CHAPTER FOUR - Truths and controversies about the Greek Civil War (1945-1949) - Part 01

CHAPTER FOUR - Truths and controversies about the Greek Civil War (1945-1949)

The biggest manipulation perpetrated against the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia after the Second World War: “From one lie to another…”

Historian Risto Kiriazovski has confirmed that: “NOF (National Liberation Front) for the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia was founded in Skopje on April 23, 1945, under the initiative of the CPY-CPM leadership.” He has also confirmed that, simultaneously within NOF, AFZH, the Women’s organization, and NOMS, the organization for the young, were also founded. It is interesting to note at this point that there was no such “Women’s organization” for the Greek women during the Greek Civil War.

1. Question: “Were these Macedonian organizations created for a future strategy? Were these organization founded for the purpose of some future need not yet defined but concocted by the CPG headed by Zahariadis and by the CPM/CPY headed by Tito?!” asked Mitre Delovichin politely, a disabled man with a missing hand which he lost while fighting in Gramos.

After a short pause he continued: “It would appear that with the formation of AFZH which was to include our women, we practically broke our Macedonian family tradition and turned our families into political families…”

Suvogorski sighed deeply and said: “You are exactly right… Let us not deceive one another! These political games we were expected to play were negotiated in Belgrade between Tito and Zahariadis who had agreed to involve the entire Macedonian population, including our women, in a massive war, in a way that is unheard of in the world to this day. The hook was baited and tossed into the water and they knew that the Macedonians wouls bite.

Meaning, with the establishment of NOF, we Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia, in the decade from 1940 to 1949, found ourselves in the grip of binary politics; from a position of longing for a “United Macedonia” to losing our ancestral homes…”

One of the people sitting down in the back got all excited, sprang up from his bed causing the bed springs to creak loudly, and asked:

“Didn’t NOF have a vision of where it was going?!”

Suvogorski calmly said: “If there was one, mainstream history, I mean the history about us Aegean Macedonians, has made no clear mention of it, especially the political messages for involving the women en masse to perform various tasks after their children were taken away and sent abroad. Things were never made clear…”

Suvogorski, looking back at the man, felt like he had not properly answered his question. He then said: “I mean, you can make a world of assumptions and use your imagination but the truth can only be found in the facts. The truth will come out when the indisputable facts replace the assumptions.

We also need to say that, it is a fact that just after the Second World War and during the Greek Civil War, a Macedonian speaking population largely dominated Aegean Macedonia and all agitation done by NOF and AFZH was done in the Macedonian language, which was hopeful and supported some of our national rights. We even had Macedonian schools for our children.

The banned Macedonian language, for which so many people were fined and beaten by the Greek police for speaking it, was again echoing in our village streets. Because of this and because the CPG did not object to it, people began to gain confidence in the CPG and began to believe that the system and the state in which the Macedonians were cruelly tortured, was beginning to fall apart.

Unfortunately, as it turned out, this too was a lie, used by the communists to bait us. The only thing, it appears, they wanted from these organizations (NOF, AFZH and NOMS) was to mobilize the Macedonian population en masse into the war effort, especially the Macedonian population living in the compact areas like Kostur, Lerin, Voden, Gumendzhe and Kukush Regions.

From the outcome of these events one thing should be clear; the purpose the strategists had in mind was to break down the traditional Macedonian family and turn it into a political family. By doing so they were able to easily manipulate… and even blackmail… the Macedonian population into doing whatever they wanted. The ideological matrix they built was put into operation… its aim was to remove the Macedonians from the Macedonian family and home. This was done under the control of the communist ideology…

This becomes obvious when you ask yourself the following questions:

1. Against whom were these Macedonian organizations and their fronts formed?

2. Who was the opposition in these fronts?

3. What were the aims of this struggle?

Someone back there asked if this was a directive given by Tito and Kolishevski or by Tsvetko Uzunov – Abas? I would say by all of them…

Well, we saw what happened to us earlier, in previous years… the kinds of conflicts we experienced… and now, with the establishment of NOF and the other Macedonian organizations, our ‘Road to Freedom’ was defined… we were seduced by foreign propaganda clothed in Macedonian patriotism...”

