Tuesday, October 20, 2020

Notes on the Greek Civil War

 Timeline: 

26 February 1944 – Nazis and Security Battalions launch major attack on ELAS in Achaia
29 February 1944 – ELAS and EDES sign peace deal 
March 1944 – Security forces fire into striking workers, inspired by Communists, in Piraeus, killing 21 and arresting another 132 strikers. ELAS attacked a convoy in revenge. In response, the Nazis killed 200 suspected Communists, burned 10 villages, and declared martial law in the Peloponnese.
10 March 1944 – EAM created PEEA to govern liberated territories
17 April 1944 – ELAS attacks EKKA, forcing the majority of the group to flee to Peloponnese and disband
25 April 1944 – Security Battalions in Peloponnese kill 110 people in retaliation for killing of 2 German officers
17- 20 May 1944 – Lebanon Conference: Government of national unity is established with 24 ministers, 6 EAM, and led by Prime Minister Papandrou
8 May 1944 – ELAS attacks Security Battalions in Patras
June 1944 – Thessaly effectively falls to ELAS and EKKA forces, with German control restricted to a few airbases and railways
3 June 1944 – EDES resumes hostilities against Axis, seizing 10km around Parga
5 June 1944 – EDES units attack Arta
c. 30 June 1944 – Soviet military mission makes contact with ELAS
c. 1 August 1944 – Papandreou appoints Spiliotopoulos military commander of Attica
5 August 1944 – Nazis begin Operation Kreuzotter against EDES, resulting in ~500 partisan casualties
c. 30 August 1944 – Nazis order withdraw of all German troops from Greece
2 September 1944 – EAM representatives join national unity government in Cairo
7 September 1944 – Liberation of Kalamata / national unity government moves to Caserta
9 September 1944 – ELAS and EDES cut off railways in Greece and prevent German troops from evacuating north of Corfu-Yannina-Kalabaka-Olympus line
11 September 1944 – ELAS begins a siege of Patras
22 September 1944 – Papandreou telegrams Churchill that British military needed to resolve political issues in Greece
26 September 1944 – Caserta Agreement is signed
1 October 1944 – British forces land near Patras
2 October 1944  – Battalionists in Patras withdraw from city and surrender to British
3 October 1944 – Nazis withdraw from Patras
4 October 1944 – British and ELAS troops enter Patras
11 October 1944 – Modis appointed Commander in Chief of all forces of national unity government
12 October 1944 – Nazis withdraw from Athens / Ioannis Rallis resigns from the collaborationist government
13 October 1944 – Nazis withdraw from Rethymno
14 October 1944 – British airborne troops land in Athens
15 October 1944 – Gen. Scobie arrives in Athens / EDES fires on an EAM demonstration, killing (7 or 9??) and injuring 82 / rightwing groups in Athens disarmed
16 October 1944 – Nazis withdraw from Salonika / Public insurrection in Salonika
18 October 1944 – Government-in-exile returns to Athens from Cairo, sans King Georgios
25 October 1944 – Katsotas replaces Spiliotopoulos as military commander of Athens
28 October 1944 – Katsotas orders ELAS to disband the National Militia in Athens / ELAS enters Salonika
30 October 1944 – Nazis withdraw from Thessaloniki, ELAS troops enter city
31 October 1944 – National unity government establishes National Guard
2 November 1944 – Nazis complete total withdraw from Greece into Yugoslavia
3 November 1944 – Othonaios appointed Commander in Chief and Chief of the General Staff
November 1944 – Assisted prison break at Syggrou, over 700 collaborators escape and join Gendarmerie
4 November 1944 – Popular demonstration in Athens demanding respect for the Caserta Agreement
5 November 1944 – Papandreou and Scobie announce that ELAS and EDES must disband by 10 December
7 November 1944 – Pro-communist demonstrations occur in Athens
8 November 1944 – 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade arrives in Athens
10 November 1944 – Deal made with trade unions over wage levels / National Guard created as temporary army out of anticommunist partisans / British troops camp outside Salonika
11 November 1944 – ELAS military leadership meets in Lamia
13 November 1944 – Othonaios placed on leave
c. 15 November 1944 – Battalionists are released from detention and encouraged to join National Guard and Hellenic Gendarmerie
16 November 1944 – British forces and representatives of National Unity government arrive in Thessaloniki / Scobie declares Athens a no-go zone for ELAS
22 November 1944 – Supreme Military Council is created, with 2 royalist generals, 2 republican generals, and 2 ELAS generals.
26 November 1944 – Committee to decide on reintegration of partisans into Greek Army disbands / Scobie orders EDES and ELAS to dismobilize
29 November 1944 – Scobie orders ELAS to disarm and disband by 10 December
30 November 1944 – Katsotas sends out telegram telling National Militia that they must disarm by 1 December / Papandreou orders the requipment of the Gendarmerie / Evert puts pro-EAM policemen on leave
1 December 1944 – Greek government decrees that all paramilitaries must disarm, except Greek Royal Army / 6 EAM ministers resign from unity government in protest after plan for simultaneous disarmament is rejected / Police placed under Ministry of Army / Scobie receives permission to declare martial law if necessary / British forces begin arresting leftists
2 December 1944 – ELAS plans for an armed insurrection
3 December 1944 – December massacre in Athens; start of civil war / British forces disarmed 2nd ELAS regiment / Katsotas orders ELAS to leave Athens within 72 hours 
4 December 1944 – EAM declares general strike / funeral procession is attacked by X / Scobie orders ELAS to leave Athens by 6 December / ELAS captures all police and gendarmerie stations in Piraeus 
5 December 1944 – Churchill sends note that Gen. Scobie is permitted to use deadly force to hold Athens / Gen. Scobie transmits order that ELAS be 'treated as an enemy' / Martial law is imposed
6 December 1944 – Aerial bombardment of working class Metz neighborhood begins / Fighting begins in Makrygiannis neighborhood
7 December 1944 – ELAS attacks Greek Army at Goudi barracks
8 December 1944 – Gendarmerie units reconstituted as 141th battalion of National Guard
9 December 1944 – ELAS rescinds orders to not attack British forces unless attacked / fighting resumes at Goudi school
11 December 1944 – ELAS issues general orders to treat all British forces as hostile
12 December 1944 – British reinforcements begin arriving from Italy
13 December 1944 – ELAS attacks Parapigmata barracks in central Athens
17 December 1944 – ELAS attacks RAF station in Kiffisia
19 December 1944 – ELAS captures RAF station in Kiffisia
24 December 1944 – Churchill visits Athens
25 December 1944 – ELAS tries to blow up British HQ in Hotel Grande Bretagne with dynamite in the sewers / negotiations start between EAM and Greek government
26 December 1944 – Negotiations between EAM and Greek government collapse
27 December 1944 – Negotiations start between Churchill and Siantos and immediately collapse
30 December 1944 – Churchill convinces King Georgios II to appoint Damaskinos, Archbishop of Athens, as regent
2 January 1945 – Damaskinos appoints Nikolaos Plastiras as Premier
5 January 1945 – ELAS begins to retreat from Athens under British pressure
11 January 1945 – Britain and ELAS agree to a ceasefire
17 January 1945 – ELAS forces withdraw from Thessaloniki under ceasefire agreement
12 February 1945 – Varkiza agreement is signed
March 1945 – National Guard organizes rightist paramilitaries in the provinces
6 March 1945 – Petru Groza becomes leader of Romania
8 March 1945 – EAM demands that Yalta Agreement be applied to Greece
5 April 1945 – KKE Central Committee holds plenum
10 April 1945 – KKE Central Committee announces that basic aim of party is to establish a 'Peoples State of Greece'
May 1945 – KKE Party Secretary, Nikos Zachariadis, returns to Athens from internment in Germany
c.1 May 1945 – Military commanders of Thessaly and Western Macedonia outlaw rightist paramilitaries
16 June 1945 – Velouchiotis dies
March 1946 – Elections are held, won by the People's Party
October 1946 – General Staff orders the organization of MAY and MAD out of rightist paramilitaries



  • The USA was critical of British action in Greece, as was most of the British public.
  • King Georgios II agreed to leave constitutional questions in Greece to a plebiscite
  • Britain respected the agreement made in Yalta in 1944 to not harm Soviet interests in Romania and Bulgaria, even if expedient to do so in Greece.
  • Head of KKE, Nikos Zachariadis, is interned in Germany for most of period, only returning in 1945.
    • He changed the KKE's position on plebiscite, saying elections should be held before constitutional issues decided.

  • Few railroads and cable lines in Greece, most connect Athens to other capitals. The only paved roads run alongside the railway. The most important railway ran from Athens to Salonika then north to Nish. 
    • Salonika and Athens are most developed in terms of infrastructure.
  • Only proper airbases are in Athens and on Crete.
  • Greece beat back Italian forces after Mussolini invaded in October 1940, only to be defeated by Germany in April 1941. The fact that they were occupied by a power they had defeated aroused resentment in the Greek population.
  • Defeated Greeks were paroled after their defeat and let go, as the Germans were too busy preparing for Operation Barbarossa to deal with them. 
  • Germany occupied the areas of Crete, the Aegean islands, Athens, and a large chunk of Salonika, but nothing else. All else was either Bulgaria or, mainly, Italy. The Italian part was reoccupied by Germany after 1943.
    • The Italians were regarded as incompetent and unable to effectively respond to guerrilla activity. When they did response, it was with collective punishment, such as massacre or burning villages, and earned the hatred of the population. 
      • Italian surrender in September 1943 was sudden. Both Nazis and partisans rushed to Italian positions to be the first to disarm them. Thousands of Italian troops decided to surrender to Germany rather than continue fighting. Some Italian units went over the partisan side, although they were later disarmed for refusing to follow orders. Some Italian soldiers still joined partisan groups.
    • The Germany occupation was run by Field Marshall Wilhelm List from Athens, later replaced by General Loehr. Athens itself was under the military control of Military Command Southern Greece and was mainly staffed by German Air Force personnel. Army near Athens was the XVIII Mountain Corps with the 5th and 6th Mountain Divisions. This military authority was undermined by SS and SA officers in occupied zones. 
      • The region of Athens was placed under the command of the LXVIII corps of Army Group E at the end of 1943.  
      • Germans built fortified 'tuetzpunkte' on major railways and road networks across the Balkans, fortified with logs and sandbags or sometimes concrete bunkers, surrounded by minefields. They could house a platoon, around 27 men. They had searchlights, mortars, antitank guns, and sometimes artillery. They were usually around 6 miles apart. These fortified positions were defeated by attacking patrols using mines, dynamite, and nails to puncture tires. 
      • In 1944, Germany moved large numbers of foreign collaborators into Greece to defend against invasion and provide labor for fortifications. Due to greater numbers of defections, in Spring and Summer 1944, many of these foreign collaborators were disarmed and interned in Greece.
        • It also raised additional security forces from the Greek population, of around 700 in the Lacon Volunteer Battalion. This battalion was used to fight partisan in the Peloponnese. 
  • The Germans and Italians set up a puppet government under General Tsolakoglou, who had surrendered the Army of Epirus in April 1941. He was allowed to organize the Security Battalions and control police, but had no military to speak of. Utterly controlled by Axis powers.
  • Greek partisans had 2 factions: EDES, roughly loyal to government in exile, and ELAS, loyal to KKE and EAM.
    • EDES was run by Colonel Zervas, a retired officer of the Greek army. They operated in the mountains of Epirus. They communicated with the Greek government in exile. 
      • EDES was around 600 men in 1942, bolstered by British propaganda and an influx of arms from Britain. By March 1943, EDES had expanded to 4,000 men. These units were sometimes commanded by former Greek army officers. By July 1943, EDES had 7,000 men, organized into 8 to 10 units, each consisting of 2 regiments, split into 2 battalions. Most were still in Epirus, but they also operated in Thessaly and Peloponnese.
      • EDES got beaten in a failed ambush at the village of Leskovic on the Albanian border by the Nazis in 1943 and ceased all operations against Nazi forces for a period of time.
      • In 1944, they had around 4,000 men that formed a disciplined professional army with heavy artillery and machine guns. They had an agreement with a local German commander to clear the mountains of ELAS in return for guns and ammunition. 
      • Around 5,000 Greek soldiers from the Cairo government are landed in Epirus and integrated into EDES in Summer 1944.
    • ELAS was run by Colonel Sarafis, who had been dismissed from the army in 1935 for political activities related to Republicanism. They formed the majority of resistance activity in the country. There were other parties associated with them, with armed groups, like EKKA in central Greece, but the core was KKE. 
      • ELAS had around 12,000 men by Summer 1943, conducting operations everywhere except Epirus. Previously it had been run by committee, but in May 1943, General Sarafis assumed command. By 1944, they had 20,000 men, organized at the battalion level and lacking most forms of support of heavy weapons. 
  • Greek partisans didn't have very many supplies, only rifles and dynamite. They have some materials, including machine guns and mines, captured from Axis forces. 
    • Mobile units were usually best armed, with automatic weapons, mortars, and antitank guns, sometimes even light artillery. 
  • Guerrilla operations in Greece were sophisticated and well organized, able to take on better armed soldiers. They took a long time to plan. One tactic was cutting off communication, setting up roadblocks to rebel assistance, and attacking near dusk so that they could flee under cover of night. 
    • Partisan operations also focused on sabotage, especially of critical railways, like the one between Salonika and Athens. Partisans blew up the Gorgopotamos bridge there in November 1941. Another common form of sabotage was laying mines at night. They also like to snipe at cablemen or plant mines at the base of telegraph towers. 
      • In response, the Nazis adopted a policy in 1944 of shooting on sight anyone who was within 5 km of a railway track. 
    • Guerrilla operations scouted out an area, cleared a village of inhabitants, then took up positions in abandoned buildings. 
  • Partisan groups originally formed along regional lines, with leader later emerging. Greek partisans were still organizing in 1942. The groups used military designations like corps, divisions, and brigades, although this did not reflect actual numbers. Partisans often had mobile units not tied to location and these were usually the best armed.
    • Only mobile units were fully professional and other guerrillas normally kept their civilian jobs when not engaging in operations. Mobile units live in prearranged hiding places in the wilderness.
    • Partisans used to receive around 2 weeks of training in rifles, mines, and dynamite. Later on, it is around 4 to 6 weeks of training, less for exmilitary. In ELAS, this includes political indoctrination. 
    • Each ELAS of the 10 divisions were only around 3,000 men. These divisions were sometimes organized along regional lines to plan together. ELAS headquarters, run by EAM, organized all these groups and planned overall strategy. 
    • EDES only even had a single battalion in 1942 with smaller affiliated units. It subordinated its strategy to the Cairo government and British command in the Middle East. 
    • There was strict discipline among partisans, with cowardice or treason punished by execution by the immediate superior officer. Lesser offenses punished by public humiliation, relief of command, or having one's gun taking away for a period of time. 
  • Greece had an issue of food scarcity and many guerrillas extracted food from the local population. Partisans fought over the right to get grain from areas and sometimes also fought resisting peasants. 
    • Greece experienced starvation and food shortages throughout the entirety of the occupation. Shortages and hyperinflation became extreme in 1944, causing even more Greeks to join ELAS. Starvation was avoided in many cases only by allowing neutral countries to provide food relief. 
  • Greek partisans used couriers for communication within areas and radio communication for long distance communication. Outside of some units trained by the Brits, most radios were unencrypted and could be intercepted by enemy forces. 
  • Partisans, especially the Communists, attacked medical personnel. They killed wounded prisoners, stole supplies, and kidnapped doctors and nurses for their own army. Corpses were usually stripped for clothes and sometimes disfigured or mutilated.
  • By the middle of 1943, Allied victory was clear to most, including collaborators and Axis members. 
    • In 1944, some collaborators defected and joined ELAS.
  • Nazis promised that Bulgaria could annex part of Thrace, which Greece and Bulgaria had fought over between 1922 and 1924. This was a wound to Greek pride. 
  • Tempo of attacks on Nazis increased in May and June 1944 as partisans saw that victory was within sight. Nazis responded with more intense operations against partisans during this period. 
    • Nazi soldiers on Crete and Rhodes are instructed to destroy materiel and hold out as long as possible. 
    • Those units that did not succeed in fighting through the partisan line in 1944, mainly noncombat forces, either destroyed equipment or handed it over to collaborationist Greek government. 

