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Abstract
The aborted 1967 attempt of the dictatorship to transform itself into some form of democracy has generally been under-researched, and even more so with regard to its international implications. And yet, the issue of foreign influences on the “Markezinis Experiment” has been given excessive weight – first and foremost by the protagonist himself, who blamed his failure and downfall on negative American interference – namely on the then US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s adversarial stance. Based on the examination of the international context in three main frameworks – namely its relations with the United States, Europe and the Cyprus issue – this article seeks to give an answer to the question of the foreign factor’s impact on the failure of the “experiment”.
Notes
1. During the archival research for this article, it became apparent that very few US sources are relevant to the subject. Characteristically, the Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) volume includes only eight documents on Greece in 1973 – not all relevant to the subject – one of which has not been declassified. In contrast, the available British sources include about 120 Foreign Office documents. This proved to be a major issue in the research, which the author needs to acknowledge at this starting point.
2. Pridham, International Influences and Democratic Transitions, 26.
3. Huntington, The Third Wave, 181, summarized this as “the desire for international respect and legitimacy”.
4. Pridham, International Influences and Democratic Transitions.
5. Whitehead, Democratisation, 9.
6. Verney and Tsakaloyannis, Linkage Politics, 182.
7. Huntingdon, The Third Wave, 93–4.
8. Haggard and Kaufman, The Political Economy of Democratic Transitions, 367.
9. For instance, Tovias, US Policy towards Democratic Transition, 186, notes that “the most tactical dimension in American decision-making was whether to let democratization … follow its own course or to intervene at the margin to accelerate it or on the contrary slow it down, according to the USA’s set of priorities”.
10. Schmitter and Whitehead, Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, 8.
11. Couloumbis et al., Foreign Interference, 144.
12. Featherstone, Introduction, 10.
13. Murthagh, The Rape of Greece, 124. Maragkou, “The Relevance of Détente to American Foreign Policy”, 648, agrees that “although some evidence bears testament to discussions exploring the possibility of complicity, no tangible proof yet exists that American officials were involved in the Colonels’ seizing power”.
14. Papahelas, The Rape, 327. Keeley agrees, as he claims (The US Embassy, 166) that the coup he feared would be organized by the (monarchist) generals rather than by the colonels. He characteristically notes that even the CIA expected a generals’ coup, but “the colonels took the CIA by surprise” (ibid., 182). Also, Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 132, notes that the US officials ignored their lack of information on the colonels’ activities, as “they were focused on the plans of the King and his senior officers”.
15. “Greek internal affairs were … about number 32 on the list of Washington’s priorities” (Murtagh, The Rape of Greece, 154).
16. Some Pentagon officials considered the coup “the best thing that happened in Athens since the time of Pericles” (Papahelas, The Rape, 354). Also Murtagh (The Rape of Greece, 231) quotes a US naval officer saying: “Once the junta took over, from a military point of view we were more secure in Greece”.
17. Murtagh, The Rape of Greece. From a different point of view, Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 135, blames the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs for ignoring Greece to the benefit of Arab-Israeli and India-Pakistan issues, thus failing to analyse properly the reports it was receiving from Athens on the Greek situation.
18. All citations are in Couloumbis et al. Foreign Interference, 132. Again, Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 147, quotes Times journalist Cyrus Sulzberger’s comment: “All the USA stands for has been hurt by this [the coup]; but not our national interests. The USA … has passively accepted the coup”.
19. Pedaliu, “A Discordant Note”, 103. Keeley also sets out three options that the US had on facing the dictators: support it and exert influence in the direction of moderation and restoration of constitutional rule; distance and critical disapproval of the regime, while informing the regime leaders that, unless moderating their attitudes the US will suspend military and any other support to Greece; and, finally, dynamic action in the direction of overthrow and restoration of the constitutional order. As Keeley contends, the US administration adopted a combination of the first and second options (Keeley, The US Embassy, 212–15).
20. Klarevas, “Were the Eagle and the Phoenix Birds of a Feather?”, 508.
21. Pedaliu, “A Discordant Note”, 108.
22. “As usual, Moscow was differentiating its state policy from its relations with her sister communist parties”. Woodhouse, The Rise and Fall, 84. Also, Maragkou, “The Relevance of Détente to American Foreign Policy”, 653, contends that “the Colonels’” gradual opening towards their communist Balkan neighbours, as well as the attempted Soviet rapprochement, silenced most advocates of ostracizing the Greek regime from the Western family of states. In fact, during the 1960s, in the context of the emerging spirit of détente and the West’s new, more flexible, bridge-building policy towards the East, Greece was prompted to normalize its relations with its Balkan neighbours mainly due to a belief in the decrease of danger from the north
23. Woodhouse, The Rise and Fall, 166. For him, this explains the “support of toleration” the US had offered the colonels thus far.
