Front Matter

The Other Face of History

By Stoian Kochov (Translated from Macedonian to English and edited by Risto Stefov)

The Other Face of History

July 18, 2013

Introduction

This book is an attempt to analyze the politics behind the Macedonian involvement in the Greek Civil War by asking critical questions such as: Who got the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia involved in this war and why? Why was this war started right after World War II ended, when everything was already decided by the Great Powers? What was the common Macedonian fighter led to believe that he or she was fighting for and what was the real motive behind getting them to fight? And most importantly, why did the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, yet again, allow foreigners and strangers to lead them in a brutal ideological war; the same foreigners who had brutally partitioned Macedonia in 1913?

This book focuses on the Macedonian people’s longing desire to free themselves after generations of persecution and how that desire and patriotism was exploited to work against them, eventually driving them out of what they had fought for and loved the most; their homeland Macedonia and their centuries old native hearth! So surely every Macedonian who has been driven out of Greek occupied Macedonia and who today finds him or her self separated from their home and from their native land must want to know the answer to these questions?!

There is no shame in asking such questions, there is no shame in looking at ones own past, but why did it have to take 60 years after that dreaded Greek Civil War for these questions to finally surface? And why have our historians, up to this day, ignored them?

Thanks to modern research techniques, modern search systems and our ability to collect, store and search through large amounts of data, we finally have the ability to not only ask but also search for the answers to these questions.

My inspiration, or should I say, my “provocation” for doing research for this book came from having read Historian Risto Kiriazovski’s book entitled “Pette sudbonosni godini vo Egejska Makedonija (1945-1949) (Five vital years in Aegean Macedonia (1945 - 1949)). I will be analyzing the specifics of this book looking at all the details, searching for facts and solid evidence that may even suggest that there was a cover-up, a conspiracy and that the reality of this war might be quite different from what we were led to believe. I will specifically be looking for:

1. Tito’s involvement in the Aegean part of Macedonia.

2. Tito’s surrender of the Aegean Macedonian people to Zahariadis.

What were Tito’s (CPY/CPM, undoubtedly the most powerful force in Yugoslavia) political and ideological notions which motivated him to establish the Macedonian organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS on April 23, 1945 in Skopje? And why were these organizations required to seek maximum mass mobilization of the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia during a time when the War (WWII) had already ended and when Greece was facing political hell?!

- Did the war (WWII) not end for us Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia on May 9, 1945 when it had for everyone else?!

- Why were we, the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, led to war on April 23, 1945 when the war was ending for everyone else?!

- Why did Tito deliver us, Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, like slaves to the Communist Party of Greece and put us in the hands of that butcher Zahariadis?!

- Why did we, Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, enter into this war without our own Macedonian strategy?!

These are legitimate questions to which every Macedonian should scream and demand answers, given the outcome of that dreaded Greek Civil War!

The Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia were lured by the CPY/CPM and by the CPG with promises that they needed to fight “together” with their “traditional enemies” in order to fix historical wrongs. But in the end, no historical wrongs were ever fixed and in addition to losing many lives and their centuries old native hearth, they also experienced genocide in massive proportions. Why did they, and why do some of us still, believe that the very same people who brutally occupied and partitioned our Macedonia in 1913 and those who were subsequently brought there to colonize our lands in the 1920’s would “somehow” now save us?!

- Why were we so brutal with our own people, pushing them to get involved in a strange alien “ideological” war while all along telling them that it was a “revolution” and that we were fighting for our freedom and liberation?!

And even though the Greek Civil War had ended, for us, the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, the war still goes on. Thousands of us were persecuted and after they had pushed us out of our homes, after they had exiled us, they prohibited us by law from ever going back; from returning to our own native lands where we were born and had lived for countless generations because somehow we were “not Greeks by genus”! Why do they fear us so much? Why do we fear our own past? Why are we so naïve?

Will our nation ever look at these facts? Facts in which our national tragedy is buried? Will we forever carry the guilt and blame ourselves for wiping ourselves out from Greek occupied Macedonia? Are we going to blame ourselves even if the facts point in a different direction? Thus far we have blamed ourselves but the final verdict has not yet been carried! History as of yet has not fully spoken! The time has come for history to show its other face, it is time for the silence to end!

