Month: June 2020

Categories
political

An Orthodox Perspective On Trump And The Democrats

The Democrats have been taken over by the extreme left of the party. This is now a party that endorses infanticide and the castration and mutilation of children. The Governors of Virginia and New York have passed extreme laws on abortion that permit the killing of infants that have survived an abortion. The Democratic party also supports the transgender movement which endorses the process of “transitioning” for children. In addition, the political left which is the base of the Democratic party supports allowing men who consider themselves female to use the ladies facilities thus overthrowing conventional norms of propriety and morality.

I am not a Republican nor am I “right wing”. I consider George W. Bush to be the worst President in American history. I consider Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleeza Rice, and Paul Wolfowitz and the rest to be war criminals. The invasion of Iraq unleashed the rise of ISIS and the subsequent genocide. The invasion of Iraq set the stage for the Obama administration’s intervention in Libya which led to the overthrow of that regime and which turned Libya into a failed state in which Al Quada and ISIS established a presence.

After Libya, the Obama administration armed and supported the various Syrian “rebels” all of whom were associated with Jihadism one way or another. The whole of the region became a slaughter house with one third of Iraq and one third of Syria coming under the control of ISIS. In addition, the wars in the region created a wave of refugees which flooded Europe. Greece was heavily impacted by the refugee crisis. In 2015-2017 Paris, London, and Brussels were bombed by members of ISIS. While the Obama administration deserves blame for its own policies, it was the Bush administration that started the whole business of “regime change”.

This brings us to President Donald Trump. There is an old expression that you should not judge a book by its cover. Donald Trump is in many ways inarticulate and does not express himself well. He does tend to say stupid things, and I cannot state that I agree with what he says on these occasions.

However, I look beyond the cover and read the book. Donald Trump has presented himself as a welcome alternative to both major political parties. Donald Trump opposed the wars in Iraq and Syria, and the intervention in Libya. Most significantly of all, he desires warm relations with Russia. President Trump removed American backing for the the so called “rebels” in Syria and allowed the Russians to save Syria and to prevent that country from becoming a failed state.

All is not perfect. Turkey has been left occupying parts of Syria and the Trump administration abandoned the Syrian Kurds who fought heroically against ISIS. These are serious moral lapses. Yet, Trump at least has begun making a change to traditional foreign policy. There is reason to believe that with a second term things may work out better.

One of the greatest and pressing concerns that I have with the Democratic party which is even more serious than the lunatic stances on social issues mentioned above is the blatant anti Russian hysteria it has come to espouse. The Bush administration was criminal for its actions in Iraq. The Democrats are willing to go even further and provoke tensions with a nuclear power like Russia!

The pathetic rabble that calls itself the Democratic Party blames Russia for Donald Trump’s election win in 2016. This is pure madness and a dangerous escalation of tensions with Moscow. We are expected to believe that the great Hillary Clinton could not have possibly lost the election because the electorate rejected her!

Hillary Clinton demonstrated that she has a big mouth when she compared Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin with Hitler! Unbeknownst to Mrs. Clinton with the big mouth, the Russian President was born in what was then Leningrad after the war. During the war, Leningrad was under siege by the Nazi invaders and massive numbers of Russians starved to death. Among them was the Russian Presidents older brother. The Russian President’s father fought in the Red Army in defense of the city, and two of his Uncle’s were killed fighting Hitler’s armies.

The Hitler comparison is even stupider considering the support that her husbands administration gave for the pro Nazi regime in Croatia during the 1990’s which was responsible for the ethnic cleansing of over 200,000 Orthodox Christian Serbs. Furthermore, the Ukrainian militias that Russia has been fighting are Neo-Nazi. Incidentally, Neo-Nazi propaganda and holocaust denial have been outlawed in Russia under President Putin.

I see things from a rather unique vantage point. I am cognizant of Byzantine history and heritage. Nine hundred years ago, the Byzantine Empire with its capital in Constantinople was the center of the world. This was the political and spiritual center of Orthodoxy. The Empire lived with the Muslim world in the east and the world of the Latins (ie Roman Catholics) in the west.