Suvogorski adjusted himself slightly, leaned forward, opened his eyes wide and said:

“Allow me to do this in order. My understanding from my lengthy research and analysis is that we Macedonians in Greece, in the hands of the CPY and CPG, have become victims and subjects of retaliation. We have fallen victim to the Greek and Yugoslav ideological views and state policies. What is an even greater paradox is that Britain and the United States of America have stood and are still standing behind the Greek government on the ‘Macedonian Question’. Meaning, what to do with us Macedonians in Greece now

that it has become apparent that we do exist, after years of non-existence? How would Britain explain to the world, especially to Stalin, how we came about? And, what will Britain do if Stalin says… demands… for us Macedonians in Greece to be recognized and, as per the Atlantic Charter, be granted the right to form our own state? But, as it turned out, Greece conveniently fell under the British sphere of influence and under British protection… and Britain was basically allowed to do whatever it wanted in Greece. Unfortunately for us Macedonians, at the time we had no idea of what had been agreed to in Yalta on May 5, 1944, when negotiations were taking place for the division of the Balkans into spheres of influence. Unfortunately for us, Britain gained supremacy over Greece (and the Soviet Union over Romania) and as we know, on May 20, 1944, under pressure from the British, the CPG, EAM and ELAS signed the dreaded Lebanon Agreement with the royal government and it dissolved the coalition government. And then we thought we would win the war and reunite our Macedonia!? What foolishness… what irony…!

Back in 1944 and 1945 a small group of elite intellectuals, who later comprised NOF, in place of properly planning our future allowed themselves to be manipulated by Yugoslavia and surrendered our destiny to the Greeks, resulting in our genocide and in being exiled from our ancestral homes and lands. An unforgiving mistake has been made showing how unprepared and unaware we were during this historic moment in time. Knowing how ignorant, misinformed and unprepared we were, a certain type of Greeks and Yugoslavs took advantage of us by dangling in front of us the one thing we all cared most about; ‘our Macedonia to be freed and reunited!’ They used our patriotism to make us do their bidding… And after we fell into their grip, we did not have the strength or the common sense to escape…

Ours has been a hidden history. A secret kept for five decades, the history of the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia.

It is really strange that for five decades the Macedonian people blamed themselves for what happened to them in Greek occupied Macedonia, being completely clueless that they had been manipulated… And yes, we are also to be blamed… for our

stupidity and for blindly following orders from strangers. But the greatest blame of them all falls on the historians, particularly on our historians, who should have discovered the truth a long time ago and informed us about it. But, instead, they tried to be ‘politically correct’ and covered it up… and for five decades they let us believe that we had done something very wrong. Our historians made us believe that our tragedy and genocide was a revolution in which we ‘supposedly’ fought for something ‘noble’. Yes, perhaps those were our intentions… but then look at what happened. We fought to reunite our Macedonia and we ended up being exiled from out ancestral homes forever! Yes we had been duped… But, what is most interesting about all this is that the Greeks carried out their well-known policies towards us all throughout the Greek Civil War, policies that were well-known to us and later towards NOF: ‘Talk softly and carry a big stick.’ Their ultimate goal was for us to pick up guns and become involved in the war they created for us… and then drive us out. And who was to blame them? Unfortunately they could not do it alone because no one trusted the Greeks. They needed some ‘unaware’ Macedonians, putting it mildly, to do the job for them… Just like they did with SNOF and the Macedonian counter-bands a few years earlier… This is precisely why the Macedonian organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS were created. They became the military drummers who sent our people to war to get killed for someone else. The NOF leadership was caught between a rock and a hard place when it began to follow directives from the two powerful communist parties, the CPY and the CPG, which spoke sweet words but made our people pay with blood and with the loss of our fatherland. From our point of view it was NOF which led our people to ‘Liberty or Death’ in this so-called ‘Holy War’ or ‘Socialist Revolution’ depending on who you ask. They were led to this only because the Macedonian people believed and trusted their Macedonian leaders… and their Macedonian leaders who promised them freedom, human rights and a united and independent Macedonia… sent them to their death, destruction and eviction from their homeland… This is the Macedonian truth! This is what it looked like from the inside! It was NOF’s responsibility to verify those directives given to it from above and to make sure they agreed with the interests of the Macedonian people. The Macedonian people trusted NOF and, as far as they were concerned,

NOF let them down because it did not do its job to protect them! Another tragic moment in our Macedonian history!