  • Most British soldiers had no idea about what was going on in Greece before arriving, learned only upon arriving, and very often learned about politics from anticommunist forces. 
    • The full anticommunist line on the December Incident was that communists, paid by Bulgarians, infiltrated the crowd and tried to start a violent insurrection. 
    • Another rumor was that ELAS had been trained by German prisoners and was thus an extension of Nazi machinations. 
    • Negative stereotype that ELAS was warshy and had avoided fighting the Nazis so that it could seize power after they left. Also accused of using women and children as shields. 
  • The British government had been informed that ELAS was strongly supported by the population, that clashes between ELAS and the Battalionists were widespread and bloody, and that the Greek population opposed King Georgios II. It, however, saw Georgios as the guarantor of British interests in the country. 
  • Ronald Scobie was the commander in charge of British forces in Greece.
  • British entry into Greece was initially greeted with joy and celebration. This was also, however, a period of governmental dysfunction and immense poverty. 
    • Hyperinflation made it difficult to set wage rates. This was eventually organized with unions by Miltiadis Porfyrogenis, the Minister of Labor and member of the KKE.
  • The December Incident resulted in 33 dead and around 150 injuries. It led to 33 days of fighting that ended with a ceasefire. Both sides overestimated their power in Greece, with neither ELAS nor proBritish factions bothering to mobilize before the conflict, and Churchill forced to personally oversee British policy in Greece.
    • Churchill's policy in Greece was criticized by both the USA and the British public. 
    • The December Incident was started by (city??) police firing into the crowd of demonstrators. 
  • Security battalions had been set up in 1943 by the collaborationist government of Ioannis Rallis. They were the main bulwark against ELAS for both the Nazis and British. Clashes were fierce and featured reprisals, sometimes against family members.
    • Britain publicly repudiated the Battalions, but privately believed that they would be good allies against ELAS.
    • One of the biggest issues was whether and when to disband the Battalions, as ELAS favored immediately and Brits were hesitant. Battalions in Peloponnese were disbanded around mid October 1944. 
  • ELAS initially avoided engaging British army units in direct combat, likely under the impression that the Brits would not intervene unless attacked. Even as the parties fought, there were often ceasefires and breaks in combat, including drinking and socializing between ELAS and British forces.
  • Combat during the 1944 civil war was characterized by sniping, random mortar attacks, and kidnapping from barracks during the night. Combat was spread out, without front lines. ELAS units tried to infiltrate through sewer system and plant explosives that way. 
  • During initial phase of fighting ELAS managed to gain control of most of Athens and Piraeus, including the police stations. British positions were concentrated in central Athens and on the coast, supported by airplanes and warships. 
    • They launched many successful attacks, capturing 500 British soldiers and taking over an RAF station in Kifisa.
    • British land reinforcements, including tanks, in Piraeus and fight their way back into center of city, moving along Piraeus and Syngrou avenues. They then spread out and conduct mop up operations in suburbs.
    • British used armed cars and tanks, only sometimes disabled by mines and took few casualties. 
    • British attacks often hit civilian populations and many British troops resented these orders. 
  • Gen. Scobie decided to reorganize many anticommunist partisans into a new National Guard, subordinate directly to British command.
    • Many National Guardsmen were former Battalionists. They committed atrocities against leftists and engaged in looting. The British resented their ill discipline and fanaticism, much preferring the royalist Greek army units.
  • British troops included 4th Indian Brigade of Gurkhas, who were feared and hated by Greeks, who alleged that they were savage and would rape and pillage. They were called 'dark locusts'. Gurkhas had been told that they would be fighting Nazis. 
    • Some British troops did loot and pillage, possibly including Gurkhas.
  • British casualties were around 2,000, with only 254 dead. They had over 1,100 taken prisoner.
    • Another 10,000 to 15,000 people were taken as hostages at some point in the conflict.
    • Brits took around 12,000 ELAS fighters prisoner, bringing it to around 18,000 sympathizers or members held prisoner by anticommunist forces. Around 12,000 of these were sent to Egypt, with the rest being held in prisons around Athens. 
    • Prisoners taken by ELAS were marched outside of Athens into the mountains, suffering from exposure to cold. Most were given food taken from villagers, although villagers also spat on and insulted them. Greek anticommunists who fell behind were shot, although not Brits. All the weapons and clothing of Brits was taken by ELAS. 
      • There were slanderous claims of torture and abuse by ELAS against prisoners, although these were not generally substantiated. 
  • ELAS forces in Athens were mainly reservists and had no uniforms or insignia. They were armed with revolvers, rifles, light machine guns, grenades, dynamite, and knives. Got food from family and friends or requisitioning, almost no medical services. 
    • Generally had very high morale, despite more conditions, and had no fear facing tanks. However, were terrified by RAF. 
  • Some British soldiers did not see the point of fighting ELAS, as they were still allied to the USSR. 

  • Assembly of December Incident was on Syntagma Square. No one expected a massacre to result, it was supposed to be an ordinary demonstration.
    • Crowd carried Greek, British, American, and Soviet flags and shouted: "Viva Roosevelt, Viva Churchill, Viva Stalin!"
    • There were police cordons blocking their path, but several thousand managed to push past into the square. 
  • First shots reported as coming from the roof of the parliament building before noon. Even if this wasn't the first shot, Greek units on parliament and British units on Grande Bretagne Hotel opened fire for ~30 minutes.
    • 28 people killed, mainly young men and women. 
    • Rather than clearing, 60,000 more people entered square and protest continued. British paratroopers cleared the square over the course of 6 hours.
  • After the first shots, a poet named Títos Patríkios jumped up on a fountain and shouted: "Comrades, don’t disperse! Victory will be ours! Don’t leave. The time has come. We will win!"
  • After the December Incident, ELAS partisans went throughout Athens disarming police stations.
  • The left in Greece, but in Athens especially, was fueled by an influx of refugees and liberal intellectuals deported from Asia Minor by the Turks. They radicalized while living in the slums of Athens and Piraeus. 
  • The Metaxas dictatorship imprisoned and tortured members of the KKE after banning the party. 
  • British intelligence noted that monarchists and rightwing groups were much slower to resist Axis occupation than leftists, making them of little importance in the resistance movement. 
  • A common tactic of counterinsurgency during the Axis occupation of Greece was establishing 'blocos', in which entire neighborhoods were cordoned off and masked informants pointed out ELAS supporters to SS officers or Security Battalionists. These supporters were then executed by hanging, left on trees in public view to intimidate the population and guarded by Battalionists to prevent removal. 
    • Collaborators and SS officers also took this opportunity to rape women. 
  • The British had a major role in the destruction of the Gorgopotamos viaduct and some other partisan operations. 
  • Some 500,000 people died during the Axis occupation of Greece, or around 7% of the population. 
  • ELAS had around 50,000 men in winter 1944, stationed in the Greek countryside.
    • Many ELAS officers had been members of the Greek Army and could have been reintegrated.
  • British authorities began releasing Battalionists in mid November 1944, strong encouraging them to join the National Guard and Gerarmerie.
    • British authorities actively encouraged this, but tried to keep their involvement under wraps. 
    • It was publicly known that senior Battalionists had been released because they were seen walking around free.
    • In November, December, and January 1944, around 12,000 Battalionists were relased from Goudi prison (converted barracks??). Most joined the National Guard, with 228 rejoining the Greek Army.
      • These Battalionists formed the main force of anticommunist forces during the 1944 civil war, as they reinforced a very small number of British combat personnel. 
  • ELAS had no intentions of taking over Greece military until confrontation with the British in late November 1944. It just wanted a place in the government and to move forward from there. 
    • ELAS fighter report great regret over having to fight Brits, who they had previously considered their allies. 
    • EAM decided to stop operation to destroy Hotel Grande Bretagne because Churchill was in the building.
  • Report of fortified positions of ELAS near Piraeus and ability to take out tanks without enormous difficult.
  • Britain set up sniper positions in the Acropolis. Greek units did not attack so as not to damage the monument. 

  • Georgios Papadapulous, future dictator of Greece, was a Battalionist serving in Patras under Colonel Nikolaos Kourkoulakos. 
  • Most of the Battalionists in Patras had previously been part of the Greek Army. They were set up in January 1944 by head of all Security Battalions Lt. General Vassilios Ndertilis. It had two battalions, the first led by Col. Kourkoulakos and consisting of 41 officers and 860 men. The other battalion, under Col. Leontokan, had 41 officers and 1,165 men. These units were later divided under different commands and spread around the country.
    • In May 1944, there are 8,000 Battalionists in the Peloponnese.  
    • Another Security Battalion had 800 men and was led by a major. 
    • Col. Kourkoulakos is reinstated as Deputy Military Commander of the Peloponnese during the Greek civil war. 
  • After a major attack by Nazis and Security Battalions on ELAS in Achaia, the EAM announces a policy of targeting the families of Battalionists. 
    • The fighting becomes increasingly cruel after this point, with Battalionists carrying out massive reprisals against civilians in response to killing.
    • Security Battalions executed hundreds of ELAS members of sympathizers and burned a number of villages.
  • Confirmation of a specific incident of Security Battalions displaying bodies of 10 prisoners in square in Patras to inspire fear in population.
  • Thinking that they are losing, Security Battalions in Patras surrender to British forces on 2 October 1944 rather than face ELAS. They are detained in the Araxos camp before most are transferred to detention camps in Italy on 14 October. 
    • This is not the only Security Battalion who fled from EDES or ELAS to surrender to the British.
  • Leonidas Spais had been a Republican officer demobilized in 1934. He was an important figure in bring Battalionists into the Greek government forces. He was Director General of the Ministry of the Army after returning to Athens on 26 October 1944, under Deputy Minister Gen. Ptolemaios Sarigiannis. After the December Incident, Gen. Spais was promoted to Deputy Minister of Military Affairs.
    • In his role as Director General, Spais is responsible for selecting which officers of different partisan groups should rejoin the Greek Army, working alongside ELAS Col. I. Pyriochos. This committee ends up disbanded due to conflict over ELAS integration. He used this position to put Battalionist officers into positions in the military and some civilian departments; the return to military service occurred during the 1944 civil war. 
  • At the beginning of the December Incident, approximately 1,000 Battalionists who had been confined to the Goudi camp were formed into 6 battalions (~165 men each) on the orders of the 3rd Mountain Brigade of the Greek Army. 
  • There was significant infighting among the partisans, with ELAS occasionally arresting royalists or republicans on claims of collaboration, which may or may not have been true. 

