3.1 THE SPLENDOR AND MISERY OF “ADORED” AIMS - Part 01

3.1 THE SPLENDOR AND MISERY OF “ADORED” AIMS

Does this also mean that we Macedonians, as a people, were prepared for this kind of revolution (war) to show off our pride with fire and sword?

For all of these things to happen, before the Greek Civil War became public knowledge, to prevent NOF from acting as organized by the CPY-CPM, the Greek government adopted the most rigorous laws against the Macedonian people and with them legitimized its violence against them.

By the most severe condemnations of NOF, AFZH and NOMS, the Athens government, through parliament, passed the following laws in 1945 which initiated the most terrible and ruthless terror against the Macedonian population:

LAW 543/45: “Against NOF and against persons acting on seceding territories from the Greek state.”

Decree “G” on June 18, 1946; “Extraordinary measures for public safety.”

July 7, 1945 – The Greek government enacted law number 453 and law TOD: / 45 “order, peace and justice” to ensure public safety and to stop “autonomist activities” of which the Macedonian political organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS were accused. NOF, AFZH and NOMS were found to be autonomist, separatist and anti-Greek and were placed outside of the law and their members were to be judged for possessing and using weapons.

July 18, 1945 - Special law CC 43: “Against autonomist activities” was enacted by the Greek government. A law with which the Macedonian organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS were declared to be autonomist and with which these organizations were placed outside of the law and their members were declared to be bandits and tried for high treason.

Forced Law (CC) 4124/1945; “Prosecution of suspected persons.”

July 20, 1945 – Law (KZ) 4124/45 was enacted to be applied only against the Macedonians.

“Prosecution of suspected persons”

July 20, 1945 – Decree “G” and laws: PZ 433/45 “Around the illegal possession of weapons” and PZ 753/45 “Around the illegal possession and use of weapons.”

“Extraordinary Measures and Public Security”

December 16, 1945 – Trials began in Kostur against 106 Macedonians from the town Rupishcha, Kostur Region. These people were accused of collaboration with the occupiers, even though they were ELAS fighters. Some were sentenced to life imprisonment and others were given lengthy sentences.

About NOF’s second period, which ranged from November 21st, 1946 when NOF was under the leadership of the CPG until April 2nd, 1952 when it was formally disbanded by the CPG, Kiriazovski

wrote: “A large group of guerrillas attacked the gendarme station in Letihoro, Katerini Region, marking the beginning of the Greek Civil War in Greece.” In his book “NOF and other Macedonian organizations in Aegean Macedonia 1945-1949”, on page 173, Kiriazovski wrote: “On October 28, 1946 all guerrillas, numbering about 1,800 fighters, were united in the Democratic Army of Greece (DAG), headed by General Headquarters made up of Commander Markos Vafiadis, Deputy Commander Georgios Protopapas -Kikitsas, and Staff Members Lambros Kanikaridis - Lasanis, Gorgis Blanas - Kishavost and Panos Kapetenios. The basic tasks set by DAG General Headquarters, after it was constructed, were to strengthen the fighter recruitment process and to conclude a unification agreement with NOF based on the principles of the October 14, 1946 agreement reached between CPG and NOF representatives.”

This is what Dr. Risto Kiriazovski wrote in his book, but later he said: “... NOF was placed under direct CPG leadership in accordance with the Tito-Zahariadis Agreement reached in October 1946.”

This, however, is how historical facts highlight the situation: Based on the October 14, 1946 agreement made between Tito (CPY) and Zahariadis (CPG), Karaivanov, representing the CPY, and Ioannidis, representing the CPG, later made the following announcement: “The Macedonian organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS and their leadership will now fall entirely under the responsibility of the CPG. All armed Macedonian units now operating in the DAG divisions will now fall under the leadership of General Markos.”

After this surprising fact: How could the people of NOF have decided the balance of power? After what was done here, basically the CPM/CPY sold NOF out; left it like a shepherd without a flock! It is more than obvious here that the missing link to uncover these facts was “the screening and adaptation of facts” to fit the current political climate.

So, the question is: Did this act, perpetrated by the CPY/CPM and CPG, destroy NOF’s initiatives and rob the Macedonian people of

their right to seek to preserve the independent character of the Macedonian struggle? YES! By doing so the main thrust of this act was, above all, to destroy the Macedonian character of the struggle which NOF had proclaimed in front of all the Macedonian people! In the eyes of the world this was a fight between the Right and the Left, not a Macedonian liberation struggle, and it had to be kept that way!

