IX. MATERIALS ON THE HISTORY OF THE MACEDONIAN NATIONAL LIBERATION MOVEMENT IN - Part 01

IX. MATERIALS ON THE HISTORY OF THE MACEDONIAN NATIONAL LIBERATION MOVEMENT IN THE AEGEAN PART OF MACEDONIA

To the editorial board of the magazine “History” Skopje

I am submitting the enclosed text “Problems from our recent history” in exchange for the text “CPG, EAM, ELAS and the Macedonian people”, which I delivered to you on February 14th this year (1983), and now I am withdrawing...

In its time the famous book “Aegean Storms”, written by Vangel Aianovski-Oche, picked up a lot of dust. On the “History” editorial board’s suggestion I wrote a critical review of that book which was then published in “History”, number 1. 1978.

A few years later, Dr. Risto Kiriazovski responded with his own remarks which were then published in “History”, number 2. 1981. On that occasion, I reacted with the text that I am now withdrawing, and I am withdrawing it exclusively because I limit myself and I am only highlighting one of the issues in Kiriazovski’s “remarks”.

Common acquaintances and friends (his and mine) have said to me: You have nothing to say? Or do you agree with Kiriazovski? In other words they are telling me to engage in clarifying all the issues brought up by Kiriazovski. So the text that I am submitting to you now deals with all the issues...

In his “response”, incomprehensible to me as to why, Dr. Risto Kiriazovski started out by throwing personal insults at me. Even more than that, he publicly blames me of being an anti-party element that “harshly attacks and slanders the CPM and CPY in general…” (History, 2/81, p. 295.) However, it is a fact that he is opening a lot of questions from our recent history. And with the publication of this text, he has practically put all these questions in “History” on the agenda before historians and the wider public. That’s perfectly normal, of course. The magazine itself is there for that purpose: to contribute to the clarification of issues in our history and to sharpen the truth...

But, what I particularly don’t care about are Kiriazovski’s personal insults and accusations made in public. My aim is to only deal with clarifying events and establishing the truth. I am doing this with help from well-known source documents of that time. By doing so, I am firmly convinced that I am most effectively defending myself by defending the truth...

Please do not reject my attached text by succumbing to pressures. I know from my own personal experience that people will say something like this: “Stop all discussions on this subject, because these things are not for the public to know”. Please allow me to assure you that there is nothing new in the accompanying text that has not been previously published. I operate exclusively with already known documents from that time. People may even say something like this: “Do not reply to Rakovski, he is an anti-party element, suspicious, and so on…” These comments, of course, are similar to the accusations made by Kiriazovski and some of his comrades who, with or without him, usually act in such a manner...

I rarely write and only a little bit at a time. Having said that, I have written a brochure entitled “The Macedonian national question through the politics of the CPG” which was then published in its entirety in “Glasnik” (number 3/1968). I have written a similar text on the same topic which was then published in two parts in the Macedonian edition “Communist” in May 1971. Our magazine “History” has also published some of my texts including my critical review of the article “On the roots of evil”. The Skopje magazine

“Pogledi” number 8/1980 has also published my article “Toward the perception of historical truth”. I previously offered this article to the “Glasnik” editorial board but it was rejected at Kiriazovski’s insistence...

In the end I have one more suggestion: I have over two hundred printed pages of historical material which could prove to be useful to the multi volume “History of the Macedonian people” being currently prepared. If you are interested call me at 261-750...

Skopje, 20.IV.1983 Sincerely, yours Pavle Rakovski

PROBLEMS FROM OUR MOST RECENT HISTORY (Materials about the history of the Macedonian National Liberation Movement in the Aegean part of Macedonia)

An article written by Dr. Risto Kiriazovski was recently published in the journal “History” (number 2/1981) entitled “Response to Pavle Rakovski’s critical review of the book ‘Aegean Storms’ by Vangel Aianovski-Oche.” (History edition, number 1/1978.)

In the interest of truth all facts must be revealed.

1.

a) “Pavel Rakovski”, wrote Kiriazovski, “has introduced misinformation about the formation of the ELAS Macedonian Voden Battalion in June 1944. According to original documents preserved from that time, regarding the formation of the ELAS Macedonian Battalion, as well as the formation of the Kostur and Lerin Region battalion, there were discussions that took place in the CPG Macedonian Bureau, in the ELAS group headquarters in Macedonia, in ELAS General Headquarters… during which a final decision was made to form the battalion. This resolution was passed by the CPG Central Committee Politburo. The task for forming the battalion was entrusted to the Voden Region CPG District Committee, and its practical implementation was entrusted to Dzhodzho Urdov, then district committee organizing secretary, and to activist Kole Pop-Sermitchiev. Pavel Rakovski, as well as some of the other activists, was involved in the action as reserve ELAS regional activist, and not as a member of the CPG regional committee, as he claims!” (Page 289.)