24. “In this regime’s early years in power, the appearance of US support was more important to Papadopoulos than it is today. The regime no longer sees such a compelling need to accommodate US desires. There will be frictions arising from the proposed major expansion of US military facilities in Greece”. FRUS, Vol. XXX, National Intelligence Estimate: Short-Term Prospects in Greece, 19/7/1973.
25. By 1972 the EEC “provided 55% of Greece’s total imports and took 61% of its total exports”. Verney and Tsakaloyannis, Linkage Politics, 183.
26. Hooper to FCO, Greece: Annual Review for 1972, 2/1/1973, WSG1/2, FCO9/1709.
27. On the events of 1967 in Cyprus, see Rizas, “Ενωση, Διχοτόμηση, Ανεξαρτησία [Union, Partition, Independence]”, 214–33; also Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 177–8.
28. Xydis, The Foreign Policy, 302.
29. Haralambis, Στρατός και Πολιτική Εξουσία [The Army and Political Power].
30. FRUS, Vol. XXX, National Intelligence Estimate, ibid. It should also be pointed out that, contrary to a widespread belief about US involvement in subversion against Makarios, there is no evidence of American collusion with the efforts of the Greek Colonels and hardline Cypriot nationalists to eliminate the president. See Nicolet, United States Policy towards Cyprus, on this point.
31. Hooper to Home, Abolition of the Greek Monarchy, 15/6/1973, WSG1/9, FCO9/1713.
32. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Memorandum from Acting Secretary of State Rush to President Nixon, 12/6/1973, Ford Library, National Security Adviser, Scowcroft Daily Work Files, Chronological File A, Box 3.
33. Memorandum from Acting Secretary of State Rush to President Nixon, ibid.
34. In March and April 1973, EEC Commissioners Soames and Dahrendorf had stated that only when democratic institutions were fully restored would the EEC restore its relations with Greece. This position did not change with Markezinis in office.
35. Goodison to FCO, British Policy towards Greece, 13/11/1973, WSG 8/548/3, FCO 9/1732.
36. Martin to Cornish, 17/9/1973, Denson Report on US/Greek relations, WSG 3/304/1, FCO 9/1732. Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 171, agrees that possible free elections under a Markezinis government “reawakened Tasca’s dream of carrying Greece back to democratic government through the mediation of Papadopoulos”.
37. Markezinis, Political Memoirs, 234.
38. All quotes from Barkman, Greece in the Dark, 119.
39. Barkman, Greece in the Dark, 121. Interestingly, Papandreou, From PAK to PASOK, 128, blames European Social Democracy for urging “the bourgeois political world of Greece to accept that solution”.
40. Hooper to Goodison, Greece: Internal Situation. 25/11/1973 WSG 25/304/12 FCO 9/1717.
41. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Telegram From the Embassy in Greece to the Department of State, Views of PM Markezinis, 18 /11/1973.
42. Woodhouse, The Rise and Fall, 177.
43. Stanger, Democratisation and the International System, 261.
44. Abadi, Constraints and Adjustments, 55.
45. Grigoriadis, History of the Dictatorship, 45.
46. Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, 708.
47. For instance, Kallivretakis, Greek–American Relations, 105 refers to rumours published in US newspapers in early 1974 that had Papadopoulos and Markezinis “telling all visitors that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) engineered their overthrow”, since Papadopoulos “refused to permit U.S. military flights resupplying Israel to use bases in Greece”.
48. Grigoriadis, History of the Dictatorship, 47. Haralambis, The Army and Political Power, 286, says that from this point “one of the most important reasons of US foreign policy support to the military dictatorship had ceased to exist”. Verney and Couloumbis, State-International Systems Interaction, 110, agree: “[The refusal] was particularly important for the USA … this created doubts in Washington concerning the Junta’s reliability as an ally during any future Middle East crisis”.
49. Markezinis, Interview: Newspaper Kathimerini, 21/2/1993. For Maragkou (“The Relevance of Détente to American Foreign Policy”, 654), this refusal was one more manifestation of the regime’s intransigence towards the Americans.
50. Markezinis, Political Memoirs, 206.
51. It is interesting to note that Markezinis, Political Memoirs, 239, interviewed early in 1973 said “it is wise to say ‘no’ to the Americans from time to time!”.
52. Martin to Cornish, Greece and the Middle East crisis, 1/11/1973 WSG 3/304/1, FCO 9/1729.
53. Kallivretakis, Greek–American Relations, 108.
54. FRUS, Vol. XXX, National Intelligence Estimate, Short-Term Prospects in Greece, 19/7/1973.
55. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Action Memorandum from the Director of the Policy Planning Staff (Lord) to Secretary of State Kissinger, US Policy toward Greece, 15/2/1974.