When the NOF leadership realized that it too was stuck in a multi-layered and complex problem, it was too late, it too had become a victim of the same alien ideological systems, and found itself before ‘communist justice’ in Siberia. And, as you all know, I was part of that leadership and paid a hefty price for my mistakes.

Fifty years later, given the evidence available to us, we still have historians like Kiriazovski who say: “Finally, with bitterness and anger, we can conclude that the CPG not only did not take its Macedonian comrades, who bled together with the Greeks, under its protection... and not only did it not oppose the above decision (referring to Law 400/76) made by the Papandreou government, but it evaluated it positively. This time too the Macedonians from Aegean Macedonia were again let down by the Greek Communists…”

The question is: “Was this just an ‘infidelity’ the Greek communists committed, like Kiriazovski says, or were they doing this on purpose under a well thought out plan, a plan that is active to this day?”

The rights of the Macedonians in Greece

If the facts presented in the newspaper “Zora” in Sobotsko, published in “Nova Makedonija” on April 8, 1995 are correct, then there is another notorious truth that we need to know about. The “Zora” article said: “According to the CPG in Lerin Region, the United States of America destabilized Greece.” On the occasion of USA Vice Consul David Suler’s visit to Solun, to meet with leaders of the Lerin Rainbow party, the CPG District Committee for Lerin Region issued a statement condemning the USA for destabilizing the Balkans with their imperialistic policy of divide and conquer. The “Zora” article, among other things, also said: “It is a case that pierces the eyes because the CPG is a party, which had promised the Macedonian people equality and self-determination…” The fact that the CPG decided to emphasize these promises, with aims at securing allies during the Greek Civil War, with well-known consequences, were promises that it did not intend to keep and went as far as to

deny that it ever made these promises, gives us the right to label this Party evil, criminal and inhuman. Further on “Zora” wrote: “In the end, here is a characteristic CPG document to remind the gentlemen of the Lerin leadership of the then CPG composition when it was a true revolutionary organization, organizing massive organizations for each national minority (Macedonians, Turks, Albanians, Jews and others) and unifying the anti-fascist forces within them...” In the chapter about the “Macedonian Question” it said: “...The ruling class had carried out its oppressive policy in the most inhuman way through terror and suppression of the rights of the national minorities living in Greece, first among whom were the Macedonians.” The CPG’s defense for the rights of Macedonian people was presented as “national treason”. (Decision of the 6th Congress, 1935, “Communist Review”, number 2.3/1936.)

Our historiography was designed to make the Macedonian people accept responsibility for everything that happened and that was done to them during the Greek Civil War; that NOF was the responsible party for creating the violent political situation in Greek occupied Macedonia. This naturally freed the real strategists and designers that caused the Macedonian genocide not only from historical responsibility but also from suspicion.

Greek occupied Macedonians in DAG’s history and the national and political implications from NOF’s enslavement to the CPY and CPG.

Does our history have open questions on the following: First, whether we, the Macedonians, if after the Second World War did not join the people’s front, through the organization NOF (established in Skopje on April 23, 1945 at the CPM/CPY Central Committee), would we have missed the historic chance to resolve the “Macedonian Question” in Greece? Second, who actually mobilized us and with what strategic objectives was NOF established to lead the armed resistance? Why did we discard the alternative (not to join the resistance movement)? Was it because it was less glorious? Did we need to defeat our enemy for not allowing us to achieve our centuries-old aspiration – to have our own country back? Third, why did we pick up arms even before the Greek Civil War had started? Was the option of starting an armed resistance ours

or the strategic goal of foreigners organized by ideological activists who had aims at perpetrating genocide against us?

In the new order the CPG became the almighty master over the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, and the consequences from that were overwhelming. In the new order, importance was measured with sacrifices under the all important slogan: “All to arms, everything for victory!”

* Were we Macedonians, as a nation, intellectually, politically and militarily prepared and able to preserve the territorial integrity of Greek occupied Macedonia and the compactness of the Macedonian population in World War II?

* After the Great Powers, in their affairs, divided the world into spheres of influence everything became “status quo”. The international state borders dividing Greece and Yugoslavia after the Second World War became the unbreakable borders of the two camps?