Accordingly, the Macedonian people were able to have these two separate battalions within ELAS thanks to the CPG, EAM and ELAS leaders...

b) In connection with this, Vangel Aianovski-Oche, then activist in Voden, in his book “Aegean storms”, published by INI, testified that:

“Around July 20, 1944, news reached the District Committee that many Macedonian anti-fascists from Meglen Region had massively moved to Kaimakchalan with a desire to join the partisan units. This move, of Macedonians going to the mountains, the District Committee estimated was due to Yugoslav partisan influence. There were Yugoslav partisans at the time stationed on Kozhuv Mountain. The District Committee ordered them to stop their activities. Dzhodzho Urdov, then CPG organizing secretary for Voden, together with Risto Kordalov, Tushi Keramitchiev and several members of the diversionary group were ordered to go to Kaimakchalan and disband the newly formed partisan units. They were ordered to use force if they encountered resistance.

As it turned out the people from Meglen Region armed themselves and took to the mountains on their own initiative. They decided on their own that they wanted to fight against the occupier and in no way were influenced or directed by the Yugoslav partisans!” (p. 135-136.)

c) Rakovski, one of the direct participants in the creation of the ELAS Macedonian Voden Battalion, said:

“At its June 1, 1944 session, the Macedonian CPG-EAM Regional Committee for the Macedonian region based in the village Tresino in Meglen Region, decided to immediately carry out mobilization in the Macedonian villages. Secretary Barba Traiko (Nikos Papasermidzis) who agreed with the decision, set off to look for the secret place where the CPG Regional Committee headquarters was located in order to obtain further clarification and direct approval.

The starting point for making this decision began with my introductory statement that I made at the session, as follows:

- For many years with their cruelty and inhumanity, the Greek bourgeois authorities forced many Macedonian people to leave their hearths and move around the world outside of the Greek state. Those who could not leave were punished and their attachment to the Greek state was repeatedly destroyed, which imposed the need for resistance.

- The Bulgarian-fascist autonomist movement with its slogan forward for a “Free Autonomous Macedonia” (within “brotherly Bulgaria”, or “mother Bulgaria”) was spreading dangerously and in the absence of attachment to the Greek state, was strong motivation for freedom from Greek slavery.

- The Party line was “full equality of minorities”. The situation created in our country imperatively demanded and required a consistent change of that line - a transition from just words to action... A Macedonian military unit appeared in Kaimakchalan and presented itself as a Macedonian national military unit with a political centre which attracted the revolutionary minded Macedonian youth from Voden Region and beyond. The formation of the Macedonian military units was a direct response to the autonomist movement and “Ohrana”, its military wing, as well as to the hated Greek police, both of which were receiving weapons from the Germans and Bulgarians and abusing the Macedonians...

- Even though the creation of a separate ELAS Macedonian unit in Voden Region was consistent with the Party line application of “equality” there was still the matter for which we did not have a special directive. However, our regional committee was precisely there to raise the people in an armed struggle against the fascist occupiers... No one should be asking for cutting our heads off because we were consistent and successful with the implementation of the party line, both for equality and for mobilizing the people in the armed struggle.

- One should pay particular attention to the fight against the autonomist movement which was not based on old divisions: patriarchates verses exarchates. No, the partisan units were not “Grkomani” (Macedonians loyal to the Greek cause) fighting against “Bugaromani” (Macedonians loyal to the Bulgarian cause). That would have been a tragedy. Our Macedonian military units must be the material force of the Macedonian national ideal!

We acted in that spirit. We started the mobilization together with Giorgi Atanasov-Blazhe in the village Dolno Pozharsko (known as an Exarchate village), and continued in the village Baovo (known as a Patriarchate village). The mobilization was a success. And as is

well-known, the ELAS Voden Macedonian Battalion recruited most of its volunteer fighters from these two villages. There was no trace of any division between the old Grkomani and Bugaromani. It turned out that the carriers of the old divisions were completely gone as if they had never existed. In fact, those who supported the foreign causes were mainly activists and paid propagandists who could not survive the strength of the new Macedonian movement and disappeared.

