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„Fight and learn, learn and fight”

Updated: Aug 5, 2018

21 Juli 2018

In the following article, you can briefly learn what happened 53 years ago in a European country where Democracy was born and abused – Greece.


The occasion? The assassination of the progressive, left activist Sotiris Petroulas on 21 July 1965.

In order to understand the historical background, we have to take into consideration some points. Let us start from the beginning:


  • Greece is the only European country that does not celebrate the Victory in Europe Day, the end of the Second World War on 8 May 1945. The reason? The country experienced after the end of the 2nd WW a terrible civil war that lasted until 1949.


  • The conflicts between the conservatives and the progressives (1946-1949) destroyed the whole country. The wounds are still open and reopen at any occasion.


  • It is international recognized that the struggle between the Hellenic Army − backed by the United Kingdom and the United States – and the communistic Democratic Army of Greece – sympathetic to the Soviet Union constitutes the first act of foreign intervention in the internal politics of a foreign country during the Cold War.


  • It was not an isolated incident that fathers killed, during the fights, their own sons, even if the decision about where to allocate Greece have already been taken at the Yalta Conference (4−11 February 1945). Greece should have to belong to the West.


  • Democracy was instable until 1974; the conflicts between progressive Democrats and those who were loyal to the king were normal course of life.


Collage by alekosch

  • 27 May 1963: The assassination of Grigoris Lambrakis

The anti-war activist, politician, gynecologist, track and field athlete, member of the faculty of the School of Medicine at the University of Athens and member of the Greek resistance to Axis rule during WWII Grigoris Lambrakis was assassinated by right-wing zealots.


  • Apostasia / Iouliana (July events) / the Royal Coup

A new, crucial political crisis occurred on 15 July 1965. The tip of the iceberg?

The compulsive resignation of Prime Minister Georgios Papandreou and the appointment, by King Constantine II, to replace him. The defectors from the Papandreous Party, the Center Union, are up to now called Apostates ("renegades"). The Apostasia indicated an extended period of political instability, which weakened the fragile post-Civil War order and ultimately led to the establishment of the military Junta in 1967. One of the renegades was Konstantinos Mitsotakis.


  • 21 July 1965: The assassination of Sotiris Petroulas



Sotiris Petroulas joined the youth organization of the left-wing Association of Democratic Left (EDA). As a student of economics in Athens, he became an activist of the Lambrakis Youth, headed by Mikis Theodorakis. On 21 July 1965 Theodorakis carried him on a demonstration in the center of Athens on his shoulders through the crowd. In the late, same evening he was killed by a tear gas grenade of the police, which was exploited by the right state.


Petroulas became a martyr of the Greek and international left movement by his violent death just because he defended the last article (114) of the Greek Constitution:


„The Compliance with the Constitution is up to the Patriotism of the Greeks"

His motto was „Fight and learn, learn and fight”


Mikis Theodorakis immortalized him with the following song:












 



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