* With the world stage set the way it was, what chance did NOF have in achieving its stated goals, especially with the iron curtain as a border between Greek occupied Macedonia and the Republic of Macedonia?

* If history has no answers as to “why things happened” and only tells us “how things happened” then in that too there is wisdom. However, in this analysis perhaps those guards of the “History of the Aegeans”, who still say that there was no other option available to us, will find it seriously difficult to answer the question: If this is how things happened then how would things have happened if the democratic forces in Greece, the Greek Civil War and so on were located in other parts of Greece and, of course, if NOF had not been created and managed by the CPM/CPY? In other words, how would events have developed for us Macedonians had NOF not existed at all? Would we have had the same kind of massive coercion and experienced the same kind of disaster?

These questions are obviously very sensitive and charged with emotion, even at this late moment in time as we think of

approaching this issue with a constructive attitude and look at our past secrets of darkness. There is no doubt that we are facing severe reactions and shock. It is not easy to accept what was done, what we did, what we believed was the right thing to do then… unbeknownst to us… that it would be fraud. It is not easy to accept that certain ideological activists of the day, who we trusted, not only fooled us to do what they wanted us to do but later cooked our history to make us feel guilty for what we did… or failed to do… and for not achieving what we set out to achieve… for not accomplishing the impossible… something that was never possible no matter how hard we tried… no matter how many lives we sacrificed. No one wants to hear that we sacrificed all those lives and it was done for nothing… Worse than that, for perpetrating fraud that worked against our interests and made us lose our ancestral homes and lands… a fraud in which we were willing participants… without even knowing it. This is why it is not enough to just know “how things happened” without knowing “why things happened” and who did this to us. We should know that we blindly followed the directives of others even though our objectives were not so clear. We should know that all kinds of stumbling blocks were put before us that made no sense to us and yet we never questioned them, or looked for other possibilities… that perhaps those who were leading us may have had different motives? We never questioned “why” would the same people, to whom our lands were given only yesterday, now want to help us get them back? We never questioned what would happen to these people if our lands were given back to us? Where would they have gone? And worst of all, “overnight” we assumed that these people were our friends… We assumed that our enemies yesterday were suddenly our friends and working for “our” interests… and not once did we ever consider… question… or even cross our minds that things might not be what they seemed? When you just know and accept only “how things happened” and never question “why things happened” and refuse to explore “all your options” then you end up being led into oblivion. And it does not help when your “history” is written under the censorship of those who actually committed the fraud and want the truth kept deep down in darkness. But this is exactly what has happened, our history has been written under censorship with the historical truth hidden from us for over half a century, so that we never find the roots of evil and the dark secrets of our genocide… and all this was accomplished through

distractions, mystifications, cynicisms and through pushing the facts aside in favour of daily politics.

We know from history that all successful or disastrous wars provide people with historic value. We know that every civilized nation uses critical analysis to evaluate its history in order to obtain important information about its past. So, isn’t it about time that our Macedonian historians do the same? If not our historians then who will provide our future generations with the valuable lesson our past has taught us? How will we navigate our future without such information? It seems that we have accepted that nothing relevant took place in Greece since our occupation about a century ago, forgetting that the Greeks slaughtered our people and appropriated our Macedonia. Had we remembered that, then we would have taken appropriate measures to protect ourselves and not live under the illusion that “someone else”, perhaps the Greeks themselves, would come and help us achieve our centuries-old aspirations. Had we paid attention to our history we would have known that Hellenism was not our friend… it was not there to help us… The Greeks did not occupy Macedonia for our benefit… And, of course, the Greek communists did not lure us into their Greek Civil War, a war of their making, to save us… They did all these things because it served their interests… and we are in the way of their interests. But there is more… Having limited knowledge of our past, the way we experienced it, has placed us in a compromising position where we have to rely on outsiders, mainly on our enemies, to tell us who we are, where we come from and if we exist or not. This “phenomenon” has created divisions, disunity and false allegiances among us. Divided as we are we have become easy prey for our enemies to manipulate us and lead us into oblivion… from defeat to defeat… from disaster to disaster… from genocide to genocide… and to our eviction from our ancestral homes and lands. Testimonies from the three-and-a-half year Greek Civil War have confirmed the old truth that this war too was no coincidence, that the ideological violence, the violent mobilization of the Macedonian people, who gave their best, in return received death, persecution, destruction of their homes and permanent eviction. To this day, we still cannot go back to our homes, not even to light a candle for our sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers who died believing that they were fighting for the Macedonian cause, which turned out to be a

fraud, a perpetrated act, a sinister political plot to get rid of us. We hope that now you understand why it is important to know your “real” history… If we all do our best to write our own true history then, perhaps, future generations will not repeat our mistakes.