On June 16, 1944, the next day after its sitting, the ELAS Macedonian Battalion in Voden Region became a reality. One month later, Renos Mihaleas created the ELAS Lerin-Kostur Macedonian Battalion. This battalion too was welcomed by our comrades in the CPG, EAM and ELAS leaderships. It was understandable that this would ease the tension in the Macedonians due to SNOF’s dissolution, and due to the pressure created by Vancho Mihailov’s “Ohrana” with its 700 well-armed autonomists, that is, the Bulgarians who could seriously jeopardize the Greek position and interests in this part of (Greek occupied) Macedonia. They had to be smashed, and that was the easiest and most painless way to do it… with the Macedonian battalions! (Pavle Rakovski.)

d) This is what happened when the ELAS Lerin-Kostur Macedonian Battalion was created: Renos Mihaleas, then representative of the ELAS IX Division, instead of following the famous CPG and ELAS order to created a separate Macedonian unit on Ilinden (August 2, 1944), he created the ELAS Lerin-Kostur Macedonian Battalion. He was harshly criticized for doing that. When he was by asked by the secretary (Leonidas Stringos, Secretary of the CPG Bureau for Macedonia and Thrace): “Why did you create an entire battalion when your orders were to create only one unit…?”

Renos replied: “What would have been the damage if even divisions were created…?”

To which the secretary said: “You are so naïve... If the Macedonians had divisions, we Greeks would not be in Macedonia!” (Letter from Renaos Mihaleas to D. Radosavlievich, handwritten in Greek, INI archives, Skopje.)

Conclusion: Both the Voden and Kostur-Lerin Macedonian battalions were created contrary to CPG, EAM and ELAS leadership plans. That is why their life was cut short. As we now know, the Macedonian battalions were attacked so that they could be totally smashed, disarmed and liquidated. And that is why they were forced to retreat to the Yugoslav part of Macedonia... This is the truth about what happened. And this reveals the true attitude of our Greek friends in the CPG, EAM and ELAS leaderships, towards the Macedonian national liberation movement and towards the Macedonian people in general...

2.

Kiriazovski wrote: “At the beginning of his review, with aims of confronting Aianovski with the entire NOF leadership, Pavle Rakovski unfoundedly and tendentiously asserted that Aianovski was the one who allegedly attacked the NOF leaders for signing the KOEM resolution against the CPY on June 20, 1949. However, the truth is completely different. Aianovski sharply criticized only those NOF-KOEM leaders who not only signed it, but expressed themselves in practice and implemented the KOEM resolution!” (Page 288.)

Rakovski wrote: On page 406 in his book “Aegean Storms”, Vangel Ajanovski wrote that the overall KOEM-NOF leadership, all those, without exception, who then fought on the ground and constituted the “managing asset of KOEM-NOF” (among whom he is not) were traitors. He then went on to name each one specifically by name and surname! (p. 383-389.)

This is the truth. I (Rakovski) have neither “unfoundedly” nor “tendentiously” pointed out any of this in my review, especially to confront Aianovski with the KOEM-NOF leadership. Aianovski himself did this on his own.

In fact, the way Aianovski has written his book “Aegean Storms”, one would think that the revolution in Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia began and ended with Vangel Aianovski as the main character of the plot. His book is a work of fiction designed to

disqualify and politically bury the entire KOEM-NOF managing asset. Again this is the truth…

3.

Kiriazovski wrote: “With aims at minimizing Aianovski’s revolutionary activities, or for some other purpose, Rakovski is insinuating that Aianovski and the Political Commission of the Macedonians under Greece was dealing with some kind of informational, and not organizational and political activities. By spreading this kind of dubious misinformation Pavle Rakovski, very clearly, was serving those who were on the side of the Informburo!” (p. 289.)

Rakovski wrote: There is no “insinuation” at all in Rakovski’s critical remarks about the Political Committee, of which Rakovski was a member, “dealing with some kind of informational, and not organizational and political activities”.

There is no such opinion in Rakovski’s review.

Accordingly, the accusations made against Rakovski that he allegedly was spreading “dubious misinformation” that supposedly served “those who were on the side of the Informburo” were false. Simply put, this was blind desire to make Rakovski look like he was on the side of the Informburo... Having accomplished that then Aianovski would be the foremost journalist of the Macedonian national liberation movement in the Aegean (Greek occupied) part of Macedonia. His numerous transplanted reports and newsletters would be the main content in the separate volumes of the “Aegean Macedonia and the National Liberation War” edition. This is the truth...

4.

Kiriovski wrote: “In order to challenge or downplay the activities of MAO, the Macedonian anti-fascist organization, Pavle Rakovski said that in Meglen and Ostrovo Regions around Voden, where he allegedly worked as an illegal in 1942 and 1943, there was no news or information coming in. Here Pavle Rakovski serves us with more

misinformation. Namely, in 1943 he did not work as an illegal because there was no need for illegal work given the fact that these regions were liberated!” (Page 289.)

