CHAPTER EIGHT – MACEDONIAN CONTRIBUTION TO THE GREEK CIVIL WAR

CHAPTER EIGHT – MACEDONIAN CONTRIBUTION TO THE GREEK CIVIL WAR

Due to their difficult past under Greek rule, particularly under the authority of chauvinists and masters of denationalization, the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, decided to ally themselves with the anti-fascist forces in the liberation of Greece during which time they took active participation and sustained heavy casualties. Unfortunately they were betrayed. They were led to believe that if they allied themselves with the democratic forces and fought against the fascist occupiers they would be recognized as Macedonians with full rights and privileges. Those expectations were unfortunately never met. In fact the opposite happened. The political right, the Macedonian people’s former enemy, was brought back to Athens after the February 1945 Varkiza Agreement was signed and given power to govern. This was done with the blessings of the very same Greeks with whom the Macedonian people had allied themselves. After the Athens regime took power it introduced unprecedented mass terror against the democratic forces and especially against the Macedonian people throughout the entire country.

To protect itself, in 1945, the unarmed population began to form armed partisan units under NOF. These armed units later became the core of the Democratic Army (DAG).

In fact half of the Democratic Army (DAG), for the duration of the Greek Civil War, was Macedonian. The Macedonian partisans in the ranks of DAG, both men and women, not only fought in Greek occupied Macedonia, they also fought in Greece south of Mount Olympus including in the regions around Athens.

It was the Macedonians partisans who liberated parts of Greek occupied Macedonia and who created free zones from the Albanian border in the west to Thrace in the east. The entire Greek Civil War was fought in Greek occupied Macedonia. The front line stretched practically from the western to the eastern part of the country. Because of their geographic locations, the free zones in Greek occupied Macedonia served as a backdrop for the Democratic Army. These free zones were converted into military workshops, where

young and old, male and female, were all placed in DAG’s service working exclusively for the Democratic Army.

Here is what a Greek leader from the Movement wrote about the Macedonian people’s participation in the armed struggle in Greece:

“4. Slavo-Macedonian Contribution

The Slavo-Macedonian people occupy a distinct place in this great struggle with their heroic women of the Slav-Macedonian nation, which for years has been terrorized by the tyrannical fascists. The Slavo-Macedonian people have been persecuted with even greater evil and anger by this new fascist occupation. But, the Slavo-Macedonian woman stands proud and fights, organized in her own Antifascist Front - AFZH.

The first woman in this country to fall from the bullets of the new occupation was Mirka Ginova, the hero and love of the entire Slavo-Macedonian nation and of all of Greece. Mirka with her example opened the way for the struggle. The police burned two fighters with hot irons; they were Katina and Aspasia Strezov. They were tortured to give-up information but the two died without opening their mouths… the struggle of the Slavo-Macedonian people is massive. Thousands of Slavo-Macedonian women, valued columns of the struggle, have gone from Vicho to Gramos, walking for days in the flames of fire. More than 3,500 Slavo-Macedonian women have worked on fortification facilities in Vicho under the rain of shells to turn it into a bastion of freedom.

(There is no mention of Mirka Ginova being a prominent NOF leader in a story about her in a Greek language newspaper. It simply said: ‘Irini Gini. A young teacher convicted by a military court was executed in Ianitsa, right before the plebiscite, along with six other convicted persons. She was the first woman to be executed in recent Greek history. Many attended her Judgment and execution.’)

The Slavo-Macedonian women carry the biggest load of our struggle with patience and strength every day while their villages are being bombed to dust. Many villages have been abandoned since they became targets for enemy artillery. All the women are at the front

working now without a minute of rest. On top of that, there are those like old lady, fighter, and mother to Iovanka Mianova, who has 6 sons and 1 daughter fighting in the Democratic Army. And she, herself, works day and night, like a young bride, in support of our struggle.

There are also those who provide for the partisans and who would not hesitate to share a piece of bread, donating it to the Democratic Army. They donate their grain, their livestock and even their dowries. And when they are asked why, they say ‘everything for the struggle so that it will bring us victory!’

The Slavo-Macedonian women are worthy fighters and great contributors to the field of the people’s power. In Kostur alone, before the latest elections, there were 78 women in 53 National Councils, 53 women in 15 people’s courts, 2 women in the District Board and 1 woman in the District Court. The vast majority of these women were Slavo-Macedonians.