* What happened with NOF was a tragedy. In its three-and-a-half year existence NOF followed strict orders and program goals which continuously evolved towards serving foreign interests. Initially, when NOF was first established on April 23, 1945, it was managed by the CPM/CPY. This was until November 21, 1946 when its program objective was: “…to struggle to attain national rights and the right to self-determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia.” This was the period during which it acted independently from the CPG and was led by the CPM/CPY (see Kirazovski, 1995/10.) There is no doubt that NOF’s optimal strategic goal, under the management of the CPM/CPY, was to recruit all the Macedonian people in Greece into the People’s Liberation Front, in order to implement its program objective.

So the question is why was NOF, the Macedonian Liberation Front, created in Yugoslavia and sent to Greek occupied Macedonia to prepare for a new conflict right after World War II ended and before the Greek Civil War had started?

The ELAS fighters who had earlier left Greek occupied Macedonia and gone to Yugoslavia, came under the leadership of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia and the Communist Party of Macedonia (CPY/CPM). It was from these fighters that, in Skopje on April 23, 1945, the organization NOF was formed under the initiative of the CPY/CPM and sent to organize the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia in preparation for a new conflict - the Greek Civil War.

This shows that the Greek Civil War was foreseen before it happened. It was anticipated. Yugoslavia knew about it and was probably part of it. The top Yugoslav leadership must have known about it. And how was that possible? Could they see into the future? The only way Yugoslavia would have known was if Yugoslavia was part of the conspiracy to get rid of the Macedonians from Greece. And it should be no surprise that this plan was already in motion by

1945 when NOF was created. There was no other easy way that Britain could have gotten rid of the Macedonians from Greece without Yugoslav help. The fact that Yugoslavia put together NOF to start a new war in Greece proves it.

NOF was created on April 23, 1945 before the Greek Civil War was even thought of. The Greek Civil War did not officially begin until March 31, 1946, by a decision of the CPG Second Plenum held on February 12, 1946. It did not happen by accident; it was planned.

After the Second World War, the Greek Civil War was a new test for the Macedonian people. The war had a dual purpose; one, to expel the Macedonian population, and for that reason the war was located inside Greek occupied Macedonia; and two, to liquidate the Communists who obviously were grossly misinformed and wanted to create socialism inside the British Protectorate of Greece.

* If we are to accept the “strategic objective” that the CPM/CPY actually cared about the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, then why, less than three months earlier, did the highest Yugoslav bodies oppose the slogan: “Turn all weapons towards Solun…” i.e. “To Solun and not to the Srem front!” All Macedonian soldiers who demonstrated for going to Solun were ruthlessly punished and some murdered. This was done by Yugoslavs against their own army, the army that Tito himself created. This, obviously, was done because Tito and Yugoslavia were “well-aware” of the division of spheres of influence and that Solun was untouchable because it had already been decided by the Great Powers that Solun would stay in Greece and that Greece fell under the British sphere of influence. Knowing all this, then why would Tito, through the CPM/CPY, only three months later, change his position and approve a plan for the Macedonians “…to struggle to attain national rights and the right to self-determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia” being fully aware of the consequences that may result from the division of spheres of influence?