At the end of the eleventh century, the Roman Catholics launched the Crusades against the Muslim world when they conquered Jerusalem and committed genocide against Muslims and Jews. Previous to their conquest of Jerusalem, the Crusaders passed through Constantinople. Tensions were very apparent as the Greek Orthodox came to loathe them.

The same tensions are apparent nine centuries later between Orthodox Russia (the successor to Byzantium) and the the western heirs to the Crusades (America, Europe, NATO). The Crusaders waged war in the name of Christianity, an idea the Orthodox east did not endorse or understand. Today, the west wages wars in the east (and more crucially near the borders of Russia) in the name of democracy.

There is much to criticize in the neoconservative elements of the Republican party who have an agenda not consistent with that of the Christian east, but for the moment it is the Democrats who represent the greater danger for the Orthodox world with their rabid and unrelenting Russophobia. A political party that embraces the belief that there are more than two genders and which has zero knowledge of history cannot be trusted with the authority to conduct foreign relations with a country like Russia, or to formulate policies in the Middle east. The Democratic party has emerged as the anti intellectual movement of the twenty first century.

Its leaders and rank and file members possess an unending expertise on matters such as “diversity”. Let them concentrate on matters such as “gender studies” and other garbage. They know nothing about world history or foreign relations. Their rabid Russophobia might lead the United States into a greater debacle than that of Iraq.

President Donald Trump is the anti war candidate. His administration has tried to end the endless foreign interventions in the middle east. His efforts to reconcile with Russia are admirable. The President without question has a greater understanding of the complexities of the world than his detractors in the Democratic Party.

Regarding the corona virus. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (he of the liberal abortion law that permits infanticide) insisted that the virus should be called the “European” virus, and not the “Chinese” virus on the grounds that the virus was transmitted to New York from Europe. This proves that Democrats are incapable of rational thought. Where did Europe get the virus? Europe got the virus from China where it originated because of the infamous wet “markets” and the unsanitary conditions.

The Chinese government waited two months before it took action to contain the spread of the virus. It allowed the citizens of Wuhan where the virus originated to gather and celebrate the Chinese new year. At the beginning, several Chinese doctors investigating the disease were warned by the communist party to keep their mouths shut. Those doctors have “disappeared’.

It is well known that the World Health Organization (WHO) is under the influence of the Chinese Communist Party. Its director general has been Beijing’s man since he was the Minister of Foreign Affairs for Ethiopia. The Chinese government nominated him for his posting at WHO. WHO does not seem to have taken an interest in the fates of the Chinese doctors who are missing and ignored the warning from the authorities inTaiwan that the virus had spread to that island.

Innocent people from around the world have died, economies have been destroyed, and virtually all citizens everywhere have had their freedoms and their lives disrupted. The Trump administration cut off funding to WHO in light of the Chinese Communist influence over that organization. The Democrats are more preoccupied with not giving offense to that Stalinist regime than they are in formulating plans on how to successfully reopen the United States.

Then there is the Democratic party’s attempt to thwart the majority of the American electorate by attempting to overturn the elections of 2016. The attempted coup against the President occurred over the utterly stupid matter of Ukraine. We are expected to believe that President Trump bullied the Ukrainian government of President Zelensky for partisan purposes so he could get dirt on his opponent in the 2020 elections, Joe Biden.

Anyone who has read the transcript of the conversations between the two Presidents would know that there was no pressure or coercion exerted on the Ukrainian President by Trump. If one wants to know what pressure and coercion really are, here is Democratic President Lyndon Johnson speaking to Greek Ambassador to Washington Alexander Matsas at the White House in 1965,

“Fuck your parliament and your constitution. America is an elephant, Cyprus is a flea. Greece is a flea. If these two fellows continue itching the elephant, they may just get whacked by the elephant’s trunk, whacked good…If your Prime Minister gives me talk about democracy, parliament, and constitution, he his parliament, and his constitution may not last very long.”

quoted from “Cyprus” by Christopher Hitchens

The Johnson outburst was in response to Ambassador Matsas rejection on behalf of the Greek government of the Acheson Plan for Cyprus which would have required Greece to cede the island of Castellorizo to the Turks among other concessions.