The Slavo-Macedonian women and the entire Slavo-Macedonian nation, with their blood, have won the right to live as they like after the liberation, creating their own independent state and existence.” (Fragment taken from a report compiled by Rula Koukoulou, Secretary of the Pan-Greek Union for Women, during a Union Conference held on March 1 to 3, 1949.)

Here is what Zahariadis himself and his associates said at the time:

“The Macedonian people, especially those in the area of Vicho, have given everything they have for the struggle and have become a real sacrifice. They have given their sons, their daughters and their entire assets. This superhuman sacrifice has caused some difficulties which we need to overcome. These difficulties have risen from the war, from the overstrained forces. These are difficulties of war. But besides them, we have other, subjective problems which are growing and creating new obstacles. The people there have given everything for the struggle. But the fighter or the theater director has come to terror and that breaks the unity.

...The people have other difficulties. One of those is the mobilization of young women. You must all understand that no one looks at this work with a good eye. It is not right to send young women to get mutilated. It is not natural, nor is it humane, but such a measure proved necessary in the interest of our two people and in the interest of the struggle. This measure, due to its great displeasure, is abused by the enemy. But in the struggle for freedom we must give it our all. The Macedonian people should be looking at the greater aims of this through a prism. They need to draw new courage and focus their pain in the interest of the struggle.

Other difficulties are hunger, bombings, suffering, cold etc...” (Taken from Zahariadis’s speech given at the 2nd NOF Congress, published on March 30, 1949, in the Democratic Army daily newspaper “Pros ti niki”).

DAG representative General Kostas Karagiorgis also spoke at the 2nd NOF Congress and, among other things, said the following:

“The Slavo-Macedonian nation with its struggle, with its victims, with its participation in this great anti-imperialist liberation struggle of the Greek people has practically earned the right to self-determination and freedom…” (Taken from Karagiorgis’s speech given during the 2nd NOF Congress, published on March 29, 1949, in the Democratic Army daily newspaper “Pros ti niki”).

The Macedonian people’s participation in the struggle was truly massive and was accompanied by heavy human and material losses. It would be very difficult for a publication to provide detailed information about this, particularly about the pain and suffering in such an experience, but we will try.

All throughout the conflict effectively half of DAG’s fighters were Macedonians. If we consider that DAG’s numbers reached 40,000, and half of those were Macedonians, it means that 6 to 7% of the Macedonian population (280,000-300,000) participated in DAG, while the figure for Greeks amounts to no more than 0.40%. This information alone illustrates the massive Macedonian involvement in DAG.

(Greek authorities do not recognize that during WW II, during NOF’s time and during the Greek Civil War, there were 280,000 to 300,000 Macedonians recorded as living in Greek occupied Macedonia. Official Greek statistics unfortunately have recorded these Macedonians as Greeks who speak a foreign language, i.e. “Slavophone Greeks” who numbered about 40,000, while other Greeks put this figure at 80,000. The same types of statements were also made by Greek officials. However, according to objective research, the number of Macedonians living in Greek occupied Macedonia at the time numbered from 280,000 to 300,000 or even 330,000. If that number was only 40,000, or even 80,000, they would not have made it to the end of the Greek Civil War. They would not have posed any significant threat and certainly could not have numbered 20,000 in DAG’s ranks and that is without counting the many thousands that became casualties of this war. If not against the Macedonians, then against whom were the draconian Greek measures, the denationalization measures and the persecution measures directed? If the situation was the way the Greeks portray it, then the Greek rulers must be Don Quixote! But it is not so. Macedonians existed and still exist in large numbers. The thing is, Greeks refuse to accept that and continue to contradict themselves in their conduct, propaganda and destructive genocidal policies).

Furthermore, it should be underlined that, as a national group, the Macedonian people have experienced many destructive processes including persecution, denationalization, terror tactics and ethnic cleansing. In addition to these atrocities, committed by the Greek authorities in the past, they suffered even more casualties as armed fighters in the ranks of the Democratic Army. Practically speaking, the Greek Civil War has left no Macedonian family untouched. Immediately after the Greek government was established in Athens in 1945, as we have shown in this write-up, regular and irregular armed forces were put in power in every village and town. With their arrival came raids, terror, beatings, arrests, jailing and all forms of torture, perpetrated to annihilate the Macedonian population. The numbers of Macedonians sent to the Greek prisons, deserted Greek islands, etc., were in the thousands.

