‘An almost unique isle in the sea of democratic Europe’: Greek Communists' perceptions of international reality, 1944–1949

Abstract

This paper proposes a realistic appreciation of Greek communist perceptions of international realities and their impact on their domestic disposition and tactics in 1944–1949, during a particularly dense and rapidly changing international milieu. In a context whose volatility fuelled too many false perceptions, the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) chose to internalise whatever it interpreted as positive signs and ignore those suggesting imponderables and adversities. The real difficulty for the Greek communists, however, was not the accuracy of their perceptions or lack thereof, but a lack of sufficient power to survive their inaccuracy. In addition, historiographically the paper seeks to redress the analytical balance in favour of national, regional and international politics as against the recent flood of local area studies.

Notes

^[*] Aristotle, ‘Poetics’, 1460a, 26–27, in J. Barnes (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle, vol. 2 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 2337.

^[**] Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, [1961] 1966), 9 (2.0121).

¹ For the self-contradictory logic of such criticisms see two leading leftist historians and a former Secretary General of the KKE Central Committee: F. Iliou, O emfylios polemos. I embloki tou KKE (Athens: Themelio, 2004), 23; O.L. Smith, ‘Communist Perceptions, Strategy and Tactics, 1945–1949’, in J.O. Iatrides and L. Wrigley (eds), Greece at the Crossroads: The Civil War and Its Legacy (University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), 120–121; and G. Farakos, ‘To KKE apenanti stous valkanikous antagonismous, 1935–1952’, in H. Fleischer (ed.), I Ellada ′36-′49 (Athens: Kastaniotis, 2003), 64.

² M. Bloch, The historian's craft (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1954), 41.

³ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 345 (8 and 9 December 1944).

⁴ [D. Konstantakopoulos (ed.),] 1931–1944. Fakelos Ellas. Ta archeia ton mystikon sovietikon ypiresion (Athens: Nea Synora, 1993), 201–202 (no. 44): Information from c. Rousos on events in Greece, 8 December 1944; I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 210 (no. 46): Rousos's information and requests to the Soviet government [December 1944].

⁵ G. Seferis, Politiko Imerologio A′, 1935–1944, edited by A. Xydis (Athens: Ikaros, 1992), 163 (Cairo, 30 August 1944). For the fear which Ta Dekemvriana (the December 1944 clash) inspired amongst the anti-communist political elite and the latter's gratitude towards the British, see K. Tsatsos, Logodosia mias zois, vol. I, 4^th edn (Athens: Ekdoseis ton Filon, 2001), 297; P. Kanellopoulos, Imerologio Katohis, 31 Martiou 1942–4 Ianouariou 1945, 2^nd edn (Athens: Estia, 2003), 735 (28 December 1944).

⁶ [KKE (es.)], To KKE: Episima Keimena tou KKE ston polemo kai tin antistasi, 1940–1945 ([Scopje and Rome: n.p., 1973), vol. V, no. 757/f: Siandos's statements to the foreign press on Varkiza, 12 February 1945.

⁷ KKE, Episima Keimena [EK], vol. V (Athens: Synchroni Epohi, 1981), 417–432: Siandos's Report at the 11^th Plenum, 5–10 April 1945 (quotation on p. 425.)

⁸Rizospastis, 2 and 5 June 1945; V. Kondis – S. Sfetas (eds), Emfylios Polemos: Eggrafa apo ta yiougoslavika kai voulgarika archeia (Thessaloniki: Paratiritis, 1999), no. 2, 45–46: Zahariadis's speech on foreign policy at the 12^th Plenum (25–27 June 1945); [KKE], Deka Hronia Agones, 1935–1945 (Athens: KE tou KKE, 1945), 272–275: Zahariadis's Report at the 12^th Plenum; KKE: EK, vol. VI, no. 706: Political Resolution of the 12^th Plenum, 30 June 1945.

⁹ N. Zahariadis, ‘The present situation in Greece and the problems of the people's democracy’, in N. Zahariadis, Syllogi Ergon (n.p.: KE tou KKE, 1953), 135–217; emphasis in original; quotations from 135, 136, 141, 153, 166.

¹⁰ Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi (Athens: Proskinio, 2003), 77.

