Although the occasion officially commemorates the horrendous events of the “night of the Polytechnic”, we like to think of it as a tribute to the spunky and daring youngsters who decided to confront the dictatorship then ruling the country, face it head on, and lock horns with it. Six years and some odd months before that, elements in the Greek army had seized power to avert an impending election that would almost certainly have returned to power the Centre Union Party led by the late George Papandreou. So much has transpired since the coup of April 21,1967, and the Greek Reality has undergone so many “sea changes” in the interval that it is worth glancing back at those events before they are engulfed in myth.
The unpleasant truth is that despite the ferment of the country at the time, the colonels were able to execute the coup of 1967 with little shedding of blood and virtually no resistance. In his book of memoirs written after those events, while in forced exile abroad, Andreas Papandreou, today the leader of PASOK, the major opposition party in Greece (in 1967 he was a leading figure in the Centre Union Party led by his father, George Papandreou), wrote that when he and other political leaders were thrown in prison by the colonels, they assumed that the people of Greece were out in the streets fighting. That this was not so has been variously attributed to indolence, to the efficiency with which the takeover was executed, or to the uncanny cleverness of a plot devised by foreign powers. There are still no simple answers and attempts to explain human behaviour are finally mere speculations. Human beings tend to run away with events and refuse to respond according to prediction. In view of the political mood of the nation at the time of the coup, there was every reason to expect strong opposition, and, indeed, there were those who protested but most acquiesced, some because they chose to protect their vested interests but most submitting, it seems to us, to something akin to what Hannah Arendt called “a concentration camp psychology”.
It is easy to misinterpret this mass submission. It’s equally easy to deny that it occurred. The fact remains it did occur and the issue is not If but Why. For almost four hundred years Greece was part of the Ottoman Empire (there is an inclination to refer to that period as an “occupation”, but four centuries of Turkish presence was a way of life that was integrated into the society), and before that, for centuries, a province of the Roman and Byzantine Empires, and regularly subjected to waves of invasion. Since its creation a century and a half ago as an independent state, Greece has been continually subjected to turmoil and conflict from within as well as influence and invasion from without. Meanwhile, the ordinary people who have populated this small, geographical area, have struggled to survive, many forced to seek their livelihood abroad (and that of their families who remained behind). They have been heirs not only to their immediate ancestry, but to the burdensome, mystical “glory that was Greece” in ancient times (a rather spent notion after so many thousands of years), and buoyed about in a confusion of ideologies and conflicts. If it is possible to generalize about a people, it might be possible to say that Greeks have long been weary, simply worn out from years and generations of conflict when more often than not their fate did not rest in the will of the people as a whole, but in the will of others, often far removed, but often in our midst. It is perhaps not surprising that there has long been a tendency to atribute all our national ills to the Turkish rule, to regular interference from foreign powers, and to other “external” factors. This placebo reasoning will not do forever.
The question will arise, what has this to do with the Polytechnic Uprising? It seems to us that we are running the risk, once again, of absolving ourselves of all responsibility as individuals and placing the blame elsewhere, on “them”; that is, the dictatorship government. We are a myth making people and the reality has a tendency to get lost in the process. We forget that “they” were actually “we”.
Among the myths in the making, and about to become established in the folklore, is what happended that night at the Polytechnic. The sit-in at the Polytechnic had been going on for some time before that final, horrendous night when the tank drove through the gates. The students had set up a radio station and were calling for change and a return to democracy. They were receiving a great deal of response from the public. Going past the Polytechnic and leaving parcels of food and medicine had been for several days something approaching a festival. Somewhere along the way on the evening of the seventeenth things began to grow ugly. The students pleaded for help over the airwaves, and, to be fair, many people tried to get to the students and many were beaten and many were arrested. After that the area was strung off. The students continued to plead for support from the populace until their radio station went off the air.
There was hardly a living soul in Athens who did not know that something dreadful was going on and that there were thousands of young people trapped in the Polytechnic without guns or ammunition. The few individuals who ventured down late in the night can testify to the fact that the situation was sinister. But very few people did venture down, and we have often wondered if the Government would have dared send in the tanks if, instead of a handful of people, thousands had descended on the area.
