"Only Greeks and Brits Were Left Standing": Why Europe Stands to Lose if Greece is Forced Out

Greek women & men from Greek People's Liberation Front during WWII

"there is also an ethical argument: modern Europe exists thanks to ancient Greece and modern Greece exists thanks to the European powers that guaranteed its independence in the early 19th century. Since then, Greeks have more than repaid their debt. They fought to defend western ideals and interests in every corner of the world – from the trenches of Europe, to the hills of Korea and the deserts of the Gulf. When Germans fell into the darkness of Nazism, when the empires of old (Belgium, Netherlands, France) surrendered within days, only Greeks and Brits were left standing. Ask those who were cowering from the pounding of Luftwaffe in the tube stations of London, during the long winter of 1940, and they will tell you that the only pieces of good news they were getting for months, were coming from the Greek mountains."

From an article on the Guardian on "What Europe Loses if Greece is Forced Out" mentioning several reasons beyond the ethical ones: Greece being the barrier to the tons of illegal immigration from Asia, the Nato efforts to assure stability in the Balkans, the undiminished geopolitical strategic point that Greece and Cyprus present in the area, betraying the sacrifices already made in the name of European directive.

"We should remember that those who sacrifice Greece on the altar of speculation, hoping that economic fascism will be satisfied with this small country and that they will escape ...those are the same ones who reliquinshed Czechoslovakia to Adolf Hitler in Munich in 1938, hoping that this new prey offered him would suffice, after they had already reliquinshed the democratic Spain."
from the Nantes announcement on "Je Suis Grec aussi, solidarité avec le peuple Grecque"

click to enlarge

The Dec. 1, 1940 New York Times editorial reported: “The hypnotism of gloom has become dangerous as the wishful thinking that preceded it in the prewar years. We can thank the people and soldiers of Greece for ridding our minds of a foul superstition…It will be the glory of modern Greece in history to have shattered the myth of invincibility of the Axis and to have given to all free men a new proof of the worth of courage.”

Further Reading:
"Heroes Fight Like Greeks, The Greek Resistance Against the Axis Powers in WWII" (Hardcover) by Ronald J. Drez
"Inside Hitler's Greece: The Experience of Occupation, 1941-44" [Paperback] by Mark Mazower


pics via the National Herald and absinthemakeyouawhore.tumblr.com