Rakovski wrote: The island area through which the Solun-Voden-Bitola railway passed remained under German occupation until the last day of the German withdrawal from Greece. Rakovski, along with young Todor Simovski-Laki and a few other illegal people, worked there from about November 1943 until May 1944, for a total of about seven months. Simovski, however, only found out about the existence of MAO many years later, here in Skopje, from the people of Voden Region. Rakovski learned about MAO from Simovski. Neither Rakovski nor Simovski knew anything about MAO while they were working in the field in Voden. So, to say that Rakovski’s “goal” was to challenge or downplay MAO’s activities is not only wrong but an attempt to divert attention from the main issue pointed out by Rakovski: The Greek CPG, EAM and ELAS leadership’s anti-Macedonian practices against MAO in the city of Voden. In other words, MAO’s short existence was kept a secret until it was completely liquidated. That is precisely the main issue: The Greek leadership’s real attitude towards the Macedonian national liberation movement, i.e. MAO, and not the embarrassing false question of whether Rakovski was an illegal worker or not?!

5.

Kiriazovski wrote: “Pavle Rakovski is also contesting Aianovski’s claim that MAO was the first Macedonian organization in Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia during the Second World War. And in this case he is not well-intentioned because Aianovski believes that MAO was the first Macedonian organization belonging to the Macedonian people from Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia during the occupation... The same is true of Rakovski in connection with the newspaper “Red Star” which was published in 1942-1943. In order to deny Aianovski’s claims, Rakovski said that “Rizospastis”, the CPG Central Committee’s newspaper, from time to time published a Macedonian language periodical in the early 1930s. This claim, made by Rakovski, is also not true!” (P. 289-290.)

Rakovski wrote: In his book “Aegean Storms” Aianovski wrote about the “revolutionary movement in Voden Region and about NOF in Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia”. In the first part of his book Aianovski speaks in general about the “Voden proletariat struggle and the anti-fascist resistance movement from 1919 to 1945”. Then, on page 94 of the same book he claims that MAO was the first Macedonian organization in Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia, which called for a national liberation struggle”. This is not true because, as impotent as it was, IMRO (United) existed for a short while in the mid-1930s. Here too Aianovski claims that the newspaper “Red Star” was the first Macedonian newspaper. This, however, does not correspond to the historical truth. As we well know the newspaper “Agricultural flag” appeared in Lerin Region in the early 1930s and managed to reach its seventh issue. Edited by Andrea Chipov, this newspaper was printed in the Macedonian language.

The expressions “during the Second World War” and “during the occupation” are not in Aianovski’s book, they were added by Kiriazovski... And the case with Rizospastis is quite another thing. Namely, soon after IMRO (United) was formed, letters from Macedonians sent to Rizospastis were published in their original form, i.e. in the Macedonian language but with Greek letters, such as those in Rizospastis number 203/7141 of 3 .X 1934 or ten days later in number 213/7151 of 1.X 1934. The reason why Rizospastis printed these letters in the Macedonian language is because it was pressured by the “slavophone” communists with their demands to have their own revolutionary press.

6.

Kiriazovski wrote: “In order to compromise and discredit Aianovski, i.e. make him look like an opportunist, Pavle Rakovski has abused the fact that, at the insistence of the CPG leadership, Aianovski was not elected to the organization’s secretariat at the NOF First Congress held in January 1948. Rakovski claims Aianovski fled to the People’s Republic of Macedonia in September 1948 and the reason for fleeing was allegedly career motivated. In order to put an end to the speculation about Aianovski’s alleged “desertion” and “abandonment of the movement”, and that of a few others, we are

obliged to present some undeniable facts. Vangel Koichev, then NOF Secretary, elected during the First NOF Plenum held in August 1948, informed the CPG Central Committee Politburo by letter that the NOF Executive Board had decided, in addition to Mihailo Keramitchiev, to send Ilia Dimovski-Goche to Yugoslavia to recruit fighters for DAG. Dimovski proposed, said the letter, that Vangel Aianovski-Oche be appointed assistant, to which the NOF Executive Board agreed. This fact, as well as the fact that Aianovski disagreed with Informburo’s politics and joined Keramitchiev and Dimovski in their mission to recruit Macedonian fighters for DAG, rejects Rakovski’s claim that Aianovski “voluntarily abandoned the movement”... (Page 292.)