When the tanks moved in, they did not move in unobtrusively. There were already many tanks in the area, but they were not the ones that charged into the Polytechnic. The convoy that did, moved in ostentatiously, rumbling slowly through some of the most heavily populated areas of the city, with a spotlight beaming, and a siren shrieking, while people stood behind their windows and curtains, or on their balconies in the darkness, and watched its progress. And watched as flares rose up over the city’s skyline from the area of the Polytechnic (from the tear gas bombs being fired into the school, it was later explained).
The question that has plagued us ever since is this: Why did Athenians not pour out of their homes screaming that no one would attack those children without first running over them? It was not a sudden onslaught. The tens of thousands who watched the tanks’ deadly progress could not possibly have rationalized the entire incident away and believed it would be alright. There must have been the odd hero who raced out and protested, but there were not many. While perverse forces pulled the strings that sent in some of the children of the society, those manning the tanks, to attack other children of the society, those inside the Polytechnic, most Athenians did nothing. It seems to us that the wreaths laid in tribute to the bravery and nobility of the students should include a few in memory of the night our society collectively failed to respond to the most fundamental of human instincts, and abandoned its children.
Ark Royal
FROM Ann Parry: There she was, anchored off Piraeus Bay, resplendent in all her glory. Britain’s largest and most powerful warship, the HMS Ark Royal, was on her final voyage, and Piraeus was to be her last major port of call. Commanded by Captain Edward Anson, and escorted by the Royal Navy supply ships Olwen, Lyness, and Resource, her visit from October 27 to November 2 was timed closely with the anniversary of the 1827 Battle of Navarino at which twenty-six British, French, and Russian warships destroyed the Turkish fleet.
Naturally, my first reaction after being invited on board for a cocktail party was one of excitement. It seemed hard to imagine a ship where the captain has been known to cycle from one end of the deck to the other in the course of his daily rounds! To reach the fifty thousand ton aircraft carrier, it was necessary to catch a small ferry boat from Zea Marina as the Ark Royalwas anchored one mile from the shore. That in itself was an experience. Bad weather had made the seas very rough and we had to spend some time trying to tie up safely along the side. Precariously stepping on board, or rather, being hoisted on by two sure-footed sailors, did nothing to stop the wind playing havoc with my pleated dress. Trying to hold it down with one hand while grasping a handbag in the other, it was impossible to emerge at the top of the ladder looking dignified and smiling in response to the saluting officers. That, however, was just the start. The next stage of the obstacle course was yet to come. To reach our destination we had to climb over about twelve rather high steel door ledges and then finally up one or two steep ladders, taking care not to bump our heads on the wav up.
However, the ‘jolly hockey sticks’ attitude prevailed among members of the older, fur-clad contingent who led the way to an enormous hangar which had been cleared of most aeroplanes and now held at least three hundred guests. It was a tremendous sight. At one end a gigantic mural of London was suspended from the ceiling and on the wall opposite a screen transmitted films-of the Ark Royal and her twenty-seven-hundred-man crew in action.
Apart from hearing about the Ark’s various detachments since April to the Caribbean, Florida, Naples and other Mediterranean ports, the highlight of the evening was the entrance of the Royal Marine Band. Guests parted to allow the band to march past with its usual precision, playing a selection of the more well-known tunes and, in accordance with tradition, the British and Greek national anthems. “Sunset”, which evoked momentary nostalgia among the onlookers, was loudly applauded and rowdily cheered as the last few notes died away and the Union Jack was hoisted from an illuminated Phantom Jet.
The” crowd began to mingle again. Filled with a renewed sense of enthusiasm, I directed questions at several officers as to how they felt about the Ark’s retirement. They were not so much upset by her retirement (made essential by creeping rust in the lower decks) but, as Flight Lieutenant Stephen Riley said, “The scrapping of the Ark Royalmarks the end of another era in naval history.” The Ark Royal is the last of Britain’s strike carriers which have been phased out and replaced by a new generation of small, aircraft-carrying cruisers.
At this point I looked around me and saw that I was virtually the last guest on board and yet I felt compelled to take a closer look at the Phantom at the end of the hangar which had earlier captivated everyone’s attention. While I was carrying out my “investigation”, one of the pilots told me that this particular aircraft, with its brightly marked “007” on its side had recently intercepted a Russian plane during exercises. Unfortunately, James Bond could not be found.
It was time to go and I once again clambered aboard the little boat for the return trip to Piraeus. Looking back at the Ark Royal, I marvelled at her dignity even at the end of her life. One thing is certain — she will never be forgotten either by those who served on her or those who, like me, felt humbled by her great beauty and honoured to have been acquainted with her.