Furthermore, in 1999 Undersecretary of State Richard Holbrooke representing the Clinton administration at Rambouillet sat down to negotiate with the Serbian government over Kosovo. He presented a plan to the Serbs that would have required Belgrade to give up part of its territory (Kosovo) after three years. The price for rejecting this plan was bombing. Serbian targets (including civilian institutions such as Churches, hospitals, television outlets, and trains) were bombed for three months.

President Trump’s conversation with President Zelensky was polite and pleasant and in no way resembled the nasty and abusive manner in which Johnson spoke to the Greek Ambassador. Furthermore, Trump did not threaten the Ukrainian government and never proceeded to bomb that country. The only threat to Ukraine came from former Vice President Joe Biden who by his own admission threatened to cut aid to Ukraine if that government did not fire the prosecutor who was investigating the gas company that employed Biden’s son.

The Democrats therefore attempted to impeach President Trump for an offense that was committed by Vice President Biden. All that President Trump did was to attempt to ascertain whether the Ukrainians had any evidence of wrongdoing by the former Vice President. The Democrats embarked on this impeachment at a time when the corona virus was spreading worldwide. If the administration was not bogged down defending itself in this attempted coup perhaps it could have concentrated on the spread of the virus and the lockdown could have been avoided.

Mention has been made of Serbia. The Democrats and their media allies such as CNN enthusiastically supported the Clinton administrations war on Serbia, another Orthodox country. The anti Russian hysteria today very much resembles the anti Serb sentiment of the mid to late 1990’s. Russia is not Serbia. From Syria to Crimea, the Russians have proven that they will both fight and win if they are provoked.

Former Democratic Presidential Candidate Julian Castro championed the cause of abortion rights for “trans females”. That is, for women who have become “men”. Who the hell can possibly consider voting for these people? These people have completely lost their minds!

Another former candidate Beta O’Rourke stated he would strip Churches of tax exempt status if they refused to perform gay marriages. Here we have an open declaration by a Democrat that he would begin the process of abolishing religious freedom.

All this is by no means to suggest that Trump is without his flaws. Trump has made some very serious errors. He badly mishandled the white supremacist gathering at Charlottsville and waited much too long to condemn the Neo-Nazis. He brought neoconservative lunatics such as John Bolton and Mike Pompeo into his administration. He also nearly triggered a war with Iran through the assassination of Iranian General Soleimani.

President Donald Trump has made mistakes. Even so, a second Trump administration is much preferable to that of a Democratic administration. As of this writing, former national security advisor Susan Rice has blamed the Russians for the riots that have broken out throughout the United States. Is there anything the Russians are not responsible for?

“Filmmaker” Michael Moore has made an anti Trump film where the poster shows the President playing golf with a nuclear blast in the background. Trump is the anti war President who also tried to pursue reconciliation with the Russians. Considering the massive amount of hatred being directed at the Russians by the Democratic Party, who is more likely to provoke a nuclear war?

In addition, the Democrats criticized President Trump’s harsh rhetoric against North Korea and suggested he would provoke a war. When President Trump through diplomacy was able to bring North Korea to the negotiating table all of a sudden he was accused by the Democrats of being soft on North Korea. The Democrats are incapable of formulating any stance based on reason, facts, or reality. Everything is strictly partisan and ideological.

Regarding Greece and Cyprus. The Clinton administration extended recognition to FYROM as “Macedonia” (despite promises made in the 1992 Presidential campaign) in 1994. On January 31, 1996 the Clinton administration pressured Greece to withdraw from the islet of Imia in order to appease Turkey. Support for Turkey continued unabated by both the Clinton and Obama administrations. The Obama-Biden administration’s Syrian war flooded the Greek islands with refugees. Greek American justification for supporting the Democratic Party cannot be sustained by historical facts.