And what was said about Kolishevski’s assurances? That now the CPG was good? There are no bad communists? The CPG did this only as an enticement to put the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia in DAG uniforms?

Right after the CPY and CPG agreed on what to do regarding the continuation of the war in Greek Occupied Macedonia, Lazar Kolishevski, Secretary of the CPM Central Committee, invited the NOF Board, headed by Paskal Mitrevski, for a briefing during which Kolishevski said the following: “Now you go down there (in Greek occupied Macedonia). The CPG is now responsible for you. You must have faith in the CPG. Its policy on the Macedonian question is clear. Any questions that may surface will now be decided by the leadership of the CPG Party. Be careful not to splinter or stray from the Party. You are to work under its directives. You are to struggle and fight to strengthen your unity with the Greek people and fight hard with all your strength against chauvinism, separatism and localized tendencies.” (Kiriazovski)

The question is: For what reasons did we enter the Greek Civil War and why?

It would be no exaggeration to say that of the 25, 000 fighters mobilized into the ranks of DAG, 50% were Macedonians, most of whom were forcibly mobilized. Looking at this in proportion, it means that half of the fighters came from the Greek population of 6 million and the other half came from the Macedonian population of no more than 300 thousand people. So in terms of percentages, the Greek population contributed 0.21% of its total population while the Macedonian population contributed 4.17 %, that ratio being 20 to 1. In the long term, throughout the entire Greek Civil War, the total Greek contribution amounted to 18-20 thousand fighters while the

Macedonian contribution amounted to 15-20 thousand fighters. The sum of the armed forces possessed by the Athens regime, on the other hand, was more than 300,000 soldiers belonging to all branches and armed with the latest weapons.

Let us also not forger that on March 1, 1947 - U.S. President Harry Truman announced the decision to proclaim the “Truman Doctrine” for engaging the U.S. in Greece. Greece was granted credit and advanced military equipment to equip its government army. At the same time Van Fleet, an American General anti-guerrilla specialist, was made available to the Greek government. (See: Todor Chepreganov, 1997/178.)

“... Immediately after the ‘Truman Doctrine’ was proclaimed, information services were established in Greece by FBI and OSS agents. An American military mission was also sent to Greece. Invited by the Greek government, representatives of the United States began to arrive in Greece in order to assist in the preservation and sovereignty of Greece as a nation. They were there unarmed with aims at regulating material assistance and providing advisory functions. Upon its arrival in Greece however, the American mission took over the most important headquarter functions in the army, navy and aviation as well as the organization and management of military operations, which were established to fight against the rebels...”

And as such, we Macedonians found ourselves in an environment full of accumulated hate, fanaticism and distrust, even by the CPG. The CPG did not trust us because NOF and AFZH were not only created by, until they were surrendered to the CPG, but they were also led by the CPY/CPM.

In the period after the American mission took over the military functions in Greece and before DAG was liquidated, the CPG was determined to do the Macedonian people as much harm as possible and, as the old saying goes, “to write their fate in the black pages of the red book”. This became obvious even for those who had already left their homeland. During this period of time the Macedonian people were fighting for survival and nothing more… they were told they had to fight if they wanted to live… and always under the

illusion that it was only a matter of time before they won… They only had one option in this horrid game they were playing… win!

There were many Macedonians, even some from the NOF leadership, who now were simple fighters with absolutely no authority and who still believed Zahariadis when he was telling them that DAG was going to win the war and that it was only a matter of time! They only stopped believing after Zahariadis accused the NOF leaders of losing the war, of being traitors and Tito’s agents and after Zahariadis sentenced them to live out the rest of their lives in the Siberian camps… Initially Zahariadis wanted the NOF leaders executed but because they were on Albanian soil, the Albanian authorities would not allow it.

The Macedonian people, including the majority of the NOF leaders, were completely taken by this change of events and surprised and confused by the development of them being guilty of losing a war they did not lead? They were well aware of their duty which was to urge the Macedonian people to fight; i.e. to do as they were commanded by the Greek leadership, especially Zahriadis; and they did exactly what they were told! And now they were being accused of losing the war; especially after Zahariadis kept telling them that they were winning it? If they did not trust the Greeks, then they surely trusted the Yugoslavs who, only a short time ago, had passed them on to the CPG and told them to follow the CPG’s lead because the CPG would look after their interests? Surely the Yugoslav’s would not put them in a harmful position… at least not intentionally?