  • First large scale operations against ELAS and EDES were undertaken by Nazis on 18 October 1943 after they replaced Italian forces in the area. The Italians had done basically nothing. These Nazi operations continued in C. and N. Greece from October 1943 to January 1944. 
    • These operations resulted in hundreds of civilian casualties and dozens of villages were burned by Axis forces. 
  • EDES was bolstered by weaponry from Italian units that had defected to their side. 
  • Beginning in October 1943, a civil war broke out between EDES and ELAS. It only ended in February 1944. 
    • Skirmishes between EDES and ELAS started on 7 or 8 October 1943 in Tsepelovo, near Metsovo. EDES responded by arresting ELAS members in Epirus while Velouchiotis ordered EDES units in Thessaly to be disarmed. 
    • On 9 October, Velouchiotis and Georgios Siantos ordered available ELAS units to attack EDES. They also arrested the EDES representatives to a joint council of partisans that had been set up in July 1943. 
    • On 14 October, first ELAS units crossed the Achelous River and attacked EDES forces. 
      • This detachment had around 2,500 men and was equipped with heavy weaponry. 
    • On 19 October, Velouchiotis demanded that all communication with Gen. Zervas of EDES cease and that any British officers who attempted to communicate with him would be stopped. He also disarmed and arrested some individual British officers. 
    • By the end of 1943, ELAS had disarmed all EDES forces outside of Epirus. However, EDES had secured British support in the conflict and a promise of Nazi neutrality. 
      • A new EDES offensive pushed ELAS forces out of Epirus beginning on 4 January 1944, pushing them across the Achelous River on 28 January. 
    • Both sides recognized that the Nazis were the real enemies and on 16 February ELAS agreed to peace terms. This established the KKE and EAM's line as support for the British and their allies. 
      • Velouchiotis and other military officers in ELAS felt that they could have won in Epirus against EDES if they hadn't been stopped. Hence, they were resentful and eager to attack EDES again. 
      • Velouchiotis and other ELAS officers also felt that the Brits were meddlers who exploited and benefitted from divisions in the ranks of the partisans. 
  • ELAS HQ had 3 leading members, of whom Aris Velouchiotis (nickname 'Mars') was the key military leader in late 1943. 
    • Velouchiotis predicted that the Brits would replace the Nazis and reimpose the monarchy, seeking to crush the political aspirations of ELAS. He predicted a long and difficult conflict against Britain. 
  • Civilians seem to have fled into the mountains, home of the partisans, to escape the Nazis. 
  • Evidence that ELAS had strong discipline, as Velouchiotis executed a member of his bodyguard on the unproven accusation of raping a village woman. 

  • Nazi administration was really concerned with keeping Metsovo crossing open for fuel and supplies and sought to come to an agreement with partisans to protect that supply line. 
    • Gen. Zervas agreed to Gen. Hubert Lanz's proposal for an informal peace between EDES and Axis forces. EDES only abandoned the agreement when the British threatened to cut off his supplies. 
    • Gen. Lanz gave EDES specific information about the Nazi retreat so that they, rather than ELAS, would replace the Nazi garrisons. 
  • In 1943, Nazis executed over 5,000 Italian prisoners who had refused to surrender to German forces. 
  • Nazis thought that EDES had between 20,000 and 30,000 men (far more than it actually did). They also considered ELAS to be a communist organization under the control of Tito. 
  • Rather than destroying supplies, Gen. Lanz distributed food and supplies to the civilian population of Ioannina. 

  • Muslims Tsamides (Cham Albanians) joined the Italian army in crossing into Greece in November 1940 and attacked and looted Christian villages. They largely collaborated with Axis forces.
  • Beginning in September 1944, EDES engaged in an ethnic cleansing of the Cham Albanians.
    • ELAS had a mixed stance to the ethnic cleansing, but managed to recruit 300 to 500 Albanians and resettle 3,000 to 5,000 to its territories in Thesprotia. However, this stability was temporary as ELAS lost power after the December Incident and EDES restarted the ethnic cleansing of the Cham Albanians. 
  • ELAS was a centralized organization under the clear control of EAM. EDES, in contrast, was more decentralized and the leadership had difficulty directing the actions of local chiefs. 
    • Even then, the central command of EDES had no interest in stopping the ethnic cleansing.

  • In late 1943, Germany suddenly realized that ELAS had grown into a 20,000 strong army equipped with Italian weapons. 
  • The collaborationist government of Ioannis Rallis was formed in April 1943. In Fall 1943, the Nazis okayed the creation of Security Battalions of the Rallis government, under the authority of Nazi SS chief for the region. 
    • The first Security Battalions were created in Athens out of former members of the Evzoni. These units were then sent out into the Greek countryside. Broader measures to create Security Battalions elsewhere in the country, beginning in Euboea, were approved in 1944. 
  • Some EDES members in Athens and other areas remote from their power base joined the Security Battalions in 1943 and 1944. This trend was primarily true in Athens, where EDES members Col. Papageorgiou, Col. Papathanassopoulos, and lawyer Elias Stamatopoulos worked alongside the Rallis government to create the Security Battalions to beat back communism. On 17 September 1943, Papageorgiou declared himself head of EDES Athens and aligned the group with the Rallis government.
    • Col. Papathanassopoulos was instrumental in creating the Security Battalions and worked with Rallis and fascist groups to accomplish this. He organized Security Battalions in Euboea, with orders to report every 48 hours. He received 500 million drachmas from the Rallis government by November 1943 to raise Security Battalions.  
      • The Euboea Security Battalions were led by Gen. D. Liakos, who had been appointed Prefect of the region. He took with him 70 gendarmes from Athens. He then set out raising men for Security Battalions on Euboea beginning in January 1944 in Chalcis. Then then set out to clear ELAS and EAM out of the island.
    • The intention of the group was to use the Security Battalions to place EDES Athens members in key positions in territory that they retook from ELAS. That way, when the Allies arrived, the areas would be liberated under noncommunist control. 
    • In April 1944, Papathanassopoulos and Papageorgiou resigned from their positions in EDES and the Rallis government. They continued, however, to organize anticommunist forces in Euboea. 
      • In May 1944, however, Papathanassopoulos is named military governor of Euboea and given control of the 3 Security Battalions there. He called for volunteers and started conscriptions, stating that those who dodged the draft would be persecuted as subversive, as would their families. They were trained during that month.
      • On 3 June 1944, new operations against ELAS in Euboea began. Conscription continued into September 1944, based on classes in school records and with specific communities being called on during different dates. By September 1944, the Security Battalions numbered 2,000 men.
  • The Euboea Security Battalions were placed under Nazi command in February 1944 and assisted in guarding Euboea during Nazi deportation campaigns there. The Security Battalions are disloyal to the Nazis and don't want to be here and start deserting, so they have to be mostly replaced by Evzoni Security Battalions sent from Athens. 
  • Gen. Liakos was killed by an Italian suicide bomber on 1 April 1944 during a battle with ELAS over Istiaia. In retaliation, Cap. Bourlidis executed 18 local youths with his revolver. The campaign in Euboea stopped after Liakos's death. 
  • The Security Battalions committed all sorts of crimes against the civilian population of Euboea. 

  • The leadership of EDES was drawn primarily from Republicans and consisted of those who had participated in Venizelist coups. The leader was Napoleon Zervas. 
    • Gen. Zervas first went into the mountains of Epirus in July 1942. 
    • There was a clear split between EDES Epirus and EDES Athens, with the latter becoming a vehicle of the collaborationist Greek government. 
  • Because EDES ended up recruiting from the mountain tribes of Epirus, different EDES bands were occasionally involved in battles of honor with EDES bands led by rival chiefs. Gen. Zervas almost dissolved several units over these conflicts. 
  • Napoleon Zervas's diaries make clear that, from his first transition to partisanship, his primary concern was the communists. He founded his partisan group to fight the Axis, but primarily to act as an alternative to the communist ELAS. 

  • The single largest anticommunist group in Greece in 1943 and 1944 were the Security Battalions. They were created by the Nazis specifically to arm the anticommunist population of Greece and fight ELAS. 
    • The Battalions proved to be extreme even by the standards of the Axis, accusing the Nazis of not being harsh enough with communists and attacking Red Cross workers as 'suppliers of gangs'. 
    • Villagers of course participated in the resistance and collaboration as informants. Villagers could either contact ELAS or the Battalionists to inform them of the activities of the other. 
  • There were two types of Security Battalion, the 9 Evzoni battalions organized by the collaborationist government, around 5,725 men, and 22 volunteer battalions, totaling 16,625 men. The Chief of Staff for all Security Battalions was SS officer Walter Simana. 
  • Story of the battalions: Tripoli Security Battalions came to the village of Valtetsi, Arcadia, in May 1944 and armed a number of villagers as Battalionists. In June 1944, ELAS attacked the village, killing at least some Battalionist prisoners, and burned the village. 
  • The Security Battalions were never punished, but all released and rearmed prior to or during the December Incident period. They were officially pardoned from 1945 into at least 1947. 
    • Despite this, the Greek government tried to not talk about the Security Battalions and only justified its behavior in terms of anticommunism, not on its own merits. 

  • The Nazis decided to leave Kaisarlani in February 1944 under heavy ELAS pressure. To replace them, they organized Security Battalions. These Battalionists, like the Nazis before them, were quartered in the Venizalos Primary School, a strong defensive position.
    • Axis forces hung 5 communists on the intersection of three streets in response to ELAS killing a Security Battalion captain on 5 April 1944. 
    • ELAS discovers news of this atrocity on 18 April and plans an incident to retake the town. They organized a protest by townspeople to distract the Nazi and Battalionist officers, then plan an attack. 
      • That night, ELAS adopts a plan to disable the Battalionists by blowing up the school. They sneak in through windows and plant dynamite. The explosions themselves are weak and do little structural damage, but fear of structural damage is enough for the Battalionists to abandon their station in Kaisarlani. 
      • There was a further battle on 21 April by Nazi and collaborationist forces, but ELAS still managed to hold its own in Kaisarlani, despite having only ~60 men in the neighborhood. They had machine guns. 

  • The first Security Battalions were formed in Athens in 1943 and were composed of Greek Army troops and officers, especially Evzoni. Others later formed in 1944 in major cities like Patras, Corinth, Agrinio, and Chalkida. These later volunteer battalions were not made up of professional soldiers. 
  • The Security Battalions were the greatest threat facing ELAS and so the KKE turned its propaganda torward the Battalions, who were emphasized as the primary enemy in late 1943 and 1944. 
  • The Nazis only organized Security Battalions in the south. In northern Greece, they organized other groups directly subordinate to themselves and based around individual commanders or villages, as well as Slavic militias. The biggest of these were the village self defense groups of the National Greek Army (EES) and the Poulos battalion of Lt.Col. Georgios Poulos. 