Pavle Rakovski wrote: Sometime in mid-February 1949, at a meeting in Skopje, Keramitchiev said: “As you well know, I came here on October 12, 1948, on orders from the CPG Central Committee... I came here for two reasons: a) to receive medical treatment and b) to recruit new fighters for creating Macedonian units as comrade Dimovski’s first assistant...” (Vangel Aianovski, p. 315, Aegean Macedonia in the national liberation war 1949, vol. VI, p. 71.)

From the NOF Executive Council decision, mentioned earlier, “in addition to Mihailo Keramitchiev sending Ilia Dimovski-Goche to Yugoslavia in order to recruit fighters for DAG”, it follows that these two were sent across the border at approximately the same time.

Sometime in the first half of September 1948, Vangel Aianovski and Slavianka stationed in Kaimakchalan, Voden Region, were invited by directive to attend a meeting in Prespa. Probably fearing difficulties from the enemy, instead of going to Prespa, Aianovski and Slavianka left Kaimakchalan, went to Bitola and did not return. Aianovski, in his book “Aegean Storms”, wrote:

“The real Macedonian cadres, brutally defamed and persecuted, were forced to leave the movement and move to the People’s Republic of Macedonia!” (Page 339)

Slavianka said: “I received a letter from my friend Vera, in which she called me a deserter!” (Vangel Aianovski, p. 320, Aegean Macedonia in the National Liberation War 1949, vol. VI, p. 74.)

Aianovski and Slavianka should have been declared deserters but they found a way to avoid it. They were assigned to Dimovski and Keramitchiev as assistants and so their crime of desertion was removed from the agenda...

This is how it was; the rest was muddied water and had nothing to do with Aianovski’s desertion...

7.

Kiriovski wrote: “Pavle Rakovski reacted sharply to Aianovski’s assessment that “a part of NOF’s old cadres did not find the strength to resist and succumbed to pressure, becoming obedient CPG-DAG leadership organs and performing tasks that were often against the interests of the Macedonian people.” Aianovski’s assessment of this is fully suited to part of the NOF leadership. That part of the NOF leadership not only signed the criminal “KOEM resolution” and implemented it in practice, but directly, indirectly and actively took part in the persecution of the Macedonian people, assaulting those who did not accept the Informburo anti-Yugoslav policy. Is there another way to accuse those who were personally responsible for the execution of innocent Macedonians? How else can those NOF leaders escape their own crimes except to blame Yugoslavia as the alleged culprit for the defeat of the Greek liberation movement? The NOF leaders used informational camouflage and intrigues in order to hide their own actions. Therefore, this is not about “Aianovski’s unfounded tendency to tarnish and disqualify the NOF leadership”, but for the objective presentation of historical facts that should serve as a lesson!” (p. 292-293)

Rakovski wrote: It is true that Aianovski in his book “Aegean Storms” on page 339 wrote: “Unfortunately, some of NOF’s old cadres did not find the strength to resist and succumbed to pressure from the CPG and DAG leaderships and they became their organs performing tasks that were often against the interests of the Macedonian people!”

And Rakovski’s “strong reaction” was: “It is amazing indeed. He withdrew himself from the pressure and then threw mud on everyone else who remained in the struggle under the same pressure conditions…!”

Why blame only “one part of the old NOF cadres” and this should not be ignored, when the entire KOEM-NOF leadership was placed under the same scrutiny? The entire group was placed under the same pressure and “did not find the strength to oppose the CPG-DAG leaders and thus succumbed to their pressure” and signed the KOEM resolution. This took place in Prespa in an area called “Africa”, inside a large cave, where the seat of the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece and DAG General Headquarters were located. There were several queues of benches for sitting and the cave was lit by electric lighting. We gathered in the cave, the entire KOEM-NOF military-political leadership, without knowing where we were going to meet with Zahariadis. Then Zahariadis appeared along with Mitsos Partselidis, member of the CPG Central Committee Politburo and President of the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece, and Periklis head of the 2nd Bureau espionage-counter-espionage department. Zahariadis pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and read it aloud. He then explained that this was part of the Party line and asked everyone to accept it and sign it individually. Zahariadis then took the piece of paper with two-column signatures and looked at it carefully. He then folded it, put it in his pocket and, with a treacherous tone of voice, said: “Posi arages ine ilikrinis…?”(How many here are honest…?) If the original piece of paper is ever found my signature sits somewhere between the 15th and the 20th line while Urania Rakovski’s signature is not there at all. Urania Rakovski herself, on the way back, confessed that she did not sign the piece of paper. I criticized her for it in front of everyone. I said: “This is not the time for open confrontation and new divisions…! You should have signed it…!” Mitrevski said: “Ask to sign it later! Tell them you were busy with your three-month-old baby…! They will kill us all…!” Vainas said: “I did not expect that from you…” Vangel Koichev was also there and began to yell at her. He was also annoyed... The piece of paper Aianovski used in his publication, obviously, was not the same as the one I remember. A Greek hand must have re-worked it and

released it. I know that because the names on the “re-worked” piece of paper were Greek, whereas the names on the original document were Macedonian. For example Tane Naumov never called himself “Tanas” and I did not sign the document as “Pavlos”. I signed it as Pavle. There were other similar examples, which prove that the document Aianovski possessed was not a copy of the original document we signed that day...