Here is what historian and author Lazarov had to say about the Yugoslavs: “... The Yugoslav leadership, during the Paris Peace Conference and afterwards, not only did not bring up the Macedonian National Question but, in the years that followed, in general it avoided! It did this in order to not disturb the smooth Yugoslav, i.e. Serbian-Greek relations.”

So, every Macedonian who suffered in all this has the right to ask the questions: “Who led us and involved us in this deadly campaign? Whose foreign goals and policies were we fulfilling when we were

spilling our blood? Whose history were we writing? Who led us in the Greek Civil War and why did we fight in it?”

This was an intensive and exhaustive war that brought devastation to the Macedonian population in Greek occupied Macedonia. It was a war in which the Macedonian people fought heroically (for whatever reason)! So, why then is there no mention of this heroism or even of Macedonian participation in this war in the history of the world? Even in the history of the Greek Civil War, or the history of DAG, written by outsiders? Unfortunately the world was never made aware of the real intent of that war, or of Greece’s true demography. As far as the world knew it was a war to oust the Greek communists out of Greece… and nothing more. And as far as the world knew, since 1928, Greece had declared itself homogeneous with 98% pure Greeks and 2% Muslim Greeks living within its borders… no Macedonians there…

The CPG Central Committee Politburo adopted an Informburo Resolution on June 30, 1948. The CPG Central Committee held its own Fourth Plenary Session on July 28 and 29, 1948.

Events that followed the Session, especially after the tangle of international circumstances with the introduction of the Informburo Resolution, had a very negative impact on the Macedonian people realizing their national rights and on the flexibility of forming their independent Macedonian state.

The CPM’s Central Committee 2nd Plenum was held in Skopje on April 19 and 20, 1949. See “Borba” published March 6, 1949. The CPM leadership strongly condemned the Greek communist call for a “United Macedonia” within a Balkan Federation because such a call, according to them, was “imperialistic”, initiated by their “critics” who campaigned against Yugoslavia. They said that such a call “was initiated by the notorious Informburo in order to break up the unity of the Macedonian and other Yugoslav peoples, to separate the Republic of Macedonia from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and to compromise socialist Yugoslavia”.

The Informburo Resolution or conflict that arose between the Soviet (KPSS) and Yugoslav (CPY) Communist Parties in June 1948 was

an excellent example of how the Macedonian people became pawns of international politics. Although this conflict had nothing to do with the Macedonians, it had an extremely negative impact on the ranks of NOF and AFZH. All of a sudden there was new political stratification, new political rhetoric, new realignment problems, new opposition and new victims.

For the purpose of furthering his own ambitions, whatever they may have been, Zahariadis orchestrated the creation of a “Communist Party” for the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia. This party, even though completely dependent on the CPG, was named “KOEM” (Communist Party of the Aegean Macedonians).

One of KOEM’s main goals was to prevent “relationships” from developing between the Macedonians in the Republic of Macedonia and those in Greek occupied Macedonia. In addition to creating “KOEM” and suspending all relations between the Macedonians, to make sure such relationships never developed again, Zahariadis instilled hatred in the Macedonians in one camp for the Macedonians in the other camp. Zahariadis made sure that the Macedonian National Question became an integral part of the Informburo’s anti-Yugoslav campaign in order to suspend and reverse all spiritual and political relations in existence between the Macedonians in the Republic of Macedonia and those in Greek occupied Macedonia. As a result, the Macedonian struggle for national and social freedom was disoriented nationwide.

After Tito and Zahariadis made their Agreement part of the CPG Central Committee Politburo, headed by Ianis Ioanidis, was transferred to Belgrade in order to represent the CPG abroad and to manage the flow of weapons and other supplies for the armed struggle in Greece. (See: Kiriazovski, “Macedonians and their relations with the CPG, 1945-1949” page 253.) For more information on this, including a complete list of equipment supplied to DAG, see “Danas” magazine published 03.06.1990, numbers 418, 419, and 420.

During the same Agreement made by Tito and Zahariadis, Tito also agreed to allow Mobilization of Macedonians inside Yugoslavia, i.e.

from those people who had fled to Yugoslavia to save themselves from the Greek terror.

