The Heroic October 28, 1940: The First Victory of World War II

The Greeks rejoiced, and the world was stunned

By Evaggelos Vallianatos

Prologue

When World War II engulfed Greece, no one expected the Greeks to imitate their ancient ancestors. But they did. Italy, one of Europe’s “great powers,” attacked little Greece on October 28, 1940. Little Greece defeated large imperial Italy. The Greek victories in Albania against the Italians were just as important as the victories of ancient Greeks against the Persians at Marathon in 490 BCE, in Salamis in 480 BCE and in Plataea in 479 BCE. In each battle, ancient and modern, the Greek troops were a fraction of the enemy forces and, second, the Greeks were defending their country and were ready to win freedom or to die.

Time Magazine of December 16, 1940, reported that the Greeks defeated larger Italian armies under difficult conditions of terrain. The report explained:

“Pushing northward to Porto Edda [in Albania], [the Greeks] crossed the marshes above Lake Butrinto which the Italians had thought were impassable. They waded armpit-deep through icy water, pushing their guns on rafts. They crawled over the mountains from the east, cut the road to Delvino and planted their guns on the heights above Porto Edda…. Fifteen miles over the hills, the Greeks had taken all the heights surrounding Argirocastro. There, the Italians also fired the town and fled up the road toward Tepeleni-harassed by snipers and artillery from the hills above. Before the Italian rear guard of tanks retired, the Greek infantry stormed the town. They dropped from balconies on to the roofs of tanks, threw hand grenades into the openings, jammed the tank-tread mechanisms with their bayonets…. In Athens people danced in the street by moonlight, carrying at the head of their procession the victory flag that had been flown on the Parthenon. First Corizza, then Porto Edda, then Argirokastro —the three advance Italian bases in Albania—now side by side over all three flew the double eagle of Albania and the blue and white banner of Greece. The Greeks rejoiced and the world was stunned.”

Clockwise: Italian bombers over Greek territory, Italian soldiers during winter in Albania. Greek soldiers in Argirokastro, Greek soldiers during the Italian spring offensive 1941. Photo: SJC American. Public Domain.

“The fact remains that Italy threw into the fight, at the outset, ten full divisions numbering, with supply and labor troops, over 200,000 men, to which two more divisions were added after the going got rough. These included many celeri (mobile) units. At the [Greek] Pindus [Mountain] passes the invaders were confronted by not more than eight divisions out of the 13, plus one of cavalry, which Greece could mobilize but of which she could equip only ten for fighting. Not even numbers of airplanes made much difference, for Italian planes outnumbered the Greeks… by at least 500 to 100, new planes versus old. And in artillery the Fascist [Italian] advantage was estimated at 919 guns to less than 100…. With their mechanized equipment, their heavier and more numerous artillery and their larger number of troops, the Italians naturally stuck to the roads, and the roads run through the valleys and the passes. [The Greek Commander-in-Chief], General [Alexandros] Papagos, made use of the mountains by moving along the heights to outflank the Italians. His infantry, composed of mountaineers – all Greece is mountainous – knew exactly how to get through hills. Everything fitted. [The Greeks] dragged their light mountain pieces over rough trails and got into position where they could drop shells on Italians who could not see them. The effectiveness of these tactics was immense…. Only of simple equipment – rifles, hand grenades, bayonets – did the Greeks have reasonably adequate supplies, and of these they made the best…. Advancing through the mountains, they repeatedly stormed small positions held by Italian detachments who had been sent out to safeguard the flanks of columns on the roads below. Time and again, Greek bayonet and grenade proved conclusive…. Observers marveled at … the endurance [of the Greek troops] on long night marches up blizzardy mountains, through slushy defiles; their sleeping on cold rocks or in frozen ditches; their unfailing grins and cheery chatter before, during and after battles. In every way the poverty of Greece had given it strength and the Greek Command knew how to capitalize upon it.”

German occupation of Greece

Things were going so bad for the Italians that Hitler came to the rescue of the Italian tyrant Benito Mussolini. But not before secret German Greek talks failed. Hitler had no interest to attack Greece. His lieutenants proposed to the Greek Prime Minister, Ioannes Metaxas, to throw the British out of Greece and avoid war with Germany. Metaxas was tempted to do just that, despite the pro-British sentiments of his boss, King George II. British spies counterattacked. Metaxas got ill and the British doctor in Athens assassinated him in the hospital. With Metaxas dead, Hitler invaded Greece in April 1941.

Greece resisted Nazi forces fearlessly, but she succumbed to German assault in April 1941. Then the tragedy of occupation by Germans, Italians, and Bulgarians resurrected the nightmare of Turkish occupation. The occupiers wrecked Greece. From April 1941 to October 1944, the Germans used violence and starvation to subdue the country, but without success. The result of Greek resistance was calamitous. Hundreds of thousands of Greeks lost their lives and the country was devastated. The German, Bulgarian and Italian troops burned something like 1,400 to 1,770 Greek villages; displaced more than a million people and either killed or brought death to 550,000 Greeks; destroyed 34 percent of the national wealth; ruined the country’s harbors, especially the large harbors of Piraeus, Thessalonike, Iolkos / Volos and Patras; wrecked railway tracks, steam engines, telephone networks, airports and bridges; sunk 73 percent of cargo ship tonnage and 94 percent of passenger ships; destroyed 65 percent of private cars, 65 percent of trucks, and 80 percent of buses; killed 60 percent of horses and cattle, and 80 percent of small animals; and burned 25 percent of the national forests. Finally, the foreign invaders all but destroyed farming: cereal production declined by 40 percent, tobacco fell by 89 percent, and currant production declined by 66 percent. The most lethal weapon against the occupied Greeks was famine.

Epilogue

The lessons of the heroic October 28^th and the holocaust of German occupation are telling. United Greeks are invincible. They defend freedom to the last man / woman. But, unfortunately, allies like the British who had looted the Parthenon and grabbed the Greek island of Cyprus, never wanted an independent Greece. They intentionally murdered Metaxas to force the Nazis into Greece. And, surreptitiously, during the German occupation of Greece, they divided the forces of resistance, bribing one against the other on the ludicrous excuse of one of them was communist. The result of this insidious British policy, Greece had a civil war after the end of World War II.