One question for my fellow Greeks. In November 2015, Turkey shot down a Russian plane. Would it not have been a good thing to have had a pro Russian Donald Trump at the White House at that time?

At the present, the United States has been engulfed in riots emanating from the murder of an African American man in Minnesota. One can be sympathetic to and endorse the effort to fight racism and promote civil rights while unequivocally rejecting the extremism of the Marxist radicals who make up a good part of the base of the Democratic Party. Yes to the effort to reverse injustices and stop abuse of African Americans. Yes to the peaceful protesters of goodwill but no to the anarchists that have hijacked a legitimate cause.

In 2016, Donald Trump wanted to go after the Islamic State which was committing genocide against Yazidis, Shiite Muslims, and Christians. Furthermore, the Islamic State was responsible for reviving the institution of slavery in the form of slave markets that trafficked in Yazidi women. Neither President Trump nor the Russians will ever be given credit for stopping these massive human rights violations.

In 2016, Donald Trump viewed Islamic State as the threat to the United States and the world. The Democratic Party viewed Russia as the threat. In 2020, Donald Trump views Communist China which through negligence spread the corona virus throughout the world as a threat to the United States. The Democratic Party still views Russia as the threat to the United States.

Nine centuries ago, the officials at the court of the Greek Emperor of Constantinople looked upon the western Crusaders that passed through the Great City as barbarians. A year from now, Moscow which is the heir to the great spiritual heritage of Constantinople may encounter a new generation of barbarians should the Democrats win in November.

Categories
faith political

The Evil Of Racism

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them”

Genesis 1:27

“You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.”

Matthew 22:37-40

Racism is an affront and an insult to God. Jesus Christ, the incarnate logos and word of God made flesh suffered the humiliation of the cross for the salvation of the whole of mankind regardless of ethnicity, ancestry, or skin color. Racism is an obscenity and a blasphemy against what God created, and a denial of what the Son of God, the incarnate logos, suffered on the cross for.

Throughout history, there have been Christians who have been practitioners of racism. These people were not Christians, they were heretics and blasphemers. These include the western Christian countries who were involved in the transatlantic slave trade against people from Africa, and American Protestants who first supported slavery and then racial segregation, as well as outright murder of African Americans.

Another form of race hatred has been in the form of anti semitism. Anti Semitism was once religious (Orthodox, Roman Catholics, and Protestants have all been complicit in this sin at one point or another in history). By the twentieth century, as Western Europe underwent a process of secularization, Anti Semitism became a matter of racial hatred.

This was the case when Hitler seized power in 1933. By 1942, what the Germans called “The Final Solution of the Jewish Question” in which the Jews were to be exterminated became official state policy. Six million Jews were slaughtered in the Shoah (Holocaust).

The Nazis may have been the most ambitious and depraved group of racists. They had entire groups of people chosen for either outright extermination or enslavement. Jews and Gypsies were chosen to be wiped out of existence. Slavic peoples such as the Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, and Czecks were considered “untermenschen” (subhuman).

The Slavic countries were treated far worse than the other countries of Nazi occupied Europe. They were considered in the Nazi racial hierarchy to be just above Jews. These Slavic peoples suffered horribly under Nazi rule. Of course, Hitler hated the Russians with an enormous passion.

Operation Barbarossa, the name of the Nazi invasion of Russia which began on June 22, 1941 was waged as a racial war of conquest against the “inferior” and “asiatic” Russians. During the war, Josef Stalin turned to help from the Russian Orthodox Church to help motivate the Russian people to fight the Nazis. The murderer of Orthodox Bishops, Priests, and faithful turned to the Holy Church of God for assistance against the pagan, racist, and occult ideology of Nazism.