I was sitting several rows from the front and signed the piece of paper after the people who were sitting in front of me. The list Aianovski had showed me, I was the first to sign the piece of paper. But, despite everyone else having signed the piece of paper, I was the only person accused of being in contact with “Tito’s agents” in Skopje and Sofia. I was the only one being suspended from the NOF secretariat. So, the entire thing was made to look like I was the first to sign the piece of paper and generally accept the resolution, and therefore I deserved a unique punishment.

Urania did not sign the piece of paper at all but appeared on the list as “Urania Rakovski” because, supposedly, that is what she was called. Urania, however, went by the name “Urania Alilomova”. A year or two later, while in emigration, and after a court decision, because she had a child, she received the surname “Rakovska” (and not Rakovski as indicated in the list) and ceased to appear as unmarried with a child...

I know that Mitrevski and some of the others did not admit to signing the KOEM resolution probably because they were afraid of being charged and called to account. But we signed a Party document. Similar documents have been signed, adopted and published by many well-known, great and celebrated Communist Parties in the world. When our comrades found out about this, that is, it was not a crime to have signed such a document and in fact signing a “Party” document was a great privilege, they admitted to it and became friendly and cooperative with the CPY. What did we know and who were we to defend and save the CPY? We were a small regional organization located in the northern border areas of the Greek state. We were an organization founded by the CPY/CPM, led by several of us and placed under the leadership and membership of the CPG by the CPY... A delicate situation, right?

What should we have done? Formally, yes, we had to do what we did as members of the CPG. But what were we supposed to do as ex-members of the CPY? Were we to follow the line of open confrontation with the leadership of the CPG? To start new rifts? We were in a cave surrounded by a multitude of armed soldiers, armed with automatic weapons. They could have had our heads shot off. A new rift would have triggered DAG’s disintegration… the units in Kaimakchalan, Vicho and Gramos would have been torn apart. This was the basis for Zahariadis’s accusations of the CPY undermining DAG and the revolution. DAG’s weakening would have made an easy Monarcho-fascist victory in neighbouring Greece…!

Of course, I did not want any trouble and I did not want DAG to fall apart or the revolution to fail. All I could think of were the words: “You have to do what you have to do! Under certain circumstances, you may need to act against your own will and conscience... But remain who you really are - the son of an enslaved people… If circumstances were different we would have struggled and resisted differently.” Zahariadis wanted to attribute DAG’s unavoidable defeat, which by the way he himself caused, to the CPY and Yugoslavia. In the KOEM resolution, which he himself wrote, in point 6 he openly accuses the CPY of “creating an internal rift for the purpose of undermining the CPG and DAG…” According to Zahariadis there were three main operations: “The first was the political operation managed by the CPM and personally by Kolishevski, its secretary. The second operation was led by OZNA, and the third by the Yugoslav Army II Bureau. The first oversaw the other two whose work was purely to spy and conduct subversive and self-serving operations in the CPG, NOF and generally in Greek occupied Macedonia, with its own special organizations and triads, agents, contact points, etc., each striving for the same goal – to undermine the CPG, and especially NOF!”

The truth is Zahariadis tried to conceal his own betrayal of DAG and the revolution by accusing the CPY and Yugoslavia of “betrayal”. It is an undeniable fact that after Zahariadis failed to show “Yugoslav betrayal” through the KOEM “trick”, he was forced to invent a new “trick”, the famous “attack from behind”. He tried to convince everyone that Yugoslavia attacked DAG from behind. But, as it

turned out, there was no such attack and Yugoslavia had nothing to do with DAG’s defeat. I have no doubt that anyone researching this subject based on the events that took place and based on the documents left behind, will easily find the truth; convening the KOEM meeting “five minutes to twelve” on the eve of DAG’s defeat was nothing more than a provocative act with an obvious goal to provoke a new split in the leadership in order to accelerate DAG’s defeat...

