Macedonia Will Save Us

Thumbing through the photos in Athens of the Belle Epoch by Yiannis Spandonis, I was struck by the pictures of the young officers of the era. They stand firm, exude pride, confidence and a dashing presence that has been lost among the technocrats and managers of the present day Greek armed forces. The class of 1896 of the Greek Military Academy, newly housed in an imposing neoclassical building erected through the generosity of the great national benefactor, George Averof, was typical of that era. Among the graduates of that class was Nikolaos Kontogouris, a founder of the Military Alliance that brought Venizelos to power, he later fought and was subsequently killed in the Balkan Wars in 1912, Alexander Mazarkis participated in all Greek wars from 1897 to 1930. He became an advisor to Venizelos , and president of the Academy. Euthimios Tsimikalkis was one of the heroes of the 2nd Balkan War while leading a division on the Macedonian front. Leandros Lakon, was one of the great romantic poets of the era, Athanasios Souliotis, was a Greek secret agent in Macedonia and Constantinople and founder of the Society of Constantinople which envisaged brotherhood between Turks and Greeks and a Balkan federation. Haralambos Tseroulis took part in the struggle for Epirus, the Asia Minor campaign and the Evros campaign where Greek forces stopped Ataturk's armies from pushing the Greek border back to Melouna.

These were a different breed of men. Hardened in the crucible of crisis and change, they loved their country and were willing to sacrifice everything for its sake. Perhaps such men still exist,  however, I doubt seriously that their modern counterparts, vetted by their political masters to be team players, are of the same caliber.  One of the distinguished graduates of the Military Academy was Pavlos Melas. He was a hero and ethnomartyr of the Struggle for Macedonia.  His story and that of his generation is an example for all present day Greeks.

Melas was born in 1870 in Marseilles, France. He was the scion of two great families. His mother, Helen was the daughter of a Cefalonian trader from Odessa and his father came from the Melladon family of Epirus, with roots in Constantinople. The family moved to Athens in 1874 where Pavlos grew up.  His family had long been committed to the idea of uniting Greeks under one flag. Pavlos grew up in an atmosphere of political tumult as the young Greek state began to expand its borders in order to redeem the millions of  Greeks under foreign rule. After attending the Military Academy, he graduated in 1891, and was assigned to the field artillery.  He later participated in the debacle of the Greco-Turkish War 0f 1897. This experience defined his generation and was to be the catalyst for its rebirth.

The path towards national integration during the nineteenth century proved particularly difficult because the limited economic and military forces of the Greek state could not meet the disproportionate challenges of its changing governments. Moreover, conditional sovereignty that had been imposed on Greece by foreign powers further undermined the already shaky nature of successive Greek governments. By 1893 the state was bankrupt  and its humiliation heightened by the defeat in the War of 1897 when Greece actually lost territory to the Turks. It became obvious that the Greek nation-state was not able to fulfill the task it had set for itself, namely the liberation of ethnic Greeks living in the Ottoman empire. During the first decade of the twentieth century, the nation collapsed into a severe economic, political and, most importantly, an identity crisis. The state had lost its credibility as the main representative of the nation. It was no longer trusted as a reliable administrator of its own affairs. The situation deteriorated further as a result of the uprisings in Crete,  which increased the strain on the relationships between Greece and the Ottoman Empire. The period between 1904 and 1908 was marked by the armed conflict between Greek and Bulgarian bands for supremacy in Ottoman Macedonia.  This key struggle played an important part in revitalizing the Greek national identity to the extent that it focused the Nation as never before on national priorities and brought Greeks together in a common effort.   

In 1878, Bulgaria became  an independent principality under the sovereignty of the Sultan and wanted   to create with the support of the Russians, one great Balkan state. This state was to include Thrace and Macedonia, both of which had been historically Greek territories, and whose populations were predominantly speakers of the Greek language. In 1902 the Bulgarian government created a number of different rebel organizations which were given the collective name of “Macedonian Revolutionary Committee." The committee armed a number  of fighters which in turn descended into Macedonia.  In the beginning, they used psychological warfare and propaganda to achieve their goals.  Shortly thereafter they resorted to terror.  Villages notables were murdered, including priests and  schoolmasters. Schoolhouses were burned and entire villages destroyed. All these steps were designed to eradicate the Greek population from Macedonia. The Bulgarian "commitadjis" active in Macedonia in 1903 amounted to 90 units, a force of approximately 3000 men. The extreme danger of this situation placed the Greeks in a quandry: either to capitulate or to react, meeting force with force. The Greeks rose to the occasion as they had done so at other critical junctures in their history and resolved to defend themselves.  The need for organization and defense became the first order of business for the residents of Macedonia. Community leaders including priests, schoolmasters, doctors, merchants and landowners, mobilized with Churches and schools becoming the focal points of their efforts.  The movement manifested itself both in free Greece and in the Greek communities of Europe with the organization of Panhellenic societies and associations that worked hard to  awaken both the Greek world and influence public opinion in Europe.