Several years ago a book was published entitled, “Ataturk in the Nazi imagination” by Stefan Ihrig. Ihrig having researched Nazi party newspapers from the 1920’s found that the Nazis were greatly inspired by the founder of modern Turkey, the so called “Ataturk” whose name was Mustafa Kemal.

Kemal was a notorious Turkish racist who presided over the final genocide of Armenian, Assyrian, and Greek Christians that had begun under the auspices of his predecessors known as “the Young Turks” in 1914. Ihrig writes in this book that the Turkish genocide of Christians served as a model for the Holocaust of the Jews under Hitler. Racism is an act of war against God and the denial of the Biblical teaching of creation.

Saint Paul writes, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Racism is a cancer that can strike anywhere. In 2012, as Greece was sinking into the economic crisis, the Neo Nazi Golden Dawn Party won seats in the Greek Parliament. This was a vile and satanic political party that embraced all the Nazi ideas of racism, anti semitism, occultism, and neo paganism. Their members went about the streets of Athens beating up and terrorizing illegal immigrants. Fortunately, their support diminished in Greece and are no longer a factor in Greek politics.

Orthodox Christians should always reject racism as such theories and practices contravene the Biblical teaching of creation, the message of the Gospel and the example of Jesus Christ, and the purpose of the saviour’s own suffering and resurrection which was for the purpose of the salvation of all people everywhere.

Orthodox Christians should reflect on the evils of racism during these critical days in the United States. Greek Americans in particular should be sympathetic to African Americans. In 1922, there was an American Admiral named Mark Bristol who was the High Commissioner at Constantinople who referred to the Greeks as “the worst race in the near east”. This man was responsible for censoring news reports that were intended to inform the world of the slaughter of Greek and Armenian Christians at Smyrna.

Five years ago, I went to see the film “Selma” about Martin Luther King. What a pleasant surprise it was to see an actor portray Greek Orthodox Archbishop Iakovos. The character is in the film for two minutes or so, but what a two minutes. The Archbishop along with Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish leaders stuck their necks out and could have been killed for joining Dr. King.

Various forms of racism have existed in the United States over the years. There is a book called “imbeciles” by a writer named Adam Cohen. The book focuses on a woman named Carrie Buck who was the daughter of a prostitute who was adopted by another couple. Carrie was impregnated by a young man who was related to the couple and was subsequently sterilized despite the fact that she did not understand the consequences of this procedure.

Carrie Buck’s case got to the Supreme Court which ruled in favor of the sterilization. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in the Court’s ruling declared that “three generations of imbeciles are enough”. Cohen writes that between 1907 and 1983, at least sixty and seventy thousand people had been involuntarily sterilized. During the late 1920’s and 1930’s, the eugenics movement which supported bills supporting involuntary sterilization throughout America was thwarted by the Roman Catholic Church (to its credit) which stopped such laws from passing by mobilizing its priests, nuns, and faithful to lobby against them.

The Eugenics movement in the United States did not only hold racist views of African Americans, they advocated immigration restrictions against Italians, Jews, Greeks, Irish, Poles, and Russians. Much racism emanates from the corruption of the theories of Charles Darwin.

These theories are called “social darwinism”. In fairness to Darwin, he never endorsed or advocated the ideas associated with “social darwinism”. Social Darwinism in the nineteenth century produced various theories of racism and included advocates such as Houston Stewart Chamberlain, an Englishman who would have an influence on Hitler himself.

The philosophy of racism is evil and will always be the enemy of Christianity and the cross of Christ.

Reflections on the Double Headed Eagle Blog

Categories
position papers

Restoring Greek National Independence Part Two

The “Megali idea” (meaning Great Idea) is the ideology on which the national goals and aspirations of modern Greece were based. The term itself was first used by Greek Prime Minister John Kolettis in the early 1840’s, although the concept itself originated in the thirteenth century following the Latin-Frankish conquest and occupation of Constantinople. After the exile of the legitimate Greek Emperor to Nicea (and other claimants to the throne establishing themselves in Epirus and Trebizond), the liberation of Constantinople was the primary aim of the Greeks.

