The continuing guerrilla war in South Vietnam underscores with grim realism the deceptively moderate words of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union’s new program. When related to the daily reports of Communist agitation, its passages on “wars of national liberation, anti-imperialist revolution,” “peaceful and non-peaceful, parliamentary and non-parliamentary forms of struggle” and also on the duty of the Communist parties everywhere “to be ready for the most rapid and unexpected change from one form to another” become clearly—if disturbingly—meaningful.
Since the unanimous approval of the program in Moscow in October 1961, several Soviet leaders have made it clear that peaceful coexistence is a form of class struggle between socialism and capitalism, and that any compromise or reconciliation between the two systems is “unthinkable.” On the contrary, “under conditions of peaceful coexistence, more favorable opportunities are created for the struggle of the working class in the capitalist countries; while the struggle of the people in the colonial and dependent countries, for their liberation, is facilitated.”
This type of nonconventional warfare under conditions of “peaceful coexistence”—or more accurately under conditions of mutual deterrence—is rightly considered by many as the most likely form of struggle in the next ten or 15 years. Provided that the West (the United States in particular) maintains its deterrent capability—a nuclear conflagration may be averted. Our deterrent capability, however, is of little practical value whenever the international Communist movement employs the methods of peaceful coexistence; i.e., subversion, general political strike, terrorism, political assassination, and guerrilla warfare. The methods of peaceful coexistence are deliberately so designed to circumvent the limitations imposed on Communist expansion by the conditions of mutual deterrence.
Western military authorities do give ample and continuous attention to problems related to strategic and tactical warfare. In spite of recently increased interest in guerrilla warfare, discussion of this stealthy form of armed conflict is still sparse by comparison. This being the case, a study of the guerrilla war waged by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) in 1946-1949 and of the reasons for the defeat of the guerrilla army, goes beyond local interest and may serve as a useful tool for devising realistic methods of combating similar Communist efforts in other areas.
Space limitations permit only a brief review of the situation which prevailed in Greece shortly before the outbreak of the Communist guerrilla war in 1946. The Varkiza Pact of 12 February 1945, sealed the failure of KKE’s armed attempt in December 1944, to seize power in Athens shortly after Greece’s liberation from German occupation. However, it did not terminate the Communist designs for conquest of power. On the first anniversary of the Varkiza Pact, the 2nd Plenum of the Central Committee of KKE secretly decided that “the all-people, pan- democratic struggle could reach the stage of general strike and armed resistance.” To the best informed members of the Party, this resolution was the signal for preparing another armed attempt to seize power.
Experience has shown that Communist revolutionary efforts have a better chance to succeed in countries where national and social cohesion is at its lowest while the political leadership is neither effective nor widely accepted by the people. To the leaders of KKE, Greece in 1946 seemed to fit the prescription: (1) The non-Communist political parties were vehemently carrying on their feud around the issue of Constitutional Monarchy vs. Republic. (2) The people were bitterly disunited. (3) The Greek economy was ravaged after five years of war, occupation, and revolution. (4) The Civil Service, ill-paid and permeated by Communist sympathizers, was ineffective. (5) The Greek Army was weakened by the infiltration of Communist agents, while it lacked both the organization and the experience to wage anti-guerrilla warfare.
On the other hand, and in spite of its defeat the previous year in the streets of Athens, KKE enjoyed certain important advantages in 1946: (1) Recognized by the Varkiza Pact as a legitimate party, KKE was free to carry on its propaganda and agitation through its own newspapers and numerous publications; (2) it had carefully concealed large quantities of weapons in mountainous areas; (3) more than four thousand of its most trusted fighters were still at large in mountain hideouts; (4) its cadres were schooled in the conduct of guerrilla warfare during the German occupation of Greece; (5) KKE enjoyed the active support of the neighboring satellites, Albania, Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria; finally, (6) it had the moral support of many well-meaning but rather naive idealists in the West, who considered the Communist-led movement in Greece as the only genuine expression of the people’s democratic aspirations.
KKE was not entirely wrong in considering the “objective conditions” as being in its favor. It took the Greek Army more than two and a half years and a complete overhauling of its organization and tactics, plus the influx of American aid, to crush the Communist rebel army and free the Greek countryside from its iron hold.