During the armed struggle a battle line stretched right through the entire region of Greek occupied Macedonia, which caused severe

destruction and turned many Macedonians into casualties and victims of war.

Because of the conditions created by the Greek Civil War, in order to avoid becoming victims from enemy attacks, especially by enemy aviation, thousands of children were evacuated from Greek occupied Macedonia to distant Eastern European countries in 1948 and 1949. Some of these children were babies and later could not recognize their parents. Even today there are still remnants of these children, now old adults who have still not met their parents.

During and before the end of the Greek Civil War in 1949, there was a mass migration leaving Greek occupied Macedonia. The number of Macedonians who left for Yugoslavia and Eastern European countries exceeded 50,000. They all left their homes and properties behind.

The following 46 Macedonian villages with a combined population of 20,913 inhabitants, which were mentioned in the 1940 census were not mentioned in the official 1951 statistics.

No. Name of Village In Macedonian

Name of Village In Greek

Residents according to 1940 official census

Drama Region

1. Izbishta Agriokerasija 160

Seres Region

2. Gorno Metoh 3. Turpesh 4. Trnka 5. Raikovtsi 6. Rupel 7. Lehovo 8. Dragotin 9. Eleshnitsa 10. Liposh

Ano Metohion 152 Makriotisa 130 Damaskinon 55 Kaknotropos 146 Klidion 304 Karasohorion 545 Promahon 1,382 Feapetra 325 Filira 400

Kukush Region

11. Golema Livada Megala Livadia 1,493

Voden Region

12. Gorno Rodivo 13. Gorno Pozhar 14. Sborsko 15. Kornishor 16. Tushin 17. Lugontsi

Ano Korifi 326 Ano Lutrakion 185 Pevkoton 292 Kromni 448 Aitohorion 1,015 Langadia 540

Lerin Region

18. German 19. Grazhdano 20. D. Drobitishta 21. Rudari 22. Oorovnik 23. Drenovo 24. Smrdesh 25. Medovo 26. V’mbel 27. Bukovik 28. Papadia 29. Prekopana 30. Orovo 31. Vineni 32. Setina 33. Tarnovo 34. Besvina

Agios Germanos 2,170 Vronderon 507 Daseri 75 Kalipera 379 Karpi 169 Kranie 150 Kristalopigi 624 Mileon 209 Moshohorion 483 Oksia 147 Papadia 149 Perikopi 545 Piksos 489 Pili 207 Skopos 1,131 Angatoton 84 Svika 294

Kostur Region

35. Labanitsa 36. Chuka 37. Ianoveni 38. D’mbeni 39. Kosinets

Agios Dimitrios 217 Arhangelos 201 Gianohorion 467 Dendrohorion 794 Gieropigi 507

40. Marchishta 41. Dolno Paprasko 42. Novoselani 43. Omotsko 44. Pilkati 45. Bapchor 46. Krchishta

Kato Perivolion 43 Kato Pteria 191 Korfula 151 Livadotopian 211 Monopilon 297 Pimenikon 859 Polianemon 270

(Only a few villages, those deemed to be uninhabited in the 1951 census, with a very small number of inhabitants, were later shown with residents who probably had returned from the prisons or were evacuated during the Greek Civil War.)

According to the same census, the number of Macedonian residents fell in most Macedonian villages. (See charts in the next chapter).

(Please note that, following population movements in the villages inhabited by Macedonians and villages inhabited by Greeks and immigrants from Asia Minor, one can conclude that, for the same period of time and in the same areas, the villages populated by Greeks and settlers from Asia Minor grew in numbers in 1951 as compared to 1940.)

When we take into account all that was said, we can reasonably argue that the Macedonian population in Greek occupied Macedonia experienced genocide.

Even though they paid a heavy price, the Macedonian people did not achieve their goals. They fought in the armed struggle to win national freedom, democracy and justice in Greece, but they lost. They not only lost their freedom they also lost their homes and native lands and became permanent refugees. But even so, the Macedonian people will never give up their struggle for their rights, no matter where they live.