According to Apostolos Vacolopoulos, the Latin-Frankish invasion and occupation of the Greek capital led to a major national awakening throughout the Greek speaking world. Constantinople was liberated by Emperor Michael VIII in 1261 but was conquered by the Ottoman Turks in 1453. Constantinople once more became the object of desire in the minds of the Greeks.

In 1821, a national reawakening after centuries of Ottoman occupation led to Greek independence. Despite the complexities caused by the blatant interference of the western powers in Greek internal affairs, the Greeks had a very firm belief in their national purpose which was expressed in the “Megali Idea”. This goal was generally the liberation of Greeks outside the borders of the new Greek Kingdom and the liberation of Constantinople specifically.

The “Megali Idea” was successful in that Greece managed to incorporate the Ionian Islands (1864), Thessaly, (1881) Crete, Macedonia, and Epirus (1912-13), Western Thrace and the aegean islands (1923) and the Dodecanese islands (1947). The efforts to liberate Asia Minor and Constantinople were a failure owing to the downfall of Prime Minister Venizelos and the restoration of the Monarchy which caused Great Britain and France to shift their support from the Greeks to Kemal’s Turks.

It is necessary to discuss the period preceding the downfall of Venizelos. The great man came to reflect the interests and aspirations of the Greek nation. He was charismatic, intelligent, and a strong nationalist with great diplomatic skills and abilities. Speaking before the Greek Parliament, Venizelos mentioned that Ottoman Turkey had “a clearly outlined policy for the extermination of the Greek race”. Under Venizelos, Greek interests predominated in the formation of foreign policy and relations with the west were undertaken based on their compatibility with those interests.

After returning to power in 1917 following his dispute with the Monarchy, Venizelos aligned Greece with Great Britain and France. In return, Greece was given territorial rights in Smyrna and Eastern Thrace. This is the period in history which should be a model for Greek foreign policy. That Greece was defeated in Asia Minor is not important here as that defeat was caused by later political developments and their consequences that were entirely avoidable.

In 1919, Venizelos submitted a memorandum to the Peace Conference in France which referred to the historical and moral claims that Greece had on the unredeemed territories of the then Ottoman Empire. It makes for fascinating reading as does the whole period of the Venizelist era. There are some historically invaluable works from that period which attest to the very prominent position that Greece had achieved.

In 1920, a prominent observer of political events in Greece and Asia Minor named Herbert Adams Gibbons published a biography of Venizelos. The final paragraph of the book published before the fatal downfall of Venizelos is excerpted here,

“Adrianople and Smyrna are stepping stones to Constantinople. Students of the Italian risorgimento maintain that the movement could not have ended elsewhere than in Rome. The renascence of Hellenism cannot end elsewhere than in Constantinople. How long it will take to achieve the unity of Hellas depends upon the Greek people. If they continue to give their support to Venizelos, he will know how to lead the Greek army to its final victory. The powers may interpose their veto. But the life of Venizelos demonstrates the folly of vetoes. In the prayer of eight million Greeks, “Zeto Venizelos!” the aspirations of Hellenism are practically expressed. For if the Cretan lives, and continues to lead, he will accomplish what the greatest Mediterranean islander before him failed to accomplish. He will take possession of Constantinople.”

Gibbons himself was a great friend of Greece who later submitted reports to the Christian Science Monitor about the genocide of the Greek populations by the Kemalists.

Greece during that particular time had a strong nationalist oriented foreign policy. One century later, it is inconceivable to ponder any possibility of Greek expansionism. If there were to be a “Megali Idea” of the twenty first century the primary aim would be to gain the diplomatic and political support of the United States and/or the Russian Federation. Whereas a century ago, Athens was on the offensive against Turkey, the post Lausanne realities require Greek diplomatic and political action against Ankara to be strictly defensive.

Much mention has been made of the city of Constantinople in this analysis. While Constantinople is long gone, the great spiritual and cultural heritage that the City represents is very much alive. One thousand years ago, Constantinople was the capital of the Greek world and under the rule of the great Basil II (976-1025).