On 30 March 1946 (five weeks after the aforementioned 2nd Plenum and on the eve of the first postwar parliamentary election in Greece), a guerrilla band attacked Litochoron, a small village on the eastern slopes of Mt. Olympus. It left in its wake corpses and charred ruins. In the months that followed, several exposed villages met with a similar fate. The guerrilla tactics were simple but effective: concentration of forces against an exposed village; attack; destruction of the gendarmerie station; forcible recruitment of young villagers; pillaging of foodstuffs and then retreat to the mountain hideouts. Throughout the summer of 1946, the Communist guerrilla bands continued their sudden, hit-and-run strikes. Meanwhile the Communist Party, safe under the protection of Greek laws, carried on its open propaganda and agitation and its subversive activities from its headquarters housed in a lofty building in the center of Athens. Rizospastis, the Party’s official daily was being sold freely all over Greece. Its leader, N. Zachariades, made the utmost use of the opportunities offered by the freedom of action he enjoyed as the head of a legitimate political party.
In August 1946, KKE instructed Markos Vafiades, one of the top Communist leaders of ELAS, the Communist-led Greek Guerrilla Army to leave for the mountains in order to co-ordinate the activities of the guerrilla bands. Before the end of the year, Markos had established somewhere on the countryside the “General Headquarters of the Democratic Army.” Still KKE remained “legal.” For several months in 1946, the Greek government and its British advisers continued to view the guerrilla attacks primarily as a police matter. It was only after October 1946, that the Greek Army replaced the gendarmerie units which were hopelessly inadequate for this type of warfare. Still, the Army leaders and their British advisers failed to comprehend fully the essence of the challenge. They employed a disastrous tactic of “static defense.” Whenever the garrison of a village or a town was attacked by superior guerrilla forces, nearby troops were not permitted to leave their assigned posts and rush to the rescue. Many towns and villages paid a heavy toll.
Several foreign and domestic critics at the time argued that it was “incomprehensible” how an army of more than a hundred thousand troops could not liquidate ten or 15 thousand guerrillas. The fact of the matter is that a successful war against a guerrilla army requires a power ratio of at least ten to one. The Greek Communists were well aware of this fact. In an article published in the Kommunistiki Epitheorisis, the theoretical organ of KKE, (May 1947), there appeared a revealing paragraph: “Greece has approximately 25 mountain ranges in the mainland, exclusive of the islands. If we visualize from the center of each mountain complex a radius of 20 kilometers, we come up with a periphery of approximately 120 kilometers. Thus we have a total frontline of 3,000 kilometers. This will require huge forces on the part of the enemy.” This evaluation was basically correct. Moreover, while a considerable part of the Greek armed forces was neutralized through the tactic of “static defense,” the Communist guerrillas were able to move swiftly, select their target, and concentrate their forces thus acquiring temporarily absolute superiority over each besieged garrison. These tactics of “static defense” together with the organization of the Greek Army, which was based on the prevailing concepts of ordinary warfare, gave the Communist guerrillas a serious initial advantage.
The guerrillas enjoyed from the outset another important advantage—the support of the neighboring satellites. The three Communist states to the north provided them with an active sanctuary, a base for retreat, recuperation, and supplies. As early as March 1946, N. Zachariades visited the Yugoslav village of Bulkes, a settlement of Greek guerrillas who had fled to Yugoslavia after the Varkiza Agreement. He openly spoke of a “third round” and assured his listeners that the Greek people and 80 per cent of the Army were already on the side of KKE. One month later, with the approval and support of the Yugoslav government, a military camp for the training of guerrilla cadres was established at Bulkes. Yugoslavia’s assistance to the Greek guerrillas took many forms and continued till the spring of 1949, several months after the Tito-Cominform breach came into the open.
Active assistance was also rendered by Albania and Bulgaria. The Greek frontiers with the three Communist neighbors—one thousand kilometers long—remained, for all practical purposes, unguarded throughout this period. Soon the guerrillas were able to establish permanent bases along the frontier areas, particularly on the mountain ranges which converge at the junction of Albanian, Yugoslavian, and Greek boundaries.
On 24 December 1947, the Communists established a “Provisional Democratic Government” with Markos Vafiades as Premier and Minister of Defense. To their dismay, no government on either side of the Iron Curtain accorded them recognition. The Communist guerrilla bands, in spite of their “hit-and-run” successes, had failed to occupy and hold any significant town which could serve as the seat of their “provisional government.” With the exception of some mountain regions along the frontier to Albania, they could not claim effective occupation of any substantial part of the country. Still, they were able to terrorize the countryside and tie down thousands of troops in a futile war.
With the enunciation of the Truman Doctrine in March 1947, and the replacement of the British by American advisers and supplies, the hopes for a successful end of the fight against the Communist-led guerrillas brightened. But the mistakes of the recent past could not be eradicated with one swift stroke. The Greek army had to be retrained and its strategy and tactics reshaped.
