet another military coup, forcing King Constantine to abdicate in favour of his eldest son King George II in Sept 1923. A counter Royalist coup failed
and in elections the Liberals won by a landslide [monarchist parties
abstained] and on 25 March 1924, the Second Hellenic Republic was
proclaimed, ratified by plebiscite a month later.
King George II
This democratic republic was weak and prone to interference from the
military who had become the main beneficiaries of the upheavals over the
previous decade. In June 1925, General Pangalos launched a
military coup, and ruled as a dictator for a year until a counter-coup
by another General Kondylis unseated him and restored the Republic.
In 1928 Venizelos returned from his self imposed exile and returned
to government in new elections. The Great Depression hit an already
poor Greece hard, and this period marks the rise of the Communist Party
of Greece. Venizelos defaulted on Greek sovereign debt in 1932 and lost
elections being replaced by a monarchist coalition.Eleftherios Venizelos
returned to exile where he died soon after. Two
pro-Venizelos military coup attempts followed and failed before in 1935
the a successful monarchist coup, led by Georgios Kondylis, abolished
the republic and restored the monarchy under King Geoge II.
Ioannis Metaxas
King George II dismissed Kondylis, and in 1936 new elections
followed. The result was a hung parliament with the Greek Communists
holding the balance of power. Ioannis Metaxas, a former royalist
general, with the king’s permission dissolved parliament and modeled
Greece on Italy’s strong fascist state, as himself as leader.
When World War Two broke out Greece remained neutral but in 1940
it was attacked by Italy. The Greeks drove the Italians back but Hitler
came to Mussolini’s rescue and over ran the country. By this stage
Metaxas had died. King George escaped first to Crete and then to Egypt.
I’m not going to go into too much detail about the Nazi occupation of
Greece, needless to say it was bloody awful. However, it is important
to note that while the monarchy ‘ruled’ in exile, the communist
led National Liberation Front (EAM) were the largest resistance group
fighting the Germans.
After an ‘agreement’ between Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin
which left Greece as a British sphere of influence, and despite the fact
that the communists were in control of most of the country, a
government of national unity, under British backed George Papandreou
came to power. However, following disagreement the six communist EAM
minister in that government resigned. Demonstrations turned to violence and then all out civil war which lasted until 1949, when the communists were defeated with the support of Great Britain and the USA. The civil war resulted in 100,000 deaths.
Greece joined NATO in 1952. The period through the 1950s and 1960s
could be characterised as democratic though right of centre parties had
control, with heavy American influence. Rising economic growth from a
very low starting point, due to manufacturing, shipping, and tourism.
On 9th July 1961 his government and the Europeans signed the protocols
of Greece’s Treaty of Association with the European Economic Community
(EEC) and in November 1962 the association treaty came into effect and
envisaged the country’s full membership at the EEC by 1984, after the
gradual elimination of all Greek tariffs on EEC imports.
In 1964 King George I died and King Constantine II took the throne.
King Constantine II
In 1965, after so many years of conservative rule, elections saw
centrist/liberal Georgios Papandreou (Sr) become Prime Minister. King
Constantine II dismissed him that same year but after failing for two
years to for a conservative coalition was forced to call new
elections for May 1967. It looked increasingly likely that Georgios
Papandreou would win and form a new government with the Democratic Left
(thought by the right to be a proxy for the Greek Communist Party which
had been banned)
There was yet another military coup just a few weeks before the scheduled elections,
almost certainly at the behest of the King. The King didn’t bargain on
what kind of people he had urged to take power, they refused to be his
puppets and in December of that year King Constatine II attempted a ‘royal coup’ to seize power from the military junta, he failed and never returned to Greece as King.
The Greek Military Junta
The EEC financial aid package as well as the protocol of accession
were suspended during the 1967–74 junta years and Greece was expelled
from the EEC.
Under the junta torture was a deliberate practice carried out both by the Security Police and the Greek Military Police.
Examples of the types of torture commonly used included:
- Beating the soles of people’s feet with sticks and pieces of metal pipe.
- Sexual torture such as shoving objects into people’s vagina/anus and twisting them violently, or hoses shoved into the anus and forcing water in at high pressure.
- Choking people and shoving rags soaked in urine and excrement down their throats
- Ripping out hair from the head and pubic regions.
- Jumping on people’s stomachs
- Pulling out toenails and fingernails
In 1973 another attempted military coup by the Greek Navy failed. In 1974 the Military Junta was overthrown, democracy restored, and the monarchy abolished.
Since then Greece has been democratic, it joined the European
Community on 1st January 1981, and the Eurozone on January 1st 1999.
The rest everyone should be familiar with.
Greece is still politically polarised, the ‘National Schism’ still exists and has be seen regularly on the streets of Athens over the last couple of years.
I think this short history demonstrates that a Greek military coup can not be totally ruled out
but I would caution that such a coup would not only mean that Greece
would have to withdraw from the Eurozone, which is likely anyway, but,
because of the rules of membership, also the EU, and personally I don’t
think that Greece under any form of government could claw it’s way back
in isolation and the Greek military understand this.
And for this reason, I don’t think it will happen.
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