56. See Markezinis, A Contemporary Political History, 210. Admiral Zumwalt confirmed in 1976 that he was advised by the Greek Chief of Navy, who was in Washington at the time, not to “listen to what is said in Greece publicly. Use your bases in Greece as you want”. Sakkas, The Greek Dictatorship, 251.
57. Markezinis, Πολιτικαί Aναμνήσεις [Political Memoirs], 621.
58. Hooper to Goodison, 18/10/73 Greece and the US, WSG 3/304/1, FCO 9/1729. Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 172–3, agrees that despite the rejection of the use of air space by the US Forces, Tasca “embraced Markezinis with the same fervour as he had earlier backed Papadopoulos” out of fear that, should the “experiment” fail, there would be a coup by a “Greek Nasser”.
59. Martin to Cornish, ibid.
60. Markezinis, Political Memoirs, 184.
61. Markezinis, A Contemporary Political History, 254.
62. Grigoriadis, Η ιστορία της δικτατορίας [The History of the Dictatorship], 71. Again, this is but speculation mostly reflecting the conventional wisdom of its time rather than proven facts.
63. Sakkas, The Greek Dictatorship, 254.
64. Just a few days before the coup, the British Ambassador said to Markezinis “are you sure you will still be able on Monday [the 26th, date in which Markezinis had said he would announce the details of his plans on elections] to proclaim the elections? I fear that you will not be in office by Sunday!”. Markezinis, A Contemporary Political History, 213. Markezinis also claimed that the ambassadors of Germany, France, Holland and Italy also had information that something was afoot. However, such prior knowledge is not evident in the published British records.
65. Psycharis, Backstaging the Change, 24.
66. For these rumours, see Arapakis, The End of Silence; and Kakaounakis, 2,650 Days and Nights.
67. Psycharis, Backstaging the Change, 30. This statement is partly confirmed by various sources. For instance, a CIA Memorandum of September 1972 mentions that “if he [Ioannides] decided to go against the prime minister, the threat of a successful military coup would balloon rapidly” and that “if Papadopoulos becomes victim of a coup, it will be essentially because of failure on his part to maintain a close relationship with those officers who see themselves as guardians of the revolutionary virtue (CIA Intelligence Memorandum, Papadopoulos: a Question of Survival, 25 September 1972). Two months later, another Memorandum states that a coup [against Papadopoulos] could succeed” and points out two possible directions a new military regime could take: the first, under Ioannides, would be to “probably move slowly towards constitutional government” while the second, “dominated by younger officers in the junta would probably set up a tighter, more dictatorial regime”. The Memorandum concluded that Papadopoulos would “probably remain in office … for another year or two … the immediate successor to George Papadopoulos will be another military government” (CIA Memorandum, Some alternative to the Papadopoulos Regime, 9 November 1972).
68. For instance, a classified State Department analysis on the 1974 Cyprus crisis, reports that “the CIA station [in Athens] was unable to contain its enthusiasm for Ioannides”. Murtagh, The Rape of Greece, 231.
69. The only available CIA report at the time of Markezinis mentions “solid opposition from the military” to a potential legalization of the Greek Communist Party by Markezinis, as well as that regime dissidents (naming only Constantine Aslanides, a minor figure in the regime) “might become part of an anti-Papadopoulos opposition” – not specifying what kind of opposition that would be, though. See Central Intelligence Bulletin, 26/10/1973.
70. Gauvin to FCO, Aftermath, ibid.
71. Markezinis, A Contemporary Political History, 245. Miller, The United States and the Making of Modern Greece, 185, agrees that “as long as Papadopoulos remained in power … Makarios could fend off the most dangerous external threat … [after Papadopoulos’s fall] a much more dangerous group now controlled the Greek Cypriot National Guard. Makarios’ internal enemies rejoiced”.
72. Gauvin to FCO, Aftermath of New Coup in Greece, 25/11/1973, WSG 1/14, FCO9/1717.
73. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Embassy in Greece to the Department of State, Greece’s Apparent New Master: Demetrios Ioannides; Some Fears. 26/11/1973.
74. Ibid.
75. Martin to FCO, Greek Internal Situation, 6/12/1973, WSG1/14, FCO9/1712.
76. Central Intelligence Bulletin, 27 November 1973.
77. Central Intelligence Bulletin, 3 December 1973.
78. Schmitter, The Influence of the International Context, 34.
79. Pridham, The Politics of the European Community, 223.
80. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Telegram From the Embassy in Greece to the Department of State, The Military in Greece: Dominant Political Power at the Crossroads – A Country Team Assessment, 8/2/1974.
81. FRUS, Vol. XXX, Action Memorandum, US Policy toward Greece. Emphasis in original.