III THE COURCE AND PROBLEMS OF A SAGA - Part 03

It was the second time Macedonian people and their democratic rights were attacked by the CPG during Zahariadis’s leadership.

As I mentioned earlier, the first major attack, organized and implemented by Zahariadis and the CPG, was ten years ago. This was a general attack against the Greek reactionaries which led to the abolition of the Greek people’s democratic rights and freedoms with the rise of the Fourth of August dictatorship which cracked down on the CPG itself.

This new large-scale attack on the Macedonian people and on their democratic rights, backed by Zahariadis and the CPG, was again a sure sign of a general offensive by the Greek reactionaries who were openly supported from the outside. This was also a bad harbinger for the Greek people and for the CPG itself. When a communist party gives up on the soul of the labour movement and on the consistency of democracy, then life becomes very difficult not only for sustaining democracy and the workers movement but also for the avant-garde, the CPG itself. And since then, we have witnessed Greece sliding towards a reactionary regime. The labour movement began to weaken from within, experiencing failure after failure, and in the end, its avant-garde, the CPG, finally fell apart. Even the late Giannoulis, an unpopular CPG activist in Macedonia, surprised by the decision of his DAG superiors to have him shot, managed to leave his communist comrades a message: “Fight to cleanse the CPG from its class enemy agents, and do this as soon as possible...” (This was passed on as an anecdote in the DAG and NOF ranks). In the meantime the CPG broke up into several independent groups that fought each other while the reactionaries grew stronger and did their job.

The new CPG attitude towards the Macedonian national question, i.e. “not wanting to know about the national characteristics and aspirations of the Macedonian movement”, led Zahariadis to formulate his new policy towards the Macedonian people. The unification of military forces and NOF’s direct transfer under the CPG leadership did not in fact mean that NOF was recognized as a bearer of the national characteristics and aspirations of the Macedonian people. In practice there was no such recognition. Judging by the events that followed, one can conclude that the unification was in fact only a CPG front for attacking NOF, and the beginning of new struggle tactics from within.

Here are some of the more characteristic events of that time in this relationship:

Soon after the unification, the Macedonian military forces, that until then had their bases on the Paiak, Kaimakchalan and Vicho massifs, were taken from Macedonia and sent south to central and southern Greece (spring-summer 1947). However, during the CPG Central Committee Second Plenum, held February 1946, it was concluded that: “In order to cover their real plans and deceive and divide the people, the Monarcho-Fascists reactionaries, the united plutocracy and their foreign leaders, constantly and relentlessly spread propaganda that the CPG wants autonomy for Macedonia. They persisted in spreading rumours that the CPG wants to give Macedonia away and insisted that Pan-Slavism was a mortal danger to Hellenism…” (“CPG 1931-1952,” p. 149.) In the meantime, the appearance of the Slav speaking Macedonian units in the Greek villages in central and southern Greece, for local people who until then had never heard of any “Slavs” living anywhere in the Greek state, was confirmation of these claims against the CPG. And as I have already said, these local Greeks and EAM supporters flew into a panic when they saw the Macedonian units, thinking that they were a Bulgarian army or some kind of legion of foreigners, despite the fact that their command was made up exclusively of Greeks. In other words the local Greek people were made to believe that Greek communists were leading a “Slav” invasion into Greece. As a result many of these local people were driven into the enemy camp where they became reserves and were used to fight against the revolution. After that, Eighth Division DAG command in Epirus was forced to order the Macedonians fighters to stop speaking Macedonian and singing Macedonian songs and to present themselves as Greeks in order to stop the panic.

Of course, anyone who knew anything about the situation in Greece would have easily predicted the consequences of this. Therefore, one cannot discount the fact that the Macedonians were sent to the Greek south to intensify the people’s revolution there and provide credibility to the theory that a “Slav danger” from the north was imminent. The CPG naturally should have known that this was going to happen and did this anyway. Why? Was it to show that a “Slav” invasion was taking place? Or was it for another reason?

The Macedonian units in Macedonia were formed and armed immediately after the Varkiza Agreement was signed. They were composed of prominent first-class Macedonian fighters and fought against the terror directed against them in the spring and summer of 1945. These units were composed of young elite Macedonian revolutionary fighters who were the most conscious and most active factor of the Macedonian national revolutionary movement. The Greeks feared them and did not want them in Macedonia. They especially did not want them to influence events in Macedonia and have more Macedonian people join them. So, in order to isolate them from the Macedonian people the CPG sent them south deep into Greece.