If World War II was a war of extermination, what then do we call the Greek Civil War after what it did to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia?!

* * *

After the Second World War (1945) ended there was constant misery and perpetual abuse of the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia. People were put in a position where they either had to fight and free themselves of the terror imposed upon them by the Greek government, or die at the hands of their abusers. Many chose to fight and courageously fought in the ranks of DAG (1946-1949). They fought with zeal, unafraid of unleashing the next hand grenade or turning their rifle barrel on their enemies. Why was it like that for these Macedonians?! Why were they put in this position where they had to “raise arms” in order to defend themselves?! Why did the Greek government terrorize them instead of protecting them? Did the Greek government not know that, pushed hard enough, they would eventually rebel against it? Or was that their aim all along! Who was behind instigating this rebellion?

Do we still believe they raised arms for ideological reasons? Did they raise arms to defend themselves or was it for something else?! Most importantly why did it take 60 years for these questions to surface?!

Now, 60 years later, we are finally looking back and questioning everything. It is about time that we collectively put our Macedonian minds together and carefully examine our past, if not for us then for our future generations and for the world. It is time that we open all questions and expose the “false” history we have been served. Let us put our minds together and expose the lies that over the years have divided and “crippled our people”.

Do we Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia know the truth about ourselves? Do we really know our truth? Have we Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia accepted the fate dealt to us by the Greek Civil War?! Don’t we all want to know who started the Greek Civil War and why? Don’t we all want to know whether the initiators were Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia or outsiders? If outsiders then who were they and why did they want us to fight?! Was their intention to destroy us? Was our tragic outcome pre-planned? By whom?!

Do we want to know if foreign countries were involved with intent to do us harm (genocide) or do we want this to remain a secret for another century?

Ask yourselves this: Has the Macedonian people’s historiography, for the last 60 years, served the Macedonian people’s national interests by omitting to show the world that we the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia experienced genocide?! Why is the “Aegean Macedonian theme” still in quarantine, kept away from the world?

We know that during World War II, the hundred-thousand strong Macedonian Army in Vardar Macedonia fought for a “United Macedonia” and we know that Tito was always against a “United Macedonia”.

How much do we know about the “political tragedy of NOF and AFZH”? How much do we know about the Macedonians who passed through the black scenario of DAG’s history and the national and political implications of their bondage to NOF, AFZH, CPY/CPM and the CPG? Don’t you want to know who lied to and lured the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia into this war?! Don’t you want to know about Tito’s (CPY/CPM) political and ideological involvement in all this? Or do you believe that the organizers and strategists that led the Greek Civil War (1) for their own interests are telling us the truth?

What we do know for sure is that the “Party loyal soldiers” belonging to the ranks of the CPY and to the CPG are responsible for writing this “false history” about the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia.

The oppressed Macedonian people from Greek occupied Macedonia have been left to wonder for six decades about what really happened to them; about their violent uprooting, about the ideological indoctrination that pushed them to self-destruct during the Greek Civil War from 1945 to 1949. We the Macedonians, living in Greek occupied Macedonia, have endured a century of struggles; from the Ilinden Uprising, World War I, the Greek-Turkish War, World War II and more recently the Greek Civil War; conflicts during which we were used by strangers and manipulated by ideological parties such as the CPY and the CPG to work against our interests. We have been lied to and manipulated too many times and if we don’t get to the truth this time and learn from our mistakes, we will no doubt be again manipulated by strangers and outsiders.

Research into this subject has been difficult and painstaking but our desire to learn the truth should be of vital importance and must supersede our fear, pain and discomfort. My desire to learn the truth has given me the courage to look deeper and further and ask the “uncomfortable” questions, questions that so far have been ignored. It is time that we “cast out” the false history that has been written for us and write our own history based on facts and on “our own” experience. There is no longer a need to conceal the truth because of fear or because of some other factor. It is to our national interest for the truth to come out; for the world to know and for our future generations to learn what really happened to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia; the genocide perpetrated against them which not only destroyed many lives but also turned many Macedonians into permanent refugees and world wanderers. We owe ourselves that much!

