My Greek Odyssey

Northern Epirotes to be Granted Greek Citizenship

The government of Kostas Karamanlis has decided to grant Greek citizenship to 200,000 Northern Epirotes!  The move has come after the passage of a constitutional amendment in Albania allowing dual citizenship. Previous Greek governments have blocked repeated requests for Greek citizenship by Northern Epirotes fearing that by doing so it would adversely affect the human and property rights of the Greek minority in Northern Epirus. The government's long overdue action which has the support of the other major Greek political party, PASOK, has also received some criticism.  There is some debate over the timing of the action and its effect on upcoming national elections. All that aside, it is my fervent hope that Helladic Greeks become more accepting of their Greek brothers. Reuniting Greeks by offering citizenship will give both communities important advantages. For Northern Epirotes it is the culmination of an elusive dream that generations have paid a very heavy price for.

A Brief History of Northern Epirus

 

In the southern Balkans. nationalist controversies involve history, archeology, religion, language and even geography. Northern Epirus has been described wholly or in part as Illyria, Epirus, Macedonia, Albania, and Greece. Some have claimed that the ancient Epirote tribes were Illyrian, while others contend that they were completely Hellenized. Unlike most other Greeks of the time, who lived in or around city-states such as Athens or Sparta, the Epirotes lived in small villages. Their region lay on the edge of the Greek world and was far from peaceful; for many centuries, it remained a frontier area contested with the Illyrian peoples. However, Epirus had a far greater religious significance than might have been expected given its geographical remoteness, due to the presence of the shrine and oracle at Dodona - regarded as second only to the more famous oracle at Delphi. The Epirotes seem to have initially been regarded with some disdain by the Greeks of the south. The historian Thucydides describes them as "barbarians" and the only Epirotes regarded as truly Greek were the Aeacidae, who claimed to be descended from Neoptolemus, son of Achilles. The Aeacidae established a state in Epirus from about 370 BC onwards, expanding their power at the expense of rival tribes. They allied themselves with the increasingly powerful kingdom of Macedon and in 359 BC, princess Olympias, niece of Arybbas of Epirus, married King Philip II of Macedon. She was to become the mother of Alexander the Great. In the 3rd century BC Epirus remained a substantial power, unified under the auspices of the Epirote League as a federal state with its own parliament (synedrion). Epirus fell to Rome in 167 BC, 150,000 of its inhabitants were enslaved and the region was so thoroughly plundered that it took 500 years for central Epirus to recover fully.

The diversity of the Greek-Albanian border zone was a consequence of two millenia of human traffic. Epirus became the westernmost province of the Eastern Roman Empire (subsequently the Greek-speaking Byzantine Empire), ruled from Constantinople when the empire was divided in two in 395 AD. In 536 the Slavs arrived. Many of the towns and villages still bear their Slavic names. When Constantinople fell to the Fourth Crusade in 1204, Michael Angelos Komnenos Ducas seized Epirus to establish an independent Despotate of Epirus. The rulers of the Despotate controlled a substantial area corresponding to a large swathe of northwestern Greece, much of modern Albania and parts of modern FYROM. In 1430 the Ottoman Empire under Sultan Murad II annexed Epirus. Ottoman rule proved particularly damaging in Epirus; the region was subjected to deforestation and excessive cultivation, which damaged the soil and drove many Epirotes to emigrate to escape the region's pervasive poverty. Nonetheless, the Ottomans did not enjoy total control of Epirus. In 1443 George Kastrioti Skenderbeg, who converted to Christianity, revolted against the Ottoman Empire and conquered Northern Epirus, but on his death it fell to Venice. The Ottomans expelled the Venetians from almost the whole area in the late 15th century. The fustanella (white cotton kilt), a significant component of traditional Greek dress, originated in this region and the ancestors of the "Arvanites." an Orthodox Christian Albanian-speaking Greek-identifying community in Greece, migrated from this region to present-day Greece in the Middle Ages. Epirus was unique among Ottoman provinces in that it was scarcely subjected to Turkish colonization or deportation policies. Most Muslims who lived there were local Christians converted in the 17th and 18th centuries.

In the 18th century, as the power of the Ottomans declined, Epirus became a virtually independent region under the despotic rule of Ali Pasha, an Albanian brigand who became the provincial governor of Ioannina in 1788. At the height of his power, he controlled much of western Greece, the Peloponnese and Albania. Ali Pasha's campaigns to subjugate the confederation of the Souli settlements is a well known incident of his rule. His forces met fierce resistance by the Souliote warriors of the mountainous area. After numerous failed attempts to defeat the Souliotes, his troops succeeded in conquering the area in 1803. When the Greek War of Independence broke out, Ali tried to make himself an independent ruler, but he was deposed and murdered by Ottoman agents in 1822. When Greece became independent, Epirus remained under Ottoman rule. However, the inhabitants of the region contributed greatly to the Greek War of Independence. Two of the founding members of the "Filiki Eteria" (secret patriotic society), Nikolaos Skoufas and Athanasios Tsakalos as well as Greece's first constitutional prime minister (1844-1847), Ioannis Kolettis, were native Epirotes.

The key to understanding current conflicts in the area lies in the study of its 19th century history, which was the embryo of Balkan identities. The Treaty of Berlin of 1881 gave Greece parts of southern Epirus, but it was not until the Balkan Wars of 1912-13 that the rest of southern Epirus joined Greece. Northern Epirus was awarded to a newly independent Albania by an international boundary commission. This outcome was unpopular among both Greeks and Albanians, as settlements of the two people existed on both sides of the border. Among Greeks, northern Epirus was regarded as "terra irredenta.". When World War I broke out in 1914, Albania collapsed. Under a March 1915 agreement among the Allies, Italy seized northern Albania and Greece set up an autonomous Greek state of North Epirus in the southern part of the country. Although short-lived, the state of North Epirus left behind a substantial historical record. The Paris Peace Conference of 1919 awarded the area to Greece after World War I, however, political developments such as the Greek defeat in the Greco-Turkish War of 1921-22 and, crucially, Italian, Austrian and German lobbying in favor of Albania meant that Greece, although backed by Russia, could not claim northern Epirus. The area was finally ceded to Albania in 1924.

During the 1930's the Albanian government took measures to suppress the Greek minority including the closing of  Greek schools, in violation of the League of Nations Treaty. After World War II, Albania was governed by a Communist regime lead by Enver Hoxha, which transformed the country into a hermetically sealed Gulag, which did its best to blurr the distinction between Albanians and Greeks. The attack was two pronged, destroy the Greek language and more importantly,the Orthodox religion. Adherence to Orthodoxy was considered "anti-modern" and dangerous to the unity of the Albanian state. In 1967, the authorities conducted a violent campaign to extinguish religious life in Albania, claiming that it had divided the Albanian nation and kept it mired in backwardness. Student agitators combed the countryside, forcing Northern Epirotes to quit practicing their faith. All churches, mosques, monasteries, and other religious institutions were closed or converted into warehouses, gymnasiums, and workshops. Clergy were imprisoned, owning an icon became a offense that could be prosecuted under Albanian law. The campaign culminated in an announcement that Albania had become the world's first atheistic state, a feat touted as one of Enver Hoxha's greatest achievements

Various sources estimate that the number of Greeks in the whole of Albania is approximately 100,000 to 200,000. A number of villages of Northern Epirus use Greek as the predominant language. There have been many small incidents between members of the Greek minority and Albanian authorities over issues such as the alleged involvement of the Greek government in local politics, the raising of the Greek flag on Albanian territory, and the language taught in state schools of the region; however, these issues have for the most part been non-violent. The crisis in Greek-Albanian relations reached its peak in late August of 1994, when an Albanian court sentenced five members (a sixth member was added later) of the ethnic Greek political party "Omonia" to prison terms on charges of undermining the Albanian state. Greece responded by freezing all EU aid to Albania, sealing its border with Albania, and between August-November 1994, expelling over 115,000 illegal Albanian immigrants. In December 1994, however, Greece began to permit limited EU aid to Albania, while Albania released two of the Omonia defendants and reduced the sentences of the remaining four. Greece and Albania signed a Friendship, Cooperation, Good Neighborliness and Security Agreement on 21st March 1996. Additionally, Greece is Albania's main foreign investor, having invested more than 400 million dollars in Albania; Albania's second largest trading partner, with Greek products accounting for some 21% of Albanian imports, and 12% of Albanian exports coming to Greece; and Albania;s fourth largest donor country, having provided aid amounting to 73.8 million euros. The Greek minority in Albania however, continues to suffer. The Albanian government has purged ethnic Greeks from appointed positions of power, continues to restrict the teaching of the Greek language and seeks to exert control over the Orthodox Church in Albania.