The principal players in the movement, which sprung originally from the heart of Macedonia, were two men sensitive to the anxiety of the Greeks: the Metropolitan of Kastoria, Germanos Karavargelis and the secretary of the Greek consulate in Monastir Ion Dragumis. While Dragoumis went to work on the organization of the  movement by encouraging and setting up committees, Germanos Karavangelis, taking advantage of the disputes between rival Bulgarian revolutionary groups, put together the first bands of Greek irregulars, composed of local inhabitants.  The Greek bands of guerrilla fighters were reinforced by volunteers from Crete and other parts of the Greek world, and eventually, undercover Greek Army officers. After the war of 1897 the Greek government maintained what was essentially a policy of nonintervention in Macedonian affairs for fear that this would provoke a misunderstanding with Turkey. In 1904,  four officers including Melas were dispatched to western Macedonia. Their mission was to assess the situation and recommend a course of action.  On the 13th of October 1904, after having been betrayed by one of the Bulgarians, Pavlos Melas was surrounded by a Turkish detachment  in the village of Statista and killed. Mela’s death shook the whole nation and incited many officers to lead armed bands into Macedonia.  For many Greeks, the Macedonian issue was seen as a test of the nation and they felt their duty to respond.                                        

For four years, Greeks fought a guerrilla war under severe weather conditions. They roamed the mountains and villages, inflicting heavy casualties on the Bulgarian bands and agents, and indeed sometimes on the Turks. Gradually they established  supremacy, evident from the ever-reduced scale of enemy operations, and prepared the region for its subsequent annexation after victory in the Balkan Wars in 1913. During the Macedonian struggle they lost some 640 fighting men and agents (a figure which excludes the numerous victims, including women and children, who, though not officially in the Greek organization, lost their lives in the conflict.

The following passage written by Ion Dragoumis, a nationalist intellectual and diplomat, during his service as a consular officer in Macedonia, expresses eloquently the influence that the ‘Macedonian struggle’ had on Greek national consciousness:

You have to know that if we hurry to save Macedonia, Macedonia will save us. She will save us from the dirt in which we roll, from the mediocrity and the dead spirit, from the    shameful sleep, she will free us. If we hurry to save Macedonia, we will be saved!

Dragoumis believed the struggle against the Bulgarian and Ottoman Others was the means to ‘awaken’ the national consciousness and save the nation from the Eastern military and political threat and the Western corrupted mores. Under the pressure of the Bulgarian threat in Macedonia, Greece had to revise its foreign policy priorities and thus opted for a strategy of co-operation with the Ottoman empire. The contradiction between the compromising attitude and weakness of the independent Greek kingdom and the nationalist fervor inspired by the Macedonian question and the struggle of Cretans for “enosis” led some intellectuals to propose the idea of the stateless nation as an alternative to the nation-state emphasizing thus the ethnic and cultural component of the nation and downplaying its territorial unity.  Ion Dragoumis and Athanasios Souliotes were the two main advocates of this idea.

Victory in the struggle was a result of superior military and administrative organization, the intrinsic strength of Hellenism in Macedonia, the laissez faire policy on the part of the Turks, and the divisions in the Bulgarian Macedonian movement, with its confused and conflicting aims and its strange mixture of sheer terrorism, social revolution and religious propaganda. The Greek officers in Macedonia maintained a degree of discipline which was lacking among the Bulgarians. Although they fought with much brutality and removed known enemies with merciless efficiency, they were also cognizant of the need to win "hearts and minds."