September 27, 1947 – DAG Headquarters ordered the mobilization of all men between the ages of 17 to 35. With much intensity, over the course of 4 to 9 months, the Macedonian political refugees who had fled to Yugoslavia and were living in Skopje, Veles, Shtip and Bitola were also mobilized into DAG and shipped from Yugoslavia to the front in Greece, in trucks covered with tarps during the night. (See: F.M INI SK.4-271/60 p.73-76.)

There is clear confirmation that all these decisions were made without Macedonian presence or consent and that the Greek Civil War was intended to be fought in Greek occupied Macedonia. All this was decided at the Belgrade Plenum in September 1947 with no Macedonian representation!

Yet, after all these decisions were made, NOF was expected to accept all terms and conditions decided by Tito and Zahariadis without its presence or consent. Ironically, NOF agreed to all CPG demands and thus began to exhaust the Macedonian population to its maximum…

It is worth mentioning at this point, or more precisely answering the questions that many historians have asked: “Why did so many people die from the same villages in Greek occupied Macedonia?” In other words, “why did some Macedonian villages contribute so much more to the war effort than others?” Even though the Macedonian population in Greek occupied Macedonia numbered about 300,000, recruitment of fighters was not proportionally and evenly conducted. Most of the people that joined DAG voluntarily, or were forcibly recruited, came from the villages in what was called “free territories”, which basically covered Prespa Region and small parts of Lerin and Kostur Regions. Almost the entire young adult population (16 to 50) in these villages was involved in the war effort and many lost as much as 10% of their population; being killed in action or generally to death due to the war. After the front of the war was pushed in this region, most of these villages lost up to 90% of the population due to evictions by the Greek government. The Greek government refused to allow the civilian war refugees, who had fled

to Albania to save themselves, to return to their homes. Many villages were also bombed to dust.

Almost the entire civilian population that fled to Albania (as war refugees) to avoid being killed by the Greek bombs was exclusively Macedonian. Besides these people being driven out from their homes, the vast majority of the families were also separated with no knowledge if members of their families were dead or alive. People had no idea what was happening to them! Children were taken away and sent to East European countries. The majority of DAG fighters were sent to the Soviet Union and many of the civilians were sent to Yugoslavia, Poland and other East European countries.

And how did the foreign authorities involved in this tragedy try to explain the situation? On August 1, 1949 the newspaper “Pros ti Niki” (On to Victory), an organ of DAG General Staff, number 168, detailed the response made by the KOEM, NOF, AFZH and NOMS leadership, that in Skopje, on July 29, 1949 a Conference was held in defense of the CPY. Attending the Conference were representatives of some 30,000 refugees from Aegean Macedonia, mostly the sons, brothers and sisters of the mobilized DAG fighters who had died in the battlefields of Gramos, Vicho and throughout Greece. Among other things, the Conference passed a Resolution that said that the Macedonians from Aegean Macedonia will never forget the assistance received and will always preserve their eternal love and gratitude for the Yugoslav people headed by Marshal Tito. The Conference strongly condemned the CPG and slandered its leadership. In response to this Conference, the leaderships of KOEM, NOF, AFZH and NOMS issued a statement which said: We the Macedonians will defend Comrade Zahariadis’s position and the views of the CPG leadership taken against Yugoslavia and its leadership, which is leading a treacherous policy and we will fight with the Greek Communists in a fair fight which the CPG and DAG will lead to free Greece from the Monarcho-Fascists. (See “Chronology of the National Liberation Struggle in Aegean Macedonia - (1945-1949)”, 1973.)

So, here again the CPG, or more precisely the Greek Left, has placed a wedge between the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia and those in the Republic of Macedonia. In addition to

that, the CPG, by putting words in the mouths of the puppet Macedonian leaders of the now completely defunct Macedonian organizations KOEM, NOF, AFZH and NOMS, inferred that the families of those who died fighting for the CPG were actually traitors because they were supposedly supporting a “foreign” i.e. Yugoslav (non-Greek) position! Here again the Macedonians are turned into pawns in the deadly games the communists played!

All these things, done to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, need to be exposed in order for us to begin to understand, not only how we were directly manipulated to sacrifice ourselves but also to understand how we were used as pawns to serve the interests of greater foreign political games!

Historian Lazar Lazarov’s book, “Macedonia in French politics in the Balkans 1944-1957”, 1998, contains much factual material and important lessons for our future. This author stands apart from the historiographers who write only about what is supported by current politics and in line with what is acceptable to governments. This author has reminded us that our history must not be remembered by the actions taken by foreigners and strangers, or manipulated by ideological cronies. With remarkable dexterity he has revealed the double standard that has been hidden by the CPY in regards to its concerns and care for the Macedonian people.