Just knowing “what happened” does not explain the absurdity of what our mainstream history has recorded, mainly that NOF was created “…to struggle to attain national rights and the right to self-

determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia”. Our mainstream history has led us to believe that this was NOF’s “actual” objective, when in fact this was incorrect. The fact of the matter is that the architects and planners of the Macedonian people’s demise, since the beginning, needed NOF to rally the Macedonian people. They needed NOF to re-awaken the Macedonian people’s old national feelings and rally them to join the struggle quickly and in massive numbers. The real objective for NOF was to involve the entire Macedonian population in the war effort in Greek occupied Macedonia, so that Greece and its allies Britain and the United States would deal with them appropriately in accordance to their interests. During this period until November 21, 1946, according to our scant information, NOF managed to organize 5 large regions, 10 districts, 3 urban areas and 32 small regions and staff them with 120 professional NOF, NOMS and AFZH people. In the entire region of Greek occupied Macedonia, NOF managed to organize 220 villages with more than 170 rural and urban organizations staffed by 4,832 NOMS members and 2,201 AFZH Macedonian and Vlach women members. In August, over 100 fighters were acting in the area of Vicho and more than 500 NOF partisans acted in Central and Western Macedonia. The NOF partisans were deployed as follows: 200 in Kaimakchalan, 80 in Paiko, 120 in Vicho and 80 Gramos. The Macedonian fighters were divided into small units of 10-15 and larger units numbering 40-50 partisans. A larger group, a battalion, was also formed in Voden Region. (Kiriazovski, 1985/143.)

* We simply don’t know whether the NOF leadership believed it or not, or whether anyone in NOF had any reservations about its objective “…to struggle to attain national rights and the right to self-determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia”, but from events that followed, NOF would, in part, be responsible for creating a local hotspot for a future war in Greek occupied Macedonia. How this war was going to be started was yet unknown. NOF’s initial task was to establish itself in Greek occupied Macedonia.

* At this point we need to ask ourselves: “Why would the CPM/CPY encourage NOF to prepare for war in Greek occupied Macedonia in order “…to struggle to attain national rights and the

right to self-determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia”, when Tito and CPM/CPY communists were fully aware of the signed Varkiza Agreement under which the political left had handed over power to the political right? Why would the CPM/CPY encourage NOF to prepare for war in Greek occupied Macedonia when, on October 1944, Stalin and Churchill decided that Greece would fall under British and American influence? We Macedonians, including NOF, may not have known about these agreements but the CPM, CPY and the CPG certainly knew about them. They certainly knew that what they were proposing: “…to struggle to attain national rights and the right to self-determination for the Macedonian people living in Greek occupied Macedonia” would be impossible under the conditions that existed at that time. And, of course, there was that “surprise” statement made by Marshal Tito in Moscow for the New York Times during which he said: “If the Macedonians in Greece express a desire to unite with the Macedonians in Yugoslavia, then we will respect their wishes.” And how should we interpret this statement made by Tito when, at a meeting with Stergios Anastasidis, member of the CPG Central Committee Politburo, held in Belgrade on September 15, 1944, Tito himself said: “Yugoslavia has no pretensions and no claims on Greek Macedonia and the whole campaign about this unification has nothing to do with anything, it is just an opinion. You can share this news with the Greek people and let them know that we have no claims on Greek Macedonia. The question of changing borders is now in international hands and we should not be rushing that issue…”

Here is what historian Dr. Ivan Katardziev wrote about this in a “Nova Makedonija” article published on January 1, 1994: “The Macedonian National Movement made a mistake in its quest to unite the territory of Macedonia… It was unrealistic to seek reunification of other parts of Macedonia to Vardar Macedonia within Yugoslavia and to call Vardar Macedonia the Piedmont of the reunification. NOB constantly asked for such a reunification but, due to resistance, mainly from Britain, we could do no more than to continue to ask…”

What the CPY and the CPG did with NOF, the National Liberation front for the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, was

a catastrophic scenario, a great evil, from our point of view. A catastrophic scenario perpetrated by the architects of the Greek Civil War against the Macedonian people in Greece, creating the right conditions for our extermination. And those who did not buy into it, well, they were simply told: “If you are not with us then you are a fascist and against us!” It was a dark time when new and old ambiguities intertwined and came into conflict. There was much confusion between expectations and reality that ranged from a united Macedonia, a Balkan federation, a Confederation, Autonomy and finally our eviction from our homeland… contradiction after contradiction not only of “words” but also of “actions” between what was promised and what was actually delivered. The brutal strangers and ideological activists spared no words to make promises of which they had no intention of delivering. They had one objective in mind; to get the Macedonian people involved in the war so that they could be “legally” destroyed; expelled from their ancestral homeland forever. But that was not all… The communists in Greece and Yugoslavia were not the only perpetrators of our demise… The Greeks on the political right, the fascists as our people appropriately called them, they too were involved in the same conspiracy. They were the ones “passing the laws” that would strip us of our citizenship, our properties and our ability to return to our homeland… They were the ones who created the nationalist gangs who terrorized us and made sure we fled… The Greek prosecutors and investigative authorities responsible for the Greek legal system were also involved, accusing the Macedonian people of being bandits, traitors, adventurers, secessionists and crypto fascists. On top of that, the Greek government continuously sought legal ways to destroy the Macedonian people both physically and spiritually, that is why it adopted laws such as 4124/45; 753/45; 453/45; 43/45; TOD/45; Decree D/46 and others. As can be seen, all these laws were enacted before the Greek Civil War started on March 31, 1946!