    Technorati : Albania, Albanian Communism, Albanian Orthodox Church, Alexander the Great, Ali Pasha, Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus, Enver Hoxha, Filiki Eteria, George Skanderberg, Greece, Greek War of Independence, Northern Epirus, Ottoman Empire, Souli

The Burden of Greek History: The Catastrophe of 1922 Part III

 

On September 15, 1922, the fires of a raging holocaust began finally to burn themselves out. The once beautiful city had gone up in flames. Future estimations would set the death toll as high as 100,000. For two days while the fires raged, and for some two weeks after, the citizens of this once-lovely and essentially Hellenic city experienced brutality and neglect on a massive scale. The fate of the Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Smyrna is instructive. Many begged him to leave Smyrna before the Turkish Army arrived. He is quoted as saying: "The tradition of the Greek Orthodox Church and the duty of the priest is to stay with his congregation." Crowds were rushing into the cathedral for shelter when Metropolitan Chrysostomos, pale from fasting and prayer, conducted his last divine liturgy. He was arrested and led away to General Nouredin Pasha was spat in his face and turned him over to the mob. After gouging his eyes out he was dragged through the streets by his beard. He was beaten and kicked while he prayed. Occasionally he would raise his hand to bless his persecutors who eventually cut it off with a sword. He was then hacked to pieces and thrown to the dogs.

The next day, the fire subsided and thousands were massed on the quays, Mustafa Kemal issued a proclamation that all Greek and Armenian men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five were to be considered prisoners of war, thus paving the way for further roundups and death marches. The Turks informed their captives of this decision by dropping leaflets onto the crammed waterfront from airplanes. While the city burned, a handful of refugees made their way onto the Allied ships. No systematic removal was undertaken prior to September 24th, when the first Greek ships entered the harbor.

During the interval, tens of thousands of victims crowded on the waterfront in extreme fear and appalling conditions. All the while Allied naval ships remained at anchor several hundred meters from the quay, their crews under orders not to intervene. The Allies feared provoking an incident with the Turks, a stance that incited bitter reproaches by witnesses and survivors later. George Horton, whose impassioned book on Smyrna is unreservedly pro-Christian, nevertheless reflects a thirty-year diplomatic experience of the region. He wrote: "Though the stench of burned flesh that hovered over the harbor was impossible to ignore, the international spectators labored to turn a blind eye to the results of their nation's political designs. Confined to their ships, sailors resorted to the feeble measure of searchlight sweeps in an effort to discourage Turkish predation. In between times they played records at full volume in an effort to drown out the nocturnal outcry. Caruso was heard singing Pagliacci as men drowned or were shot while trying to swim out to the ships. On the Iron Duke , the Royal Navy flagship, the band played night-long concerts."

A new treaty to supplant Sevres was drawn up at Lausanne. Great Power diplomacy staged its second act, beginning in November 1922 and ending with the signing of the treaty in July the following year. Allied power brokers had to acknowledge that (1) Greece was defeated in Thrace and Asia Minor, and (2) the Nationalist Turks now held power within Turkey. Modern Turkey had become a recognized sovereign nation. A separate treaty between Greece and Turkey formalized an exchange of population's, a scheme headed by the Norwegian explorer and humanitarian Fridtjof Nansen. Greeks living in Asia Minor or Eastern Thrace were required to return to the Greek homeland, while Turkish nationals living in Greek territory were compelled to return to Turkish homelands. Greeks living in Constantinople were exempted from these provisions, as were Muslims living in Western Thrace.

Estimates vary, but approximately 375,000 Turks and 1.25 million Greeks were thus uprooted, with the Greek exodus well underway long before the exchange program was formally enacted. Ernest Hemingway witnessed the misery of those retreating through Thrace after the Greek collapse and recorded it in reportage and fiction alike: "The enormity of the refugee problem for Greece can scarcely be exaggerated. A poor country with a population of around 4 million was faced with an influx of roughly one-third of its population. Housing and lands abandoned by Muslims did not begin to approach the level necessary to accommodate the new arrivals, whose culture, in any case, was more in line with Constantinople than Athens. Indeed, some fifty years after their transplantation, the anthropologist Renee Hirschon found the Asia Minor refugees and their descendants still maintaining a separate sense of identity from the people they called 'locals', 'Old Greeks' or simply 'Greeks'.

The Treaty of Lausanne represented the final step in the Allied abandonment of Greece. Britain in particular had consistently encouraged Greece, only to step aside as she faltered and then drop her in her utter defeat. No Allied help was forthcoming as Greece crumbled in 1922, there was no military aid, no significant diplomatic pressure, and, apart from a belated Italian relief ship, not even humanitarian support in response to the Smyrna debacle. The Greek army was gradually forced to abandon Asia Minor, leading to the uprooting of the Greek populations of all parts of Turkey, who were "exchanged" for much of the Turkish populace of Greece, in perhaps the largest internationally-sanctioned "ethnic cleansing" in modern history. The ensuing economic and sociological catastrophe devastated Greece, reducing the country to virtually a Third World status from which it did not emerge for generations, and cast a pall over its politics through the late 20th century. It has also left the Greeks with a profound sense of betrayal by the Great Powers, yet it should be acknowledged that Greece had played a significant role in her own failure. As the human flotsam of the war floated back to Greece, assigning blame became the order of the day. Someone had to pay and the military was chosen to assign blame and mete out punishment. The seeds were sown for future disasters.

    Technorati : Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Smyrna, Population Exchange, Smyrna, Treaty of Lausanne

The Burden of Greek History: The Catastrpohe of 1922 Part II

In October 1920, the Greek Army advanced east into Anatolia, with the encouragement of British Prime Minister, Lloyd George who intended to increase the pressure on the Turkish and Ottoman governments to sign the Treaty of Sevres. This advance was begun under the Liberal government of Venizelos, however, a war weary electorate voted him out and soon after the offensive began he was replaced by Dimitrios Gounaris, who appointed inexperienced monarchist officers to senior commands. King Constantine assumed personal command of the army at Smyrna. The strategic objective of these operations was to defeat the Turkish Nationalists and force Kemal into peace negotiations. The advancing Greeks met little resistance, as the Turks managed to retreat in an orderly manner and avoid encirclement.The Greek advance was halted for the first time at the first battle of Inonu on January 11, 1921, and the Allied states proposed to amend the Treaty of Sevres at a conference in London where both the Revolutionary and Ottoman governments were represented.

