Greece entered the
Second World War on
28 October 1940, when the Italian army invaded from
Albania. The Greek army dealt the first victory for the
Allies by defeating the invasion and pushing
Mussolini's forces back into Albania.
[1] Hitler was reluctantly forced to send his own forces to overcome Greece in April 1941, and delay the
invasion of the
Soviet Union by six weeks. This is considered by some historians as the first turning point of the war, since the delay proved disastrous to the German invasion, with the onset of the Russian winter and the strong resistance of the Soviet armed forces halting it before the gates of Moscow.
[2] Although the German invasion of Greece was swift, their forces met fierce resistance on the island of
Crete, where the elite ''
Fallschirmjäger'' suffered almost 7,000 casualties.
[3] These heavy losses eliminated the option of a massive airborne invasion of the Soviet Union and further expansion in the Mediterranean saving
Malta,
Gibraltar,
Cyprus, and the
Suez Canal from airborne invasion.
After Greece was occupied and divided between the Axis powers, a large-scale
Resistance movement developed in the country, which tied down a large number of Axis divisions. However, political tensions between the Resistance groups resulted in the outbreak of a civil conflict among them in late 1943, which continued until the spring of 1944. The exiled Greek government also formed armed forces of its own, which served and fought alongside the British in the Middle East, North Africa and Italy. The contribution of the Greek War and the Merchant navies in particular was of special importance to the Allied cause.
Mainland Greece was liberated in October 1944 with the German withdrawal in the face of the advancing
Red Army, while German garrisons continued to hold out in the
Aegean Islands until after the war's end. The country was devastated by war and occupation, its economy and infrastructure lay in ruins. Greece suffered more than 300,000 casualties during the occupation, and the country's Jewish minority was almost completely exterminated in the
Holocaust. Soon, however, a vicious
civil war erupted between the British and American-sponsored conservative government and leftist guerrillas, which would last until 1949.
Fascist Italy invades Greece
Main articles: Greco-Italian War
Propaganda poster supporting Greece.
The Italian invasion from
Albania on
October 28 1940, after making small initial gains, was stopped by the determined defence of Greek forces in the battles at the Elaia-Kalama line and the
Pindus Mountains. The unwillingness of
Bulgaria to attack Greece, as the Italians had hoped, allowed the Greek High Command to transfer most of the mobilizing divisions intended for the garrisoning of
Macedonia to the front, where they were instrumental in the Greek counteroffensive, launched on
November 14. Greek forces crossed the border into Albania and took city after city despite facing a harsh winter, having inadequate supplies and facing the Italian air superiority. By mid-January, Greek forces had occupied a fourth of Albania, but the offensive had come to a standstill before it had reached its objective, the port of
Vlorë.
This situation prompted a reaction from Germany, which had to come to the rescue of its junior
Axis partner. In a final attempt to restore Italian prestige before the German intervention, a counterattack was launched on
March 9 1941 against the key sector of Klissura, under Mussolini's personal supervision. Despite massive artillery bombardments and the employment of several divisions on a narrow frontage, the attack failed to make any headway and was called off after almost two weeks.
The German invasion
Main articles: Battle of Greece
The German invasion of Greece
The long-anticipated German attack (''Unternehmen Marita'') began on April 6 1941, against both Greece and
Yugoslavia. The resulting "Battle of Greece" ended with the fall of
Kalamata in the
Peloponnese on April 30, the evacuation of the Commonwealth Expeditionary Force and the complete occupation of the Greek mainland by the Axis.
The initial attack came against the Greek positions of the "
Metaxas Line" (19 forts in Eastern Macedonia between Mt. Beles and River Nestos and 2 more in Western Thrace). It was launched from Bulgarian territory and supported by artillery and bomber aircraft. The resistance of the forts was both courageous and determined, but eventually futile. The rapid collapse of Yugoslavia had allowed
the 2nd Panzer Division (which had started from the Strumica Valley in Bulgaria, advanced through Yugoslav territory and turned south along the Vardar/Axios River valley) to bypass the defenses and capture the vital port city of
Thessaloniki on April 9. As a result, the Greek forces manning the forts (the Army Section of Eastern Macedonia, ''TSAM'') were cut off and given permission to surrender by the Greek High Command. The surrender was completed the next day, April 10, the same day that German forces crossed the Yugoslav-Greek border near
Florina in Western Macedonia, after having defeated any resistance in southern Yugoslavia.The Germans broke through the Commonwealth (2 div. & 1 arm. brig.) and Greek (2 div.) defensive positions in the Kleidi area on April 11/12, and moved on to the south and southwest.