When NOF was unable to motivate the Macedonian people to re-arm themselves and go to the mountains, the Greek political right escalated the so-called “white terror” campaign and began to torment the Macedonian population to no end.

The war (WWII) was over, so why was there a need to torment the population? Most people after World War II wanted to end all hostilities, to rest and live in peace. They were craving peace. The Macedonian people were craving peace. They had had enough of wars. That is why the Macedonian people were reluctant to pick up arms and go to the mountains. When NOF failed to motivate the Macedonian people to rise and fight, the Greek reactionaries stepped in and resorted to using Metaxas’s tactics to terrorize the people and get them to fight back or leave their homes and run off over the border. This was the expected reaction.

The idea here was to have the Macedonian people raise arms against Greece so that Greece would have “no other choice but to defend itself against an aggressor who wanted to carve out parts of its territory”! Yugoslavia, for the sake of having good relations with the West, naturally prepared the groundwork through the creation and indoctrination of NOF and AFZH (Women’s Anti-Fascist Front) with aims at starting an armed uprising in Greek occupied Macedonia. The Macedonian people, however, did not want to fight and initially refused to participate. To get them motivated the Greek right, the Fascists, pitched in and initiated what was later termed the “white terror”. Greeks indiscriminately began to kill people and burn properties and homes. Fearing for their lives many Macedonians fled to the mountains (Vicho and Gramos) where they were armed and trained to protect themselves. And this is how the conflict was started. This was a war that would be fatal to the Macedonian people; it had to be an ideological war in order to involve the international factor (US and Britain); a war that Greece would have no choice but to fight in order to save its territory. This was going to be a legal genocide because these “Slavs” were prepared to carve out Greek territory! The Macedonians were told they needed the guns to protect themselves but as soon as the shooting started they were told they were fighting to “re-unite their Macedonia” and after Yugoslavia abandoned them they were told they were fighting for their human rights to gain equality with the Greeks. Then, when the war became very hot, they were told to fight for their lives; “to fight or die!”

There was not a single Macedonian, in those days, who not only publicly proclaimed that he or she was fighting to re-unite

Macedonia but many Macedonians were made to believe that it was possible to do that! And why do you suppose they believed that? Because the architects of this war, through NOV and AFZH, told them so…, naturally through lies and deception!

Again, there was no reason for starting this war because it had been decided by the Great Powers that Greek occupied Macedonia was staying with Greece. So, the most likely reason why this war was started, which actually makes sense, was to eradicate the communist menace and to exterminate the Macedonian population.

After the Greek Civil War was officially started by the CPG on March 31, 1946, NOF’s second period began which lasted from November 21, 1946 until December 23, 1947 when the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece was formed. The government’s first act was to shackle NOF, which for the Macedonian people was a political tragedy. A delicate balance was reached between the CPY and the CPG and NOF was put under a big CPG stick. The CPG now demanded strict obedience from every member of NOF. And why is that? Why did the CPG want a political servant instead of a partner? The CPG wanted to fetter NOF and use it as it saw fit in its destructive policies aimed at the Macedonian population. This was the kind of justice served by the CPG, where it turned our best patriots into traitors and sent the entire Macedonian population to purgatory. This was the time when every Macedonian was told that it was his or her fault for what had happened; they were told to accept responsibility for all failures because the Macedonians were traitors, the only traitors who deserted the CPG and who worked with foreign agencies to sabotage the same war in which they were spilling their own blood.