  • There were a number of anticommunist organizations that spread during late 1943 and 1944: X in Athens, EASAD in Thessaly, PAO in Macedonia. 
  • The first Greek collaborator government was led by Geórgios Tsolákoglou, he was later sentenced to death by a special court, but his was commuted to life imprisonment. He died in jail in 1948. 
  • The third and last Greek collaborator government was led by Ioannis Rallis, who pleaded to the British in special court that he had done what he needed to to lessen the harm done to the Greek people. He was imprisoned and died in prison in 1946.
  • The Security Battalions committed an enormous number of crimes of looting, rape, murder, torture, and arson. They were sometimes considered worst than the Nazi occupiers. They mainly operated in Athens, Euboea, and the Peloponnese. 
    • The idea for the Security Battalions came from Theodoros Pangalos, a former dictator and republican. 
    • The Battalionists were also the most vicious fighters during the 1944 and 1946 Greek civil wars. 
  • Overall, anticommunist Greek forces were eager to finance and recruit Battalionists as allies against ELAS. 
  • The Security Battalions were denounced by the British Middle East command and by the national unity government created in Lebanon, both did not want to though and only did this to please EAM. In reality, both sides wanted to use the Battalionists.
    • PM Papandreou actively plotted to disarm ELAS and arm old Battalionists even when head of the national unity government. Originally, he wanted to postpone the disarmament of the Security Battalions until ELAS had also disarmed. 
  • In late November 1944, the KKE recognized that the British government had sided with the Battalionists, as it highlighted many incidences of them being released, including Ioannis Rallis's son joining the Greek Army mountain brigades. 
  • The Varkiza agreement was a terrible decision for ELAS. In its aftermath, Battalionists from the National Guard became the new Greek Army, and even more Battalionists joined the security forces. This also meant that far right terrorist groups, like X in Athens, Sourla in Thessaly, and Magana in Moria could operate freely. 
    • Over 1,200 Battalionist officers were incorporated into the Greek Army after February 1944. This included Ch. Gerakinis, member of the Euboea Security Battalionis, who was made deputy commander of the training school of the National Guard. Another, Col. Dionysis Papadogonas, head of the Peloponnese Security Battalions was promoted to Lt.Gen. in the Greek Army. 
    • ELAS fighters were detained and arrested, often tortured. Some were deported to prisons in other area

  • More evidence of British and Greek authorities officially denouncing the Security Battalions and all collaborators. 
    • This, however, was disingenuous. PM Papandreou indicated back in 1943 that he would like to avoid the dissolution of the Security Battalions, which were the most preventive bulwark against communism. 
  • Many leaders of the Security Battalions claimed that they were doing the interests of the Greek people in fighting communism. Ioannis Rallis even claimed that his action in setting up the Battalions had been intended to support British interests in Greece. 
  • The Security Battalions numbered around perhaps 30,000 men. The divisions were:
    • Peloponnese (D. Papadogonas, Kourkoulakos - Zerveas - Bakoyannis - Vrettakos - Katsareas etc.) 9,000 men
    • Athens (I. Plytzanopoulos, Grivas, EDES etc.) 5,000 men
    • D. and A. Stereas Hellas (Greece). Toliopoulos, X. Gerakinis, etc.) 3,000 men
    • Macedonia-Thessaly (Poulos, PAO, Kisa Batzak, Dagkoulas, Chrysochou, EASAD, etc.) total of 10,000

  • The Security Battalions were actually fairly diverse and fought for different reasons:
    • Evzoni battalions were formed explicitly to fight communism by Ioannis Rallis and permission for their formation was his main precondition to accept the head of government position from the Nazis. They were legally established in June 1943 and formed as units in October through December 1943. 
      • In February 1944, the Greek collaborationist government passed a law allowing Security Battalions to be raised outside of Athens. Even before this, Evzoni battalions were sent to the provinces: battalions were established in Chalkida on 29 December 1943, in Patras on 20 January 1944, in Agrinio on 18 February, in Corinth in April 1944, in Pyrgos on 19 May 1944, and in Nafpaktos on 22 June 1944. 
    • Volunteer battalions composed of either local anticommunists or ex Greek Army officers. The first of these were formed in Fall 1943 in Laconia, Kalamata, Ilia, and Patras. By Spring 1944, these volunteer groups were organized under the Rallis government's Ministry of Security. 
      • An example of this was the arming of anticommunists led by Dionysios Papadogonas in Tripoli on 23 March 1944. He eventually controlled 4,000 men in Tripoli, Sparta, Gythio, Meligalas and Gargalianoi. 
      • It was expected that both Monarchist and Republican members of the former Greek Army would enlist in the Security Battalions. In Kalamata, many who did not were arrested. 
    • Small scale antisemitic or fascist groups, usually no more than a few dozen men, who worked with the Security Battalions and Germans to attack ELAS, but were never integrated into formal units. 
    • Anticommunist groups directly under German control in northern Greece and not affiliated with the Rallis government. There were 10 of these in Macedonia and 3 or 4 in central Greece. This group consisted either of Slavs or, in Greece itself, of the Turkish speaking refugee community. 
    • Muslim populations, particularly Cham Albanians, who were armed and given the opportunity to fight Greeks for national self determination. 

  • Greece had two police forces: a royal gendarmerie responsible broadly for social order and city police forces responsible for enforcing criminal laws. In 1929, the government of Eleftherios Venizelos set up a special security directorate under the Gendarmerie to hunt down communists. A similar department was soon added to the city police, being made separate and fully mobile in May 1939 under the command of Nikos Bourandas. Both anticommunist departments collaborated with the Nazis and were responsible for around 2,000 deaths.
    • These forces were placed under the Ministry of Interior during the Axis occupation, led by Anastasios Tavoularis after the beginning of the prime ministership of Konstantinos Logothetopoulos on 2 December 1942. He remained in this position under the Rallis government. 
    • The security forces of the collaborationist government were staffed by figures from previous Greek dictatorships: the Gendarmerie by Konstantinos Ginos, the special anticommunist force by Alexandros Lambou, and director of security by Stylianos Papagrigorakis.
    • Later on in 1943, the anticommunist divisions of the gendarmerie and police would assist the Nazis in attacking ELAS.
      • Direct conflict between ELAS and the police intensified after April 1943, when gendarmes fired into a crowd of striking miners in Kalogreza, killing 5. In retaliation, ELAs began assassinating gendarmes. 
      • By Summer 1943, the City Police were ordered to shot on sight any ELAS members, rather than arrest them. In Athens, this was overseen by Athens police chief Angelos Evert, although he warned that police did not want to do this and many defected or deserted.
        • The police forces and gendarmerie were further militarized throughout 1943 and 1944, as the anticommunist units either actively worked with far right organizations like X or recruited those members into their ranks; often times the officers of anticommunist police were also leaders in far right organizations. 
      • The author suggests that police also participated in bloco raids, at least beginning in March 1944. 
  • In early 1943, the Nazis had originally intended to send thousands of Greeks to Germany as laborers. Massive protests and the threat of resistance led to the abandonment of these plans. 
  • The program to create the Security Battalions was led by the Liberal parliamentarian Stylianos Gonatas and Republican general Theodoros Pangalos. They help fill the ranks of the Battalions with experienced military personnel, often drawn from EDES Athens. 
  • A lot of Italian equipment passed into the hands of ELAS fighters after the Italian surrender. As a result, ELAS began to operate in Athens beginning in 1943.

  • Although the Security Battalions were present, they presented a weak force against ELAS after the Nazis had withdrawn. They would be unable to take or hold many positions against ELAS. 
  • Villagers sometimes cooperated for petty reasons. One turned over a group of ELAS supporters to the Italians because their sister rejected his romantic advances. 
  • The Greek state was strongly involved in anticommunist violence in 1945 and 1946, directing army units to attack ELAS forces and organizing nationalist organizations to conduct a white terror. Some anticommunist groups acted independently, but they had to be formed and directed by the Greek government where they didn't exist. 

  • Italy occupied the region between June 1941 and Summer 1943, trying to arrest Allied agents in the area and disarm the peasantry. They were unsuccessful in preventing the organization of partisan groups. 
  • Organized resistance did not develop in Messinia until May 1943 and only became a serious threat after an influx of Italian weapons from the Italian surrender in September 1943. There were two groups, ELAS and 'the Greek Army', created by former army officers, both armed by Britain. 
    • The 'Greek Army' remained solely an armed group, whereas ELAS in Messinia had been organized by EAM. 
    • ELAS manages to dominate the Messinia region in 1943, disarming the 'Greek Army' divisions in Trifylia in August 1943 and in Taygetos in late October 1943. 
    • ELAS is successful in created a liberated zone around Kalamata and Filiatria, success marked by the murder of gendarme commanders in the region in October 1943. The influx of Italian arms and disarmament of the 'Greek Army' allows it to dominate. It first sentences Italian collaborators to death, but the 'red terror' gradually expands as ELAS murders any 'reactionary elements' who refuse to cooperate with ELAS and EAM. 
  • The disarmament of the 'Greek Army' makes the struggle in Messinia a lot more intense and bloody, as the fight now becomes between Greeks and all anticommunist forces, primarily the Security Battalions. Many former officers of the 'Greek Army' have a major role in organizing and leading the Security Battalions in the region. The first Security Battalions in the region were created in February 1944 and by April 1944 had a presence in most towns. 
    • In Spring 1944, Security Battalions join the Germans in carrying out operations against ELAS in lowland areas, often involving collective punishment and mass execution of civilians. In response, ELAS become more paranoid in the regions it controls, interning suspected collaborators or reactionaries in converted villages. 
      • Standard story is as follows: ELAS burns house of someone associated with rightwing, Nazis come and execute 4 villagers, ELAS returns to village and marches 5 villagers away for execution. Then Security Battalions kill 2 villagers linked with EAM. 
    • Violence was most intense in 1944 and almost all fighting was between ELAS and the Security Battalions. The largest battle was at Meligalas in September 1944, after the Germans had withdrawn from the area. These later battles are followed by mass executions.
  • Local experience matters for a lot, in one village in Messinia the Security Battalions and EAM leadership were both locals and the village was to be jointly guarded by ELAS and the Security Battalions. 
  • Recruitment into ELAs or the Security Battalions did not seem to follow regional political affiliation, but instead some in areas controlled by ELAS, in the mountains joined that group, and those in the lowlands joined the Battalions. This may have been for lack of opportunity.

  • During and after the war, many rightwing figures claimed that all ELAS fighters were stooges of the Russians or Bulgarians. 
  • ELAS did use a lot of violence, both against civilians and other partisan groups, seeking to dominate the Greek resistance. 

  • Germans withdrew from Rethymno on the night of 12 October 1944 and morning of 13 October, destroying stores, blowing up bridges, and destroying the airport during the retreat. They commanded Greek forces under Chr. Tzifaki to take their positions and prevent the advance of ELAS. 
    • ELAS forces almost immediately entered the city and took up positions in various buildings. Control of the city was roughly divided between ELAS and anticommunist EOR. Actually administration was overseen by a small British force.
  • Civil war took a long time to reach Crete. The conflict actually started on 16 January 1945, when EOR soldiers took control of KKE offices in Rethymno. EOR then, under the command of Pavlos Gyparis and assisted by the British army, went out into the countryside to attack ELAS positions there. 
    • The sole remaining ELAS garrison in Rethymno surrendered on 18 January, the same day that ELAS forces in the countryside were forced to retreat into a monastery. The ELAS forces were uncoordinated and surrendered to EOR one by one. This initial stage of the civil war saw around a dozen casualties out of maybe 100 ELAS guerrillas. 
    • Thinking that ELAS would gather a large force and attack, Gyparis asked local authorities to send armed men down from the villages to fight communists. In this way they gathered a force of around 120 men to hunt communists. They pursued ELAS forces in the countryside for several days, executing most officers and taking others prisoner. 
  • After the civil war, anyone with connections to ELAS or leftwing organizations was excluded from political power in the area, which was dominated by rightwing forces. 

https://tvxs.gr/news/egrapsan-eipan/i-parapetameni-apeleytherosi-tis-thessalonikis (stopped at October 1945, or the Η ματωμένη επέτειος section)
  • Britain sought to avoid a ELAS takeover of Greece and thus tried to maintain control of at least Athens and Thessaloniki. To this end, British high command tried to come to an agreement with the Nazis at a meeting in Lisbon to plan the Nazi withdraw so that their soldiers could be quickly replaced by Brits. 
    • Instead, the Nazi command in the city came to an agreement with ELAS that ELAS would not hinder the German retreat and the Germans would withdraw the Security Battalions and allow ELAS to take Thessaloniki. 
    • On 26 September 1944, British and ELAS forces, led by Stefanos Sarafis come to an agreement that Thessaloniki would come under British control. ELAS then orders that no troops cross into Thessaloniki and remain in Macedonia. The local forces refuse to follow the agreement and enter Thessaloniki anyway. 
      • Despite previous agreements, ELAS attacked Nazi forces as they retreated from Thessaloniki beginning on 16 October and forced them to retreat on 30 October. This attack was accompanied by mass demonstrations against Nazi occupation and demanding the dissolution of the Security Battalions, getting steadily larger over the course of the month. ELAS then occupied the city and harassed the Nazis as they tried to retreat north; most ELAS units actually less Thessaloniki by 1 November to chase the Germans.
      • During this period, the British, EDES, and other anticommunist forces tried to convince someone else to move on Thessaloniki. No one came.
      • The Nazis tried to blow up everything they could, but this work was hurried and disrupted by ELAS attacks. 
    • There was a huge celebration after the liberation of Thessaloniki. ELAS kept only a small garrison in the city, but passed out weapons to the crowd and organized them into a new brigade. 
  • At the very end of the war, the Nazis released all EDES officers they had held on the promise that these officers would fight ELAS.
  • The Athens Security Battalions are disarmed when British soldiers enter the city, but are kept in detention camps nearby so that they could be theoretically remobilized to fight ELAS. 
  • Thessaloniki had a strong antisemitic, anticommunist, and far right community that other parts of Greece. The Germans took advantage of this to organize Security Battalions and other far right units. These forces were generally under the command of Col. Athanasios Chrysochou, First Deputy Prime Minister under Rallis and Gen. Tsolakoglou's Chief of Staff. 
    • By Summer 1944, the situation in Thessaloniki had become very violent. Despite German forays into the mountains, attacks on units in Thessaloniki grew growing more intense. 
    • The Security Battalions and other Axis forces are split: some retreat with the Germans; some, particularly Pontian Greeks, surrender to ELAS; some decide to fight ELAS for control of Thessaloniki. 
      • Some of the old Security Battalions modify their uniforms to claim they had been members of EDES. Their membership is not recognized by EDES of Gen. Zervas. 
      • Some members of the 'National Militia' arrested Col. Chrysochou on 28 October, along with 320 other prominent collaborators. This defeated their plan to defend the city to the last. As a result, Thessaloniki was bloodlessly occupied by ELAS. Those forces that did decide to fight holed up in a single building, but surrendered without a fight on 31 October. 
    • There were around 15,000 armed collaborators in and around Thessaloniki when ELAS took the city on 30 October 1944. 
  • By 1 November 1944, there is a huge battle in Kilkis between ELAS and the combination of EDES and former collaborators who joined EDES. ELAS won the battle. 
  • ELAS retained majority control of Thessaloniki until 17 January 1945, when they retreated under a ceasefire agreement. They governed Thessaloniki through militias and people's committee and were responsible for restoring city services. 