Although some agreements were reached with Italy, France and Britain, the decisions were not agreed to by the Greek government, who believed that they still retained the strategic advantage and could negotiate from a stronger position. The Greeks initiated another attack on March 27 (Battle of İnönü II), to be resisted fiercely and finally defeated by the Kemalist troops on March 30. The British favored a Greek territorial expansion unfortunately, they refused to offer any military assistance in order to avoid provoking the French. The Turkish forces however received significant assistance from the Soviet Union. In June 1921, a reinforced Greek Army advanced to the River Sakarya , 62 miles west of Ankara. Meanwhile, the new Turkish government at Ankara appointed Mustafa Kemal, as commander in chief. The advance of the Greek Army faced fierce resistance which culminated in the 21-day Battle of the Sakarya (August 23 - September 13, 1921). The ranks of the Greek were augmented by Greek volunteers from Asia Minor. These men knew full well the costs of failure and both sides fought valiantly. No quarter was asked and none given. Much of the fighting was close quarters and hand to hand. The ferocity of the battle exhausted both sides to such an extent that they were both contemplating a withdrawal, but the Greeks were the first to withdraw to their previous lines. That was the furthest in Anatolia the Greeks had advanced, and within few weeks they withdrew in an orderly fashion  back to the lines they held in June, intending at least to protect the Smyrna area.

The Greek defeat can be largely attributed to a lack of whole-hearted Allied support, as King Constantine was reviled by the British for his pro-German policies during World War I (in contrast to former prime minister Venizelos). On the contrary, the Kemalist Turks enjoyed significant Soviet support. The main reason though was the poor strategic and operational planning of this ill-conceived advance in-depth. Although the Greek Army was not lacking in men, courage or enthusiasm, it was lacking in nearly everything else. Three factors contributed to Greek defeat: poor leadership at the strategic level, replacement of Venizelist officers all the way down to platoon level by inexperienced monarchist officers, and poor logistics.

The Greek Army exceeded the limits of its logistic structure, overextended its supply lines and had no way of retaining such a large territory under constant attacks by regular and irregular Turkish troops fighting in their homeland. Having failed to reach a military solution Greece appealed for allied help, but the allies decided that the treaty of Sevres could not be enforced and they evacuated their positions leaving the Greeks exposed. In March 1922 the Allies proposed an armistice, but Kemal feeling that now he has the strategic advantage, declined any settlement while the Greeks remained in Anatolia and intensified his efforts to re-organize the Turkish military for the final offensive against the Greeks. At the same time, the Greeks strengthened their defensive positions, but were increasingly demoralized by the inactivity of remaining on the defensive and the prolongation of the war. The Turkish offensive was launched on August 26, defeating the Greeks at the Battle of Dumlupınar near Afyon (August 30, 1922), celebrated as "Victory Day" and a national holiday in Turkey. The Greek Army was thrown back in headlong flight towards Smyrna.  Some units were able to remain cohesive and retreated fighting all the way. Others fell apart. It has been suggested that the Greek retreat involved a "scorched earth" policy, which left large tracts of land and property ruined or destroyed. The adherents of this view claim that the burning of crops left the remaining inhabitants of Smyrna close to starvation. However, the validity of this interpretation is questionable considering the haste of the Greek retreat (which was concluded in fewer than 2 weeks), and the lack of any documented evidence of Greek orders to destroy property during the retreat. In any case, most historians today agree that the great fire that gutted Smyrna expanded from the burning of Greek and Armenian Quarters of Smyrna by the Turkish Army. Despite an order from Kemal to prevent harm to non-combatants, these orders were largely ignored, and Nasruddin Pasha, the commander of Turkish forces in the Smyrna district gave orders contradicting Ataturk's. Nasruddin Pasha's orders were largely followed, and the Greek and Armenian civilian population of Smyrna suffered heavily at the hands of the Turkish Army.

    Technorati : Armenians, Battle of Inou, Battle of Sakarya, Greek Army, Greek-Turkish War 1921-1922, Mustafa Kemal. Nasradin Pasha, Smyrna, Turkish Army

The Burden of Greek History: The Catastrophe of 1922 Part I

 

The legacy of Greek history is a heavy one. It has shaped Greeks like the powerful blows of a blacksmith's hammer on red hot iron. During the twentieth century Greeks suffered multiple traumatic events that have left their indelible mark on succeeding generations. I am often asked by non-Greek friends why Greeks and Turks can't get along. There is no easy answer. To understand the present predicament one has to understand the shared history. Modern Greece and Turkey are two countries founded by wars of independence in which the opposing side suffered catastrophes that changed each in fundamental ways for better and worse. The Greco-Turkish War of 1920-1922 and the resulting destruction of Smyrna, a city with a Greek population greater than Athens at the time, was a defining moment equal to the Fall of Constantinople in Greek history and its ramifications are still reverberating today. Today this piece of history is forgotten except for the two countries involved. It created over two million refugees, the largest mass exodus of its kind prior to World War II.

When Greece won its independence in 1821, only a small portion of Greeks lived within its borders. The nation that emerged from the crucible of the Greek War of Independence was one ridden by factionalism. The one unifying concept that fired the imagination of all Greeks regardless of political persuasion was the "Megali Idea (Great Idea)." This concept of manifest destiny, the dream of uniting Greeks scattered over the entire eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea would become a major source of friction with the neighbors of this emerging state, especially the Ottoman Empire. It would cause Greece, despite its limited financial assets and natural resources, to fight a series of wars that greatly enlarged her borders and shaped the country we now recognize. Unfortunately it cost the lives of countless Greeks and ended in a major national catastrophe that set the stage for future cataclysms. The Greeks knew that the only way they could achieve their foreign policy objectives was through the help of one of the "Great Powers." This idea of a resurrected "Greater Greece" was appealing as well to many European Philhellenes, particularly in Britain. .

The architect who did more than any other Greek to realize the dream of the Megali Idea was Eleftherios Venizelos. In 1910, Venizelos became Prime Minister and lead his country through two Balkan Wars in which Greece gained enough territory to double in size. Venizelos could see the writing on the wall and wanted Greece to join the Allied cause in World War I. When King Constantine, who was married to the Kaiser's sister, refused to allow Greek support for the Dardanelles campaign, Venizelos resigned. He was reelected by a landslide in 1915, and immediately ordered the mobilization of the Greek Army and invited Allied Forces into Thessaloniki. He was subsequently dismissed by the King and retired to Crete where he formed a revolutionary republican government. Through his efforts the King was forced to abdicate and Greece entered World War I on the Allied side. A deep chasm was created between monarchists and republican Venizelists. It would prove to be costly, long lived and a portent of other deep seated divisions in Greek society. Venizelos' astute reading of the outcome of World War I and recognition of the potential for Greek foreign policy to reap substantial benefits was rewarded at the Versailles Conference. Greece gained important territory belonging to Bulgaria and Turkey including Imbros, Tenedos, and Eastern Thrace.

Part II will be published on July 14.

    Technorati : Eleftherios Venizelos, Greco-Turkish War 1920-1922, King Constantine I, Megali Idea, Modern Greek History, Smyrna

The Mantra of Anti-Americanism

Loving America is not very fashionable these days. Sometimes I cringe at the things that Americans and their government are accused of. Let's just say that Americans aren't very popular. Everyone was supposedly on our side after 9/11 and we squandered their sympathy with our unilateralism. At least that's the popular thinking. Unfortunately anti-Americanism was well entrenched in the psyche of a great many people well before the fall of the Twin Towers.

Anti-Americanism has become a particular fact of life in Greece, where it has developed into a central tenet of the Greek worldview. This animosity surfaced after the fall of the military junta and the invasion and occupation of Cyprus, both events seen by the great majority of Greeks as the handiwork of the US. The sins of the US are vast according to many of my Greek friends. America shows favoritism to Turkey, refuses to support Greek demands regarding FYROM, bombed innocent Serbs, has a penchant for invading peace loving countries for dubious reasons, etc, etc, etc.

Anti-Americanism serves an important purpose for many segments of Greek society and it cuts across the political spectrum. The Communists, the Church, the Greek mainstream media, the intelligentsia, the Left and increasingly, even the Right. Have I left anyone out? By scapegoating America, these elements deflect Greeks from focusing on the failures of their own institutions. The failure to craft a realistic and credible foreign policy, the failure to weed out corruption and nepotism, the failure to reverse the decline of the fertility rate, the failure to Christianize young Greeks, the failure to re-energize the Church, the failure to free the dormant economic vitality of the average Greek, the failure to stand up to Turkish aggression and provocations, the failure to Hellenize Europe (instead Europeanizing Hellas), the failure to provide opportunity, the failure to build a world class system of higher education that is accessible, the failure to decrease the role of government, the failure to reach out to or support the Greek diaspora and the failure to provide a balanced public discourse.