Zahariadis had me personally in mind when he wrote item 18 of the resolution in which he said: “KOEM decisively condemns any crypto-Titoist subversion in the ranks of NOF, AFZH and DAG. This is the last warning for Comrade Rakovski and his like-minded comrades who, as they did in Bulgaria and Yugoslavia, made contact with Tito’s agents and are now here in Free Greece spreading propaganda in favour of Tito and his betrayal. I am suspending Rakovski from every function and deploying him to DAG where, with a rifle in hand, he will have to wash his mistakes that led him to treason!”

A day or two later, I left for Gramos to join the front in the Arapades sector as an ordinary fighter. And here, fighting on the first line in battle, besides facing danger from the enemy ahead, I twice happily avoided death from behind. I will talk about this in detail later...

Now the question is who were those “other” NOF Macedonian leaders and cadres about whom Aianovski wrote in “Aegean Storms” and Kiriazovski in “Istoria”, who “did not accept the anti-Yugoslavian politics of the Informburo…”

I believe they were talking about those NOF leaders and cadres who were not in the country, the likes of Goche and Keramitchiev and their assistants Aianovski and Slavianka. They must have been the ones to “find the strength to resist” from afar, from outside the country. Perhaps that is why they refused to return to the field because they were going to find harassment? Obviously it was not a “betrayal” for Aianovski to have fled the battlefield and to have abandoned the struggle... They could do no wrong… But we, on the other hand, who remained behind and fought, were placed in the same category as the “Grkomani” (Macedonians loyal to the Greek

cause) who infiltrated the NOF-KOEM leadership, and were accused of having committed crimes against the Macedonian national liberation movement and against the Macedonian people. Naturally, the Macedonian cadres resisted and fought under these difficult conditions as much as they could and the fact that they became “organs” of the CPG shows convincingly the duress they were under. It is a fact that they were arrested, severely mistreated and almost executed. They only remained alive because the Albanian authorities refused to allow the Greeks to execute them on Albanian soil. They were tried and found guilty of being “Tito’s agents”, for which they served long sentences. But what does Aianovski have to say about that? Here is what he wrote: “Treachery is loved by all, and traitors by none...”

8.

Kiriazovski wote: “Pavle Rakovski irresponsibly and loudly stated (in the above-mentioned review) that in “Aegean Storms” and “Chronology” issued by the Union of the Associations of Fighters from the National Liberation Army of Macedonia in 1973, that is, in our historiography of the Macedonian national liberation movement in the Aegean part of Macedonia, events were supposedly rewritten and adjusted. Rakovski utterly and irresponsibly said: ‘This was done by some people who are bitter about their own fate because they were unable to participate in the movement, that is, they were thrown out and eventually dropped out of the movement, and now they are making an effort, through such publications, to convince the public that they were the soul of the movement. And those who stayed at the front lines of the movement (because of some kind of natural selection) are nowhere to be found in these publications, or mud has been thrown at them, or they are proclaimed traitors…’ Rakovski here is extremely biased and malicious. According to him, his ‘comrades who have fallen from the movement’ are those Macedonians and leadership cadres from the Aegean part of Macedonia who in the angry CPG anti-Yugoslav campaign in early 1949 came into conflict with the leadership of the CPG, both in terms of defamation against the CPY, and in relation to the Macedonian National Question. (The truth is that the CPG initiated this campaign in October 1949, during the CPG Central Committee VI Plenum.) All of these comrades took up various functions in the

People’s Republic of Macedonia and with their efforts contributed to the reconstruction of our homeland and, in bad times, proved to be consistent fighters and sons of the people and the Party in the struggle against the Informburo. (Apparently Goche, Keramitchiev and their assistants Aianovski and Slavianka were not mentioned here.) And here Pavle Rakovski dares to call these comrades ‘outcasts of the movement!’...” (p. 290-291.)

Rakovski wrote: As we can see they are having problems explaining things. The Macedonian leaders who remained and fought in the front of the movement and in the battlefields are either not mentioned in our national history, or mud is thrown at them… Some, like myself, were even declared traitors… This, it appears, was one way of skipping the scandalous fact that they were denying it all by putting the “ultimate irresponsibility” on Rakovski. Rakovski was a liar and he lied about everything. They were certain that no one was going to check! And to emphasize this: “The comrades taking various functions in the People’s Republic of Macedonia and with their labour contributing to the reconstruction of our country... and in very difficult times proved themselves to be consistent fighters and sons of their people and the Party in the struggle against the Informburo”, and to impose it as “the only healthy driving force, as the soul of the movement at that difficult time in Greek occupied Macedonia…” is truly rich indeed!

