In 1943, shortly after the successful deportation of the Sephardim from Salonika to the extermination camps in Treblinka and Birkenau, the Greek government in cooperation with the Nazi Germany leadership in charge of administering the pro German Greek state during the war, implemented and enforced the establishment of an institution which was in charge of eliminating and erasing the four centuries long Jewish Heritage embedded in Ottoman Salonika since their arrival from Spain in 1492. To be just and equal, as well as to provide enough perspective and to be able to judge everyone in retrospect for their crimes against humanity and war crimes, not only the Greeks, one must endorse a relentless policy of pursuit and not live a single stone unturned. Yes, it is true; Venizelos and his government were not the only ultra-nationalists in the Balkans, as Mustafa Kemal Ataturk had to the same extent contributed to the ethnic cleansing of Anatolia and his administration had been instrumental in the choreography, orchestrating and incorporating of the Armenian Genocide. But, this is the ultimate irony of world history; the two biggest butchers to have ever run legitimate governments in the countries in the Balkan peninsula, are for the most part responsible for the biggest atrocities and more human death than anyone else in the past, yet they are the very national symbols of patriotism and both modern states that emerged from the turmoil of the WWI. It is a paradox in itself, a great tribute and triumph of inhumanity to have these two savages to represent two countries, after all the ethnic cleansing and genocide as well all the massacres they were substantial to It would have been greatly selective to only speak about the involvement of the Greek state in the government endorsed ethnic cleansing, not only of the Aegean part of Macedonia that was incorporated into Greece, but about the atrocities against the native Turks from the Peloponnese as well as the assimilation of the Arvanites(Christian Orthodox Albanians), and all the other non-Greek ethnic communities who were either by force converted or forever expelled or perhaps exterminated from the region under Greek government for good Of course, the story would be greatly undervalued and unappreciated, had we only spoken of the involvement of the Greeks and their effort in the state sponsored ethnic cleansing of Macedonia and Greece, and we dont mention the atrocities of the Young Turks and the Committee for Union and Progress in their Fascist policies against all Non Turks in Anatolia, as well as the subsequent genocides committed in Asia Minor However, to a great detriment of millions who died for the establishment of one nation ethnically clean states in the Balkans, the least we can do at the beginning of a new millennium is to correct the mistakes from the past, accepted as the official and mainstream truth from regional national history books, and to a great extent accepted by the whole world as the official history from the period from that part of the world 2
We must correct these lies and finally accept revision of regional history for the benefit of a better future for all, who did once know how to live and coexist together before they turned against each other because they were indoctrinated to exterminate each other by a handful of politicians who infiltrated regional politics to spread terror and intolerance, as well as religious hatred. As far as the two million Macedonians, who were either assimilated or expelled, or perhaps exterminated, all by force, their truth lies buried under ground, a victim of propaganda and lies that have infiltrated mainstream history, only to prevail under great scrutiny and a sincere attempt to distinguish Facts from Myth I am one of these people who fight for the truth; to finally replace the lies that have for long enough poisoned and suffocated the version of history that is officially accepted to be the truth about what happened in Macedonia and the Balkans between 1913 and 1948 One must sustain and prevail as well as pursue the truth with great resistance from outside pressure, if one is indeed determined to find out the truth about the first great state sponsored operation of genocide, extermination, and forced assimilation that was enforced in the region of Macedonia by the State of Greece. The amount of schools that were closed down, the amount of people who disappeared or were imprisoned and subject of assimilation and forced labour, the untold many stories of pogroms and mass murder are all much too much buried under ground and concealed from the truth The forced name changes, the forced religious conversions, the deliberately changed Slav and Vallach names into Greek ones to be able to resume a life in the regions now incorporated into Greece, all this to a great extend is a story untold, by a world much to indifferent much too reluctant and complacent, but to the same extent mislead and lied to by an elaborate state propaganda of one of the most undemocratic regimes in Europe of that period. Let there be no mistake, the regime of Metaxas was a totalitarian police state run by a Military Junta, that implemented and administered one of the most brutal and harsh regimes in Europe, exterminating all opposition and dissent along the way. Yes, the own Greek population was a great subject of abuse and mistreatment, false prosecution and imprisonment on false and insinuated charges, but for the rest, the non-Greeks, life was a privilege seldom offered to anyone Such denial of identity and own heritage, such aggressive pursuit of a policy of forced assimilation and identity change is unknown in modern European history, but not because it did not happened, but because it was concealed and buried under ground to cover these crimes against humanity Modern Greece is a country founded on Genocide and mass murder, its own government pursued these War Crimes as state sponsored policies of total assimilation and forced conversions, yet the World has not yet reprimanded anyone for it, allowing hypocrisy to evade the truth once more Greece since its recent modern beginnings was a country founded on Apartheid values, but theres no public outrage, theres no criticism for the abuse of humanity and the amount of Crimes against humanity perpetrated in the country in the period between 1913 and 1948 3