Blind anti-Americanism is nothing more than an excuse for Greeks to continue playing the "victim" card. It is an excuse for Greeks to disengage from the world, to feel surrounded, to feel impotent and to become more politically isolationist. By scapegoating others for our own faults we create an environment in which it is impossible to take responsibility and thereby begin the first step of emerging into the light. Hellenism and Orthodoxy need to engage the rest of the world, not withdraw from it. The Ancient Greeks were not afraid to sail out and meet the world, they were travelers and they reveled in and sought out new ideas. They were not frightened by the "Varvari (barbarians)" nor their ideas. The Greeks, were in fact, the agents of change and modernity. Today, modernity is frightening. It means we have to compete. It means we can't explain everything away with conspiracy theories.

The rot is deep. Kathimerini is a conservative Greek newspaper, considered by many to be the "paper of record." One of its frequent and respected columnists, a professor emeritus at Panteion University in Athens, Christos Yiannaras, recently wrote: "the European Union appears (with dramatic consequences) infected with a syndrome of inferiority in the face of the new/rich primitive culture, economic might, and military superiority of the United States. The E.U. wants to bring the traditionally state controlled universities under the politically uncontrollable demands of the economy, creating institutions of a society that seek to teach its leading cadres itself, and not to entrust them to the so-called "free market."

"The American model that seems to have enchanted the E.U.," he said, "is a society of emigrants, a racial hodgepodge of uprooted people for the sake of survival, with tragically antisocial differences in their way of thinking and in their cultures. They are 'united' by their blind devotion to 'money,' a devotion they inherited from the early emigrants, 'money' being the measure of evaluating every person. Their idea of life is the search for "opportunity," the stubborn effort to show off their riches and their power to the lands of their origin-their childish admiration for their machines and for the size and glitter of their products.

"The overwhelming majority of the American people are in a state of undifferentiated masses, buried deep in their lack of education, with dizzying percentages of illiterate people. An aesthetic barbarism, ridiculous clothing, a torpid state of overweight, with idiotic gullibility and easy submission to any kind of power (even the power of crazy religious preachers). This is the model, the E.U. wants to imitate and sacrifice for its sake the social conquests and its cultural refinements which should have been upheld as its cause of pride."

The part about showing off riches and wealth in the country of their origin will no doubt particularly endear him to Greek Americans. How do you argue with such a distorted view of Americans. The simple answer is: you don't. If some people want to engage in this type of rhetoric so they can absolve themselves of their own sins, there is not much to be done about it.

Faoud Ajami is a professor at John Hopkins University, an immigrant like myself and part of that "racial hodgepodge" known as America. In an article entitled "The Falseness of Anti-Americanism" he writes the following: "Today, the United States carries the disturbance of the modern to older places? to the east and to the intermediate zones in Europe. There is energy in the United States, and there is force. And there is resistance and resentment and emulation, in older places affixed on the delicate balancing act of a younger United States not yet content to make its peace with traditional pains and limitations and tyrannies. That sensitive French interpreter of his country, Dominique Moïsi, recently told of a simple countryman of his who was wistful when Saddam Hussein's statue fell on April 9 in Baghdad's Firdos Square. France opposed this war, but this Frenchman expressed a sense of diminishment that his country had sat out this stirring story of political liberation. A society like France with a revolutionary history should have had a hand in toppling the tyranny in Baghdad, but it didn't. Instead, a cable attached to a U.S. tank had pulled down the statue, to the delirium of the crowd. The new history being made was a distinctly American (and British) creation. It was soldiers from Burlington, Vermont, and Linden, New Jersey, and Bon Aqua, Tennessee ( I single out those towns because they are the hometowns of three soldiers who were killed in the Iraq war) who raced through the desert making this new history and paying for it. " Read the whole article.

Technorati : Anti-Americanism, Christos Yiannaras.Greece, Faoud Ajami, Greek-Americans

The Greek Kristallnacht

In 1955, Turkey took a page out of the playbook of the Nazi Movement in pre-war Germany and conducted a pogrom similar in every respect to the one known as "Kristallnacht (The Night of Glass)".  The victims this time were not Jews but the Greeks of Constantinople (Istanbul), the last vestige of a community that had lived there for over two thousand years. Although this brutal episode occurred over fifty years ago it still rankles in Greek memory and has done much to poison the well of Greek-Turkish relations. The pogrom took place with the backdrop of the emerging crisis in Cyprus at the time. Britain poised to lose her colony on the island of Cyprus decided to play the "Turkish card" and initiated a tripartite conference designed to draw Turkey into the process as a counter-balance to the growing movement toward "enosis" or union with Greece. In the midst of negotiations Turkey decided to send a calculated message on September 6, 1955. The following account is from an article by John Phillips that appeared in Harper's Magazine in June, 1956: "Squads of marauders were driven to the shopping area in trucks and taxis, waving picks and crowbars, consulting lists of addresses, as the police stood by smiling. Greek priests were reported circumcised, scalped and burned alive; Greek women raped. The Greek Consulate was destroyed in Izmir, Just nine out of eighty Greek churches were left undesecrated, twenty nine were demolished. Ghouls invaded the huge cemetery where the Patriarchs of Constantinople are buried, opened mausoleums, dug up graves, and flung bones into the streets; corpses waiting burial with knives. There had been no comparable destruction of Greek sanctuaries since the fall of Constantinople."

The riots were allegedly sparked by a rumor that the birthplace of Kemal Ataturk, the Father of Modern Turkey, which was located in Thessaloniki, had been bombed. This rumor was given legs by the Turkish media and did much to incite the anti-Greek frenzy. Dr Spiros Vryonis in his landmark 700 page work: The Mechanism of Catastrophe: The Turkish Pogrom of September 6-7, 1955 details the intent of the Turkish government. to destroy the Greek community of Istanbul and to serve the domestic and foreign policies of the Adnan Menderes government. The pogrom was well planned and the carnage skillfully executed. It was not a spontaneous burst of anger but a methodical and coordinated operation. As the police stood passively on the sidelines, riots began emanating from the center of the city at Taksim Square and moved out to its suburbs The government imported thousands of illiterate Anatolian Turks armed them with crowbars, clubs, spades, pickaxes, dynamite and gasoline. Approximately 100,000 Turks participated. The attack came in three waves; the first broke down doors and windows in order to gain entrance to buildings, the second fell on the contents of those buildings and the third finished the destruction of the building after it was thoroughly looted. One thousand homes were destroyed, 2500 partially destroyed, 4500 stores were looted , damaged or destroyed. Thirty Greek men were killed and 200 Greek women were raped. Nothing Greek was spared, not even cemeteries. It would mark the beginning of the end of the historic Greek community in Istanbul that was supposedly protected under the Treaty of Lausanne.

Turkey imposed a press blackout immediately and the incident received minimal press coverage. Damages were estimated to be $500,000,000. A mildly worded note from the British government was dispatched to the Turkish Prime Minister, Adnan Menderes by his British counterpart, Harold Macmillan.  Although an embarrassment the incident had uses that the British did not fail to grasp. The Americans on the other hand, sent a strongly worded note to both sides from President Eisenhower deploring the antagonism between the two nations and calling for calm despite the fact that Greek government reacted with exemplary coolness during the crisis. The note had the effect equating perpetrator with victim. This seminal event started the downward slide of Greek-American relations that has over time become a rising tide of anti-Americanism.