While pursuing the British southwards, the southwest movement threatened the rear of the bulk of the Greek Army (14 divisions), which was facing the Italians at the Albanian front. The Army belatedly began retreating southwards, first its northeast flank on April 12, and finally the southwest flank on April 17. The German thrust towards Kastoria on April 15 however made the situation critical, threatening to cut the Greek forces' retreat. The generals at the front began exploring the possibilities for capitulation (to the Germans only), despite the High Command's insistence on continuing the fight to cover the British retreat.
In the event, several generals under the leadership of Lt.Gen.
Georgios Tsolakoglou mutinied on April 20, and taking matters in their own hands, signed a protocol of surrender with the commander of the "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler" near
Metsovo the same day. It was followed by a second in
Ioannina the next day (with Italian representation this time) and a final one in Thessaloniki between the three combatants on the 23rd. The very same day in Athens, Lt. General A. Papagos resigned his office as Supreme Commander whereas the
King and his government embarked for
Crete. About the same time the Commonwealth forces made a last stand at
Thermopylae before their final retreat to the ports of Peloponnese for evacuation to Crete or Egypt. German troops seized the
Corinth Canal bridges, entered Athens on April 27, and completed their occupation of the mainland and most islands by the end of the month.
The Battle of Crete
Main articles: Battle of Crete
German invasion of Crete. Heavy losses were suffered by the parachutists.
The only Greek territory remaining free by May 1941 was the large and strategically important island of
Crete, which was held by a strong Allied garrison. To conquer it, the German High Command prepared "'Unternehmen Merkur'", the largest airborne attack seen to date.
The attack was launched on
May 20, 1941. The Germans attacked the three main airfields of the island, at the northern towns of
Maleme,
Rethimnon, and
Heraklion, with paratroopers and gliders. The Germans met stubborn resistance from the British, Australian, New Zealand and the remaining Greek troops on the island, and from local civilians. At the end of the first day, none of the objectives had been reached and the Germans had suffered around 4,000 casualties.
During the next day however, through miscommunication and failure of the Allied commanders to grasp the situation, Maleme airfield in western Crete fell to the Germans. With Maleme airfield secured, the Germans flew in thousands of reinforcements and overwhelmed the western side of the island. This was followed by severe British naval loses due to intense German air attacks around the island. After seven days of fighting the Allied commanders realized that so many Germans had been flown in that hope of Allied victory was gone. By
June 1, the evacuation of Crete by the Allies was complete and the island was under German occupation. In light of the heavy casualties suffered by the elite
7th Flieger Division, Adolf Hitler forbade further airborne operations. General
Kurt Student would dub Crete "the graveyard of the German paratroopers" and a "disastrous victory."
[4]
Occupation
Main articles: Axis Occupation of Greece
Occupation forces
Map showing the three occupation zones.
Conquered Greece was divided into three zones of control by the occupying powers,
Germany,
Italy and
Bulgaria.
[5] The Germans controlled Athens, Central Macedonia, Western Crete, Milos, Amorgos and the islands of the Northern Aegean. Bulgaria annexed
Thrace and Eastern
Macedonia, while
Italy occupied the rest of the country. The Italians were thus responsible for the greater part of Greece, especially the countryside, where any armed Resistance might take place. Italian forces in Greece comprised 11 infantry divisions, grouped in the
11th Army under General
Carlo Geloso,
[6] with a further division in the Italian colony of the
Dodecanese Islands. The Italians adopted a rather relaxed attitude towards their security duties, but they were in part justified to do so. Until the summer of 1942, as the Resistance movement was in its infancy, they faced little real opposition and considered the situation to have been normalized.
[7] The Germans limited themselves during the first period of the Occupation to the strategically important areas, and their forces were limited. The German troops in southeastern Europe came under the
12th Army headed initially by Field Marshal
Wilhelm List and later by General
Alexander Löhr. In Greece, two separate commands were created: the Salonica-Aegean Military Command at Thessalonica and the Southern Greece Military Command at Athens, for the entire duration of the war under Luftwaffe General
Helmuth Felmy.
[8] Crete was organised as a fortress ("Festung Kreta") garrisoned by the
Fortress Division "Kreta", and after August garrisoned by the crack
22nd Air Landing Division. The Bulgarians occupied their own zone with a Corps, and, faced with active resistance from the local population, engaged from the outset in a policy of
Bulgarization of the area.
After mid-1942, with the growth of armed Resistance, and the spectacular destruction of the Gorgopotamos bridge (
Operation "Harling") by a force of Greek guerrillas and British saboteurs on 25 November, the Italian authorities tried vainly to contain the surge in acts of resistance directed against their forces. The guerrillas were largely successful against the Italians, allowing for the creation of "liberated" areas in the mountainous interior, including sizeable towns, by mid-1943. At that time, however, German troops began being moved into Greece. Elite formations such as the
1st Panzer Division and the
1st Mountain Division were brought into the country, both in anticipation of a possible Allied landing in Greece (a concept deliberately promoted by the Allies themselves as a diversion from the
landings at Sicily) and as a guarantee against a possible Italian capitulation.