We need to ask ourselves (particularly about our involvement in the Greek Civil War): “Did we shed all this Macedonian blood for century old Macedonian ideals or were we manipulated into sacrificing ourselves for nothing?! This is a question I want to firmly resolve for our future generations and explain to them why their recent ancestors have been firmly and forever uprooted from their homeland and exiled and why they are cast out as permanent refugees all over the world. We also have an obligation to inform our Macedonian brothers and sisters who remained in Greece and who still bear deep family roots and who have lived in our homeland for centuries (like our “VINIZHITO” brothers for example) and have not shared our fate and did not have to live like strangers in foreign lands or as “ideological subjects”. We need to inform them of what truly happened to us and to interpret for them the hardships we had to endure in this unwanted journey. The overriding question that comes to mind in this historical and military analysis is: “Did the ‘Road to Freedom’ chosen for us by our ideological activists lead us to the loss of our ancestral homes? Did it lead us to the destruction of our nation? Did it lead us to ‘persecution and permanent mass eviction?’!”

Our historical and military analysis shows that the truth has always been there for the last 60 years; only lies had to be invented to cover it up. So the question is who covered it up and why? Our research of what happened to the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia in a span of a century and especially during the Greek Civil War years (1945-1949) has revealed that the Macedonians were always lied to. Macedonian patriotism was destroyed by the Communists before it even had a chance to come to the fore. Through their ideological activism the Communists led the Macedonian people to believe that they were fighting for freedom and for a united Macedonia and their patriotism was only used to make sacrifices of them. The so-called “Road to Freedom” for the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia was chosen for them after World War II ended, after the Balkans were divided into spheres of influence by the Great Power and after it was decided that all of Greece would fall under the British sphere of influence. So why then did the CPY/CPM, under Yugoslav directives, form NOF and AFZH and initiate the “Road to Freedom” campaign in Aegean Macedonia? Was this one of (CPY/CPM) Tito’s political and ideological creations aspiring to demonstrate his greatness to the Macedonian people? Or was this, as the outcome has shown, a Western Power ploy to permanently rid Greece of the Macedonians?

After being created and led by the CPY/CPM, the Macedonian organizations NOF and AFZH were then, by Tito’s orders, surrendered to the Communist Party of Greece. This was not only unexpected, it was downright treasonous! It was the worst thing that could have happened to the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia; to be led into a senseless ideological war by the very same people responsible for Macedonia’s occupation, partition (1913) and Macedonia’s colonization (1920s’s). So instead of taking the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia on the “Road to Freedom”, as promised by Tito and his cronies, Tito surrendered them to Zahariadis and to his cronies who in turn then took them on the “Road to persecution” and turned them into permanent “wanderers”. Now, generations later, they are still asking themselves: “Who are we? What are we doing here? What happened to us? Where are we going?...”

It is a fair question to ask: Why did Tito write our Macedonian history in this way? And why did Zahariadis turn us into “timeless hostages” for over half a century?

Greek occupied Macedonia is full of secrets. These secrets are tied to the many tragedies that occurred there which have largely determined our fate. Since its brutal occupation and violent partition in 1913 (2), that part of Macedonia has been plagued with conspiracies, murders, assassinations, spying and all sorts of affairs that would fill volumes of history books. Now, a century later and 60 years after the Greek Civil War, the ideological walls are starting to crack and crumble and the truth is beginning to reveal itself. Historian Risto Kiriazovski in his book: “Pette sudbonosti vo Egejska Makedonija (1945-1949) (Five vital years in Aegean Macedonia (1945-1949)), on page 40 has revealed that: “Tito handed over the Aegean Macedonians to Zahariadis”, which in essence means that Tito delivered the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia directly into the hands of their new masters, the CPG, to be used and abused by Zahariadis and his masters as nothing more than a weapon, a Kalashnikov, the deadliest Russian weapon ever made.