The Turkish military initially acquiesced to the actions of the Menderes government and the Chief of Staff, General Cemal Gursel promised protection. Five years later, he overthrew Menderes in a bloodless coup and hung him and two of his cabinet ministers. The military intervention tightened the government's grip over its minorities, and intensified the suppression of rights of other ethnic minorities in Turkey as well as the Turlish people themselves.  Ethnic cleansing in Turkey and Cyprus has continued unabated by the Turkish government including the destruction of Kurdish villages of southeast Anatolia which is being slowly reduced to a desolate wasteland. Despite the passage of time, the effects of the Pogrom of 1955 are still reverberating today. For Turks it solidified the notion that they could continue their policy of ethnic cleansing and human rights violations unhampered by the West. For Greeks the event reinforced the futility of relying on the West for support in issues involving Turkey and highlighted their sense of being an aggrieved party, victimized once again. Both outcomes bode ill for the future.

 

    Technorati : Constantinople, Cyprus, Enosis, Greek minority in Istanbul, Greek-American Relations, Greek-Turkish Relations, Pogrom, Spiros Vryonis, Treaty of Lausanne, Turkey

Living With 17 November

Back in the 1985, I was a career Marine waiting for my next assignment. I'm not sure I ever heard of the 17 November terrorist group before I got that fateful phone call from Washington. The guy on the other end was the dreaded, "monitor." He was the bureaucrat at Headquarters Marine Corps who decided your next duty assignment. This was one person that you didn't want to upset. "I hope you want to go to Greece, because I'm cutting you a set of orders as we speak. Stay away from the Ouzo, I hear it's murder," then he hung up abruptly. To say I was ecstatic at that moment is an understatement. I was the prodigal son returning to the homeland that my parents had talked about my entire life.Within a few short months I was to find myself in the middle of Athens, embroiled in a war I thought had ended thirty five years previously. I was assigned to a unit known as JUSMAGG, Joint US Military Aid Group, Greece. It consisted of twelve Americans. Two of them had been shot in the last 6 months. Nick the Greek might have thought the odds were good, I wasn't so sure.

JUSMAGG was a descendant of the staff that Lieutenant General James A.Van Fleet had put together to help the Greek government fight the civil war after the British pulled out. Van Fleet struggled to turn the Greek Army into an effective fighting force, overseeing its training, organization and operations. On his recommendation, incompetent officers were sacked, more maneuver battalions created and aggressive offensive actions taken. The defeat of the Communist insurgency can be attributed to many things. Without the substantial military aid managed by Van Fleet's staff one thing is certain, Greece would have been pulled behind the iron curtain. Duty at the MAGG was good through its heyday, the 50s and 60s. It started to turn ugly when Turkey invaded Cyprus. Most Greeks blamed the US.

17 November, named after the date of the fabled student uprising against the Military Junta, was a terrorist group who's first known attack came in December, 1975, when the CIA's station chief in Athens was shot and killed with a .45-caliber automatic pistol, November 17's favorite weapon. Since then, the group has claimed responsibility for twenty-one murders. During the 1980s the group expanded its repertoire to include bombings of people and property. Its targets have included foreign business and European Union facilities. On the sunny morning of November 15, Navy Captain George Tsantes, the son of Greek immigrants from the island of Ikaria, left for work in a vehicle driven by Nick Veloutsos. While stuck in traffic on his way to work at JUSMAGG, two men on a motorcycle pulled up beside the sedan. The passenger behind the driver, shot Veloutsos with a .45 caliber automatic and then shot Capt. Tsantes in the back seat. Then they drove off and disappeared into the morning traffic. A few months later another American member of the MAGG, Army Master Sargent Michael Judd, was headed to Hellenikon Air Base. While stopped at a red light he noticed a motorcycle with two passengers approaching. He stepped on the gas, but was shot and wounded in the shoulder. He managed to drive through the main gate at the base and became one of the few survivors of a 17 November hit.

So this was my introduction to life in Greece. Living with 17 November was to be a constant element of my life for the next two years. How ironic, I was a Greek American with a big target on my chest, chased by fellow Greeks with an ax to grind. Two sides in a war that had supposedly ended. The next two years was a sequence of watch your back, changing routes, being unpredictable, checking the car, the apartment and the street. Living with terrorism isn't always pleasant but it is doable. I wasn't going to hunker down and I wasn't about to let these guys spoil my chance to enjoy life in Greece. A few months after I left Greece, the US Naval Attache, Capt William Nordeen was killed by a car bomb. He was not their last victim.

In 2003, the authorities descended on the sleepy island of Lipsi and arrested Alexandros Giotopoulos, ending the twenty eight year reign of terror of 17 November. Giotopoulos was the supposed mastermind behind the group. His father, Dimitris, was a leader of the Archive Marxists, a Trotskyite group that was considered a grave threat by the KKE (Communist Party of Greece) and its members were hunted down by the OPLA, the party's secret service, Their executioners took particular delight in slicing throats with the lids of tin cans, and executed at least six hundred Archive Marxists.

There have been no further attacks since Giotopoulos and his accomplices were arrested. Maybe the civil war is finally over.

Technorati : 17 November Terrorist Group, Anti-Americanism, Capt. George Tsantes, Capt. William Nordeen, Greek Americans, Greek Civil War, Greek History, LtGen James Van Fleet, MSgt Michael Judd, Terrorism

The Electronic Kafenion

 

The kafenion (coffee shop) was a major congregating point in the life of a Greek village. It was usually located at the village square. Men often retreated to this male sanctuary to socialize and most importantly to talk. Greeks love to talk, discuss, and argue. Sometimes it is hard for outsiders to figure out whether Greeks are having a discussion or getting ready to come to blows. I remember inviting a Marine buddy from Tennessee to join me at a family gathering in New York City. This guy grew up on a farm and he was a little overwhelmed by the noise and vastness of the city. When we arrived home, my mother and aunts were laying out a vast smorgasbord of Greek delicacies and my Dad and Uncles were in the midst of a debate on some aspect of the always turbulent Greek political scene. Children were running around and it was quite noisy. My friend was visibly uncomfortable and turned to me and whispered: "What are they all fighting about?" I told him not to worry unless everything went completely dead silent.

The early Greek immigrants to America, who were mostly young men, did not have a lot of free time for recreation. The little time they did have was spent in a little piece of home known as the kafenion. Yes, they even brought them to America. A few tables and chairs, a Greek flag and a picture of Venizelos or King Constantine on the wall. They drank the dark, thick Turkish coffee in the little demitasse cups, ate confections known as loukoumia ("Turkish delight") or mezzedakia (appetizers) like tomato slices, meatballs, feta cheese, olives, played backgammon or cards, gossiped and argued endlessly about how to fix the world. Put five Greeks together in a room and you'll invariably end up with six different opinions.

The kafenion was traditionally males only, no self respecting Greek woman would be found in such a place. Now women are just as likely to be there as men. Things are certainly changing; the kafenion is giving way to trendy coffee bars, cyber cafes and patisseries. Lately I've been thinking about the birth of the new "kafenion" on the internet. The internet is a modern marvel, capable of generating both evil and good things. One of the good things it has done, in my humble opinion, is it has become an "electronic kafenion." Now I'm not suggesting that we fore sake human contact with others and communicate soley through electronic means. My point is that the kafenion was a place where Greeks congregated with others in their horio (village) and now the electronic kafenion is a place that Greeks from all walks of life, male, female and all over the world can come together and exchange ideas. They can even carry on "Socratic dialogues." For further explanation, go to: http://www.sfcp.org.uk/socratic_dialogue.htm. Now if we can only figure out how to serve mezze with our discussions.

