The rise and fall of the Greek colonels

On 21 April 1967 a group of Colonels headed by George Papadopoulos seized power in Greece. Ostensibly their action was justified by the danger of a Communist conspiracy. Yet in spite of many treason trials, not a single person was ever convicted of any action or plot prior to the coup; the Colonels merely revealed themselves as naive megalomaniacs with a self-imposed mission to reform Greece by force. The immediate excuse for toppling the government of the day was the fear that the General Election which was about to be held would lead to grave disorder and even revolution. The tense atmosphere was aggravated by controversies over Cyprus, over the royal family, over the killing of a left-wing Deputy, over allegations of electoral fraud, and much else; but above all by the ingrained habit of conspiracy among Army officers of different political persuasions. Only the final collapse of the dictatorship in 1974, and the return to power of Constantine Karamanlis, restored the hope that Greece could develop into a Stable democracy, C M Woodhouse sensitively chronicles the last days of civilian rule, the dissension and confusion which made the coup inevitable and the aftermath of the Colonels' rule and its implications for Greece today - He also analyses international reactions, which were mostly neutral at the official level, in contrast to the widespread hostility of public opinion. His account of betrayal and opportunism illuminates a still too little understood episode of contemporary European history.