Wizard of Boz

In the land where the words for democracy and politics were coined, sly old Politico Eleutherios Venizelos, whose first name means "Liberty," had last week resorted to civil war because he lost the last elections (TIME, March 13, 1933). "Venizelos has gone mad," cried Premier Tsaldaris. But everyone knew that the old wizard of Greek politics must have known he had a 50-50 chance before he risked open revolution. Last week those were still the odds.

On Venizelos' side were the mixed races of the Greek islands and of Thrace and Eastern Macedonia on the mainland, whence come Greece's crack troops, the kilted Evzones. For money he had his wife's fortune, estimated at $15,000,000, inherited from her father. He soon had the armored cruiser Aver off and the cruiser-minelayer Helle, either one of which is capable of blowing the rest of the Greek Navy out of the water. His best card was his battle cry that he was saving the Republic from the monarchist machinations of Premier Tsaldaris.

What kept the balance for the Government were airplanes, but they were mostly light pursuit planes, good for strafing troops but unable to carry big enough bombs to hurt the Aver off much. The "pure Greeks" of the mainland were loyal to the Government but apathetic. And the Government command was divided between Tsaldaris' two formidable partners, wily Monarchist John Metaxas, Minister without portfolio, and a rough-&-ready soldier, General George Kondylis, Minister of War, who promptly took charge in the field and had himself promoted to Field Marshal.

The Greek Civil War's land front was drawn last week along the River Struma in Eastern Macedonia, famed for non-Greek wars in 42 B. C. and 1917 A. D. Day after day General Kondylis announced, "We have crushed the rebels." Day after day, rain, snow and sleet froze the two armies in their tracks in the shadow of the mountains of Boz. Both sides fought best with rumors: that Venizelos had been wounded by an airplane bomb; that he had fled to Egypt; that the Averoff had been sunk; that the rest of the fleet had gone over to the rebels; that the Averoff had shot down two loyal planes; that a man named Anthony Fix was financing the revolution; that the rebels had advanced halfway to Athens; that they had bombarded the Parthenon. The Government was not "crushing" the revolution but as time passed without a rebel victory the morale and the chances of the Venizelos cause slowly faded. At week's end the weather cleared and the Government launched an actual offensive across the Struma, with heavy artillery, cavalry, infantry and machine gun units. The rebels suddenly seemed fatally short of ammunition and the Government's planes bothered them badly. Under a rain of bombs and propaganda leaflets, Macedonian spunk rapidly crumpled.

On the eleventh day of the revolution, Venizelos' generals threw in the sponge and scuttled for the Bulgarian frontier. Their automobile stuck in the Boz snowdrifts and they crossed the frontier on foot, their baggage on their backs. Rebel General Demetrius Kamenos told newshawks: "Our efforts to overthrow the Tsaldaris regime must, at least for the moment, be abandoned."

Meanwhile the fretful Balkans were all trying hard to see where they came in.

Bulgaria saw a threat in all the troops Turkey had massed in Turkish Thrace. Turkey saw a Bulgarian threat. Bulgaria reported Turkey to the League of Nations, then took it back. Yugoslavia saw an Italian threat to the Balkan Pact, claimed that Venizelos had planned to smash the French-inspired Pact and substitute an Italian arrangement between Greece, Bulgaria and Albania.

Quietly into Greek harbors last week slipped 50,000 tons of sleek British, French and Italian war boats.

News of all this filtered into the high Himalayas, into innermost Nepal, and there found Greece's onetime King George II ("Gorgeous Georgios") shooting tigers. He was so impressed by Venizelos' claim that Premier Tsaldaris was about to restore the monarchy that he lit out by forced marches for the Indian coast. Some said, however, that Greek Royalists wanted, not George, but his second cousin, Marina's husband, Britain's George Duke of Kent. Last week Marina's uncle. Prince Andrew, cousin of Britain's George V, spoke for the royalties. Indignant over Venizelos' refusal to heed the monarchist sentiment shown in the last Greek elections. Prince Andrew said: "Venizelos has never recognized the sanctity of the ballot nor has he even considered the voice of the people, except when the majority of the votes went in his favor."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.