Personally speaking I have learned a great deal from the exchanges I have had with people on this blog and on Phylax Blog.  If they're not careful, Greeks can easily find themselves in an echo chamber. They need to be exposed to different points of view and they need to get their point of view across to others. They need to think critically and challenge there preconceived ideas. The electronic kafenion is a way to do this. I am always pleasantly shocked when I go to "Site Meter" on my blog and find out how many different countries my readers hail from.  We are just scratching the surface. I truly have come to believe that this is a powerful tool for bringing Greeks and those that aspire to be  "Greek"  together. I do not say that in a strictly ethnically oriented sense. As I have said before, being Greek  as the philosopher Isocrates understood it, was partaking of Greek paidea (education) and thinking and acting in the classically Greek manner. Some of our brothers and sisters in Greece and elsewhere fall short of the mark, whilst some "xeni" (foreigners) aspire to reach it.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Ted Laskaris of Phylax Blog and Epithesis Now for leading the way. For bringing Greeks together and for introducing me to blogging. Bravo Ted and to all who take the time to comment and listen. Hope we will continue to have many kavgathes (arguments) in the future and continue to Hellenize the world.   Semper Fi, Stavros

Saving the Jews of Greece

 

When I was a kid growing up on East 91st Street in Manhattan in the 50s and 60s, the summers were sweltering and living in a tenement building before the days of air conditioning was to say the least, unpleasant. Turning on a fire hydrant was always an option, although frowned upon by the fire department. One summer, my parents decided they had had enough and that we would rent a room for the summer at Rockaway Beach. I have never forgotten those summers; swimming at the beach, playing outside with the other kids and going home only to grab a bite or when your mother started threatening bodily harm unless you came right home. Rockaway Beach back then was an area that was heavily populated by Jews. Many were refugees from the terrible holocaust in Europe, some were survivors of the death camps. I remember one Jewish lady in particular who liked to knit while sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of the boarding house we stayed at. She had been born and raised in Athens. When she found out I was Greek, she broke out into her impeccable Greek and hugged me like I was a long lost relative. Her name was Miriam, I called her "Kiria" (madam). She always seemed sad, sitting there like a permanent fixture, but would invariably smile when she would catch a glimpse of me and would often give me a quarter to buy candy at the corner grocery. I could never figure out why she had those blue numbers on her arm. When I asked my Baba (Dad) what it all meant, he got very serious, sat down and explained it as best he could, warning me never to discuss it in her presence. He gave me the look, "It is too painful" he said in Greek. I was still confused, yet shook my head.

It wasn't until many years later that I began to piece it all together. I learned what happened to the Jews of Greece and to Kiria. The thriving and very old Jewish community in Greece before World War II consisted of 75,000 Greek Jews. Sixty-five thousand were deported and sent to the killing factories of the Third Reich. The remarkable fact that this number is not higher is a testament to the resistance of the Greek people against Nazi Occupation. That fact unfortunately, has been obscured by time and by the rocky road of Greek relations with the State of Israel. Just recently Mikis Theodorakis, a veritable icon in Greece, made comments many Jews consider ant-semitic. Europeans have often been accused of anti-Semitism, much of it virulent, historic but also related to the strong dislike that many, especially of the Left, have for Israeli policies in Palestine. The level of anti-Semitism in Greece is palpably lower. Unfortunately, it does exist to some degree, as it does in every country, including the US. What is personally disappointing to me is how the proud history of Greek help to the Jews has been swept under the rug, largely ignored, and replaced by charges of anti-Semitism, against the backdrop of international politics.

In contrast to many Catholic and Protestant leaders at the time, who ignored or countenanced Nazi atrocities, Archbishop Damaskinos, as well as a number of other prelates of the Greek Orthodox Church, risked immediate execution to save Greek Jews. In March of 1943, the Nazis began deporting the city of Thessaloniki's Jews to Poland. Within 6 months almost the entire community had been liquidated at Auschwitz and Birkineau. After learning of the deportation of Jews in Thessaloniki, Archbishop Damaskinos sent a formal letter of protest which was also signed by many prominent Greeks. Read the whole thing. When the SS General commanding the Athens area read the letter he threatened to shoot the Archbishop, who calmly informed him: "According to the traditions of the Greek Orthodox Church, our prelates are hung and not shot, please respect our traditions." After the Italian surrender, the Germans moved quickly to gather up the Jews living in the Italian Occupation zone. Two things hindered the effort, the Greek Resistance movement in the mountains and ordinary Greek citizens. At that point,Archbishop Damaskinos decided to violate Church Canon Law and issue false baptismal certificates and he instructed the Athens Police Chief, Angelos Evert, to issue false identification cards.

On the island of Zakynthos, the Mayor, Loukas Carrer and Bishop Chrysostomos were instructed to provide a list of all Jews on the island. They turned in a list with two names on it, their own. Not one Jew was given up. The Rabbi and Bishop of Volos, a city in central Greece, worked together and managed to save 900 out of over 1000 of that city's Jews. Many Greek individuals and families throughout Greece, including a member of the Greek Royal family, Princess Irene, not only hid Jews at great personal peril, they shared their meager rations in the famine that swept Greece during the Occupation. Five thousand Greek Jews were saved, protected in hiding by friends and generous strangers. I daresay that some Greeks who collaborated, committed shameful acts that were not in keeping with the Herculean efforts of their compatriots. Greeks, however, can rightfully be proud of their splendid record during World War II in saving their fellow countrymen of the Jewish faith. It should also be noted here that Greek Jews fought heroically in the Albanian campaign of 1940 and in the Resistance. One of the first Greek officers to die in the war was Colonel Mordechai Frezis, a Jew from Chalkis, who helped stem the initial Italian thrust into Greek territory. Their contributions as patriotic Greeks should never be forgotten. International politics aside, maybe it's time we are all reminded of our common history.

 

    Technorati : Archbishop Damaskinos, Greek Jews, Greek-Israeli Relations, Holocaust, World War II

The Elusive Ghost of Greek Unity

This post appears on Phylax Blog

Greek unity has always been elusive. When Greeks are united in a common cause, they work miracles. When they are arguing unceasingly and at loggerheads, disaster is not far behind. This phenomenon is as old as Greek history. To understand what divides us we have to see our divisions through the prism of our common historical experience.

Ancient Greece was a collection of city states that often competed or warred against each other. The two strongest city states Athens and Sparta, diametrically different in orientation, fought a series of conflicts known as the Peloponnesian Wars. The outcome brought both to ruin. The duality of the Greek spirit, that is, unity and disunity, is illustrated by the fact that these feuding Greeks saw "Hellenism" as a universal idea, not necessarily predicated on a racial or ethnic concept. Isocrates, for example, saw the polis spreading to non-Greeks. Internecine squabbles could also be set aside when Greeks were threaten by an external threat.

In 481 B.C., the Persian Emperor Xerxes sent ambassadors demanding earth and water, a sign of submission, from the Greek city states as his vast army marched toward Greece. The Spartans called a conference in Corinth which was attended by the Greek city states thinking of resisting, including Athens. Athens conceded leadership of the effort to Sparta and they made the following resolutions: to end all wars among themselves and to declare war on Persia. A small force under a Spartan King named Leonidas was sent to a strategic pass to block the advance of the Persian Army and buy valuable time. The sacrifice of the Spartans and other Greeks at Thermopylae allowed the Athenian fleet to eventually defeat the numerically superior Persian fleet in the narrow straits off the island of Salamis. Greece and the West was saved. Victor David Hanson, a professor of classics, writes: "Nothing provides a better or more clear illustration of this than Herodotus's description of Thermopylae, where [soldiers] in the royal army of Xerxes were being whipped to fight, whereas Leonidas and the Spartans said they were there because they were following the law that they themselves had created. What kind of army, ancient or modern, would name their triremes "Free Speech" or "Freedom" like the Athenians did at Salamis, or have a play by Aeschylus that says, "We rowed into battle saying 'freedom, freedom, freedom.'" It is very strange in comparison to what motivated other armies of the era."