On October 4, 1946 an agreement was reached in Belgrade between the CPM/CPY and the CPG to unify the Greek democratic forces and NOF, in other words, to put NOF under direct CPG control. The agreement was allegedly imposed by the Soviet Union, wanting Yugoslavia to accept the CPG leadership. Present at the meeting were Aleksandar Rankovich, Milovan Gialas, Kolishevski, Tsvetsko Uzunov, and Paskal Mitrevski (see: Kiriazovski 1995/204).

On November 21, 1946 the agreement was reviewed by Ivan Karaivanov from the CPY and by Ioannis Ioannidis from the CPG, after which NOF’s program and aims were changed to read: “…NOF will struggle in alliance with the Greek people and will fight to protect the Macedonian people from physical harm…” In other words, NOF will follow and abide by the CPG’s goals and objectives. But as soon as this “unification” took place NOF was greeted with the CPG broomstick. In time NOF became unsuitable and undesirable. This confirms that at this point in time NOF was tethered and unable to operate on its own. It was unable to work for Macedonian interests and, being told what to do, became an instrument of the CPG and began to work for foreign interests. So the question is: “What part of this is considered a ‘Macedonian revolution’ and a continuation of our bright Ilinden struggle?” How can historians call this “tactic of foreigners”, this “catastrophe”, this “treacherous act”, this “betrayal by the CPG”, a Macedonian revolution? But that is not all. This very treacherous act of surrendering NOF to the CPG further divided the Macedonian people. Those Macedonians, loyal to the CPM/CPY, who remained in Yugoslavia (the Republic of Macedonia) and who watched what was happening to the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia saw this as a treasonous act, NOF “selling out” to the CPG and to Greek nostalgia. While the Macedonian people, loyal to the CPG, who were fighting and spilling their blood in Greece saw those in the Republic of Macedonia as “traitors” and “deserters”, who had left their families behind to save their own skins. Now we have yet another Macedonian division which, no doubt, further served foreign interests…

The CPM, standing between the CPY and the CPG, sacrificed the Macedonian people and legalized the annexation of Greek occupied Macedonia.

As an elite organization, formed by the CPM/CPY, NOF had fulfilled its program objectives and subsequently was handed over to the CPG to begin a new mandate. Its new mandate was to “hand over” the Macedonian people to the CPG and allow it to become their new omnipotent ruler. After the Macedonian people were mobilized en masse, the CPG became totally “responsible for the Slavo-Macedonians” but continued with the elusion that NOF was

still in charge, especially in the ranks of DAG. Now NOF’s main priority task, as ordered by the CPG, was to make “ideological soldiers” out of the Macedonians so that it would make it easier for them to join the disastrous civil war scenario. The new slogan became: “Everything for the struggle and for freedom!”

What is most unfortunate about this experience is that NOF, at least outwardly, still played the heroic role of freedom fighter, fostering strong spiritual and national unity and projecting a sense of patriotic confidence all in the “name of the people!”, a mandatory part of its everyday political vocabulary, a motive and an alibi for the ideological and military turmoil. This indeed took place in our history which raises the question:

“If it were not for NOF, how would it have been possible to attract so many people from the Macedonian villages to join DAG and become casualties of this foreign inspired war?” There was no Macedonian village in Greek occupied Macedonia that did not lose a large portion of its population… to have 60 to 100 casualties! There was no family that was unaffected… Yet this happened and the Macedonian people fought heroically. They were the true warriors in DAG. Unfortunately, because of our bondage to the CPY and to the CPG through NOF, we lost everything...

NOF’s third period lasted from December 23, 1947 until DAG was liquidated. This was a time when NOF accepted the Provisional Democratic Government’s program on the national question: “Recognition of equality of the national minorities and their free national activities…” (See: AE: 179/47.)

By willingly or unwillingly leaning toward the CPY or towards the CPG, NOF lost its independence, if it ever had any, which resulted in the Macedonian people falling into foreign hands. After NOF was passed on from the CPY to the CPG, the CPG showed much care and gave the NOF leadership much attention. But, as time has shown, all this was done intentionally to lull the Macedonian people into a sense of false security. Then, slowly and over time, the CPG manipulated the Macedonian people into taking part in the Greek Civil War, which for the Macedonians was a foreign war and not of their making. The moment they picked up weapons and fought