The fact that their presence and activities in southern Greece, which forced many Greeks to join the opponent, did not bother Zahariadis a bit, but quite the opposite, the stronger the opponent was the easier it would be to liquidate the Macedonian units. And as it turned out, the well-armed Monarcho-Fascists slowly liquidated the elite Macedonian units in difficult and uneven battles.

It is a fact that no reactionary Athenian government had ever succeeded in liquidating an elite Macedonian unit. The Athenian success this time can only be attributed to Zahariadis and the CPG leadership who set the right conditions for this to happen.

Here is another fact, no less characteristic in this relationship:

In early July 1947, at the same time the Macedonian elite units were falling victim to the Athens government in the far Greek south, due to Zahariadis’s treachery, the NOF Central Council Secretariat received a telegram from the CPG Central Committee Politburo signed by Zahariadis. According to this telegram, the full NOF Secretariat, as well as the agitation and propaganda department staff, were ordered to meet with Zahariadis at DAG headquarters in Gramos, located near the village Likorahi in Epirus. The predetermined route they were expected to take was as follows: Pass through the villages Prekopana, Kostarazi, Pesiak, via the church on the hill, etc. to Likorahi. As it turned out, because of some kind of meeting that had just ended, the people invited to the meeting with

Zahariadis ran into another group of people who were headed the same way. Then, around 1or 2 o’clock in the morning the mixed group reached the village Pesiak. There were no dogs barking in the dead of night and the village, composed of Macedonians and Asia Minor colonists, seemed to be abandoned so the group decided to enter the village and take a break.

While sitting around and having conversations, an old man, who overheard them speaking Macedonian, came out of his house and told them about the presence of a large Greek military unit in the area. He told them that the unit had arrived in the village four days ago and at the moment was watching the road as if waiting to ambush someone. So, had the group continued to follow the road, it would have fallen into the unit’s hands...

Since Zahariadis himself chose the time, place and route to take to the meeting, one can only speculate that this was an attempt by Zahariadis to get rid of the NOF leadership and behead the Macedonian liberation movement. Since there is no direct evidence to prove this, it remains an open question which undeniably links to Zahariadis’s characteristic behaviour towards the Macedonian people and their liberation movement. What gives this theory more credibility is Dzhodzho’s death. Dzhodzho was a NOF representative at DAG Headquarters for Central and Western Macedonia. He was executed at the same time (summer 1947) when the NOF leadership was set up for an ambush. While he was sent on an errand by the CPG he was surrounded and ambushed on the way by a hostile army unit. Dzhodzho used his last bullet on himself to avoid capture.

Vangel Shamardanov, battalion commissar and former NOF Board president for Voden Region, was killed, shot in the back. Months before he was killed, during a meeting he secretly admitted to me that he was afraid of being killed by his Greek comrades around him. Many other prominent Macedonian fighters were killed in various ways. This included Lazo Koroveshov who was a gun repair technician and had a shop in Lerin before the war started. He was a good person and influential among the Macedonian DAG fighters. He was killed while having his meal by the soup cauldron. A

supposedly “stray bullet” left him dead on the spot. The killer, of course, was never found.

No one really knows exactly how many Macedonians patriots were killed this way.

This new CPG application against the Macedonian fighters, i.e. the extermination of prominent Macedonians and bearers of the Macedonian national ideal, was carried out more intensely during the first year after the unification in 1947. Attempts were even made to take my (Pavle Rakovski) life. One time on August 24, 1949, through Major Hrisostomos, commander of DAG Tenth Division heavy weapons battalion in Gramos at Arapades Sector, and again on August 31, 1949, through Micho Sariovski, second lieutenant of the same battalion.

The First NOF Congress was organized by the CPG and held in January followed by the NOF Central Council First Plenum held seven months later, in August of the same year. The purpose for convening these bodies was to remove the NOF leaders, in a rather unscrupulous and rigid manner, and replace them with leaders who were “loyal to the Greek cause” and who, until yesterday happened to be anti-NOF people. And so, in the spirit of the new CPG attitude, much grafting was done to the top of NOF. So, the new top NOF leadership which was expected to lead the Macedonians people’s national revolutionary organization, turned into a “democratic political organization of the Slavophones” in the Greek state.

While the Macedonian cadres and fighters, bearers of the Macedonian national ideal, were being “eliminated” in various ways, dissemination of the Macedonian press was suppressed by all means possible. In May 1947, six months after the unification, for example, the NOF agitation and propaganda department was ordered by the CPG (Petris) to relocate to a village called Likorahi on Mount Voios in Epirus. This was so far away from any of the NOF organizations that the move made no sense to the staff of the agitation and propaganda department. But the department was told that it had to move if it wanted the CPG to support it. And while moving to its new location it was unable to issue any printed material at all. Then, on May 1, 1947, when it finally was set up and

ready to publish its first edition of the newspaper “Nepokoren”, it was only able to print 100 copies consisting of four small pages. This was because, according to the CPG, there was no paper available.