It is no secret, as our research is slowly uncovering, that we have surrendered our fate to strangers on many occasions in our recent historic past. We have allowed foreign powers to not only put us in precarious positions (for example Greece’s name dispute with Macedonia) but to take advantage of us (Ilinden Uprising) and to lead us to do their bidding (Greek Civil War). And why have they done this to us? To serve their own interests, of course! They want to destroy us because we remind them of what they have done to us; brutally invading and occupying our homeland; partitioning our country and destroying our spiritual and cultural unification! They want our iconic past to be forgotten, erased! They want us to permanently disappear from the face of this earth!

We need to know all these things; we need to know what truly happened to us in order to avoid repeating our mistakes; in order to heal and re-unite as Macedonians spiritually and culturally no matter where we live; that should be our permanent goal. We need to know once and for all “how” our predecessors were influenced, divided and misled by foreigners and outsiders and pass that knowledge on to future generations so that our past mistakes are not repeated. We must learn not to bow before every “ideological bully” that comes along or give in to any scheme, like a Balkan Federation, unification etc., presented to us. And most importantly we must remember to not allow anyone to manipulate us and use our patriotism against us.

Every Macedonian must know and respect that our choice to be Macedonians, or our self-determination, was made for us many centuries ago by our ancestors. Our Macedonian state’s name was chosen and our Macedonian statehood was forged a long time ago; they were a “fait accompli” for us, something that we should all be proud of! Our ancestors, like many other peoples, knew who they were and because of that today we have a natural right to be Macedonians. Today our self-determination is guaranteed by international law. It would be a great injustice to deny ourselves our historical name that belonged to our people for many centuries. It would be an even greater injustice to allow those who occupied and colonized our lands to rob us of that privilege and take our name away from us.

We have discovered much about ourselves but there is still more to discover: Whose victims are we? Who pushed us to sacrifice ourselves? Who pushed us to eradicate our deep and venerable roots?

Given that the Greeks, since our occupation in 1912, 1913, have been bent on destroying us and replacing us with colonists and settlers from Asia Minor, we need to ask ourselves: Why have we allowed the very same Greeks and their colonists to lead us during the Greek Civil War (1946-1949) and make us believe that they were helping us fight for our rights and for our “self-determination”?!

Another question that we should be asking ourselves, in view of the previous question and knowing that the Greeks were bent on destroying us, is why did Tito support the Greek injustices against Macedonia and the Macedonian people during and after the Greek Civil War?! Why didn’t he expose the genocide perpetrated against the Macedonian people?

In my view I can confirm, with much certainty, that: Many exiled Macedonians (and their descendants) from Greek occupied Macedonia, who today find themselves spread worldwide, have kept the memories of their homeland and their Macedonian identity alive!

Historians, one day, will have to answer the following questions: 1. Why were the Macedonians from the People's Republic of Macedonia sent to fight in Goli Ostok when they actually wanted to fight for a “United Macedonia”?! 2. Why were the Macedonians, from Greek occupied Macedonia, sent to fight in the Greek Civil War and led to believe that they were fighting for a United Macedonia?!

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act”! George Orwell.

“In war, the aim is not to die for your country but to make the enemy die for his.” Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945).

“The price that good men pay for not participating in public events is that they allow corrupt people to rule.” Plato.

I – The Other Face of History

1.0 For years the Macedonian people have been unwitting accomplices and victims of fatal ideological foreign strategies

The following is a review of events and of the general course of political developments in Aegean Macedonia (Party Chronicle from 1940 until the end of the Second World War).

The book “Pette sudbonosni godini vo Egejska Makedonija (1945-1949) (“Five vital years in Aegean Macedonia (1945-1949)”), which I intend to analyze in this write up, is written by Dr. Risto Kiriazovski (3). It is an intimate confession of a political historian, loyal to the establishment – whom I consider a sinner. A sinner because in the past he had supported the establishment on issues which I consider contrary to the interests of the Macedonian people from Greek occupied Macedonia.

In this book, however, Dr. Kiriazovski has uncovered and revealed something quite different from what he had officially published in his previous books, which were published by the Institute of Natural History in the six decades of Yugoslav dominance. But in this book, which he wrote after the Republic of Macedonia became independent, he chose to write in a different way as if wanting to deny what he had written before and bury it deep in a political tomb. In other words, by writing this book he demonstrated that he wanted to tell the truth, which to this day has been hidden from view by all those invented lies written before.