The national crisis was concluded in 1909 with the military coup of Goudi. The coup was enacted by the Military League, it involved a sizable proportion of the Athens garrison and, even though it originated from professional grievances among Army officers, it imposed on the government a number of non-military reforms. In effect, the Army rose against the corrupt and inefficient political class, under the pressure of the specific domestic and foreign policy circumstances .  As a matter of fact, the coup may be seen as the turning point from national crisis to revival. It marked the beginning of a new period for Greece, during which, under the leadership of Eleftherios Venizelos,  and by a combination of both military and diplomatic actions, Greece managed to achieve a large part of its nationalist aspirations. During the election of August 1912, Venizelos and his Liberal party won almost 300 out of 364 seats in parliament. The new government’s agenda included both domestic socio-economic reform and the aggressive pursuit of the Great Idea. Unfortunately, the unity of the period was short-lived and Greece was wracked by division as competing factions supported different sides in World War I.  During this period, the view of the nation-without-state was abandoned, not only because the Greek state acquired new strength and prepared to fight for the liberation of unredeemed Greeks, but also because of the forced Ottomanization policy inaugurated by the Young Turks, despite their initial promises of equality for all ethnic or religious groups living in the former empire.

Nowadays the Macedonian issue is alive and well and still troublesome. After the breakup of former Yugoslavia, a hybrid nation of Albanians and Slavs was created. This nation decided to call itself Macedonia, thus laying claim to the entire region including Greek territory. Since it had no substantial history to speak of, it seeks to acquire portions of Greek history and claim them as its own. Americans and Europeans scoff at the controversy over a mere name. Then again they understand very little about the sacrifices made by generations of Greeks during the Macedonian struggle.

More information about the Macedonian Issue can be found here.

Comments

[Margaret]

Stavros,

Sorry, an "off post" comment. I'm not lucky enough to own a Mac computer, but I am finding that your site takes an age to load recently. Perhaps just my computer, but it seems to get stuck on a couple of the Amazon and MP3 files and can take a couple of minutes to get itself sorted. If nobody else is having similar problems, I'll see if I can get things sorted out my end ...

[Margaret]

Much, much better. Makes an amazing difference. Thank you.

M

[ΠΡΕΖΑTV]

Αγαπητοί και εξαιρετικοί μου φίλοι,

Το ΠΡΕΖΑTV πιστό στις αρχές του παρουσιάζει 5-ΠΡΟΤΑΣΕΙΣ-ΣΟΚ και προκαλεί όποιον πολιτικό έχει αρχίδια να τις εφαρμόσει ΤΩΡΑ!

1. ΔΩΡΕΑΝ ΝΑΡΚΩΤΙΚΑ ΣΕ ΟΛΑ ΤΑ ΣΧΟΛΕΙΑ ΤΩΡΑ!
2. ΚΑΤΑΡΓΗΣΗ ΤΟΥ ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΟΥ ΣΤΡΑΤΟΥ ΤΩΡΑ!
3. ΑΝΟΙΓΜΑ ΤΩΝ ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΩΝ ΣΥΝΟΡΩΝ ΤΩΡΑ!
4. ΦΥΛΑΚΙΣΗ ΑΚΡΟΔΕΞΙΩΝ ΣΤΟΙΧΕΙΩΝ ΤΩΡΑ!
5. ΓΑΜΟΙ ΜΕΤΑΞΥ ΟΜΟΦΥΛΟΦΙΛΩΝ ΤΩΡΑ!

Όχι άλλο κάρβουνο, Ε.Π.Α.Ν.Α.Σ.Τ.Α.Σ.Η. ΤΩΡΑ!

Με εκτίμηση πάντα,
prezatv@hotmail.com

[GoodBytes]

These are the people (melas, karavangelis) who slaughtered my grand-grandparents. The "struggle for Macedonia" is nothing but a genocide and if it happened today, those two would now be in Hague.

[Niko]

Ei, comme on greek orthodox brothers. Please respect the truth. You have given so much light to the world, but you don`t need to bow to your own bandits.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMtHUJX37i8&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-wkL6StPbk

[George]

"These are the people (melas, karavangelis) who slaughtered my grand-grandparents. The "struggle for Macedonia" is nothing but a genocide and if it happened today, those two would now be in Hague."

Nope. Actually the slaughter of Greeks in those areas had already been taking place, the VMRO and proto IMRO were proud of it and their criminal massacres by the pan-Slav and "Macedonian revolutionaries" behind the Iliden episodes, which included pogroms and slaughters against Greeks and Turks in the region.

If there was a Hague back then there would be a heck of lot more Slav Macedonian and Bulgarian nationalists on the dock for genocide than Greeks!

[Niko]

this are greek lies. I have even red Karavangelis "Struggle for Macedonia". He is only a infiltrated terrorist, who operates in a dominantly bulgarian area. The peasants he relyies to are grekomanian Bulgars and Vlahs. the proof that Macedonia was dominantly bulgarian is the Ilinden upraising. one of the bloodiest in ottoman empire. the Greeks tried also their own upraising in order to show the world that macedonia is greek but this upraising almost didn`t happen. so they only proofed that macedonia wasn`t greek.
but of course today Macedonia is greek, like it was in ancient times and no one doubt this. we Bulgars have forgiven you.