¹¹ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 396 (9 February 1945). Also, Archives of the Soviet Foreign Ministry: ‘Greek-Soviet Relations in 1946–1949’, in P. Antaios, Nikos Zahariadis: Thytis kai Thyma, 2^nd edn (Athens: Fytrakis, 1991), 451; V. Kondis – S. Sfetas (eds), Emfylios Polemos, no. 122, 235–236: note by Lavrischev, 23 January 1946; ibid., no. 72, 172–175: Report of the KKE Central Committee ‘On the Situation in Greece’, sent by Georgi Dimitrov to the Soviets on 5 February 1946; I. Papathanasiou, ‘Ittimenos protagonistis: to kommounistiko komma sta hronia 1945–1950’, in H. Hadziiosif (ed.), Istoria tis Elladas tou 20ou aiona, vol. D1 (Athens: Vivliorama, 2010), 258–259.

¹² T.D. Sfikas, The British Labour Government and the Greek Civil War: The Imperialism of ‘Non-Intervention’ (Keele: Keele University Press, 1994), 85–87. For an analysis of KKE policy based on the concepts of ‘gradualism’ (1945–1946) and ‘dualism’ (1946–1949), see P.J. Stavrakis, Moscow and Greek Communism, 1944–1949 (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1989), 48–185.

¹³ L. Eleftheriou, Synomilies me ton Niko Zahariadi (Athens: Kentavros, 1986), 35.

¹⁴ For documentary evidence and discussion of Zahariadis's second meeting with Dimitrov, see I. Papathanasiou, ‘Ittimenos protagonistis’, 252–253. In his diary Dimitrov recorded the meeting of 2 April but not that of 26 April 1946.

¹⁵ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 352–3, 414 (10 January 1945 and 2 September 1946).

¹⁶ ‘A Note on Greece’ by Admiral Rodionov (Athens) to Foreign Ministry (Moscow), 25 April 1946, ed. I. Papathansiou, Eleftherotypia/Vivliothiki, 15 October 1999, 8.

¹⁷ V. Kondis – S. Sfetas (eds), Emfylios Polemos, no. 123, 237: Note of conversation between Rodionov – Zahariadis, Athens, 4 May 1946.

¹⁸Cf T.D. Sfikas, ‘War and Peace in the Strategy of the Communist Party of Greece, 1945–1949’, Journal of Cold War Studies, vol. 3, no. 3 (Fall 2001), 5–30; and I. Papathanasiou, ‘Ittimenos protagonistis’, 254, 257–258. On the elections of 31 March 1946 see I. Nikolakopoulos, I kahektiki dimokratia: kommata kai ekloges, 1946–1967 (Athens: Patakis, 2001), 67–85; T.D. Sfikas, ‘“Profanos me ti dexia…”: i Vretania kai oi ekloges tou 1946’, in G. Psallidas (ed.), Oi ekloges tou 1946 (Athens: Patakis, 2008), 314–331.

¹⁹ N. Zahariadis, ‘Speech at the nation-wide organisational meeting of the KKE’, 15–17 April 1946, in N. Zahariadis, Syllogi Ergon, 305–319 (esp. 305–6, 309, 311.)

²⁰ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/1: ‘The Situation in Greece and the Urgent Problems of our Movement’, August 1946, with Appendices A and B. Ioannidis dated the report 12 September, the day he gave it to Dimitrov for passing it over to Moscow.

²¹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/4: Zahariadis to [Dimitrov], 30 August 1946.

²² ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/115: Dionysis to [Zachariadis], 10 November 1946.

²³ ‘Greek-Soviet relations in 1944–1949’, in P. Antaios, Nikos Zahariadis, 453–454; ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 356, F 20/6/6: Ioannidis to Vladimirov, 21 November 1946.

²⁴ Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi, 78.

²⁵ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/1: ‘The Situation in Greece and the Urgent Problems of our Movement’, August 1946.

²⁶ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/112: Ioannidis to Zahariadis, 3 October [1946].

²⁷ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/115: Ioannidis to [Zachariadis], 10 November 1946; ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/112: Ioannidis to Zahariadis, 3 October [1946];, Box 146, F 7/33/12: [Zachariadis] to Ioannidis, 31 December 1946.

²⁸ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 356, F 20/69: Dimitrov to Ioannidis, 31 December 1946.

²⁹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 356, F 20/69: Ioannidis to Zahariadis, 31 December 1946; ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 356, F 20/69: Dimitrov to Ioannidis, 31 December 1946;, Box 383, F 20/33/4: Zahariadis to Stalin, 12 January 1947; ibid., Box 146: Ioannidis to [Zahariadis], 1 February 1947.