What are the secret CIA documents saying?

According to secret CIA documents, the conflict between Stalin and Tito was about Tito not adhering to the idea that the Soviet leader did not want problems with the allies of America and England because of the Yalta agreement. So Tito continued to supply the communist rebels in Greece with weapons, equipment and officer corps to fight on the Greek partisan side. Stalin sent a letter to Tito criticizing him for opening the “Greek line” and for helping the Greek communists who started a fight that had no chance of success because Athens was supported by America, “the most powerful country in the world”.

From what has been said above it should be obvious to everyone that not only did the Macedonians have no chance of uniting

Macedonia because the West would not allow Greece to break up, but the communists in Greece had no chance of succeeding either! So why did Yugoslavia, against Stalin’s advice, continue to support this campaign? Again, it is important to understand that events such as this war do not happen by chance, there is always a purpose to them and to understand that purpose we need to take look at the final outcome. There is no doubt here that the Macedonian people were lied to in order to get them involved in this war and eventually led, not to the victories they were promised but to their demise! Why? Because the powers to be did not want the presence of Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia… They wanted the Macedonians out of Greek occupied Macedonia! And by doing what they did, the CPY and the CPG made that happen! They emptied Macedonia of its Macedonians! And what are the chances of that ever happening purely by chance alone? Very small… very small indeed!

What happened next? In June 1948 the Informburo published a resolution placing Yugoslavia in complete isolation from the socialist bloc.

CIA documents have also revealed that immediately after Yugoslavia was discharged by the Informbiro, Tito suspended aid to the communist resistance in Greece, even closed the borders. This was destined to end the civil war in Greece.

Now we can see how and by whom NOF and AFZH were ideologically instructed and blindly led to the gallows. And those who were left alive?! Well, they did not fair any better feeling guilty all their lives for what they had done and crying the blues in the far corners of the world where they were left to roam forever with no chance of ever returning to their ancestral homes for which they fought so hard to protect and preserve… They were not allowed to return home not even to light a candle at the graves of their dead… And our homeland; the mountains we roamed on which we spilled our blood? They are the tapestry, a historical stamp soaked in our blood that will remain unseen until it is forgotten…

What was this pseudo CPY concern all about? Here is what a senior official had to say: “In September, when the Parliamentary Yugoslav delegation visited Athens, a Greek journalist asked Mosha

Piade what he thought about the ‘Macedonian Question’, the answer given, according to Jean Belan, French Ambassador to Greece, was: ‘The Greek government is itself due to judge it (the Macedonian Question), which is purely an internal matter and every government should regulate such matters in accordance with their own processes’...” And we all know exactly what the Greek government thinks of the Macedonian Question and of the Macedonians… and how it judged them! Has anything changed since then? Has the manipulation of the Macedonians ended? No it has not! We are still being lied to and manipulated to this day…

The purpose of writing this and similar books is to inform our readers not only of our past but also to make them aware of the various methods of manipulation used to coerse us into doing things that we ordinarily would not do. Knowing the lies and tricks used against us in the past will help us identify them in the present. Our enemies, to this day, have not stopped manipulating us and our past to suit their agendas and to serve their interests. We have to become better at identifying these tactics and expose them. These are the traps that got us into trouble in the past which must be avoided in the future.

Leaving our ancestral homes was a national disaster!

Now about my book “(Self) sacrifice of the Macedonians under Greece” 1994. My attempts to “think differently”, to think outside of the usual totalitarian prescribed methodology, were not interpreted by Dr. Kiriazovski as a way of contributing to the promotion of freedom of intellectual thought, as I had intended. He and his kind saw my book as an attack against their totalitarian ideology that has always played the role of “master of the truth”! So, to counter my attempts, he wrote a 41 page report (with premeditated attempts to vilify me) and instead of publishing it, he distributed it among the “guards” of Aegean Macedonian history and instructed them to rewrite the entire passage and send it to the newspaper “Nova Makedonija” for publishing in the column under “letters to the editor”. This was Kiriazovski’s traditional method of responding to the “free thinkers” of our society. Some accepted blame. Some did not! As time has shown, not all people who can read and write are

necessarily literate. They are just not illiterate. Real literacy needs a lot more work and effort!