[George]

Niko, your statement makes no sense.

Bulgarian operatives during Ilindin boasted of killing unarmed Greeks (as well as Turkish peasants who had nothing to do with the occupation).

The Bulgarians slaughtered wholesale most of the Greek men women and children of Sozopol, and then in areas to the south of Sozopol ruthlessly attacked the Greek towns along the Black Sea coast, terrorizing and illegally driving out populations of tens of thousands of Greeks who had been there continually since the 8th century BC or longer.

By the way in ALL of Europe in al of World War Two, the most efficient "evacuation" for murder of the Jews was done in Bulgarian occupied areas of Yugoslavia and Greece. Those areas had the highest death rates of Jews. All arrested by Bulgarian forces without German in sight.

[Niko]

Dear brother in Christ, I`m offering to you this new made video, which shows all the truth about Macedonia:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv6Phs6zqfg&NR=1&feature=fvwp
I don`t want to speak about greek atrocities in the balkan wars and IWW. about the BW You can read from the link to the Carnegie commission and some caught letters from greek soldiers:
http://www.h-net.org/~habsweb/sourcetexts/greeks1.htm
I tried to study the bulgarian atrocities against Greeks - there was such also, but not like this. the killed greek people in the black sea towns are not more than 50 perhaps. most of the Greeks left Bulgaria by themselvses burning their houses leaving. there are many bulgarian atrocities against greek partizans (but also against bulgarian partizans) and perhaps 3 or 4 thousand Greeks killed in one uprising - I think Kavala - in WWII from the bulgarian army - but this was the answer for the former wars and the bulgarian army never felt like occupator, but it was like reconquista for the bulgarians.
We Bulgareans wanted in the WWII only land what was bulgarian. Hitler offered us also Thessaloniki, but we never took it, because it never has been bulgarian town.
So the truth about Macedonia is, that South Macedonia was hellenic in ancient times. than since the 5th century it`s without population because of the Awar attacks. and since the 7th century it`s inhabited by Protobulgarians and bulgarian Slavs. the Greeks held only the coast for themselves. big parts from Thessalia are also inhabited by Bulgarians, like You see on the cards in the video above. after balkan war and IWW Bulgarians in South Macedonia are massacred or leave it. so it became greek. North Macedonia suffered even bigger terror from the Serbs. it remained ethnicaly bulgarian. inhabited by brainwashed Bulgarians - the descendants of Super Alex, calling themselves Macedonians.
the ideals behind the organization of ORIM (VMRO) and the Ilinden uprising are the ideals of the Great French Revolution - so I don`t believe that they attacked innocent Greeks or Turks. in the ORIM can participate everyone, who was against slavery. many bulgarian ORIM heroes are Vlachs.
and my last words - because You attacked me about the Jews in the occupied (by the Bulgarians) parts of Yugoslavia and Greece. But as You surely know the Jews in the Bulgarian motherland were saved. and in the Jad Vashem memorial is listed the name of the Bulgarian King - the "ally" of Hitler. so I have to dissapoint You. it will sound surprizingly for You perhaps - but the secret is that the bulgarian king didn`t saved the Jews. it wasn`t also the church, the army or the politicans. it was the people. the ordinary people. the neighbours of this same Jews. it was to the Greeks in South Macedonia or to the Bulgarians in Northern (Yugoslav) Macedonia to save them, but they didn`t.

God bless You

[Stavros]

Niko,

Please don't sell your version of history here. Bulgaria historically has ended up on the wrong side in the Balkan Wars, WWI and WWII. Bulgarians can only blame themselves for this. Bulgaria willingly occupied Greek territory after the Germans conquered Greece. The Bulgarian authorities were responsible for rounding up all the Jews in the occupied areas and shipping them to Auschwitz. This is a historical fact.

It was largely through the efforts of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church which led protests against deportations that Bulgarian Jews were saved. The IMRO on the other hand, had a well earned reputation as a terror network and gangster organization. The full story is here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Macedonian_Revolutionary_Organization

As an Orthodox Christian I prefer that all Orthodox Christians in the Balkans show solidarity with each other, learn to live in peace and put aside the feuds of the past.

May God bless us ALL and may we learn the importance of humility. Something in short supply in the Balkan region.

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