The second issue of “Nepokoren”, which carried the resolution of the First NOF Conference, held on May 20, 1947, printed only 70 copies, again because of a shortage of paper. Twenty copies were sent to the NOF District Committee in Voden Region. Unfortunately Tasios Gushopoulos-Makis, secretary of the CPG City Committee for the city Voden, destroyed the newspapers and arrested the courier who delivered them.

All in all, during the entire year in 1947, a terrible year for the many Macedonian patriots who lost their lives, “Nepokoren” managed to come out with only five publications with a circulation of about 200 copies each on average. This, without exaggeration, was almost nothing to what actually could have been done if the CPG had not imposed restrictions.

Further restrictions followed in 1948, with the reduction of agitation and propaganda staff. Only three people were left to work in the department, the rest were deployed to fight at the fronts. Eventually the department was reduced to one person, myself (Pavle Rakovski). Given the circumstances, it was no surprise that the Macedonian press was unable to produce much especially articles and information on the progress made in the liberated part of Macedonia, the People’s Republic of Macedonia, within the framework of the Yugoslav federation...

Zahariadis’s “new” attitude towards the Macedonian people came to the fore once again with the liquidation of the Macedonian amateur cultural and artistic group (KUG), founded in 1947 by NOF’s agitation and propaganda department. The group consisted of 12 girls from Macedonia ages 14-16. They were employed by the agitation and propaganda department to sing songs in a choir and perform for general audiences including the troops. They sang mostly folk songs and songs about the struggle in both Macedonian and Greek. As a folk group, the girls always wore their native folk dress and danced native folk dances. As a theatrical group, they

performed episodes on stage portraying battles at the front and revolutionary life behind the scenes in the face of the enemy. They also performed opera depicting the struggle. Their performances in the Macedonian villages and for the DAG units resembled an exceptionally beautiful manifestation of the folk culture of a nation being reborn in the flames of its liberation struggle, bringing deep satisfaction to civilians and soldiers alike. The group had a huge influence in mobilizing people to the war effort.

Ordinary logic dictated that groups such as these could greatly benefit the struggle and should be expanded to all the districts. Each district should have had at least one such group. But, of course, having such groups was contrary to the “new” CPG position with regard to the Macedonian national question. As a result the only group available was disbanded.

The initial reason given for disbanding the group was “DAG needed more fighters”. As a result, Foti Ilkovski, the group’s artistic director, was mobilized and sent to the front to fight. Later, the group was accused of allegedly spreading “nationalist” propaganda and “undermining” the CPG and DAG… accusations that held no water…

By the second half of 1948, the aforementioned acts committed by Zahariadis’s CPG became well-known to the Macedonian people. As the Macedonian people and the Macedonian DAG fighters became aware of these acts, especially of the executions, they became suspicious of the sincerity of Zahariadis’s leadership. The Macedonian struggle began to appear increasingly hopeless and pointless, especially after NOF’s leadership was replaced. Hundreds of fighters, among them prominent ones, began to desert. Little by little the atmosphere became tense and the new NOF leadership was left hanging in isolation. This unfavourable condition was turning NOF into an impotent organization. In other words Zahariadis’s “new” attitude did not allow NOF to “blossom” as a political organization. Moreover, NOF’s new leadership did not have the necessary support from the people in order for it to grow. So NOF began to shrivel. The new NOF to the Macedonian people was alien because its ideological content regarding the Macedonian people’s struggle did not support the Macedonian people’s ideals.

That is why it did not work.

So, in order to bolster the “new” NOF’s popularity, the CPG introduced some new and revolutionary tactics… which, in the end, did not work.

A new Macedonian printing house and a new and larger format were introduced to publish the already existing Macedonian newspapers “Nepokoren”, “Nova Makedonka” and “Bilten”, published regularly with circulations of two thousand copies each. This, however, did not help and neither did the words contained in the CPG Central Committee Fourth Plenum Resolution spoken on July 28-29, 1948, which preceded the creation of the new NOF leadership only by ten days. The resolution, among other things, said: “The Slavo-Macedonian people with their struggle are firmly building their free and equitable life. They strengthen and secure their rights with the blood of their sons and daughters in their national democratic future...” (“CPG from 1931 to 1952”, p. 175.)