The material written by Kiriazovski was archived on April 8, 1994 under the title “Memoirs” no. SK. 1118, in the INI Department of Documentation.

In the “Macedonian Sun” FORUM magazine, dated December 14, 2001, Kiriazovski himself wrote the following about my book “Ideological activism over the Macedonians under Greece” (2000):

“According to S. Kochov, the current Macedonian historiography is servile, biased and submissive to Belgrade’s line of daily politics... Who motivated Kochov to want to answer the question of who is to blame for the Greek Civil War and who is guilty of the severe consequences that befell the Macedonian people?

...Mr. S. Kochov argues that the Greek Civil War was neither a revolution nor a continuation of the famous Ilinden Uprising and that the Organization NOF enslaved the Macedonian people from Aegean Macedonia and surrendered them to the CPG and the CPY, where they served the CPG and CPY’s alien anti-Macedonian interests.

…If the organization NOF played a role as described by Mr. Kochov, then the leadership of NOF is a direct accomplice and responsible for the tragic consequences of the Macedonian people, therefore, according to him, it can not be amnestied or forgiven…

…Kochov accuses Macedonian historiography of not being an integrated study of the history of the Macedonian people and that it is an example unique to us (Macedonian phenomenon), which is not quite true.”

This is what historian Kiriazovski has accused me of having said in my book, which now he himself has recognized to be true and about which he has written in his last book. But I, even today, have a wide range of issues. One of the most dominant questions that dogs my mind is: “Do we have an integral Macedonian history?”

Why do I ask this question? Because, whether we like it on not, we the Macedonian people from Greek occupied Macedonia had only one homeland and we lost it. So, how unfair would it be to admit to the truth and reveal the secret as to why we lost it? How is it in “our national interest” not to know the truth of what happened to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, especially when our Macedonian organizations were led by the CPY/CPM all throughout the Greek Civil War?

Who and what gave Kiriazovski the right to “politicize” and deprive “us” of our rights and privileges? By “us” I mean all those fighters who did not desert DAG and did not return to Yugoslavia until later.

I and many others stayed and fought until the war was over. After that, almost the entire military formation left Greece and was sent to the USSR. While we were in the USSR I went to school and had a great time learning. It was a happy period of my life which helped me to understand, to learn and to appreciate the people and things around me a lot more than I had before. The peace and tranquility gave me a chance to review what had happened to us and sort out all the evils that befell the Macedonian people and the Macedonian family. I was able to sort out all those “historic problems” that we Macedonians lived through. By then I was very happy to be returning to my homeland, the Republic of Macedonia. But, having to go to prison upon my return was incomprehensible?!... Now, I believe that it should be clear to everyone that we Macedonians suffered immensely because “Stalin and Tito were annoyed with each other!” If you can believe that!

And as the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky once said: “He who lies to himself can easily be offended.”

Any intelligent person could have figured out what Kiriazovski’s motives were and what he was trying to do. As a historian with an academic title he asked that my book “Sacrifice of the Macedonians under Greece” be evaluated under academic standards and declared academically “unfit” because it was written by a layman. To do that he organized a group of so-called “scientists”, people who, for half a century after our national defeat, still pretended to be Marxists and “revolutionaries”. But I knew that these people, along with

Kiriazovski, were nothing more than “deserters” from DAG who had fled to Yugoslavia to save their own necks. Kiriazovski wanted to discredit my book in order to defend his own books, particularly his books about the Macedonians under Greece.

But in the end how did all this help him? This reminded me of what the philosopher Socrates (469 p. n. e. 399 p. n. e.) said when he was asked: “What animal bites worst?” He replied: “From the wild kind the one that is annoyed the most and from the domestic kind the one which is a bootlicker.”

At every occasion, be it a “class hassle” or a pointless “ideological act”, these people as guardians of the “open mass grave” threw every self-conscious Macedonian into it. Everything was reduced to a dangerous division of the Macedonian national body.

It is a fact that “foreign ideologies” created and have always created parallel worlds and parallel historical events inside Macedonia and among us Macedonians.

We the participants of DAG, who have a historic memory of a long series of national defeats, now know this very well. But too bad we did not know it before the Greek Civil War and before DAG’s defeat. Had we known it, so many lives that were lost in vain could have been saved. We would have known the “tricks” used on NOF and AFZH who in turn, wittingly or unwittingly, tricked the “Macedonian people” to (self) sacrifice themselves for nothing and on top of that, to lose their homes, their lands and have their identity questioned by being called “Aegeans”.