During the reign of Emperor Alexios Comnenus of Constantinople, the European Crusaders passed through the City on their way to Jerusalem. The westerners were amazed at the splendor of the Greek Capital. In those days, the Greeks looked on the Europeans as barbarians and loathed them.

This brings to mind tw0 events that occurred during the tenure of the late Archbishop of Athens and all Greece Christodoulos (1998-2008). The first events consisted of rallies called by the Archbishop in Thessaloniki and Athens to protest the Simitis government’s plans to remove religion from identity cards. The cards were a trivial issue, as the real issue had to do with Greece’s Byzantine past and independence vs the Europeanization and secularization of Greece at the expense of its Helleno-Orthodox identity and traditional goals.

The second event I am recalling had to do with the visit of Pope John Paul II to Athens in 2001. The Simitis government accepted the Papal request to visit Athens without consulting the Church. More important than the visit itself was the way in which the Church and the Government each viewed the visit. Objections to the visit may have been primarily ecclesiastical, but there were also historical and national tensions at play.

Pope John Paul II apologized to the Church of Greece for the Fourth Crusade which destroyed Constantinople in 1204. For the advocates of Europeanization this history was completely irrelevant. For the Church and its conservative allies this was a matter of remembering the history of the “ethnos” or nation. The Fourth Crusade and its fifty seven year occupation fatally weakened the Greeks and made it impossible for them to resist the slow but irreversible advance of the Ottoman Turks.

The importance of history to the national survival of the Greek nation-state cannot be stressed too much. What is a nation if it forgets its own history and the misfortunes that it has suffered in the past? An example can be found in the events of the summer of 2015 which transpired under the government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.

At the height of the economic crisis the Greek negotiations with Europe reminded one of the Greeks who travelled to Florence in 1439 to unite the Greek Church with the Latins in the belief that this would save Constantinople. In 2015, the Greek efforts to gain understanding from Europe ended in failure. After the “OXI” referendum held under the auspices of Syriza the Greek banks ended up being closed and the Greeks rediscovered how much the Europeans loved them.

This analysis has spent more time on history than was originally intended or conceived. Nonetheless, this is extremely important. When the Greeks are weak, they are alone. That was the case in 1439 when the Greeks humiliated themselves by accepting the faith of the Latins for help which was never to arrive. It was also the case in 1922, when the Europeans, the United States, and the Russian Bolsheviks all supported Kemal’s forces in Asia Minor.

Even in the aftermath of the slaughter at Smyrna, the western powers were merciless to the Greeks. The Treaty of Lausanne legalized the genocide of the previous decade and further legitimized the ethnic cleansing of over 1,000,000 Greeks from Asia Minor. Had later Greek governments been cognizant of this history they might not have let Greece fall into economic misery and be at the mercy of the powerful yet again.

One more comparison of recent times with the historical past must be made. In the decades that preceded the Fall of Constantinople the Greeks were caught between the west and the Ottomans in the east. The Franks from the west and the Ottoman advances that seized more and more Greek territory until they got closer and closer to the Capital.

Today, Greece is caught between the west which is led by the United States (heir to the Franks) and which has instigated wars against Iraq and Syria, and by Erdogan’s Turkey (heir to the Ottomans) in the east. Centuries ago, the Greek world paid heavily for the Crusades that were waged by the west. Today, Greece pays mostly for the western intervention in Syria. Greece has been forced to accept large numbers of refugees from Syria as a result of a war that Athens neither desired nor participated in.

Most of the refugees are without question there for humanitarian purposes and it is to their credit that Greeks have risen to the occasion and treated them well and provided them with shelter, food, and medicine. But at the same time how can Greece be expected to take in an unlimited number of refugees? Greece is once again caught between a west which pursues policies that have devastating consequences for the Greek world and expansionistic Turkish power.