³⁰ N. Zahariadis, ‘Two years under the new occupation. The situation and its problems’, in N. Zahariadis, Syllogi Ergon, 320–339; quotations on 321–323, 324, 326–327, 328, 330, 331, 332.

³¹Rizospastis, 1 March 1947.

³² ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/11: Memorandum by Zahariadis to Stalin and the CPSU leadership, 13 May 1947.

³³ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 147, F 7/34/35: Top secret directives by Zahariadis and Ioannidis to Markos Vafiadis, 17 April 1947.

³⁴Rizospastis, 14, 23 and 28 March 1947.

³⁵ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 408, F 23/1/173: Resolution of the Information Bureau of the ‘ADMTh’, 15 March 1947.

³⁶ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 408, F 23/1/177: Resolution of the KKE Macedonia-Thrace Bureau, 7 April 1947.

³⁷ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 147, F 7/34/35: Top secret directives by Zahariadis and Ioannidis to Markos Vafiadis, 17 April 1947.

³⁸ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 366, F 20/16/26: Zahariadis's letter to Tito, 22 April 1947.

³⁹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/11: Memorandum by Zahariadis to Stalin and the CPSU leadership, 13 May 1947.

⁴⁰ ‘Note of c. Zhdanov's conversation with c. Nikolai [Zahariadis]’, Moscow, 22 May 1947, ed. I. Papathanasiou, Ta Nea (Prosopa, 21os aionas), no. 11, 22 May 1999, 12–15. An entirely different account of this meeting is presented in V. Zubok and C. Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin's Cold War: From Stalin to Khruschev (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996), 127–128.

⁴¹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/164: Ioannidis to Stergios Anastasiadis, 4 June 1947.

⁴² ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/13, 24 May 1947.

⁴³ Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi, 83.

⁴⁴ The speech in KKE, EK, vol. VI (Athens: Synchroni Epohi, 1987), 440–443; quotation on 440.

⁴⁵ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/23: ‘On the situation in Greece after the American intervention’, report by Petros Rousos (Belgrade), 17 July 1947.

⁴⁶ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 146, F 7/33/80: Partsalidis to Ioannidis, 20 June 1947.

⁴⁷ Konstantinos Tsaldaris Papers (‘Konstantinos G. Karamanlis’ Foundation, Athens), hereafter Tsaldaris Papers, File 23A: Stratos to Maximos, Tsaldaris, political leaders and Chief of the Army General Staff, 25 July 1947, no. 516783.

⁴⁸ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 147, F 7/34/92: Ioannidis to Markos, 7 August 1947.

⁴⁹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 366, F 20/16/52: Zahariadis to Tito, 13 August 1947.

⁵⁰ F. Iliou, O emfylios polemos, 180–203.

⁵¹ F. Iliou, O emfylios polemos, 196–197.

⁵² T.D. Sfikas, The British Labour Government and the Greek Civil War, 163–175.

⁵³ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 366, F 20/16/56: Zahariadis to the CC of the CP of Yugolslavia, 20 September 1947.

⁵⁴ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/37: Zahariadis to Zhdanov, 1 October 1947.

⁵⁵ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 147, F 7/34/142: Ioannidis to Markos, 4 November 1947; ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/37: Zahariadis to Zhdanov, 1 October 1947, Box 383, F 20/33/40: [Zachariadis] to Baranov, 10 November 1947.

⁵⁶ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/38: [Zachariadis] to Baranov, 6 October 1947.

⁵⁷ G. Procacci et al. (ed.), The Cominform: Minutes of the Three Conferences, 1947, 1948, 1949 (Milano: Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrineli, 1994), 601.

⁵⁸ G. Procacci et al. (ed.), The Cominform: Minutes of the Three Conferences, 1947, 1948, 1949 (Milano: Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrineli, 1994), 403.

⁵⁹ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 156, F 7/43/37: Rousos to the Foreign Minister of Romania, 1 January 1948; G. Procacci et al. (ed.), The Cominform: Minutes of the Three Conferences, 1947, 1948, 1949 (Milano: Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrineli, 1994), Box 378, F 20/28/30: National Committee for Aid to the Greek people (Bucharest) to Markos, 4 January 1948.

⁶⁰ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 443 (10 February 1948).

⁶¹ The speech in N. Zahariadis, Syllogi Ergon, 343–405; quotations on 346–7, 348, 348–9, 350, 353, 357–8, 403.