First, the “selective recruitment” of ideologically reliable youth was abandoned. Under this erroneous method in the past, pro- Communist draftees were deferred “for health reasons”; thus leaving them free to go on with their subversive activities or even join the guerrillas in the mountains. Under the new system, all those eligible for military service were inducted without exception. Those of questionable loyalty were placed in nonsensitive posts. The most dangerous among them were held in a concentration camp on the island of Makronisos where they received intensive indoctrination. Some of the most celebrated anti-Communist units came out of this camp.
Second, the army doubled its forces. Its units were trained to meet the challenge of this unconventional type of warfare. Their mobility increased. Special commando units were organized, known by their Greek initials as LOK. American war materiel helped increase substantially the Army’s fire power. The Air Force was supplied with dive bombers and napalm bombs.
Third, the Army’s leadership and the officer corps made effective use of the experience they had gained, revised their tactics, and worked out a new plan for an all-out drive to crush the rebellion.
Fourth, the supreme command of the Greek Armed Forces was entrusted to Marshal Alexander Papagos who took over the reins on 20 January 1949. Till then, there was no unified command. Ostensibly, the leadership was in the hands of the Chief of the General Staff. But his authority was curtailed by the intervention of political committees, foreign advisers, and his inability to impose strict discipline on the major military commanders on the field. Most of the field commanders had been fellow-students with one another and with the successive Chiefs of the General Staff—and had formed personal friendships as well as animosities.
Fifth, a strategy which could be called the strategy of staggered expansion of control gradually evolved. The unproductive, “time-limited” sweeps of troops through the country-side and the spasmodic countermeasures to Communist initiatives were abandoned. Instead, the army began systematically to expand its control over well-defined areas. This meant, up to a point, a reversal of the guerrilla tactics; it involved (a) selection of target area; (b) concentration of regular and special anti-guerrilla forces; (c) relentless eradication of the underground apparatus used by the guerrillas for information, recruitment, and supplies; (d) launching of a sustained series of offensive operations from the periphery toward the center of the Communist stronghold; (e) establishment of several successive lines of defense designed to cut off all possible routes of escape; (f) extermination or capture of the guerrilla force in the area; (g) mop-up operations by auxiliary forces; (h) establishment of local units of static self-defense; (i) extension of permanent government control and authority over the cleared area; (j) measures to prevent re-infiltration of the area by guerrillas from other regions; (k) selection of another suitable area to repeat the process; (1) special operations to join the two cleared areas and proceed further. Prior to the beginning of such an operation the army would establish a “no man’s land” by removing the population of entire villages located in the periphery of the Communist strongholds shortly before waging major clean-up operations. This tactic deprived the guerrillas of indispensable sources of information and supplies at critical moments. It had several disadvantages. It resulted in the concentration of almost 800,000 villagers, under difficult conditions, in the major provincial towns while it imposed a heavy burden on the country’s already overburdened budget. Furthermore, a prolonged concentration of people in the “evacuee camps” could have created an explosive situation which might have played right into the hands of the Communist agitators. It proved helpful because it was applied only at the decisive moment for a relatively short period of time. Marshal Papagos’ strategy was to be climaxed with the concentration of all available forces for a massive assault against the Communist strongholds along the Albanian frontier in the Grammos-Vitsi mountain complex.
Tito’s decision in July 1949, to close the Yugloslav-Greek frontiers and discontinue all assistance to the Greek guerrillas undoubtedly contributed to their ultimate defeat. Following his break with Comintern in July 1948, Tito’s action was in line with the gradual reorientation of Yugoslavia’s foreign policy toward an accommodation with the West.
Long before the closing of the Greek- Yugoslav frontiers, the Greek Communists had been thrown into a quandary by the Tito-Cominform quarrel. Already in the late summer of 1948, KKE was split into two major factions. In January 1949, Markos was relieved of all his duties. Zachariades took over the reins of the revolution. This internal party crisis was the culmination of a long dispute over the strategic character of the revolution. The question had already been raised at the 3rd Plenum in September 1947: Should KKE set as its ultimate objective the conquest of power through its own armed forces alone, or should these forces play an auxiliary role, preparing the ground for the propitious moment when foreign Communist forces would invade Greece in support of the “Revolution?” This was far more than a mere exercise in semantics; the strategy and the tactics of the guerrilla army would be shaped by the answer to that question. In the opinion of Markos and those who were later labeled as “opportunists,” a Communist victory in Greece could only be achieved as a result of foreign intervention. Therefore, the guerrilla army should remain organized in swiftly moving small bands with one basic mission; to keep the routes open for the moment of foreign intervention while weakening the National Army, demoralizing the population, spreading economic chaos, and discrediting the Greek government.