All the things done however did not help. The situation still remained tense, dangerous and full of uncertainty. To stop the situation from getting worse, the CPG leadership, during its CPG Central Committee Fifth Plenum, held in January 1949, resolutely reverted back to its 1924 position with regards to the Macedonian national question. The Macedonian people were again recognized as a unique nation and their rights to self-determination were reinstated. “The Slavo-Macedonian people in northern Greece have given their all in the struggle and are fighting heroically with such self-sacrifice that it arouses admiration. There should be no doubt that, as a result of DAG’s victory in the people’s revolution, the Macedonian people will fully gain their national establishment, as they themselves want, for which they are shedding their blood today...” (“CPC from 1931 to 1952”, p. 195.)

To add more credence to his “verbal policy”, a few days later, during the NOF Central Council Second Plenum, held on February 3 and 4, 1949, Zahariadis personally suggested that some of the old NOF leaders be re-elected by vote to the NOF Secretariat, that is, to the Presidency that was elected during the NOF First Congress then

known as the NOF Central Committee Executive. Among those nominated were myself (Pavle Rakovski) and Paskal Mitrevski. Outside of that, the CPG’s anti-Macedonian policy, in essence, remained unchanged. At the same NOF Central Council Second Plenum, for example, even before he nominated me and Mitrevski’s for reelection, Zahariadis had already committed to what the NOF program would look like without any input from NOF. In other words everything was decided by Zahariadis alone even before the voting for new NOF personnel took place. This is what Zahariadis proposed:

“The Second NOF Congress will proclaim the new NOF programming principles that represent the century-long pursuit of our people. The Second Congress will declare the unification of the Macedonian people in one independent Macedonian state within the Balkan People’s Federation of Republics...” (“Nepokoren”, February 15, 1949.)

The above-mentioned CPG attitude was adopted during the time when the Bulgarian democratic people denied the national existence of the Macedonian people. Albania, Bulgaria, and Romania, at that time, were running hostile propaganda campaigns against Yugoslavia. This was done in the spirit of the well-known Informburo resolution. And since DAG was far from achieving a victory in Greece, the CPG itself had not yet taken a position on this issue. Thus, this attitude had been taken quite independently from the Balkan reality and was an absurdity.

Things were not what they seemed however.

It is unreasonable to believe that the CPG, with this act, could have wanted Bulgaria to recognize the national existence of the Macedonian people when the CPG itself would not recognize them.

So, it must have been something else.

The attitude the CPG took was directed internally. Without a commitment such as this from Yugoslavia it would have been inconceivable for the Macedonian people in the Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to have won their national and social freedom under

the circumstances of those times, regardless of what the Informburo said and did. There is no doubt that the Yugoslav commitment guaranteed the Macedonian people’s freedom and the preservation of the People’s Republic of Macedonia. The real power behind this was Macedonian brotherhood and unity with the other Yugoslav nations, the most precious benefit derived from the common liberation struggle. The CPG recognized the strength behind such a commitment and by recognizing the Macedonian people’s right to self-determination, it was trying to force the Macedonian people to give up on the brotherhood and unity with the other Yugoslav nations, and seek their own “unification” in some sort of a non existent utopian Balkan people’s federation.

It is obvious that this, in essence, was an anti-Macedonian move on Zahariadis’s part. Why would Zahariadis propose the Macedonian people give up something real, something guaranteed, for something that did not exist? Yet Zahariadis took that road. This was simply done to undermine the Macedonian people’s political unity, an attempt to create a stir in the Macedonian people’s political demands and split them up.

The anti-Yugoslav stand was taken for the same reason. It openly called on the Macedonian people in the People’s Republic of Macedonia to disassociate themselves from the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia...

However, as Peiov has correctly noted: “In the then state of Balkans affairs, this NOF decision caused vivid public interest and a sharp reaction from the Athens government…” (“Macedonians and the Civil War in Greece”, p. 160.) But, only five weeks after making the statement, Zahariadis, for some reason, decided to deny it. By publishing a special personal announcement on behalf of the NOF Central Committee Executive Council, Zahariadis denied making such a statement and blamed it all on NOF. He insisted that NOF had made this decision on its own...

But by then Zahariadis had already prepared a new move.

The day after NOF held its Second Congress, (March 25-26, 1949), on March 27, 1949, KOEM (Communist organization of Aegean

Macedonia) was founded. KOEM was the only communist organization in the world that had not emerged as an avant-garde organization in charge of organizing and mobilizing the working people in their struggle for rights and freedom. Eventually, after all the Macedonian people, or the “Slavophone” people, as Zahariadis called them, were mobilized to the last one, KOEM’s aim was to influence them from inside NOF. KOEM was created to lead the Macedonian national liberation movement in the spirit of Zahariadis’s new attitude.

