Who's backing the colonels?
Sir : In the letter from 'An Old Athenian' to the SPECTATOR of 22 March, which is indeed confused beyond measure, there is a sentence revealing in a perfectly clear way the hypocrisy
of the supporters of the Greek dictatorship: Vlachos's readers] believed'—the writer of the letter says—`that had she followed her father's example, who did not suspend the publication of Kathimerini during German occupation, she could have helped the present government to improve our political methods . .
Mrs Vlachos has already reminded us what really happened to her father and his paper during the occupation. But the point I con- sider so clearly revealing is another one: after all the efforts made by the pro-junta Old Athenian to prove that Greece is not under a state of siege (which obviously contradicts what Mr Papadopoulos himself said at his most recent press conference, to say that, given the fact that Kathimerini did not suspend publica- tion during German occupation, Mrs Vlachos had to do the same under the present regime, is a very striking point of view indeed. The reasons for such a suggestion? Mrs Vlachos could thus have helped the government to 'render healthier our administration.'
The analogy established between two hated dictatorial regimes is clear enough to convince anybody about what the writer of the letter —and the Greek regime itself—mean by their beloved 'National Revolution.'
To say that Greece is not under a state of siege when thousands of people are in jail or in concentration camps, some of them tor- tured and all of us muzzled to point of suffo- cation and denied the most elementary rights of freedom and self-respect, is a ridiculous lie. To say 'I am not in favour of revolutions, having lived under various dictatorships (fre- quent during the period 1922-1935)'—and missing, of course, the next and longest one, the Metaxas dictatorship of August 1936—but adding 'the choice now was between revolution or chaos,' is a lie again, because Greece before 21 April 1967 was not at all at the door of chaos, but at the door of a forthcoming general election.
The old-fashioned myth of imminent com- munist danger has been employed too often in the past by 'National Revolution' propaganda (Mussolini's and Hitler's, among others) so as to impose terror and intimidation.
As for the term 'Revolution' . . . revolution implies a minimum of popular support and the 21 April coup had not been launched by the Greek popular masses, but by the tanks down the streets of Athens. It is those tanks and the suffocating censorship they imposed that Mrs Helen Vlachos opposed by closing her newspapers and refusing to 'help the present government.' Her readers—one of whom I used to be—were waiting for such courageous be- haviour, knowing and admiring her moral integrity for a long time.
I want to remind your 'Old Athenian' writer that, besides more than twelve daily or weekly publications closed as a result of last year's coup, the rest of the Greek press did not submit to the new status with such a good will as he makes out. Mr Christo Lambrakis, editor of the two leading liberal newspapers Vima and Neoa, which continued publication, was put under house arrest in Athens, then sent to a special camp in the island of Syros for four months and finally released but compelled to retire from active publishing.
As for the ex cathedra assurance that 'the
majority of Greek people believe' in the present regime, all I can say is that if the men of the regime were confident enough of their popular strength (80 per cent of the people support us, said Mr Papadopoulos), why, then,
don't they proclaim a free election right now? Why have we to wait for a farce-referendum to approve a highly anti-democratic constitu- tion, which will enable them—according to their hopes—to oppress the country as long as they wish?
Mr Constantopoulos, influential Porte-parole of the junta, pointed out some months ago in his paper Eleftheros Cosmos that the army could not prevent the infliction of a 'clearly mistaken popular verdict.' Statements like this, along with the Prime Minister's continual warn- ings that he's determined to save the Greek people from its 'moral corruption,' show how much the neurotic terrorists who govern us in fact despise this tormented but proud people.
Previous page