  • The KKE organized EAM in September 1941 and by 1943 its armed group, ELAS, had ~60,000 fighters. It subordinated itself to British command at the instruction of the USSR, which wanted to maintain good relations between all wartime allies. 
    • KKE and EAM were cut off from communication with Moscow for most of the war. The first Soviet military mission to ELAS was in June 1944 and demanded that EAM obey the May 1944 Lebanon Agreement.
    • Stalin did jack shit to help in the December Incident and called on the KKE to respect the Varzika Agreement. 

  • Following Nazi withdrawal from Athens on 12 October 1944, the KKE organized two massive rallies on 13 October and 15 October. These demonstrations had a positive response from the people, who raised red flags and communist emblems. They called for the harsh punishment of collaborators. 
  • There are already clashes in Athens in mid October, even though Security Battalions are detained at the Goudi barracks. These are between street demonstrators, normally ELAS, and anticommunist factions, particularly EDES. 

https://www.jstor.org/stable/3180758 (stopped at 1946, pg. 529)
  • After the Axis occupation of Greece, all political prisoners were handed over to the Axis powers. The Germans sometimes executed these, others they sent to concentration camps run by the Italians. The ones near Athens were Larissa and Chaidari. The Chaidari camp was taken over by the Germans in April 1943 and became the main transfer camp for slave laborers and Jews destined for Germany. 
    • The Nazis executed 200 prisoners on 1 May 1943 for resistance to the camp orders at Chaidari. 
    • At least one prisoner, and likely more, was released from Chaidari on 16 September 1944. 
  • Under the law of 1938, political prisoners in Greece had to recant communism to be released from detention. 
  • After the defeat of ELAS in December 1944, the Greek government and their British allies sought to institute a white terror using the power of the state and anticommunist paramilitaries. After the Varkiza Agreement, there were 1,192 leftists killed, 159 women raped, 6,413 leftists injured, 551 officers or printing houses attacked, and 80,000 arrest warrants issued, of which 50,000 were arrested and 17,000 imprisoned. 
  • A law was passed in March 1945 prohibiting anyone who had participated in the ELAS struggle in December 1944 from working in the civil service. 
  • As a result of their persecution, the KKE cultivated an extreme sense of self sacrifice in its membership, a willingness to suffer, and a desire to sacrifice one's life for the party's cause. 

  • During the first fews of the December Incident, both sides were ill prepared and lacked military materiel. In the Makrygianni neighborhood, ELAS had around 245 Italian rifles with 40 bullets each. Grenades and dynamite were also in short supply. The anticommunist forces were similarly low on ammunition for their sten machine guns, and only had enough shells to fire a few artillery rounds. 
  • The combat in Athens during the December Incident was confused, as neither side knew the position of the enemy. Intel often came from the residents of the buildings, as combat took place in a civilian area. 
    • In Makrygianni, ELAS converted certain buildings or apartments into strongholds. These strongholds were very difficult to take, often requiring physically busting through walls or climbing into windows using ladders. 
    • Both sides set up outposts manned by soldiers or gendarmes that were meant to alert a main camp to attack. In practice, they mainly absorbed the initial brunt of an attack. 
  • ELAS generally distinguished between the bulk of the gendarmerie, who they disarmed and released to go back home, and officers, who had collaborated and would be executed. Any known collaborators or security forces who had participated in Axis campaigns, like blocos, would also be killed. 
    • ELAS tried to keep a good reputation and thus prohibited execution of captured prisoners, with the exception of officers. This principle was strongly followed in central Athens and less so in the suburbs or the Greek countryside. 
    • Former collaborators typically fought the hardest because they understood that they would be executed by ELAS if captured. 
  • ELAS forces first attacked gendarme or National Guard outposts. They disarmed and stripped these soldiers, donning their uniforms to confuse British forces - particularly British snipers set up on the Acropolis. 
    • The anticommunist forces began having all EDES fighters and gendarmes wear a white armband to distinguish them from ELAS forces. 

  • The British forces were totally unprepared for the December Incident. In December 1944, they had only 10,000 soldiers in Greece, of which 4,500 were in Athens. Neither the British force in Athens nor the Greek 3rd Mountain Brigade had many heavy weapons, pretty much limited to 25 Sherman tanks in Athens.  
    • Gen. Scobie recognized that his military forces would be insufficient to hold Athens. This opinion was reinforced by early setbacks during the December Incident, as British forces seriously considered abandoning Athens and pulling back to the airport at Elliniko on 11 December. 
    • British forces were scattered throughout the Athens area, often in nonfortified or indefensible positions. This is how the Kifissia airbase was captured on 19 December 1945 and its 200 personnel taken prisoner. 
    • Britain had left a skeleton force in Greece because WWII was ongoing. 
  • The KKE Chief of Staff, Maj. Theodoros Makridis, continually suggested that ELAS eliminate or capture the isolated British outposts. 
  • Britain's position in Athens was only saved by British reinforcement that arrived in mid December 1944. By the end of December, there were around 60,000 British military personnel in Greece. 
  • Churchill had been concerned that Gen. Scobie would be reluctant to use the necessary force to hold Athens. Thus, on 5 December, he transmitted a cable to Scobie that Athens should be treated as an occupied city and that, if unavoidable, he could use deadly force. 
  • The KKE had created a plan for the occupation of Athens back in October 1943, based on previous military coups; it would enter Athens and preemptively disarm and detain a few thousand preselected people. The plan had been created by Maj. Makridis and approved by the EAM committee. The plan then went through two revisions, the second in August 1944. The revised plan had ELAS occupy all police stations in Athens, but leave military posts under observation only.
    • This plan had not been updated to record that the occupying forces in Athens were no longer the Security Battalions, but instead the 3rd Mountain Brigade of the Greek Army, which was a much more disciplined and professional force, although also smaller. It also entirely ignored the presence of British troops.
    • From a military perspective, the first target should have been the Goudi barracks of the Greek Army, but this attack did not start until 7 December. However, not enough forces were dedicated to the attack and it failed. 
  • ELAS did not have a good distribution of armed forces in December 1944. Most of the armed forces were in Epirus fighting EDES, leaving too few units in Athens to take the city. Moreover, when reinforcements did arrive, they were haphazardly thrown into battle and their strength was not used to tactical advantage. 
  • ELAS was able to successfully capture all gendarmerie and police stations in Piraeus on 4 December, but faced resistance in Athens. By 6 December, ELAS had captured 18 police stations, but the other 5 still held out against them. The Makyrgiannis gendarmerie post was crucial to capturing Athens, but was not successfully taken. 
  • The KKE leadership did not realize how badly they had bungled the Athens operation, with Georgios Siantos, KKE General Secretary, continuing to insist that the fight would leave ELAS in a position of strength to negotiation with the British. He met with Churchill and others on 27 December, but made ridiculous terms that led to an immediate end to the meeting. This blindness infected most of the KKE politburo leadership. 
    • They also believed that Britain would stay neutral in the conflict, as seen by the fact that orders to not attack British forces continued until 9 December. This allowed British forces to keep open communications and congregate in key areas. 
      • Britain is involved in the December Incident from the outset, with British forces surprising and disarming the ELAS 2nd Regiment on the night of 3 December. They also held police stations on behalf of police and gendarmes. Britain began major offensive operations against ELAS on 6 December.  
  • The collaborationist forces in Athens were also taken by surprise at the December Incident, as seen by the lack of preparation around police and gendarmerie stations. There were discussions among these forces to start some general confrontation between ELAS and the British, but this was never put into action. 
  • The main combatants against ELAS were police and gendarmes. Their importance in the fight against ELAS rehabilitated their image to many, whereas previously they had been seen only as collaborationist organizations.

  • The December Incident began as a KKE response to plans to disarm ELAS. The fighting began on 4 December, when ELAS attacked Greek government forces, although plans had been made for an armed response on 2 December. 
    • During the December Incident, the British released and armed most of the collaborationist forces from Athens and the Peloponnese. 
  • Stalin repeatedly stressed that the KKE should abide by the Lebanon Agreement and seek cooperation with British and anticommunist forces. The December Incident went against these principles. 
  • ELAS arrested thousands in the Athens area during the conflict, with this author suggesting thousands of executions by ELAS. Specifically a special branch, directly under the KKE Politburo, known as OPLA. 

  • The Greek monarchy and most of the Greek government had been discredited in the eyes of the Greek people because he had imposed the 4th August dictatorship and then they had fled to Egypt rather than being present in Greece during the occupation. The Monarchist and the government knew that this was the case and that they would only return to power with British assistance. 
  • Britain sought to restore the Greek monarchy, which they believed was the best guarantor of their interests, particularly the control and safety over eastern Mediterranean sea lands. They saw the EAM as the main obstacle to this goal. 
    • Britain managed to return the Greek government in exile to shared power by agreeing to a unity government with EAM under the Lebanon and Caserta Agreements. They were unwilling, however, to budge on the disarmament of ELAS, resulting in a violent confrontation. 
  • The Greek government set up special courts to try 169 ELAS and National Militia (OPLA) members who participated in the December Incident. 
  • Approximately 2,500 people died in the December Incident in Athens, accounting for both combatants and civilians. 
  • The Monarchists had been actively trying to prevent any reconciliation between EAM and PM Papandreou. The Liberal Party also stalemated negotiations with the EAM because Themistoklis Sofoulis and (Georgios??) Kafantaris wanted more political power and was trying cheap power tricks. 
    • One of the key reasons for the breakdown in negotiations between EAM and the Greek government on 26 December was that Papandreou refused to disband the Greek Mountain Brigade, which Kafantaris derided as 'monarchical' and one of the things that led to the failure of negotiations. 
  • The Greek 3rd Mountain Brigade and the old members of the Security Battalions held the most power in Greece in December 1944, as the unity government was largely dysfunctional. These figures had been responsible for violence on 15 October and were responsible for the December Incident, which killed at least 11 and injured around 70.
    • The Battalionists were placed in positions of power by the Greek government and the British. They were detained in areas close to Athens and other areas of strategic importance and, in one instance in Syggrou prison, over 700 former collaborators were broken out and then allowed to join the Gendarmerie. 
  • The British and Greek government began arrest EAM members and other leftists on 1 December, arresting 14,000 by the end of the December Incident, many of whom were sent to el Daba in Egypt. 
  • During its retreat from Athens, ELAS took a number of hostages. This tarnished its public reputation. 
  • Soviets did not intervene because they knew how important Greece was to Britain and sought to prevent war with their allies and keep their prior agreement with Britain over the division of Eastern Europe. 

  • In October 1944, central Athens remained occupied by the Nazis while the outskirts had already been liberated by ELAS. Thus, civilians congregated in the suburbs. The mood in October was celebratory, as German withdrawal was expected, and parades were held in the outskirts. 
    • German forces left Athens on the morning of 12 October 1944 after laying a wreath on the tomb of the unknown soldier. As the Germans left, crowds formed in public places to celebrate. 
    • To the relief of noncommunists, ELAS did not try to occupy Athens and obeyed agreements with Britain. It also patrolled the outskirts to prevent looting or crime. 
  • Over the course of the Nazi occupation, around 1,800 people had been executed in Athens and another 2,000 had died in civil war. Additionally, around 40,000 to 45,000 people were starving. 
  • PM Papandreou was deeply concerned about ELAS taking control of Athens, so he sought to organize an alternative government before the Nazi withdrawal. At the beginning of August 1944, Papandreou appointed Lt.Gen. Panagiotis Spiliotopoulos as military commander of Attica and directed him to organize all Greek groups except ELAS into an 'Athens National Army'. 
    • Spiliotopoulos organized the Athens National Army, partially recruited from X and EDES, and placed them in strategic buildings in Athens. These rightwing forces were in central locations and not disarmed, adding to tensions. 
  • EAM held a political rally in central Athens on 15 October, outside of its home turf and near another rightwing rally. As the EAM rally entered Omonia Square, rightwing groups at the Hermes Hotel fired on them, killing 7 and injuring 82.  
    •  As a result of this massacre, the Chief of Staff of Attica Military Commander, Pausanias Katsotas, and Angelos Evert intervened and disarmed some of the rightwing groups.
    • EAM did not respond to the 15 October massacre as an attempt to prove its dedication to the national unity government, although it was troubled and annoyed at how rightwing groups were still being kept on hand for future violence. 
  • In December 1944, the feeling of potential violence was distant but clear. There had been past incidences and the main issues dividing EAM from other parties had always been present. 