Compared to Zahariadis’s rigidly implemented NOF policies and with his above-mentioned anti-Macedonian and anti-Yugoslav moves, creating KOEM was undoubtedly a more mature and therefore a more dangerous move.

But it was made too late. The People’s Revolution in Greece was about to be defeated.

But as we know, at the basis of this anti-Macedonian policy, implemented by Zahariadis and his associates, was the basic contradiction between the “Macedonian national and democratic rights and interests”, on the one hand, and the “Greek national interests” on the other. The Macedonian national liberation movement was opposed to the spirit of this “new position” adopted at the CPG Central Committee Second Plenum because it knew there was no place for it in the “Greek Axis”. The very spirit of this “new CPG attitude”, imposed on the Macedonian people, caused new hostilities. This was another way of striking at NOF. In other words, the CPG open frontal attacks against NOF were now camouflaged with revolutionary phraseology and strikes from within...

The CPG betrayal against the Macedonian people, naturally, was only one symptom of the high treason that Zahariadis committed against the people and the people’s revolution in Greece. It is well-known that:

- By calling England a “great friend” of Greece, and its “friendly presence and support” being a primary necessity for securing Greece’s “peaceful development”, Zahariadis actually abused the

CPG’s immense authority to justify England’s presence in Greece and to allow it to interfere in Greece’s internal affairs, thereby weakening the people’s resistance. England’s presence and interference in Greek affairs facilitated the strengthening of bourgeoisie power.

- In April 1947, when DAG was delivering heavy blows against the Athens regime and against the English interventionists, the Greek bourgeoisie was forced to retreat its troops into the cities. Unprotected their morale fell and the regime began to experience a bad crisis. In August 1947, Greece was without a government for almost two weeks. But, instead of ordering a general offensive during a time when he could have won the war, Zahariadis did his best to facilitate his opponent. He could have had DAG strike the military bases and have the civilians participate in massive strikes and demonstrations, and easily finished his opponent, but he didn’t. On top of that Zahariadis also withdrew the Macedonian military forces out of Macedonia and sent them down south to Epirus, Thessaly and Rumeli, away from the Macedonian people to stop them from mobilizing more Macedonians and influencing events in Macedonia. Zahariadis was afraid that, unchecked, the Macedonians could have amassed a large military force that could have threatened the Athens regime.

- On top of all else, by moving the Macedonian forces to western, central and southern Greece, Zahariadis intentionally discredited and compromised the struggle. The CPG and DAG did not inform the Greek people in those regions that these forces were friendly and local, i.e. Macedonian, and since these people did not know that Macedonians existed in Greece, they naturally assumed the forces were invaders from the north, led by the CPG to occupy their lands. To save themselves a multitude of them rushed to join the opponent’s camp where they were mobilized and turned into reservist counterrevolutionaries. If that was not enough, Zahariadis then ordered these Macedonian elite fighter and carriers of the Macedonian ideal, to fight against, numerically, a much superior force in uneven battles until they were all liquidated.

- The Democratic Army of Greece (DAG), born and intensified out of necessity to protect the people from the bloody terror perpetrated

against them by the Greek bourgeoisie, was taken over by Zahariadis and by the CPG leadership and used to remedy the “Greek Axis” implementation. In other words DAG was constantly controlled by the CPG limiting its growth and combat activities eventually condemning it to fail and be destroyed.

So, once again it turned out that behind the betrayal committed against the small oppressed Macedonian population hid the great betrayal of the entire Greek democratic population.

Occurrences in a given situation, like the unknowns in mathematical problems, are not always obvious. That is why there are people even today, including many Macedonians, who still trust and follow Zahariadis. But I am sure that future historians will certainly put things in their place. They will find out where Zahariadis belongs and will put him in his place where he really deserves to be. The Macedonian people too will give him his “properly deserved recognition” for his role, for his “greatness” and for his contribution to the so-called Greek Civil War. Naum Peiovs’ work, despite its shortcomings, in this respect, will be a good foundation to build on. There are many recorded discussions and articles written by Peiov’s contemporaries on the Greek Civil War, including my own that will help in this regard. It is necessary to demand that this be done in order to break the silence and reveal what truly happened. Blaming the Macedonian people without any proof and continuing to harass them for something they “may or may not have done” is not the answer...

(August 1968)