Greek Byzantium was the bulwark again against the advance of eastern invaders for over a thousand years. Unfortunately, the empire was often wracked by internal dissension and infighting, which weakened it, along with the destruction wrought by the Crusaders, who sacked Constantinople. In the seventh and eighth centuries, in particular, first the Persians and then the Arabs launched major offensives into the region. Yet these invaders ultimately failed to establish themselves on Byzantine territory. However, a period of civil war in the late eleventh century enabled the Turks to make huge inroads into Byzantine territory. In many places, usurpers used mercenary Turkish troops to occupy strategic towns, only for those mercenaries to take the towns for themselves when the usurpers had departed. By 1095, virtually the whole of Asia Minor, comprising about 70% of the Byzantine Empire, had been lost.

The substantial efforts of Greeks in the Greek War of Independence to throw off the yoke of the Ottoman Empire was also marred by a surprising inability at critical junctures to establish a united front, both during the war and after independence. Internal rivalries, however, prevented the Greeks from extending their control and from firmly consolidating their position in the Peloponnese. In 1823, civil war broke out between the guerrilla leader Theodoros Kolokotronis and Georgios Kountouriotis, who was head of the government that had been formed in January 1822 but that was forced to flee to the island of Hydra in December, 1822. After a second civil war, Kountouriotis was firmly established as leader, but his government and the entire revolution were gravely threatened by the arrival of Egyptian forces, led by Ibrahim Pasha, which had been sent to aid the Turks. With the support of Egyptian sea power, the Ottoman forces successfully invaded the Peloponnese; they furthermore captured Messolonghi, the town of Athens, and the Athenian acropolis. The Greek cause, however, was saved by the intervention of the European Powers.

The Greek state that emerged in 1830 was dominated by the factionalism left over the Ottoman period. In addition, there was a sudden influx of diasporan Greeks and this created much suspicion among the insular residents of the small Greek state. Political factions were not organized along party lines but around one's support to one of the Great Powers. The "Great Idea," a doctrine of manifest destiny to bring all unredeemed Greeks together into one state was a unifying and non-partisan theme which developed after independence. This theme, the driving force behind Greek foreign policy of the era, drove Greece into two Balkan Wars and finally the debacle of 1922. It was the stunning Greek defeat in Asia Minor by Kemal Attaturk, aided and abetted by some of the Allied Powers and the Soviet Union, which brought Greek irredentist dreams to a halt. The broad divide between monarchists supporting the Greek King and republicans who supported Eleftherios Venizelos, the prime minister who had engineered Greek Occupation of Asia Minor under the Treaty of Versailles, was in large part responsible for that defeat. In October 1920, the Greek army advanced further east into Anatolia, with the encouragement of Lloyd George, the British prime minister, who intended to increase the pressure on the Turkish and Ottoman governments to sign the Treaty of Sevres. This advance began under the Liberal government of Venizelos, but soon after the it started, Venizelos fell from power and was replaced by Dimitrios Gounaris, who appointed inexperienced monarchist officers to senior commands. The result was a military and human disaster.

In the wake of 1922, Greece was saddled with enormous debt, over a million refugees and along with the Depression, this created a situation in Greece that eventually lead to the rise of a disaffected portion of the Greek population, easily organized by the Communists. The 30s were plagued by constant coups, military governments and the systematic purge of communists from the body politic. The Italian Invasion of Greece swept all of that aside, at least temporarily. It brought Greeks together as few other events in their history, and it pitted them against a common foe instead of each other. Patriotism and martial spirit swept Greece as the Greek Army repelled the invader and advanced into Albanian territory. Defeated subsequently by Germany and suffering under a cruel occupation Greeks were to revert to business as usual, fighting among themselves almost as often as they did against the enemy. The internecine warfare that followed liberation between monarchists and communists culminated in one the worst bloodbaths of Greek history known as the Greek Civil War. The Right emerged victorious and consolidated its hold on Greece under the military dictatorship of the Colonels. After the fall of the military junta, Greece has gone back and forth between two main political parties that increasingly have divided Greeks along parochial personal interests and are finding it more difficult to differentiate themselves from each other ideologically.

Greeks have a tendency to find all kinds of things to argue about and break ranks with their fellow Greeks. Greek immigrants in America even brought their homegrown political disputes to America. These rifts stunted the development of the growing Greek American community and did irreparable harm to its efforts to establish itself. Then there is the divide that has always existed between "Hellenistic Greeks," those that live outside of Greece, and "Helladic Greeks," those that live in Greece. The cosmopolitan views of the Hellenists rarely coincided with the more insular views of their Helladic cousins. Hellenistic Greeks live in the real world, buffeted by the current storms of globalization, assimilation, and dechristianization. Often they have an idealized version of Greece. Helladic Greeks live in a completely different world with problems of their own. Often they have a distorted view of their overseas brethren. Greece is the center of their world and rightly so. The Hellenistic Greek on the other hand has to straddle two very different worlds.

Then there is the notion of "Greekness" and who or who does not fit our preconceived notions of who is Greek. Greeks throughout the world are dealing with change and upheaval. Some Greek reactions are dysfunctional. Xenophobia, fear of the foreigner and his ideas versus Xenolatria, the penchant for idolizing all that is foreign. There is an element of self hate at work here. Some reject Greekness because they find some Greeks fall far short of an idealized version of it. They want to excise that part of them that is Greek and replace it with anything else. In so doing they throw out the proverbial baby with the bath water. Others are afraid of everything that is not Greek, of being exposed to new ideas. Perhaps they are too comfortable in their own skin.

Unity does not necessarily mean that Greeks agree on everything. Divisions in societies or groups are normal and usually healthy. The problem arises when Greeks become too entrenched in their thinking and approach to the world or each other. When they fail to heed their own history and forget the rich legacy passed down to them. The question is can Greeks bridge the divides, and come together long enough to learn from each other in the face of serious threats to their cultural and national survival or will they revert to past practices?

Technorati : Balkan, Communism, Constantinople, Germany, Greece, Greek Aegean, Greek History, Greek heritage, Messolonghi, Pasok, Thermopolyae

Greeks versus Turks above the Aegean

On Tuesday, May 23 two Turkish F-16 fighters escorting a F-4 reconaissance aircraft and flying over Greek airspacewere intercepted by Hellenic Air Force F16s. The Turks were flying in formation, straight and deep towards Crete to photograph anti-aircraft sites in a sovereign country. Hardly the actions of a friendly neighbor. A mid-air collisionensued between one of the Turkish fighter aircraft and a Greek fighter. Both crashed. The Greek pilot is missing and presumed dead. His name was Group Captain Konstantinos Iliakis, married with two children. The Turkish pilot was rescued by a passing Panamanian ship. So why is this important to anyone but the parties involved? What's wrong with those Greeks and Turks, why can't they just get along?

Just a few short years ago, there was hope that Greece and Turkey would put aside their differences and engage in rapprochement. There are still many in both countries that yearn for good relations and mutual respect. Unfortunately, there is a fly in the ointment. Turkey is a country that is in deep trouble. It is a country that cannot decide whether it is secular or Islamic. It is a country ruled by civilians, but run by the military. It is a country fighting its own indigenous people, its Kurdish minority. It is a country that takes pride in throwing its substantial weight around like it did during the Ottoman heyday. It is a country in which successive governments have shamelessly encouraged and enshrined anti-Greek sentiment in order to lull its people into complacency regarding their sad plight and to deflect attention from its own failures. It is a country which wants to be Western and an EU member but can't seem to act like one. It is a country where human rights are trampled on daily. It is a country that has lost its way.

The problems between Greeks and Turks could be solved tomorrow. In order to do so however, you need Turkish leaders who are willing to negotiate in good faith, make concessions in order to get concessions and who ultimately must give up their reliance on the Greek bogeyman. No such leaders exist. Greeks on the other hand, need leaders that are willing to shape a realistic and effective foreign policy that cuts across political parties and that they are willing to enforce with diplomatic, economic and if needed, military muscle. No such leaders exist.

