Greeks must be brave and get history to repeat itself
The country needs to draw on its ancient reserves of courage, writes John Dillon, and say No to the EU
CONTEMPLATING the present crisis facing Greece, I am provoked to conjure up two notable occasions in its history — one from ancient history, the other from modern — on which the Greeks said No to a larger foreign power bringing pressure to bear on them, and got away with it, though in the second case not with such a fortunate outcome as in the first. I am not sure if any lessons are to be drawn from the examples or not, but it would not surprise me if they are passing through the minds of many of my Greek friends during this dismal time.
The first occasion takes us back to 480 BC, when the Persian king Xerxes, in the face of a series of provocations from this tiny, feisty and divided nation on his western flank, decided to bring the Greeks to heel once and for all, and add them to his empire. In preparation for an invasion, he sent a formal demand to all the Greek states for the forwarding of ‘earth and water' in token of submission to his rule. A number of the weaker and more vulnerable island states duly sent in the earth and water, but the two main states, Athens and Sparta, proudly refused.
The result was an invasion of Greece by an army of up to a million men, and the devastation of much territory, including Athens, but ultimately the expedition resulted in the defeat in 479 BC of the Persian navy at the Battle of Salamis, and of its army at the Battle of Plataea, by Greek forces that were smaller, but vastly superior in terms of bravery and discipline. This in turn led to an outpouring of creativity in the arts, sciences and politics which constituted the classical age of Greece, and one of the great periods of the human race so far.
In this case, great danger and dire short-term devastation led in the longer run to great prosperity and self-confidence, and ultimately to the conquest of the whole Persian empire 150 years later by Alexander the Great.
‘No troops or military hardware will roll in; instead, there will come about an absence – everything will just dry up’
The decision to say ‘No' from the modern era was equally brave, and was initially successful, but did not ultimately work out quite so well. In the autumn of 1940, on the crest of a wave of Axis successes, Mussolini decided to pick a quarrel with Greece, and presented an ultimatum, calling upon the Greeks to surrender to him, in anticipation of an easy victory if they resisted. General Metaxas, Greece’s dictator at the time (and not a very lovable figure), to his great credit told the Italians to get lost — enunciating the famous ‘No' (Okhi), which is still vividly remembered.
The Italians poured across the Albanian border, but, to their great surprise, were met by well-organised Greek resistance, and were soundly thrashed, being driven back in disorder into Albania. Unfortunately, however, matters could not rest there, as the Germans felt they could not leave their allies in the lurch, and they duly invaded, and occupied Greece for the duration of the war — committing a number of atrocities in the process, which are, of course, still remembered — and currently being highlighted by many indignant Greeks.
And so we come to 2012. Once again, Greece is threatened grievously from without, but this time by a foe much more intangible than before, though nonetheless dangerous and oppressive for that. A combination of banks and financial speculators have — admittedly with the connivance of successive Greek governments themselves — woven around the Greek nation an inextricable web of debt, guaranteed to bring the economy to a halt, depress living standards to an unbearable extent, and establish a debt repayment regime which will amount to a more or less permanent state of serfdom. To enforce this regime, a functionary from the ECB has been imposed on them as ‘prime minister' who is himself Greek (it helps to be able to speak the language), but who is bound to find his loyalties conflicted between Greece and the EU.
What is to be done? Well, there are many Greeks who are prepared once again to say ‘Okhi!', and take the consequences, whatever they may be. Unfortunately, though, to defeat this enemy ordinary old-fashioned bravery will not be enough, as its onset will be strangely intangible. No troops or military hardware will roll in; instead, there will come about an absence — everything will just dry up. Money, credit, supplies of essential commodities will simply become unavailable. Such an enemy is almost impossible to defeat, but I am inclined to feel that even so the effort is worth making — and indeed that Portugal and Ireland should follow suit.
The results will be apocalyptic in the short run, so we are promised, but it is our best chance to destroy the octopus of international finance that has brought us all to this crisis, and which, if allowed to triumph, will ultimately bring down the environment and civilisation along with it. I would go for it. John Dillon is former Regius professor of Greek at Trinity College Dublin and was director of the Irish Institute in Athens