Zachariades, apparently aware of the fact that foreign intervention was out of the question, advocated that the conquest of power should be effected by the forces of the “Democratic Army” alone. To fulfill this mission, the guerrilla bands should be transformed as soon as possible into “a regular revolutionary army” along the lines adopted by Mao tse- tung and the Red Chinese (cf. Politbureau Resolution of 15 August 1948). Zachariades’ point of view finally prevailed. It proved a fatal error. The major advantage of a Communist-led guerrilla army lies in its ability to move swiftly, select its targets, employ hit- and-run tactics, and engage large forces of its adversaries. Its strategic objective is to prepare for the time when (a) foreign intervention may be feasible; or (b) the morale of the people will be sufficiently undermined to accept a compromise leading to the admission of Communists in the national government as a prelude to possible establishment of an all- Communist regime; or (c) the leadership of the target country becomes discredited to the point that the armed forces and a substantial majority of the people accept the Communist guerrillas as liberators. If the softening up process reaches such levels, the guerrillas may adopt the tactics and the organization of a regular army with impunity. Otherwise, they face grave risks. The moment a Communist guerrilla army transforms itself to a regular army, it faces its opponent on equal terms. The ten-to-one ratio is no longer operative. Strangely, a guerrilla army is most vulnerable when it appears to be strongest. If the leadership of the target country is aware of the peculiarities of this type of warfare and has prepared for this moment, it can seize the opportunity and deliver a crushing blow.
In 1948, the Greek Communists ignored these basic principles of guerrilla warfare. Still their “regular revolutionary army” might have been able to achieve its strategic objectives had it gained the support of a wide section of the population and of the national army, culminating in wholesale desertions of national troops. This did not happen. The Communist attempt to seize power remained throughout a limited, terroristic enterprise which failed to acquire a truly social content. To most Greeks it represented a foreign- directed force serving the interests of traditional “enemies.” The “Democratic Army” rested on a narrow popular basis, composed primarily of poor peasants. The leading cadres in the mountains as well as the Communists and Communist sympathizers in the cities and towns were mostly of petty-bourgeois origin, often seeking in a Communist victory the satisfaction of personal ambitions, KKE never realized its primary objective to “mobilize the towns.” Its constant problem remained the inadequacy of its “reserves.” There were no detections from the National Army while there was a constant trickling of deserters from the “Democratic Army.” Without strong support from the people and the army, the Communist effort was doomed to failure, unless an open intervention of foreign troops in support of the “Democratic Army” could take place. Such intervention became politically inadvisable after the proclamation of the Truman Doctrine. Following the Tito-Cominform breach, it became a practical impossibility.
The Communist leadership, in a last ditch effort to gain popular support, appealed to the Slavic-speaking minority in Northern Macedonia. On 30 January 1949, the 5th Plenum pledged the establishment of a Macedonian state by detaching Greek Macedonia inhabited by 1,500,000 Greeks and approximately 80,000 “Slavomacedonians.” This resolution of the 5th Plenum alienated many of KKE’s sympathizers, while it indelibly branded the Party with the seal of treason. To anyone familiar with the question of the “Macedonian” minority, it was obvious that KKE, in adopting the resolution, hoped to placate the Bulgarians. Following the defection of Yugoslavia from the Communist camp, the establishment of an independent Macedonia under Communist auspices could only serve as a prelude to its incorporation by Bulgaria. An ill-conceived act of desperation, the resolution failed to avert the oncoming collapse of the “third round.”
With most of Greece freed of Communist bands by methodically carried out mop-up operations, the Greek Army prepared for the final assault against the two major Communist strongholds of Vitsi and Grammos along the Albanian frontier. The plan provided for a diversionary attack against Grammos to be followed by the main thrust against Vitsi. With the successful termination of this phase of the operations, the major part of the Greek forces was to concentrate on an all-out attack against the Grammos stronghold. The diversionary operation against Grammos which began on the 1st of August, 1949, was concluded on the 9th, and the following day, after heavy bombardment, the Second Army Corps launched a three-pronged attack against the Communist positions in the area of Vitsi. Five days later, the Greek units had reached the Albanian border. The night of 24-25 August, in the presence of King Paul, the units of the First Army Corps moved against the heavily defended positions of Grammos. At ten o’clock in the morning of 30 August all organized resistance had ceased.