[9]
These forces, especially the experienced mountain troops, engaged in large-scale counter-guerrilla operations in the area of
Epirus. Their operations were successful in that they reduced the threat of guerrilla attacks on the occupation forces, but their often brutal conduct and mass
reprisals policy resulted in massacres of civilians such as that of
Kommeno on
August 16, or the "
Massacre of Kalavryta" in December. In anticipation of the Italian collapse, the German command structure throughout the Balkans was reorganized:
Army Group E under Löhr took over in Greece, overseeing both German forces and the Italian 11th Army.
[10]
The Italian capitulation in September caused most Italian units to surrender to the Germans, although others, such as the
''Pinerolo'' division and the ''Aosta'' Cavalry Regiment, went over to the guerrillas, or chose to resist the German takeover. This resulted in brief but violent clashes between Germans and Italians, accompanied by atrocities against Italian prisoners of war, such as the massacre of the
'Acqui' Division on
Cephallonia, dramatized by the film ''
Captain Corelli's Mandolin''. In addition, British and Greek forces tried to occupy the Italian-held Dodecanese, but they and their Italian allies were defeated in a short campaign (see
Dodecanese Campaign).
[11]
Throughout late 1943 and the first half of 1944, the Germans, in cooperation with the Bulgarians and aided by Greek collaborators (see below) launched clearing operations against the Greek resistance, primarily against the communist-controlled ELAS, while coming into an unofficial truce with the rightist EDES. At the same time, raids by British and Greek special forces were increasing in frequency in the Aegean islands. Finally, with the advance of the Red Army and the desertion of Romania and Bulgaria, the Germans were forced to evacuate mainland Greece in October 1944, although isolated garrisons remained in Crete, the Dodecanese and various other Aegean islands until the end of the war in May 1945.
Greek collaborators & conscripts
As in all European countries, a Greek
puppet government was formed from the outset by the Occupation authorities, initially headed by General
Georgios Tsolakoglou and later by
Konstantinos Logothetopoulos. The forces this government had at its disposal were primarily these of the city police and the rural
gendarmerie, which were relied upon to maintain and enforce order. However, the government was never able to extend its authority to all of the country, as on the one side it was never given free rein nor entirely trusted by its Axis overseers nor was it popular among the people. As anti-Axis sentiment grew in 1942, its organs found themselves attacked by guerrillas and socially isolated. Except for isolated cases, such as the group of Colonel
Georgios Poulos, only in 1943, with the appointment of the experienced politician
Ioannis Rallis as Prime Minister, did the Germans allow any substantial Greek armed force to be recruited by the Athens government. These were the infamous "
Security Battalions" (''Tagmata Asfaleias''), whose motivation, as in many other cases in occupied Europe, was primarily political: they fought exclusively against the communist-dominated EAM-ELAS resistance movement, which controlled most of the country. Their harsh and indiscriminate repressive activities against the population at large and their association with the Germans led to their being widely reviled, and in colloquial Greek they were known as ''Germanotsoliades'' (
Greek: Γερμανοτσολιάδες, literally meaning "German
Tsolias").
Resistance
Main articles: Greek Resistance
Greek Royal Forces in the Middle East
After the
fall of Greece to the Axis, elements of the Greek armed forces managed to escape to the British-controlled Middle East. There they were placed under the royal government-in-exile, and continued the fight along the Allies.
Army
In the face of the overwhelming German advance into Greece, several thousand Greek officers and soldiers were either evacuated, along with the Greek government, to Crete and then Egypt, in April-May 1941, or managed to flee, mainly via neutral
Turkey, to the British-controlled
Middle East. There they were placed under British command and re-equipped with British arms, complemented by volunteers from the local Greek communities, forming the "Royal Hellenic Army in the Middle East" (''Βασιλικός Ελληνικός Στρατός Μέσης Ανατολής'', or ''ΒΕΣΜΑ'').
Already on
23 June 1941, the
I Brigade began being formed in Palestine under Col. Ev. Antoniou. It comprised ca. 5,000 men in three infantry battalions, an artillery regiment (of battalion-size), and support units. An independent armoured car regiment (of battalion size) was also formed, but later incorporated in the Brigade's artillery regiment. The Brigade remained in training camps in Palestine until May 1942, where its command was taken over by Col. Pafsanias Katsotas. It was then transferred to Syria, before being deployed to Egypt in August. There it was placed under
British 50th Division in the
Nile Delta, and joined it in the
Second Battle of El Alamein, where it suffered 89 dead and 228 wounded. A
II Brigade also began being formed in Egypt since
27 July 1942 along similar lines, but did not see action.
Both Brigades remained on guard duty in Egypt and Libya, where they became involved in the widespread pro-
EAM mutiny in April
1944. Subsequently, both units were disbanded by the British, and their personnel interned in camps or used in non-combat duties. 3,500 politically reliable officers and men were formed into the
III Greek Mountain Brigade under Col.
