Greek Elder Statesmen Issue Appeal
To Save Their Nation
Feb. 18—On Feb. 15, a young woman, the mother of a disabled child, stood on the ledge of a building in Athens, intending to jump to her death. Two weeks before, the perfidious "Troika"—the European Commission, European Central Bank, and the IMF—demanded that 150,000 public sector workers be fired, in addition to those thousands who have already lost their jobs. That same week, two of those fired workers killed themselves. Since 2009, when Greece's neck came under the boot of the financial empire, suicides have risen by 22%.
But tens of thousands more Greeks have taken to the streets in protests against the crushing austerity measures, in the face of intolerable conditions imposed by the bankers.
The new Memorandum of Understanding imposed on Greece by the European Financial Stability Facility on Feb. 8, and passed by the Greek Parliament, if carried out, ensures that the nation will, in short order, be fully devoured by the insatiable hunger of the collapsing imperial financial order headquartered in London. Under its terms, an additional EU3.3 billion in cuts, over and above those made before, will be imposed. The new Memorandum specifies which civil service jobs are to be eliminated, and how the privatization of almost all public assets should be carried out; it calls for cuts in private sector wages, including the minimum wage, the elimination of collective bargaining rights of unions, and much more. The dictatorship of the financial bloodsuckers, if allowed to continue, will spell the end of the Greek nation.
Is it any wonder then, that the tyranny of the Troika is being compared to the Nazi occupation of Greece in World War II?
Now, two highly respected elder statesmen and war heroes, the world-famous composer, 87-year-old Mikis Theodorakis, and the writer-politician Manolis Glezos, who turns 90 in September, have come forward to rally their compatriots, once again, as they did in the Resistance against the Nazis, to defend the nation, against the "Empire of Money." When, at a mass demonstration Feb. 13 outside the parliament in Athens, the two Resistance fighters were tear-gassed by police, Theodorakis challenged, "I am going inside to look into the eyes of those who are preparing to sign the death of Greece."
This new Empire, writes Glezos,
"now requires a fast, violent, brutal transformation of a Eurozone country, Greece, into a country of the third world, with a so-called program of 'rescue,' in fact, the 'rescue' of banks who lent to the country."
While German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble issued derogatory statements, referring to Greece as a "bottomless pit," in fact, of the EU130 billion "bailout" which is the "reward" for Greece's submission to the Troika, EU93.7 billion, or roughly 70%, goes directly to the bondholder banks.
Under the Nazi occupation, 1941-44, Theodorakis points out, 1 million Greeks perished, murdered or starved to death. "When the SS and hunger killed one million citizens, and the Wehrmacht was systematically destroying the country, and stealing all its agricultural production and the gold from the banks, Greeks saved the people from hunger by creating the National Solidarity Movement and a partisan army of 100,000, which tied down 20 German divisions in our country.
"...Greece chose the path of self-sacrifice for the sake of freedom and simultaneously of survival."
"Now," he added: "we are doing exactly the same thing, with the certainty that the Greek people will be the ultimate victors."
Here, then, are substantial excerpts from the statements by Theodorakis and Glezos.