  • Massive rally organized by EAM occurs in Syntagma Square, organized to protest Papandreou government, on 3 December 1944. At 11:00, police storm square and start arresting hundreds of protestors and placing them in trucks for transport elsewhere. Then, Evert gave orders to fire on the crowd, allegedly on the orders of higher ups. 
    • On 4 December, the EAM calls for a general strike across Greece. Some of the strikers in Athens are attacked by rightists during a march, killing at least 100 strikers. 
  • Papandreou had desired to dissolve and disempower EAM since at least July 1943. He actively sought British assistance in this, indicating in a telegram to Churchill on 22 September 1944 that he believed tensions could only be solved by British military intervention. 
    • Even when the government of national unity still existed, Papndreou ordered Thrasyvoulos Tsakalotos, head of the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade, to not trust any member of ELAS and discourage officers from working with or cooperating with them. 
  • Britain actively sought to preserve the majority of the collaborationist forces. In Peloponnese, they restricted the movement of ELAS and demanded that all captured collaborators be turned over to British authorities. They then transported these prisoners to detention camps on islands, where they were trained and often released. 
  • It was agreed at the Lebanon Conference that the issue of a national army would be dealt with after liberation. Moreover, it would be preceded by the demobilization of all paramilitaries and the army would recruit on the standard basis of conscription from school classes with officers coming from partisan leaders or the old military.

  • The Lebanon Conference decided that Greece would have a single national army to replace all partisan paramilitaries and that the constitutional form of the Greek government would be determined by democratic elections. It was also agreed that the Cairo government would be enlarged into a government of national unity. 
    • At the Lebanon Conference, the representatives were Angelopoulos, Svolos, and Askoutsis from PEEA ('Free Greece'), Porphyrogenis and Stratis from EAM, and Roussos from KKE. 
    • The Lebanon Conference was tense and the distrust between Papandreou and the EAM was clearly on display. At the conference he asked them whether they intended to seize power by force and accused their violence of having triggered the formation of the Security Battalions. 
    • Papandreou also served in the role of Minister of the Army at least during October 1944.
  • The Caserta Agreement, signed on 26 September, replaced the Lebanon Agreement. It reaffirmed previous points, while also adding that all partisan forces were now under the command of Gen. Scobie, that all partisans would prevent their forces from seizing power by forces, and that the Security Battalions would be treated as enemy forces unless they surrendered. 
    • The Caserta Agreement meant that partisans could not engage in any operations without the approval of Gen. Scobie. Moreover, partisan divisions were placed under the national unity government military control, so ELAS Athens now had to respond to the orders of Lt.Gen. Spiliotopoulos.
  • Papandreou gave a radio speech on 2 September 1944 that condemned the Security Battalions as traitors and urged all Battalionists to abandon their positions. 
  • Spiliotopoulos, the newly appointed military commander of Athens, had been the head of the gendarmerie under the collaborationist government of Tsolakoglou, but had used this position to set up an intelligence network and send information to the Allies. He was trusted by the British and the Greek government. His appointed was disputed in occupied Greece.
    • Col. Geórgios Papageorgíou, formerly the founder of PAO, was appointed the military commander of Thessaloniki. 
    • Thrace was placed under the military command of G. Modis. 
    • On 11 October, Gen. Scobie declared that all areas east of the Axios River, including Thessaloniki, would be under the military authority of Col. St. Prókou. This same order also relieved Modis of command of Thrace and made him Commander in Chief of the forces of the national unity government. 
    • Spiliotopoulos requested and was granted relief of his command on 25 October 1944, being replaced by Brig.Gen. Pafsanias Katsotas, a veteran of the battle of el Alamein, as military commander of Athens. On 28 October, he Papandreou ordered Katsotas to respond directly to the command of Scobie. 
      • Spiliotopoulos also resigned from his position as General Director of the Ministry of the Army on 5 November, as he felt that his position there was unnecessarily provocative toward EAM and would undermine future cooperation. 
    • Gen. Alexandros Othonaios was appointed he new Commander in Chief and Chief of the General Staff on 3 November, in accordance with an agreement made in Lebanon. In practice, he had no forces under his control since all of them had been directly transferred to Scobie's command. 
      • Othonaios proposed a new plan under which none of the units were disarmed, but instead they were all integrated into a single National Army and would gradually be replaced by new conscripts and volunteers. He selected, as his deputy, Stefanos Sarafis, military commander of ELAS, to promote trust. 
      • This plan was rejected by Papandreou, who announced on 5 November that all forces should disband by 10 December.
      • Othonaios complained of constant British interference in his responsibilities and, on 13 November, told Papandreou that he would only remain in the position if Scobie's jurisdiction was restricted to British troops and he was given full command over all Greek forces. Not wanting to deal with the issue, Papandreou placed Othonaios on leave until 10 December. 
  • The Rallis government quickly accepted the role of the government of national unity and urged all Greek security forces, including the Security Battalions, to cooperate with it.
  • The only place where there was turmoil in the handover was Thessaloniki, where ELAS forces, commanded by Euripides Bakirtzis and Markos Vafiadis, entered the city on 30 October against orders. The Gendarmerie, which had received permission for administration from Gen. Scobie, then requested control, but ELAS accused them of collaboration and disarmed them and detained the gendarmes.  
  • The disagreements between EAM and Papandreou existed the whole time, but came to a head later. In 25 October, Siantos and Papandreou agreed that all armed units must be disarmed, the difference, which they did not discover until later, was that Siantos included the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade in this category, whereas Papandreou did not. By 9 November, this gulf had been discovered and Siantos said that ELAS would never disarm without guarantees that all other units, including the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade, had also been disarmed and refused to disband the National Militia. 
    • Papandreou believed that he had found a mutually acceptable solution on 20 November, proposing to put all officers of the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade on leave, to families in Egypt, in return for ELAS disarming. The British, however, declared this to be unacceptable and forced him to renegotiate. 
    • On 22 November, Papandreou created the Supreme Military Council, led by Othonaios, that would vet all senior officers of the new army and the new National Guard. It was composed of 2 ELAS generals, 2 republicans, and 2 royalists: Gens. Othonaios, Theodoros Manetas, Ptolemy Sarigiannis, Emmanuel Mantakas, Katheniotis, and Vlachos. He made certain that none of the anticommunists were members of EDES or the 'Holy Corps'. 
    • Scobie met with Sarafis and Zervas on 26 November and ordered EDES and ELAS to demobilize. Zervas agreed, but Sarafis said he would only do so after receiving an order from the 'Free Greece' and EAM members of the national unity government. 
    • On 1 December, national unity government voted to demand the unilateral disarmament of the National Militia, prompting the resignation of all EAM ministers. After this, EAM called for protests on 3 December and a general strike on 4 December. Papandreou ordered the total disarmament of all paramilitaries and placed the police under the Ministry of the Army. 
      • Although Papandreou initially gave permission for a demonstration on 3 December, he then revoked it. EAM carried on anyway. The remaining Greek government then ordered the City Police to prevent the 3 December demonstration by any means necessary, including force. 
  • The 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade was a loyal Monarchist unit of the Greek Army specifically sent to Athens as a check on communist influence. It did not have its heavy weaponry because it did not have sufficient transport boats. 
    • The Rimini Brigade arrived on 8 November, was celebrated by the townsfolk, but treated with suspicion by EAM. They believed that the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade was part of a plot to restore King Georgios II by force. 
  • On 31 October, Scobie, other members of British senior command, Papandreou, and Deputy Minister of the Army, Lambros Lambrianidis, met and agreed on the creation of a National Guard. It was initially decided to create the National Guard by conscription based on lottery, with members of partisans being specifically excluded, and specifically drawing from veterans. Officers of ELAS and EDES would be allowed to become officers in the Greek Army. 
    • It was intended for the National Guard to start forming up, based mainly on veteran officers, on 24 November, and to assume active duty by 1 December. There were supposed to be 14 brigades in Attica, Patras, and Kalamata, with each brigade composed of 600 men and 30 officers, further divided into 4 battalions, each composed of 5 divisions (the Athens brigade was called Megaron). The process was overseen by Lt.Col. Godfrey Hobbes. The actually organization was horribly disorganized, with no weapons or uniforms or facilities available for those who signed up, although the British tried to solve these problems. 
      • The lack of uniforms was a consistent problem and during the fighting of the December Incident, National Guardsmen had to wear blue armbands to distinguish themselves from ELAS fighters. 
    • Believing in the plan to integrate ELAS officers into the National Guard, Siantos sent out a telegram on 22 November for ELAS officers, especially KKE members, to join the National Guard as quickly as possible and be among its first class. 
    • The process of selecting officers for the National Guard was an absolute failure, as the KKE used its veto to dismiss 281 of the 292 veteran officers proposed to run the National Guard, often because many of those suggested had either served in EDES or the Security Battalions. By 28 November, they had managed to approve around 20 to 40 more officers, many from the police. 
      • Lambrianidis, with the permission of Papandreou, went behind the back of EAM and appointed 250 officers of the National Guard without the approval of ELAS, all of them anticommunists and some from the Security Battalions. Under pressure from EAM, Lambrianidis was then dismissed and replaced by Ptolemy Sarigiannis on 23 November. 
    • Upon the creation of the National Guard, the city police and gendarmerie were meant to hand over their weapons and surrender their duties to the National Guard. 
    • All of these plans were abandoned upon the breakout of the December Incident. Despite being largely unformed, the National Guard as it existed was mobilized on 1 December. The ranks of the National Guard rapidly expanded during the December Incident. 
  • By late November, it was clear that conflict was likely to break out between ELAS and everyone else, probably on 10 December. In preparation, Evert put all policemen with EAM sympathize on leave beginning 30 November and Papandreou ordered the full rearmament of the Gendarmerie. 
    • In preparation for conflict after 1 December, Siantos was made head of the ELAS Central Committee and Sarafis was made Chief of Staff, subordinate to the committee. It also activated a plan to seize control of Athens using armed force. 
  • The December Incident occurred as part of the rally in Syntagma Square. City Police beat protesters and then opened fire on the crowd. Many members of the demonstration were killed. 
    • On 4 December, EAM held another rally and public funeral to commemorate the dead. At this rally, Dimitris Partsalidis, General Secretary of EAM Central Committee, denounced the government of Papandreou. On the evening of 4 December, ELAS units entered Athens and occupied police stations in Athens and Piraeus. 
  • Orders for the Greek military were conveyed between big cities by radio. 
  • The Rizopastas newspaper (organ of KKE) on 1 December accused the government of organizing a rightwing coup. 
  • As the insurrection began on 3 December, the Papandreou government's control was limited to central Athens on an axis of Alexandras Avenue-Kyriakou-Acharnon Square-Vathis Square-Agios Konstantinos-Piraeus Street-Makrygianni Island Area-Zappeion-Rigillis Square-Vasilerosilos Scholipofis Asofiros Stofias-Sofia Gesion-Mesogeion Avenue, with many exceptions. There were even more isolated outposts, like the Makrygiannis Gendarmerie School. 
  • The gendarmerie had been almost entirely disarmed by 3 December and most units were waiting to surrender their weapons and position to the National Guard. 
    • On the night of 3 December, Papandreou called the Chief of the Gendarmerie, Col. Argyrios Papargyris, to his residence at Hotel Great Britain and told him to use the gendarmerie to suppress ELAS. Col. Papargyris was excited about the order, but his forces were spread across the city and in a state of disrepair. 
      • One of the few defensible gendarmerie positions was at the Makyrgiannis regiment. This base and the Goudi gendarmerie station were the two key tactical points protecting central Athens. ELAS did not realize this and never made an attack on these positions with full force. 
        • The Goudi position was defended by the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade, a small number of British tanks, 600 rearmed Battalionists, and the special anticommunist group of the Gendarmerie. 
        • The gendarmerie school at Goudi was defended by the 400 regular gendarmes, an additional 120 gendarmes who made it to the area, and 50 EDES fighters. They had only 580 rifles, 10 machine guns (7 Sten models), and 3 mortars. Ammunition was low, but supply lines remained open to Greek government positions at Goudi. 
        • The Makyrgiannis gendamerie was commanded by Col. Georgios Samouil and his deputy, Lt.Col. Evangelos Sofras. They had around 435 men and 117 officers. There were another 500 anticommunist forces in the area, but outside of the main gendarmerie complex. Their armament was limited to 289 Italian Arabid rifles, with 10,500 rounds of ammunition, and 24 Mannlicher-Schönauer rifles, with 700 rounds of ammunition. They also had 3 Breda machine guns, with 600 cartridges of ammo, 11 Sten machine guns, with 1,650 cartridges, and 3 atomic mortars with 30 20mm rounds and 5 15mm rounds. 
      • Most gendarmes were at central stations, but those in the Athens suburbs remained at isolated outposts and totally unarmed. Small gendarme detachments also were on guard duty around the city. In total, Athens had 5,700 gendarmes, another 500 out in the suburbs, and an additional 1,000 men enrolled from the National Guard. 
    • The gendarme detachments in the suburbs were ordered to abandon their posts and fall in on 4 December, but most were killed or captured by ELAS. 
    • After the fight against ELAS began, the government gathered disbanded elements of the Gendarmerie and converted them into detachments of the National Guard, with the 141st battalion being formed this way. It was split into 3 battalions, each of 100 men and 15 officers. Each battalion was divided into divisions and each division led by a lieutenant. 
      • It was originally created to guard against ELAS attacks on parliament, but after anticommunist victory in Makyrgiannis, some of the gendarmes there were transferred and the 141st battalion joined the British 13th Armored Brigade. 
    • Col. Samouil requested additional ammunition at the Makyrgiannis gendarmerie station, so he was sent two 37mm mortars with 500 rounds, of which 45 were armor piercing, and a tank (armored car??) with 3 Breda heavy machine guns with 2,750 rounds. 
  • ELAS launched an attack on the Goudi school on the morning of 4 December, deploying the 2nd ELAS Division, a regiment of the Roumeli Division, a battalion of the 2nd Athens Brigade, and a battalion of the 6th Corinth regiment. The attack featured calvary and machine guns and lasted for 3 days, until the evening of 6 December. 
    • The attack was resumed on 9 December, with ELAS being joined by an additional regiment and armed citizens. Prior to this, ELAS also attacked reinforcements and Red Cross units. During this last attack, the number of ELAS fighter was around 5,000 and equipped with heavy mortars, machine guns, antitank guns, grenades, and dynamite. 
  • The attack on the Makyrgiannis gendarmerie, which began on 6 December, featured the use of dynamite and explosive to destroy defenses. The ELAS strategy was to explode their way into the defenses and then use gasoline to burn down the buildings. The defense of the buildings was organized by Lt. Col. Konstantinos Costopoulos, a former member of the Laconia Security Battalions. 