I am thankful to the then political activists who opened my eyes; because of their activities it became clear to me that they were systematically working to destroy our national pride.

The most amusing part about the people in one of those groups was the way they spoke and referred to Macedonians like themselves calling them “Greeks” and “Yugoslavs”. Remember, these people were officials, part of the elite mainstream society. So, the question is, “Were they completely incompetent and totally uninformed? Or were they implanted with computer chips and programmed to

support ‘Greek’ and ‘Yugoslav’ interests inside Macedonia?” A large number of these people were on Gogol’s list of “Dead Souls” and this reminded me of what Bielinski wrote after reading the “Dead Souls” by Gogol: “Lord, why is our truth so depressing, miserable and sad”?! It is understandable that all these articles were promoted as “a well-known model” of our past, with predetermined and premeditated thinking and with a narrow intellectual horizon. “What did they actually protect?” When asked, one said: “Our well-written history; the history of the Aegeans…”

After all the “ideological barking” I had received from them, I felt completely degraded, ruined and full of rage because I still could not find an answer, even in my own homeland; “Why was I and thousands of Macedonians like me sacrificed? Regardless of whether the Greek Civil War was “a revolution” or “fraud” – instigated by the CPY/CPM for some sort of plot, “did we the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia have to be sacrificed? Did we have to experience genocide?” Why?

I was convinced that history, as a social science, must be a function of society and of free thought. And someday when that happens we will know what we are seeking to know, - the truth. There has always been a fear of history... History is true only when it is full of authentic facts and only authentic facts can remove the veil of darkness. We will know the truth when all those historical events that we experienced, pave the way into the future – with giant steps backwards.

But the question is: “Are we Macedonians simply incapable of self-criticism?”

This is not the first “horrible oblivion” that has engulfed Macedonia and swept the Macedonian people away. But please God, let it be the last! No more illusions and lies. But to achieve that, we need a radical Macedonian mentality change. Those who think they have a need to mislead and deceive – have a problem with themselves. Kiriazovski was one such person, who by his own actions proved it, when he issued his latest book outside of the INI national institution. What he said “before” and what he said “after” were two different

and contradictory things! By changing his mind, he proved that he was a deceiver!

The kind of historiography written about us, the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia in the last 60 years, has shown itself to be most susceptible to politicization. And when it is “politically manipulated”, even with the most minute of deviations from reality, it produces unforeseeable consequences for the Macedonian people.

Our research has uncovered many of the “hidden” facts that other authors who have written history about the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia, have intentionally or unintentionally omitted. The “roots of evil” and “dark secrets” hidden for the last sixty years by the actors and perpetrators who set the “deadly trap” through ideological activism that led to the greatest deception of the century, are now slowly coming out. We will finally know why we experienced “genocide” and the largest migrations of Macedonians out of Greek occupied Macedonia in Macedonia’s history!

Those who do not recognize or feel that the acts of genocide, perpetrated against the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia between 1945 and 1949, were a Macedonian tragedy will never be able to understand Greece’s fascist genocidal policy against the Macedonian people.

For that reason it is illusory to run away from fate, no matter how tragic or unfortunate it may be for us Macedonians.

History remembers both words and silence. The truth is in history. And with the truth on our side it is possible to build something real and lasting.

And why haven’t we built something “real and lasting” this far? Well, for that we have ourselves to blame. The time when we could blame “someone else” has passed. But now, since the Republic of Macedonia became an independent state we have no one to blame but ourselves for all of our mistakes. Being “masters of our own destiny” unfortunately has not taught us much; it has not stopped us from making mistakes, big mistakes that will have great consequences for years. The reasons that we still make mistakes lies

in our history, about which we have learned very little. Why? Because we allowed others, outsiders, to manipulate us, to tell us what to do, who we are and how we should feel!

We, the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, have to admit that, for a long time, we have been under not only the physical but also the psychological “Greek thumb”. They have been filling our heads with lies and nonsense and we believed them; many still believe them; even some of those who now no longer live in Greece, still believe them. By doing this we are creating, we are writing our own tragic history!

What is our truth like?