⁶² I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 441, 443 (10 February 1948).

⁶³ See Zahariadi's articles in the DSE's monthy political and military journal Dimokratikos Stratos, First Year, no. 2 (February 1948), 26–32; no. 4 (April 1948), 107–112; no. 8 (August 1948), 270–276. no. 10 (October 1948), 374–376; no. 11 (November 1948), 431–440; Second Year, no. 1 (January 1949), 33–37; no. 4 (April 1949), 207–216; no. 5 (May 1949), 289–295. See also V. Kondis – S. Sfetas (eds), Emfylios Polemos, no. 16, 72: Vafiadis's letter to the Yugoslav leadership on the tactics of the DSE, 4 August 1947; I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, no. 36, 121: Protocol of a conversation between Tito, Kardelji, Zahariadis, Ioannidis, 21 February 1948.

⁶⁴ Tsaldaris Papers, File 32/1: Top secret personal memorandum by the Minister of War to Sofoulis and Tsaldaris, 22 July 1948, no. 809546.

⁶⁵ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 447 (11 June 1948), 453 (30 December 1948 and 19 January 1949).

⁶⁶ I. Papathanasiou, ‘The Cominform and the Greek Civil War’, in Ph. Carabott and T.D. Sfikas (eds), The Greek Civil War:Essays on a Conflict of Exceptionalism and Silences (Aldershot: Ashgate/Centre for Hellenic Studies, King's College, London, 2004), 68.

⁶⁷ F. Iliou, O emfylios polemos, 301–304 and ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 156, F 7/43/129: Unsigned handwritten draft report (in Russian) to the CPSU CC, undated [after 25 August 1948]. See also N. Marantzidis, ‘Dimokratikos Stratos Elladas 1946–1949: i enopli koinonia tou KKE’, in V.K. Gounaris, S.N. Kalyvas and I.D. Stefanidis (eds), Anorthodoxoi polemoi. Makedonia, Emfylios, Kypros (Athens: Patakis, 2010), 303–309.

⁶⁸ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 156, F 7/43/21: Rousos to KKE leadership, 16 November 1948: ‘The deterioration of our relations with Yugoslavia and the difficutlies in our work’.

⁶⁹ I. Banac (ed.), The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 453 (30 December 1948 and 19 January 1949).

⁷⁰ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 367, F 20/17/31 and Box 156, F 7/43/147: Typescript (Box 367) and handwritten notes (Box 156) by Rousos, nd [April 1949]: ‘The negotiations between the KKE and the CP of Yugoslavia. Two conversations with general Rankovic, 1 and 7 April 1949’.

⁷¹ Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi, 85; T.D. Sfikas, The British Labour Government and the Greek Civil War, 257–260.

⁷² I. Papathanasiou, ‘The Cominfrom and the Greek Civil War’, 69.

⁷³ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 353, F 20/3/49: Zahariadis's letter to the Albanian Party of Labour, 22 August 1949.

⁷⁴ On peace initiatives and opportunities for a political settlement, see T.D. Sfikas, ‘I irinopolemi diastasi tou ellinikou emfyliou polemou: eirineftikes protovoulies kai dynatotites symvivasmou, 1945–1949’, in I. Nikolakopoulos, A. Rigos and G. Psallidas (eds), The Civil War: From Varkiza to Grammos (Athens: Themelio, 2002), 75–101.

⁷⁵ See above, footnote 1.

⁷⁶ ASKI: KKE Archive, Box 383, F 20/33/81: Letter by Zahariadis and Partsalidis to the CPSU CC, 15 January 1950.

⁷⁷ Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi, 94, 83.

⁷⁸ Indeterminacy is defined here as extending beyond ‘what simple uncertainty cannot suffice to explain. It is the realm in which it remains impossible directly to grasp a situation, an event, or an externality so complex and dynamic that knowability of their present and future states cannot be deduced.’ See A. Tomazinis, ‘Adaptive Planning in Dynamic Societies: Giving Sense to Futures Conditional’, in J. Ciprut, Indeterminacy: the Mapped, the Navigable and the Uncharted (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2008), 289. See also, W. Breckman, ‘History and Indeterminacy: Making Sense of Pasts Imperfect’, in Minutes of conversation with Zahariadis, Moscow, 25 February 1956, in G. Petropoulos (ed.), I kathairesi tou Nikou Zahariadi, 267–287; J.L. Gaddis, The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 71–89.