Greece cannot retrieve its lost homelands, but it can retrieve its history, its sovereignty, and its ethos. For many years, attempts have been made to cleanse Greece of its history. A perfect example has been the attempt to rewrite Greek history as it pertained to the Greek genocide in Smyrna. In his book, “Greece The Hidden Centuries”, David Brewer writes, “In September 2006 the Greek government introduced a new school history textbook for twelve-year olds, covering Greek history from 1453 to the present”. Further down, Brewer writes, “But all the textbook has to say of the event (the slaughter at Smyrna) is “The Turkish Army enters Smyrna. Thousands of Greeks crowd at the port and try to leave for Greece.”

This was just one example of the falsification of history that was introduced into Greek textbooks. Other examples of the falsification of history include denial of the existence of secret schools in the Ottoman Empire and the denial of the forced kidnapping of boys for the Janissaries. And this is done in the name of liberalization and enlightenment. It is in fact undemocratic and a form of fascism.

Returning to the point that Greek diplomatic and political action must be defensive. As has been pointed out in part one of this analysis, Turkey has questioned the validity of the Treaty of Lausanne and is questioning Greek sovereignty of the islands. Erdogan overthrew the Kemalist regime which does have benefits as pointed out in part one. Therefore, a carefully considered response to Erdogan’s Turkey should model itself on the foreign policy of the era of Venizelos.

The Venizelos quote cited above demonstrates that under his leadership, Greek foreign policy had been fully Hellenized. This unfortunately is not the case today. The Hellenization of Greek foreign policy necessitates that European and NATO interests take a back seat to the greater interests of Cyprus, the Aegean, and the islands. Certainly, an alliance with Europe, America, and NATO is welcome but on the condition that they support Greece’s rights and interests above and beyond those of Turkey. European support for the effort by Greece to defend its border last February is most certainly a political and diplomatic success and a step in the right direction.

At the apogee of the reign of the Kemalists in Turkey, Ankara acquired near political invincibility. It’s strategic value began with its proximity to the Soviet Union and increased as a result of political developments on its borders such as the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq in 1990. Its alliance with Israel had gradually developed and grown and Ankara could count on the support of the Israeli government and its lobby in Washington.

The policies of the Erdogan government have destroyed those diplomatic achievements and alliances. Turkey’s former advantage could become Greece’s advantage. What the west found advantageous in Turkey in the past, is becoming increasingly disadvantageous today and in the future.

Greek relations with Russia are just as important, if not more important for Athens. The standing of the Greeks in the Orthodox world has suffered considerably as a result of certain ecclesiastical developments (which have been critiqued elsewhere on this blog and in any case fall outside the scope of this summary and analysis). A separate post on Greece and Russia will eventually follow.

In conclusion, modern Greece has always succeeded when its national interests were pursued front and center (the war of independence, Balkan Wars etc) and did not take a back seat to the interests of the great powers when their interests conflicted with Hellenic interests. Greek foreign policy has been seriously constrained by its membership in both NATO and the European Union.

While Greece remains a member in both, its foreign policy should revert to the era before Athens was admitted into NATO, especially the Venizelist era.

Sources

American Hellenic Society. Greece Before the Peace Congress of 1919. A Memorandum Dealing With The Rights of Greece Submitted by Eleutherios Venizelos Prime Minister of Greece.1919.

Brewer, David. Greece the Hidden Centuries. I.B. Taurus. 2010.

Clogg, Richard. A Concise History of Greece Second Edition. 2002. Cambridge University Press. Page 47.

Gibbons, Herbert Adams. Venizelos. Houghton Mifflin Company. 1920.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece Service of Historical Archives. The Foundation of the Modern Greek State Major Treaties and Conventions (1830-1947). Kastaniotis Editions. 1999.

Vacolopoulos, Apostolos E. Origins of the Greek Nation 1204-1461. 1970 Rutgers University Press. Page 35.

Xanthaky, Socrates A. and Sakellarios, Nicholas G. Greece in her true light. Her position In the World-Wide War as Expounded by El. K. Venizelos. 1916.