Moscow AND GREEK COMMUNISM, I 944-I 949 Moscow AND GREEK COMMUNISM, 1944-1949 by PETER J. STAVRAKIS Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London Copyright © 1989 by Cornell University All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, 124 Roberts Place, Ithaca, New York 14850. First published 1989 by Cornell University Press. International Standard Book Number o-8014-2125-x Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 88-47767 Printed in the United States of America Librarians: Library of Congress cataloging information appears on the last page of the book. The paper in this book is acid-free and meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources. To Regina Vassiliki Stavrakis CONTENTS Preface ix Abbreviations xiii Transliteration and Documentation XV Map XVlll I INTRODUCTION: THE GREEK CIVIL wAR AND SoviET FoREIGN PoLICY 2 CONSOLIDATING WARTIME GAINS, 1944-1945 7 3 POSTWAR SOVIET OBJECTIVES AND GREEK COMMUNIST GRADUALISM, I945-1946 48 4 FROM DUALISM TO DEFEAT, 1946-1949: THE SOVIET IMPACT ON THE THIRD ROUND OF THE CIVIL WAR 127 5 ELITE CONFLICT AND SOVIET POLICY IN GREECE I86 6 THE IMPACT OF SOVIET POLICY ON POSTWAR BALKAN POLITICS 203 Appendix: Historical Narrative and Path Analysis 2I7 Bibliography 221 Index 233 PREFACE Few postwar events have had as profound an effect on Western percep tions of Soviet international behavior as the Greek Civil War. The politi cal instability and Communist insurgency in Greece, coinciding with Soviet pressure on the fragile Turkish and Iranian governments, con vinced the West it was confronted by an ideologically militant Soviet Union pursuing a policy of global revolutionary expansionism. With the Truman Doctrine, the United States served notice that Greece was to be America's first test of a policy of containment of Soviet expansionism. Although victory in the Greek Civil War was important to the United States at the time, the conflict's long-term importance lies in the American perceptions it created about the means and motives of Soviet foreign policy. More than four decades later, that legacy of the Greek Civil War continues to affect U.S. calculations of Soviet behavior. Greece's strategic location and the occurrence of civil war there during a historic transformation of the international system naturally assured the examination of the Communist insurgency. What is surprising is the ex tent to which assumptions about Soviet conduct in the Balkans have remained unexamined. No investigation has ever determined actual Soviet involvement in Greece; no persuasive explanation of Soviet policy during the years 1944-49 has ever emerged. In this book, using a variety of sources (Greek Communist, in particular), I have tried to determine as precisely as possible the extent and impact of Soviet activity in Greece. Beyond this, I have integrated the historical evidence into an interpreta tion that, without sacrifice of complexity, adequately explains Soviet