Research has shown that we, the surviving Macedonians from the Greek Civil War and the survivors from all turbulent times in our history, have not been able to “shake off” our expectations and dependency on others, on outsiders, on strangers, on the CPY, on the CPG, etc., who don’t see us the way we see them. While they have proven to us that they want no part of and have attempted to “destroy us” at every opportunity, without self-respect we continue to play their games by their rules, sacrificing ourselves and dying for them. Why such false hopes? Why do we choose to live illusions? And for these reasons we allow our history to also be an illusion!

So why is this happening to the Macedonians? Why do we put our feet in their traps and our heads in their noose? Time and events have shown that the programs put in place by the CPY/CPM through NOF and AFZH to encourage a Macedonian mass participation in an “ideological and alien war” have destroyed the Macedonian nation and culture in Greek occupied Macedonia and have left the survivors stranded in alien lands with a half century old “blank stare”.

I hope you now appreciate why we need to understand what happened to us and why we need to know the “historic truth”, which has been hidden from us for more than a half century.

The following was the Left’s position after the Greek Civil War:

In September 1988, almost one year after the May 1987 Congress, CPG Secretary General Harilaos Florakis held a press conference in Solun with Greek and foreign journalists to openly explain the position he took at the Congress. In his answer to a journalist working for “Mesimvrini”, among other things, Florakis said: “On this occasion I would like to say that for us, for our Party, the Macedonian minority does not exist!” (Vecher, November 5, 1988, page 9)

I remember this like it was said yesterday. During the 1950’s when I was in Tashkent, one of my fellow fighters, a brave fellow, nephew of an Ilinden fighter and son of a fighter from Kostur who was ruthlessly liquidated, said something. He said: “It is true that the Kostur fighters before us failed to create a Paradise in our Aegean Macedonia and because of that did NOF and AFZH have to create a hell there?”

Many secrets of the genocide committed against the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia are hidden in the CPY/CPM archives and will remain there undiscovered along with the motives for creating NOF and AFZH in Skopje on April 23, 1945, by the CPY/CPM leadership (Tito, Kolishevski and Mitrevski), the people responsible for putting the noose around our necks.

We all know that Macedonia was partitioned in 1913 into three pieces. We all know that two of the three pieces failed to liberate themselves. We also all know that one part survived and did liberate itself, first as a Republic within a federal state and then as an Independent State. Therefore, we should also be aware that all Greek attempts and efforts to “entirely destroy” Macedonia have failed - the Republic of Macedonia is alive and well.

This, however, is also a good place to mention that even though Greece has failed to destroy Macedonia, it does not mean that it has given up; hence the so-called fabricated “name dispute”! Greece has not stopped and will not stop doing what it started in 1913. Greece, over the last 60 years, has tried very hard, by any means possible, to suppress the Macedonian name, identity and language not only inside Greece but also outside, even in the Republic of Macedonia. The Interim Agreement Greece signed with Macedonia for alleged

Macedonian security threats is only a front for hiding what it has done and is still doing to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia. All these “constitutional changes”, “flag changes”, “temporary name”, etc. are just stumbling blocks and curtains to veil the Macedonian “problem” inside Greece; the land confiscations, the terror, the murders, the depravation of rights, the exiling of hundreds of thousands of Macedonian people and the “genocide” perpetrated against the Macedonian culture and nation!

I could stop here and leave the reader to ask their own questions and seek their own answers as to what happened to us Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia. But instead of doing that I prefer to present you with more evidence: facts and arguments that will lead you to understand why the Macedonian people experienced persecution, loss of their homes and lands, permanent exile and genocide during and after the Greek Civil War. Why did this happen to a peace-loving population?

Conclusion: Instead of a scream, there is silence about the genocide.

It is an undeniable fact that: It was after Greece fell under the Western Power sphere of influence, i.e. Great Britain, the United States of America and NATO, that the CPY/CPM undertook action to establish the Macedonian organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS in Skopje on April 23, 1945. It was during this time that the CPY/CPM decided to call on the unarmed Macedonian peasant to arm himself and start a rebellion against the Greek Government. This was not only “stupidity” but, as it turned out, a major “tragedy”.

It is an undeniable fact that: The CPY/CPM promised the Macedonian people that: “Yugoslavia was then the Centre of the Revolution in the Balkans and that the Macedonian question became a Yugoslav question.” This was not only a lie but a definitive death sentence for us, the Macedonian people from Greek occupied Macedonia. There is no doubt that this was the formula for the “Final Solution of the Macedonian question.”

In other words the plan was: “To kill and expel the entire Macedonian population from Greece because the British did not