  • ELAS never fully informed its membership of the details of the Caserta Agreement, fearing it would prompt revolt. Most field commanders wanted to actively fight the British and other Greek government forces. 
    • Many ELAS members felt betrayed by their leadership not allowing them to take immediate military action against the fleeing Nazis or seize positions that had been reserved for the British by political agreement. 
    • The ELAS 10th Division and 9th Division, led by Markos Vafeiadis, Bakirjis, and Kititsas, entered Salonika on 28 October against the orders of EAM. A contingent of 11 British commanders arrived on 29 October, but was turned away. 
      • Britain did not enter Salonika directly, but did station an Indian division outside of the city at the Karabournou camp on 10 November.
  • ELAS forces were in place to attack fleeing German units from Athens and take the city, but did not received the orders from HQ, which did not receive permission from the British military command. This was part of a deal by which the Nazi general agreed not to blow up the Marathon dam and flood Athens. 
  • The Soviet agent meeting with the EAM politburo was Lt.Col. Grigoriy Popov. 
  • The ELAS Second Division under Ortestis entered the suburbs of Athens, having been denied permission to enter the city itself. He later received permission from Spiliotopoulos, on the condition that his men be spread among the National Militia and dispersed. 
  • It had been agreed that Georgios II would not return to Greece until after elections had been held, instead staying in London. It had already been decided that Archbishop Damaskinos, a physically huge man, would be regent. 
  • Upon arriving in Athens, the British arrested collaborators alongside the Greek police and the ELAS National Militia. All collaborators were given over to British control, either held in Averof prison or released. 
    • There was no immediate action taken against the Security Battalions, despite the Caserta Agreement. The Battalions who surrendered to Britain in Peloponnese and Halkidiki were trained by the British in the handling of modern arms for future use against communists. 
    • Police and gendarmes under Papandreou's control also released almost all collaborators turned over to them. They also did nothing to stop a prison break from occurring at Syngrou. 
  • Salonika had 68,000 Jews before the war, of which around 2,000 survived. 
  • Lamia is the site of ELAS HQ. It was at this location that there was a general meeting of ELAS military leadership on 11 November. Despite the fierce objections of Aris Velouchiotis, the political leadership decided that no immediate action be taken against the British. 
  • After liberation, ELAS organized detachments of the National Militia along the same lines as the Greek City Police, with the same numbers and organization, to carry out arrest of collaborators, who were then turned over to the Greek government. 
  • ELAS sought the support of Tito and contacted him for assistance and advice in November 1944, believing that his model of unilaterally capturing Belgrade might be a good example. Tito, however, was occupied with the siege of Trieste and could not spare units to assist ELAS.
  • Siantos made the decision to reject settlement with the Papandreou government, convinced by the arguments of Giannis Ioannidis during a meeting on 27 November. He convinced the rest of the EAM committee of this position on 29 November, after the final breakdown of negotiations over the army with the Papandreou government. 
  • Total ELAS units in the Attica region in early December were around 25,000, placed under the control of Siantos and Gen. Mandakas. Athens ELAS, the 2nd Attica Division, the 3rd Peloponnese Division, and the 13th Roumeli Division were set aside for the purpose of capturing the capital. The units of the 8th Epirus Division, 1st Thessaly Division, Calvary Brigade, and the 6th, 9th, 10th, and 11th Macedonian Divisions were tasked with defeated EDES and placed under the command of Aris and Sarafis. 
  • On 2 December, a British aircraft flew over Athens and dispensed leaflets from Gen. Scobie saying "I am going to protect you and your government against any attempt at a coup d'etet and against unconstitutional acts of violence". 
  • The winter of 1944 was cold and rainy, although the sun came out on 3 December. 
  • The December Incident began with shooting on the crowd from the top of the Police Building. Additional fire opened from the roof of the Royal Palace. The crowd scattered, some trying to climb into the royal gardens and others ducking for cover behind the walls of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. 
    • The shooting lasted between 2 or 3 minutes and left 28 dead and over 100 injured. 
    • In the aftermath of the shooting, the crowd continued an even angrier protest and waved around cloths soaked in the blood of the victims. Some policemen joined the protesters. 
    • There was a funeral procession in Athens on 4 December that passed through Constitution Square and attracted 400,000 to 500,000 mourners. British troops were not at the event. The funeral column was attacked as it passed by the Hermes Hotel, as X members fired from the windows, resulting in 100 casualties. 
  • The general strike took effect on 4 December and paralyzed the entire country.
  • During the ELAS attacks in Piraeus and Athens on 4 December, the membership wore white scarves to identify each other and used the password 'Elektra Bouboulina'. ELAS was generally successful in its attacks on police stations, occasionally having to use dynamite to blow out walls. 
    • Attacks on schools and barracks housing imprisoned Security Battalions were dangerous because the British had rearmed the Battalionists. 

  • At the time of liberation in late 1944, the total strength of ELAS was 43,700 men, 1,070 captains, 700 active duty officers, 1,500 reserve officers, and 600 agents of PEEA. 
  • The other armed forces in Greece during this time were 15,000 Battalionists, split between 3,000 in Athens, 9,000 in the Peloponnese, and 3,000 in Central Greece, and 10,000 men in other anticommunist organizations such as EDES and rightwing groups armed by the Germans.  
  • ELAS was almost single handedly responsible for harrying German units as they retreated from Greece following Soviet offensives into the Balkans. Almost no British units participated in this offensive. 
    • ELAS was also primarily responsible for fighting off German and collaborationist forces in most of Greece, liberating cities and then handing them over to the British. 
  • After the Varkiza Accords, large amounts of food and weapons were taken from ELAS, as were over 5,000 mines, 11 boats, 350 animals, 14 radios, and all ELAS weapons, including 81 large mortars, 138 personal mortars, 1,412 machine guns, 713 automatic rifles, 48,793 rifles, and 57 antitank rifles.
  • The national unity government in the Peloponnese was led by Panagiotis Kanellopoulos.

  • On 26 December, British soldiers discovered that dynamite had been placed in the sewers under the Great Britain Hotel, which housed many members of the Greek government and the British administration, including Gen. Scobie and Churchill. 
    • KKE members wired the explosives under the hotel with the plan to blow it up on 25 December. They launched the operation on 22 December with a team of 150 ELAS soldiers using maps of the city sewer system. 
    • The plan to blow up the Great Britain Hotel was abandoned on the orders of Spyros Kalodikis, Second Secretary of the Communist Organization of Athens, who alerted the team that Churchill had arrived at the hotel. 
  • Information of the Great Britain Hotel plot was suppressed by both communist and anticommunist press. 
  • During this period of late 1944, rightwing groups pushed the theory that ELAS was supported by the Nazis to undermine Britain. This view was supported by rightwing papers like 'Hellas', which had the semi official support of the Papandreou government. 
  • Lt.Col. Popov was also staying at Hotel Great Britain during this period, a fact of which the KKE appears to have been unaware. 

  • EAM governance in Athens was cruel and brutal. Even during the December Incident, the communists carried out purges and persecuted political enemies. Possession of Trotskyist newspaper carried the death penalty, while possession of bourgeois newspaper or a picture of the king were both causes of suspicion. 
  • ELAS entirely ignored the laws of war, at one point disguising a mortar with a Red Cross flag. 

  • After communist defeat in 1945, there was widespread persecution of leftists. In June 1945, the newspaper offices of the KKE are attacked by fascist gangs and wrecked.
  • Greece is a very poor country with primitive methods of agriculture, few good roads, almost no railways still functional after the war, and were most of the population lives in thatched huts. 

  • Knowledge of Britain's massacre of leftists in Egypt was present at least among EAM members in Greece in 1944. 
  • The Battalions were rapidly rearmed by the British authorities and were included in the National Guard, with 8 of the 14 officers appointed to create the new National Guard being Battalionists. 
  • British armored cars were present at the 3 December massacre, along they did not participate. 
  • During the December Incident, Papandreou and other government ministers fled their previous accommodations and sought refuge at British headquarters in the Great Britain Hotel. 

https://www.jstor.org/stable/260759 (stopped at 1946, pg. 491)
  • The Communists in Greece did not enjoy the diplomatic or military support of the USSR. 
  • The first round of the Greek civil war began in 1943 with fighting between ELAS and EDES, the latter supported by the British. Conflict broke out again in 1944, with ELAS fighting the Greek army and the British. This second round ended with the Varkiza Accords in February 1945, in which ELAS agreed to disband in return for an amnesty. 
    • Neither side fully obeyed the Varkiza Accords, with the Greek government actively persecuting communists and ELAS hiding weapons and retreating into the mountains, where it would reform as the Greek Democratic Army (DSE) in 1946, backed by Yugoslavia and Bulgaria.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/20081806 (stopped at 1946, pg.482)
  • There was a brief period when the areas controlled by EAM were governed separated under the name 'Free Greece'. 
  • Although many women supported ELAS, there were relatively few female ELAS fighters. The number of women soldiers greatly increased after ELAS reformed as DSE, growing to between 20% and 30% of all DSE fighters. 

  • EDES cooperated with the Nazis on a number of occasions, informing the Nazis of ELAS locations. 
  • During the 1946 parliament, the leadership praised Zervas as the champion of the national resistance against Axis occupation.
    • This declaration ignores that EDES played only a minor role in the resistance against Axis occupation and was mostly involved in fighting ELAS. Its military and political orientation was focused on Greece after Allied victory and thus on securing a position for Zervas in the government. 