Of course this is historical injustice! The struggle in which our comrades in the Republic of Macedonia participated was done from their offices where they were clean and warm, nicely dressed and well fed. This is not and cannot be the same as fighting in the armed struggle fighting on two fronts on Paiak, Vicho, Kaimakchalan and Gramos mountains. Sitting in the office is not the same as fighting against the Athens regime forces, against the Greek “patriots” in the CPG and DAG ranks, and against their obedient, robotic “Grkomani”. It was their duty to do whatever they needed to do as officials in the People’s Republic of Macedonia, but let us face facts, they were absent from the decisive battles that took place during the last year of the armed struggle from the fall of 1948 to the fall of 1949. There is nothing they can say to change that...! And to underline: “These same comrades... who in very difficult times proved themselves to be consistent fighters and sons of their people

and the Party in the fight against the Informburo…” who Pavle Rakovski dares to call “outcasts of the movement”… is obviously another attempt to inflict another hard blow below my belt...

9.

Here is something else that happened to me. I submitted my review of the book “Aegean Storms” in which I spoke about Aianovski’s endeavours, which was then published in “Istoria” number 1/1978. Then, a few years later, this was published in “Istoria” (2/81): “In order to confront Aianovski with the entire NOF managerial asset, Rakovski, in his review, groundlessly and stubbornly argues that Aianovski is the one who allegedly attacked the entire NOF leadership because it signed the KOEM resolution against the CPY on June 20, 1949. However, the truth is different altogether. Aianovski sharply criticized only those NOF-KOEM leaders who not only signed the KOEM resolution, but rather pronounced it, and in practice, implemented it…” (p. 288.)

In the critical review, Rakovski wrote:

“For anyone who knew Aianovski they would be able to see that the book “Aegean storms” was not written by Aianovski himself. The material used, of course, is his but it was someone else’s intellectual process that put it together the way Aianovski wanted it. The book contains Aianovski’s impression exactly the way he wanted them presented to the public... Aianovski wrote a beautiful autobiography in which he threw mud on others, and at the same time highly praised himself with someone else’s effort…

Rakovski wrote: Rakovski did the same. The documents quoted in the article, published in the collection of documents “Aegean Macedonia in the National Liberation War”, refer to events in which he himself directly participated and showed that events were re-written and adjusted in the book “Aegean Storms” in order to “throw mud on others”. (Paskal Mitrevski, volume III, doc 171, p.38; III, Doc 164, 366; Rakovski’s report, volume III, doc. 168, p. 372-373.) Rakovski wrote: “According to Aianovski’s accounts (Aegean Storms, p. 231-232), members of the “Kendriki Kataditisi”, that is, Urdov and Rakovski from the NOF central leadership, acted rather

clumsily and irresponsibly... Aianovski re-wrote and redressed events to publicly belittle the NOF activists and cast a shadow over their work!” In fact if we compare the mentioned source documents of that time against the text in Aianovski’s book “Aegean Storms” we will find that they are different and that Aianovski’s accounts are wrong. As for the assertion that Rakovski, in his critical review, not only does not point to Aianovski’s arguments, but makes major mistakes, misinforms and makes false and tendentious conclusions… this is obviously based only on trust that none of the readers will actually read Rakovski’s review published in 1978 and check to see what is true...

10.

Kiriazovski wrote: “In order to attach himself to the importance of playing a major role in NOF, Pavle Rakovski claims that Aianovski was elected ‘MEMBER OF THE NOF NARROW LEADERSHIP’ during the NOF meeting held in May 20, 1947. Rakovski claims that this allegedly took place at Rakovski’s own initiative and responsibility. Does Pavle Rakovski truly believe he can convince anyone with such an assertion? The question of which comrades made up the NOF leadership was not and could not have been an individual’s task, at least not Pavle Rakovski’s task, but of the CPG and NOF leaderships. Rakovski’s non-objectivity was also expressed through his statement that Aianovski was elected “member of the leadership” but is silent about the fact that Aianovski was elected organizational secretary, which means that he was the second top man in the organization!” (p. 291.)

Rakovski wrote: At that time, in 1947, NOF was led by a three-member secretariat which consisted of Keramitchiev, Rakovski and Vera. But due to his ambitious plans to expand the agitation and propaganda department, i.e. to develop a cultural and educational plan, Rakovski, on behalf of the Secretariat, brought out and explained this proposal which was then accepted by the asset. Because of his plans, Rakovski suggested and persuaded Keramitchiev and Vera to convene a new NOF asset. Among other things, Rakovski proposed that Aianovski be allowed to join the asset as member of the Secretariat. Rakovski considered Aianovski to be the most promising among the regional activists as his