The problem as I see it is not Greeks and Turks; the two fighter pilots were each doing their duty, when things went horribly wrong. The problem, is the people who sent these two young men up there, to do what they were doing. The problem (and the solution) is with their leaders.

Technorati : Greek Airspace, Greek Current Affairs, Greek Turkish Relations, Hellenic Air Force, Mid-Air Collision, Turkish Air Force

A Lesson in Greek Democracy

Theancient Athenians had a law that excluded citizens from voting on decisions of war, if they owned property outside the city's walls. The basis for this exclusion,on such a weighty matter, was the recognition that the standard practice of an invading army was always to destroy the lands outside the walls first. These Greeks understood the influence exercised by special interests on issues that concerned the general welfare of the entire "demos" or state. What a contrast to our current state of affairs in the United States, where special interests take precedence over the common good. The Founding Fathersof our country, who were great admirers, not to mention emulators of the ancient Greeks, would be saddened to see the lobbyists and special interests wheeling and dealing in the corridors of power in Washington.

Another characteristic of Athenian democracy which I genuinely admire is the utter contempt that Athenians had for the "idiotis", a private person and forerunner of the modern word idiot. These people were generally despised for shirking their duty as citizens to actively participate in the political process. In the assembly, those chosen by lot had to participate unless they had a very good reason for not doing so and when they shirked their responsibilities the Athenians would send a constable to smear red paint on the offender.

I often hear my fellow citizens wax eloquent about all that is wrong with American politics, the government and their disdain for do nothing politicians. When they finally get someone to take aggressive action to solve problems, they scream bloody murder. You get what you ask for: politicians afraid to lead and propose solutions to vexing problems in order to get reelected. When things don't go our way, people often drop out of the process and throw up their hands in disgust or they threaten to stay home to punish their political party. How counter-productive.

Here in Maine we have a tradition of participatory democracy called the Town Hall meeting that is slowly dying, except for the occasional controversial issue that gets folks riled up. Unfortunately, when more mundane, yet more critical issues are discussed, voters are home watching American Idol. The lesson here is that we all have to get out and get involved in our communities and in the political process on every level. It's too important to leave to the opportunists and politicians alone. Maybe those old Greeks knew a thing or two about how a real democracy works after all and we can still learn from them.

Technorati : American politics, Ancient Greeks, Athenian democracy, Athenians, Loobyists

A Tale of Two Communities

Gulbeyaz KaraHasan is a 27 year old lawyer and mother who is running for Parliament as a nominee of George Papandreou's socialist PASOK party. If elected she will be the second Muslim parliamentarian representing the Turkish minority in Greece which numbers approximately 120,000. Her candidacy has become a bit of a political football in Greece, with politicians from PASOK and New Democracy trading barbs and tripping over themselves to assure everyone that minorities share the same rights as Greeks. Perhaps they need a history lesson regarding two communities, a Turkish one in Greece and a Greek one in Turkey.

The Muslim minority in Thrace which constitutes about 1.3% of the population, was protected under the Treaty of Lausanne signed by Greece and Turkey. It's counterpart inTurkey were the Greek communities of Constantinople and the islands of Imbros and Tenedos. Greece is often taken to task for its suppposed ill treatment of its citizens of Turkish origin by the EU, Helinski Watch and the US State Department. Turks in Greece have numerous mosques, two state run Islamic centers, a Mufti with judicial powers is appointed based on recommendations of a committee of religious authorities, Muslim scholars, and community leaders. They are allowed to teach the Turkish language and own property. Their numbers have increased significantly from what they were in 1922.

On the other hand, the Greeks of Istanbul, Imbros and Tenedos are almost extinct except for a few scared old people. Those that weren't terrorized into leaving by the anti-Greek riots of 1955, were gradually pushed out through ruses such as the Varlek Vergisi or wealth tax. Inability to pay this exorbitant tax often resulted in the confiscation of Greek owned property and occasionally prison sentences at hard labor. The Patriarch of Constantinople, who represents millions of Orthodox Christians and who is part of an unbroken line of religious leaders that dates back over a thousand years and I might add before the arrival of the Turks themselves in the lands they presently occupy, is under constant pressure to leave Turkey. The same country that is now chomping at the bit to take its "rightful" place as a member of the EU and to be considered "Western", recently denied the Pope permission to visit the Patriarch of Constantinople. Patriarch Bartholomew's position is increasingly untenable, he is constantly the object of demonstrations by right wing Turks, not to mention the target of violent acts. The position of Patriarch can only be filled by a Turkish citizen. The Turkish government closed the Theological Seminary at Halki in 1971. It remains closed supposedly because the Patriarchate had the temerity to refuse incorporation of the Seminary under a secular Turkish University. In so doing, the Turks are denying Orthodox Christians the ability to replace the aging bishops from which the Patriarch must be chosen.

Ms. KaraHasan is a lucky woman, after all imagine if she had been a Greek woman born in Turkey.

Technorati : Greece, Greek Current Affairs, Greek Politics, Greek-Turkish Relations, Muslim Minority in Greek Thrace, PASOK

The Promised Land

I never met my paternal grandfather. He was born and lived most of his life in a small Greek village in what is now southern Albania (Northern Epirus). He was a simple man who made his living as a cobbler. His wife died in her thirties leaving him with four children to raise. He managed to scrape enough together to get his son a high school education, no small feat in a destitute country like Albania in the decade before World War II. My father was chosen to attend the Patriarchal Theological Seminary on the island of Halki, located in the Bosporus and spent the next seven years there as a seminarian. It was thus that my grandfather was able to save his son before the Iron Curtain descended on his homeland. He died without ever meeting me, his namesake or seeing his son again.

Papou (Greek word for Grandfather) was an ardent Venizelist. A follower of Eleftherios Venizelos, the man who engineered Greek entry on the Allied side in World War I and almost succeeded in realizing the expansion of the borders of the Greek state to include millions of ethnic Greeks. Papou fought in the Balkan War of 1912, but he and other Greeks like him who lived in the region known as Northern Epirus, were never reunited with their Greek brothers. The happiest day of Papou's life came twenty eight years later and was proclaimed in a dogeared, tear stained letter my Dad kept. It starts out: "My dear Nikolaki, I kiss you eyes. I'm writing to you today from Greek soil that has been swept clean of Italians. The brave soldiers of Greece have chased them north like frightened sheep. May God bless Greece." This letter, a family heirloom and one of the few physical objects related to my grandfather, was sent in 1940 from his Greek occupied village after the Greek Army had routed the Italian Fascists who had only a few weeks earlier launched an invasion of Greece from Albania. This brief freedom as a Greek living on a piece of redeemed Greek territory was followed by German occupation and Communist tyranny for the rest of his life.

For years as I was growing up I subsisted on a few pictures and the stories my Dad would tell about his father and the village he grew up in. He told me about my grandfather working in America for three years as a young man, working in the mills in Maine during the turn of the century. For me it was always a collection of shadows until I found www.ellisisland.org . Searching through the records I found a copy of a ship's manifest with my grandfather's name on it. As my finger traced the outline of his personal information written on the manifest, I felt closer than I ever felt to a man who I had never met, but lived inside of me.

Papou arrived at Ellis Island in 1907 with 25 dollars in his pocket, he was 5' 9", and had brown hair and eyes. As required of all new immigrants, he had given the address of his final destination It was a street and house number in the Maine town where I currently work. Everyday I travel past this location on the way to work, and everyday I wave and say hello to Papou. Papou came to America as a guest worker at a time when America needed labor to fuel its economic expansion. He made a small fortune (for his world), returned to his home and family with dreams of returning permanently to America with his wife and children. Yiayia (Greek word for Grandmother) would have none of it and the idea died until fate intervened again decades later. It's funny how little things change everything. Thanks Yiayia, I owe my very existence to you and thanks Papou for leading the way to the Promised Land.

Technorati : Greek Americans, Greek Diaspora, Greek Education, Greek History