The Communist program of action which aims at fomenting and abetting “wars of liberation” need not necessarily succeed, provided that we understand the principles of this type of warfare and react accordingly. This being the most likely type of warfare to confront us within the next ten or 15 years, it is worthwhile to draw from the experience of the Greeks who were the first to thwart and finally crush a full-scale guerrilla attack.
(1) The most basic requirement for success against a Communist effort to undermine, subvert, and take over a country is that the great majority of the people and the totality of the armed forces must be opposed to the Communist objectives in whatever deceiving manner they may be presented. Only a government which can command the support of the majority of the people and the loyalty of the armed forces can hope to wage a successful defense and eventually a victorious counter-offensive against the guerrillas.
(2) The training and equipment of the Armed Forces must be geared to this type of unconventional warfare. They must have mobility and fire power.
(3) This being a conflict with pronounced ideological overtones, an intensive indoctrination of the Armed Forces and the people at large becomes imperative. Military training alone, however necessary, will remain inadequate without a parallel effort to inculcate the soldiers with a strong belief in the meaning and the significance of their fight in terms of their own personal, familiar, and national interests. Well-trained soldiers will become dangerous guerrillas if they ever cross over into the enemy camp.
(4) An indispensable part of a successful plan is the disintegration of the Communist underground apparatus in the towns as well as in the villages. Any person, even remotely suspected of pro-Communist sympathies, must be removed to non-sensitive areas, probably into special camps where he may remain under close control throughout the emergency.
(5) Strange as it may seem, the best time for a relentless pursuit of the guerrilla bands is during the period when climatic conditions in the country are at their worst. The guerrillas cannot match the armed forces in providing themselves with adequate supplies, clothing, or ammunition. Clean-up operations in Greece proved most fruitful during the winter months of 1948-49.
(6) In order to prevent the re-entry of Communist forces in cleared-up areas, it is necessary to organize militia units composed of villagers under the command of regular or reserve officers. These militia units are entrusted with the static defense of their villages; leaving the regular army free to concentrate against remaining Communist strongholds.
(7) Shortly before decisive operations are undertaken, it may be advisable to evacuate all inhabitants from the periphery of the Communist positions, thus leaving a sort of “no- man’s land.” This device, if used at the proper time (swiftly and without warning) deprives the Communists of all sources of information and supply.
(8) The moment when the guerrillas feel strong enough to adopt the tactics of a regular army may be the most opportune time for the ultimate reckoning. Provided that the legitimate government has prepared for this contingency, the rebels will prove to be most vulnerable when they feel strongest. The reason is very simple. By transforming themselves into a regular army, they lose the advantages which they enjoyed heretofore; namely, elusiveness, mobility, surprise. From then on they are forced to face the national army on equal terms. They can no longer rely on the ratio of ten to one. Yet, to pass into conventional forms of combat is almost unavoidable. To remain for an indefinite period at the guerrilla stage, the offensive risks the very real danger of disintegrating as even the most loyal Communists find it rather hard to take the rigors of prolonged guerrilla life. Furthermore, they cannot expect to achieve a permanent victory unless somehow they pass from the sub-conventional guerrilla stage of attack to a higher, conventional level of organization and tactics. Guerrilla bands, as such, cannot hold large populated areas for a long period of time. Their basic tactic is the hit-and-run type of attack. Experience has shown that a Communist offensive which has started as a guerrilla war may be successfully terminated (from the Communist point of view) in three ways: (a) The majority of the people and a substantial section of the army shifts over to the side of the guerrillas; (b) the guerrillas are joined by foreign Communist forces to the extent that together they can fight the loyal army on equal terms in a conventional type of warfare; (c) the legitimate government is sufficiently demoralized so that a compromise solution is sought as the only alternative to an inconclusive, devastating war. In this last case, a coalition government is expected to pave the way for a Communist take over.
In sum, the decisive link—if we may use the familiar Leninist phrase—is the ability of the legitimate government to muster and retain the support and loyalty of the armed forces and of the great majority of the people (primarily the intellectuals and the peasants). Unless they are fully convinced that it is to their own interest to continue the struggle to a successful conclusion, the time will come when they will first turn apathetic and then, in swift succession, disenchanted and finally hostile to the legitimate government.
The decisive weapon in this type of nonconventional warfare is the morale of the national armed forces and the attitude of the significant sections of the population.