  • The occupation of Greece began on 27 April 1941, when Nazi forces entered Athens and planted a swastika flag on the Acropolis. The country was split between the Germans, Bulgarians, and Italians, but the Nazis exercised the real authority. 
  • The main partisan group was EAM, although other major partisan groups existed: EDES under Zervas and National and Social Liberation (EKKA), led by Dimitrios Psarros. The primary difference in this group was that EAM was national and had a political character, whereas EKKA and EDES operated regionally and were purely military organizations. EKKA and EDES were also more dependent on individual leaders than was EAM.
    • EAM controlled so much of the country by 1944 that it represented a real challenge to the legitimacy of the internationally recognized Greek government in Cairo. The position of the exiled government was only secured by the security of a national unity government in September 1944.
  • EAM was founded in Athens on 27 September 1941 by a group of communists and far left members of the Agrarian Party. Despite its communist base, the founders believed that the best way for the organization to grow was to encourage a broad front against Axis occupation and promoting free elections following liberation, based on the model of the popular front against the Metaxas dictatorship. It deliberately avoided discussion of class warfare in its literature.
    • EAM was composed of five parties, each of which had a seat at its central committee: KKE, represented by Siantos; the Union of Popular Democracy (ELD), represented by Alexander Svolos; Socialist Party of Greece (SKE), represented by Dimitrios Strates; United Socialist Party of Greece (ESKE), represented by Dimitrios Asimakes; and Agrarian Party of Greece (AKE), represented by Konstantinos Gavrielides.
    • EAM also organized a number of organizations which held much of the movement's power, particularly ELAS; EPON, the youth association; EEAM, the worker's liberation front; and Mutual Assistance Aid, the medical corps. ELAS likely had 50,000 soldiers, with between 500,000 and 1 million additional persons participating in other EAM groups. 
      • These groups attracted mainly poor members of the population, but also had support among other sectors. A number of university professors joined, as did a number of bishops and priests, and a number of Greek officers, including 16 generals, 34 colonels, and 1,500 lower ranks. Almost all labor leaders were part of EEAM. 
    • The EAM central committee had one representatives from the 5 political parties, one from each of the organizations, and one from each of the approximately 25 regional central committee.
  • EAM began setting up local governments in October 1942. Villages gathered together and elected a village committee that would run the village, with various subcommittees created for security, school, church, food and social welfare, and control and oversight. Village general committees then worked together to establish district general committees and courts.
    • A group of lawyers in Athens drew up a set of laws and procedures for courts to follow and this was adopted for all legal proceedings in 'Free Greece' in December 1943. The courts were democratically elected and frequently gave out harsh punishments, such as the death penalty for theft. Proceedings were public and there was constant participation from the audience. 
    • At the local level, the EAM administration of 'Free Greece' was based on the 'guerrilla committee', responsible for collecting taxes and supplies from each village, and the EAM committee, which was usually led by a communist.
      • Villages EAM committee chairman from a region got together and elected a EAM committee for that district, which then appointed its own chairman. The chairman of multiple district committees then got together to elect a prefectural EAM committee; the process then repeated itself at the regional level, with this regional EAM committee representing an area of Greece as large as Thessaly or Patras. Each of the regions had representation on the EAM central committee.
      • As the KKE was the only party with a national network, most EAM village organizations were founded and controlled by communists. This meant that communists, despite only constituting 10% of EAM members, dominated central committees at each level and, because they controlled the regional committees, also had a majority on the national central committee. 
  • EAM founded ELAS in December 1942 as a military branch of the party. ELAS had two governing bodies, the high command and the central committee, both appointed by EAM. The high command was responsible for military matters, whereas all political issues were dealt with by the ELAS central committee. 
    • The division of military and political authority in ELAS was also expressed through army organization. Each unit had both a military commander, often a former member of the Greek army, and a 'kapetanos', a political officer drawn from the ranks and responsible for propaganda, morale, and relations with the civilian population. At the highest levels of regional and general HQs, ELAS also had a representative of EAM. 
      • The kapetanos of a unit was almost always a Communist, as were almost all EAM representatives at the regional and national level. 
    • EAM established ELAS high command on 19 May 1943 with Stefanos Sarafis, a former army officer, as military commander, Velouchiotis as kapetanos, and Vasilis Samariniotis as the EAM representative. Both Velouchiotis and Samariniotis were Communists.
  • The Political Committee of National Liberation (PEEA) was created on 10 March 1944 to govern liberated territories. It had the ability to overrule local democratically elected government and imposed a centralized administration on the country. It also organized the National Militia. It was intended as a provisional government that would be replaced after democratic elections.
    • The original membership of PEEA was Euripides Bakirjes, a liberal former army officer; Emmanuel Mandakas, a leftist former army officer; Elias Tsirimokos, member of ELD; Gavrielides; and Siantos. Bakirjes was later replaced by Svolos. 
    • Most of the functions of PEEA were abandoned in May 1944 after EAM agreed to participate in a national unity government at the Lebanon Conference.

  • EKKA was another partisan group, also known as the 5/42 Evzones Regiment, based around the republican officer Dimitrios Psarros. It was formed in Central Greece in Spring 1943. It was disbanded by ELAS on two separate occasions in 1943, but then allowed to reform. 
    • There were tensions within EKKA over cooperation with ELAS, which Psarros supported, but others, grouped around Cpt. Thymios Dedousis, strongly opposed due to anticommunism.
    • EKKA backed ELAS in its conflict against EDES in 1943, but later experienced tensions of its own with ELAS groups in Central Greece. This escalated into open conflict on 17 April 1944, when ELAS attacked EKKA after they refused to disband. After a fierce battle, EKKA surrenders, but many of its officers and men were executed by ELAS. 

  • There had always been support for Nazism and fascism among the Greek ruling class and many were eager to side with the Axis occupational authorities, including Gen. Tsolakoglu. 
    • In April 1943, the Germans appointed Ioannis Rallis, a monarchist, to be the head of the collaborationist government, stressing its anticommunist credentials. He created the Security Battalions, anticommunist groups often drawn from the ranks of republican partisans whom ELAS had forcibly disbanded. They were poorly disciplined and committed numerous rapes, thefts, and murders.
  • There was immediate resistance to the Axis occupation, particularly because the Italians were hated enemies who had been losing the war. This manifested in civil disobedience, as well as sabotage of ships in Piraeus and ammunition dumps in Salonika as early as Summer 1941. Armed resistance broke out in Fall 1941 in northern Greece, but was crushed by collective punishment. 
    • Organized resistance concentrated around the KKE following its foundation of EAM in September 1941 and ELAS in 1942. Starvation and threats of a civil mobilization that would force Greek civilians to work in Germany greatly increased the number of people joining the partisans. 
    • ELAS had a centralized structure, but most of its units were heavily local and based around dominant personalities, very few of whom were communist. Most soldiers fought to end the occupation and the dominance of the Athenian elite. Many resented EAM placing them under the command of aged officers and listening to political decisions by the central committee. 
  • During the Axis occupation, Greece experienced a famine that killed over 300,000 people. The food shortage was exacerbated by Bulgaria's ethnic cleansing of Thrace, which drove displaced refugees into Central Greece. Nazi reprisals and collective punishment against villages further increased food scarcity. 
  • Axis control over Athens became precarious already by 1943, with large scale marches held in honor of poet Kostas Palamas on 5 March 1943 drew a crowd of 7,000 that sang nationalist songs and was dispersed by gendarmes, resulting in 5 deaths. Strikes became more common from this point out, as did marches against occupation, both often organized by EAM. 
  • The areas of 'Free Greece' were largely run by autonomous village committees based on mass meetings and public democracy. They generally supported the KKE, but sometimes clashed with party ideals, particularly because most villagers were conservative, restricting the influence of women and young people, as well as supporting large landowners. 
  • The Nazis and collaborationists began carrying out blocos in late 1943 and 1944 in response to ELAS having taken control of some parts of Athens, particularly Kokkina. The police, Battalionists, and gendarme terrorized communities, especially the 'Special Security' units trained by the SS. 
  • Following the December Incident, Britain arrested over 10,000 leftists, deporting many of them to Egypt. ELAS responded by kidnapping thousands of wealthy Greeks. 
  • Only a minority of ELAS rejected the Varkiza Agreement, choosing to the return to guerrilla warfare instead; Aris Velouchiotis led one of these groups. Greece was then terrorized by a rightwing backlash led by the National Guard, composed primarily of former Battalionists. They imprisoned former partisans, who outnumbered collaborators in Greek prisons. 

  • One of the first things that the National Guard did after being established in provincial towns across Greece was release collaborators from prison, often arming them and forming them into gangs to attack members of ELAS and the KKE. Although officially condemned, these gangs operated alongside the National Guard and the Gendarmerie. This trend began as early as March 1945, with anticommunist groups often equipped with weapons surrendered by ELAS in the Varkiza Accords. 
    • In Lamia, these nationalist paramilitaries were lead by Kostas Vourlakis and Thymios Tsamadias, allegedly to counter the influence of 9 'anarchist' groups in the area of Fthiotida, Evritania and Parnassida, with between 50 to 100 members. In May 1945, Tsamadias organized a gang of 40 villagers, motivated by personal resentment against EAM demanding use of his pastureland. The other leader, Vourlakis, was an livestock rustler whose brothers were killed by ELAS, so he collected 10 others who had been victims of ELAS violence and founded a gang. These local gangs often had pull with anticommunist politicians. 
    • The National Guard in an area selected former collaborators from among the population, finding those of good moral standing and nationalist beliefs, and had them become informers. They were instructed to report everything in that village to the National Guard. The Gendarmerie was particularly effective at this, as it had sway in rural areas and its membership was reliably conservative and royalist. They were able to gather masses of information on EAM members, resulting in their imprisonment or execution. 
    • The national government was deeply unhappy with the chaos in the countryside and the existence of armed paramilitaries. They demanded that these groups be disbanded and sanctioned military commanders who allowed their existence. In May 1945, such groups were outlawed by the military commanders of Thessaly and Western Macedonia. By July 1945, the action of anticommunist paramilitaries had been denounced by major political groups, including the British and the Liberal Party. 
  • During this period of chaos, peasants also armed themselves, either to defend against the anticommunist gangs or to participate in looting and banditry themselves.
  • In Summer 1946, the anticommunist paramilitaries came under the control of the Greek government, dominated by the People's Party, which had strong ties to these groups. Local politicians used government funds to pay and finance these paramilitaries in exchange for their assistance against communists and in rigging the referendum in favor of the monarchy.
    • The direct government support of the rightist paramilitaries created a state of civil war in rural Greece, as the depredations of the rightists led villagers to flee to the mountains and join the communists, who presence and attacks were used as an excuse to build up larger rightist paramilitaries and gave more villagers a reason to join the anticommunist gangs. 
    • In October 1946, the rightist paramilitaries were reorganized into the Rural Security Units (MAY) and the Prosecution Detachment Units (MAD), both under the control of the local gendarmerie or army. In essence, this gave rightist gangs legal standing in Greece. It also formed new units under the command of gendarmes and army officers, with men usually drawn from former members of EDES or the Security Battalions. 
      • MAD and MAY units continued criminal activity after their creating, looting and murdering in villages, and extorting supplies that were then resold in cities at higher prices through a criminal racket. These groups attacked not only communists, but anyone who threatened their power and commercial interests. 

  • ELAS had difficulty recruiting among the Slavs of northern Greece because of deep distrust between Greeks and Slavs and the presence of a large number of German soldiers in the region. In response to these issues, it created the Slavic National Liberation Front (SNOF) to target this population. 
    • SNOF was given a significant amount of autonomy from the KKE and EAM, including running its own propaganda operations. The distance between SNOF and other groups lead to the dissolution of the group by EAM in May 1944. In Summer 1944, ELAS will reactive some units, but there is consistent conflict between these Slavic paramilitaries and the rest of ELAS, with most Slavic paramilitaries being transferred entirely to Yugoslav control. 

  • EDES originally shared power on Corfu with ELAS, but, despite the accommodating attitude of the EDES commander, EDES was attacked the defeated by ELAS, with its primary leadership executed. 
  • EDES mainly functioned through personal relationships between Zervas and local chiefs. These personal ties were further reinforced through the dispensation of supplies and money given to Zervas by the British. 
  • Epirus became the center of EDES control, rather than ELAS, because the Epirus mountainfolk were generally conservative and opposed to both EAM's modernizing social policies and to the hierarchical control that EAM wanted to exercise. EDES gave its Epirote fighters considerable autonomy, leeway to engage in traditional practices like animal rustling, and didn't challenge conservative social norms. 

  • EDES and ELAS began fighting in October 1943, ending their conflict with a peace deal signed at the Plaka Bridge on 29 February 1944. 
  • EDES did conclude some kind of partial truce with the Germans during the period of conflict with ELAS, partially encouraged by British high command, which instructed Zervas to avoid costly participation in resistance against Axis occupation. However, many units of EDES clearly ignored this truce, as fighting between EDES and the Nazis continued. 

  • During the height of the Greek civil war, the anticommunists revived the older Greek and Ottoman practice of taking severed heads as a trophy. There are numerous occasions of the heads of ELAS or DSE guerrillas being taken and displayed. 

  • On 13 December 1943, the Germans, after taking heavy casualties fighting ELAS in Kerpini, Achaea, enacted collective punishment by killing the entire male population of Kalavryta. 
  • By December 1943, the KKE is aware of rumors that the collaborationist government of Rallis and many members of the Security Battalions and other anticommunist collaborators believe that they will be pardoned by Britain if they fight communism. 

  • After the surrender of ELAS in the Varkiza Accords, the Greek government allowed a campaign of 'white terror' led by far right and monarchist groups against the left. Many of these rightist paramilitaries had been German collaborators and had been neither disarmed nor arrested following liberation. 
    • DSE was founded by Markos Vafiadis on 28 October 1946 in response to the violent persecution of leftists during this period. This was based on prior meetings of the KKE, which had recognized the need for a return to armed struggle, but had not decided on a specific strategy. 
    • It was during this extremely oppressive political atmosphere that the constitutional referendum was held in September 1946, where it was decided to restore the monarchy. 
  • The KKE abstained from the 31 March 1946 elections, believing that their participation would give legitimacy to the government, encourage electoralism among the population, and distract from the armed struggle. 
    • Later on, this was seen as a major strategic mistake for the party. 
  • Responding to a KKE attack on a gendarmerie station on election day in 1946, the new Greek government became even more intolerant of leftism. It passed extraordinary security measures, including a decision to reopen concentration camps in 1947. 
  • The DSE lost the civil war, largely due to its failure to manage supplies in southern Greece correctly and its poor foreign connections, as it accepted the Stalinist line despite the lack of any support from the USSR and was actively hostile towards Tito. After its defeat in 1949, however, most of the DSE retreated into Albania, preparing to again challenge the Greek government. 
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González-Ruibal, Alfredo. "Fascist Colonialism: The Archaeology of Italian Outposts in Western Ethiopia (1936-41)". International Journal of Historical Archaeology, Vol.14, No.4 (2010): 547-574.

  González-Ruibal, Alfredo. "Fascist Colonialism: The Archaeology of Italian Outposts in Western Ethiopia (1936-41)". Internationa...