Thrasyvoulos Tsakalotos, on
4 June 1944. This unit was embarked for
Italy in August and fought with distinction, particularly at the
Battle of Rimini, where it earned the honorific ''Rimini Brigade''. This loyal and battle-hardened unit would later be instrumental in the between the British-backed government and the
EAM-
ELAS forces.
In September 1942, an elite
special forces unit, the
Sacred Band (''Ιερός Λόχος''), was formed, made up solely of officers and volunteers. Under its charismatic leader, Col.
Christodoulos Tsigantes, it was attached to the 1st
SAS Regiment, and participated in raids in Libya. In February 1943, the unit was placed under the orders of General
Philippe Leclerc, and participated in the
Tunisia Campaign. From May to October 1943, the Sacred Band was re-trained in airborne and amphibious operations, and for the remainder of the war it was employed in operations against the German garrisons of the Aegean islands. The unit was disbanded in Athens, on
7 August 1945.
Navy
The Hellenic Royal Navy suffered enormous casualties during the German invasion, losing over 20 ships, mostly to German air attacks, within a few days in April 1941. Its chief, Vice Admiral Alexandros Sakellariou, managed to save some of its ships, including the cruiser ''
Averof'', six destroyers, five submarines and several support ships, by evacuating them to
Alexandria. The fleet was subsequently expanded by several destroyers, submarines, mine-sweepers and other vessels handed over by the British
Royal Navy, until it became, with 44 ships and over 8,500 men, the second-largest Allied Navy in the
Mediterranean after the RN, accounting for 80% of all non-RN operations.
Greek ships served in convoy escort duties in the
Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans. RHN ships also participated in the landing operations in
Sicily,
Anzio and
Normandy, as well as at the ill-fated
Dodecanese Campaign. A significant moment in the RHN's history was the acceptance of the
Italian Fleet's surrender in September 1943, alongside the British Royal Navy. Two of the most notable Greek warships of the war were the destroyers ''
Adrias'' and ''
Vasilissa Olga''. The large Greek merchant navy, likewise, contributed enormously to the Allied war effort, losing over 2,500 men and 60% of its ships in the process.
When the April 1944 mutiny broke out, a large part of the Navy joined it. These ships were stormed by Greek officers loyal to the government-in-exile and recaptured. Eleven seamen were killed, others wounded, and many were subsequently interned. Thus, when the Navy returned to liberated Greece in October 1944, it was firmly behind the government of
George Papandreou.
Air Force
The few Air Force personnel that managed to escape eventually constituted the 13th Light Bombing and the
335th and
336th Fighter squadrons, operating under the
Desert Air Force in North Africa and Italy, before being repatriated in late 1944.
13th Squadron was formed in June 1941 in Egypt as a naval cooperation unit, using the 5 surviving
Avro Ansons of the former RHAF 13th Naval Cooperation Squadron. The Squadron was later reequipped with
Blenheims and, later,
Baltimores.
[12] 335 Squadron was formed on 10 October 1941, while 336 Squadron on 25 February 1943. Both were initially equipped with
Hurricanes, mostly of the Mk. IIc type, until they were re-equipped with
Spitfire Mk Vb and Vc in january 1944.
[13]
Liberation & civil war
Main articles: Greek Civil War
Culture
The Axis occupation of Greece, specifically the Greek islands, figures much larger in English speaking books and films than the Axis occupation of almost all other countries. Real special forces raids e.g.
Ill Met by Moonlight or fictional special forces raids
The Guns of Navarone,
Escape to Athena, They Who Dare 1954
[1] or a fictional occupation narrative
Captain Corelli's Mandolin.
See also
★
Timeline of modern Greek history
References
1. http://encarta.msn.com/sidebar_461501862/1940_Greece.html
2. http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/3395.htm#history
3. http://encarta.msn.com/sidebar_461502269/1941_Crete.html
4. Beevor (1992), p. 229-231
5. http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761572872_11/Greece.html#p87
6. German Antiguerrilla Operations, Ch. 4.II
7. Mazower (2001), p. 106-107
8. German Antiguerrilla Operations, Ch. 4.III
9. German Antiguerrilla Operations, Ch. 5.II-III
10. German Antiguerrilla Operations, Ch. 7.III
11. German Antiguerrilla Operations, Ch. 8.III
12. 13th Hellenic Light Bombing Squadron - A brief history
13. RAF Squadron Histories
Sources
★
Crete: The Battle and the Resistance, Antony Beevor, , , Penguin Books, , ISBN 0-14-016787-0
★
Center of Military History (1953 – Reissue edition 1984-1986).
German Antiguerrilla Operations in The Balkans (1941-1944) Washington DC:
United States Army.
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