GREEK INTERNAL SECURITY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85T00353R000100300009-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 8, 2002
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: July 16, 1976
• Content Type: MF

Approved For Release 200
16 July 1976
MEMORANDUM FOR: Energy Research and Development
Administration
SUBJECT Greek Internal Security
1. Prime Minister Caramanlis has given Greece nearly
two years of strong, effective government since he returned
to power in the aftermath of the military junta's misadventure
on Cyprus in July 1974. He has largely rehabilitated Greece's.
international image--in particular strengthening Greek, ties
to Western Europe, made some progress in reviving the country's.
economy, shored up its defenses and tried generally to heal
the wounds of the junta period. At the same time, however,
Caramanlis' efforts to institutionalize democratic rule are
meeting increasing resistence, and there are signs that the
partisanship that frustrated earlier attempts
to give Greece stable government is again beginning to emerge.
2. Caramanlis recognizes that the military--deeply
imbued with the junta mentality--remains a long-term threat
to democratic government and has sought to maintain the con-
fidence of the officer corps. He has worked to tone down
vindictive efforts by the left to punish all officers involved
with the junta and has effectively utilized Defense Minister
Averoff--?a longtime favorite with the military--to assure
individual officers that their careers are safe. In general
his policies have worked, althoughthere has been a contin-
uing undercurrent of concern among-the officers over the prime
minister's willingness to allow the extreme left to operate
as a legitimate political force. Some junta diehards and
monarchists continue to plot . against the government, but they
are reportedly leaderless and disorganized.
CI M 76-10138
No. 0179-76
25X1
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3. In recent months growing anti-government and anti-US
agitation by the extreme left has convinced Caramanlis that
the left represents a more immediate threat to internal security
and political stability than does the right. Radical socialist
leader Andreas Papandreou is constantly seeking ways to
embarrass Caramanlis and register his strong opposition to
the US military presence in Greece. Several of his followers
were caught earlier this year trying to smuggle arms into
Greece for use in protests against the US bases there. In
May Papandreou partisans and members of the Moscow-backed
Communist Party of the Exterior--one'of three communist
factions in Greece--protested a new labor law and prevented
the landing of liberty parties from the US Sixth Fleet. The
,small, militant Revolutionary Communist Party had on several
earlier occasions demonstrated its abilities as a disruptive
force.
4. Concerned that the growing leftist agitation might
eventually prompt another move by the military, Cararnanlis
in May abandoned his previous attempts to follow a middle-
of-the-road course and lashed out at Papandreou and the
Moscow-backed Communists by name for their roles in the dis-
turbances. He declared that the principal danger to democracy
in Greece now lay on the left. The security services- dominated
by a conservative political mentality and chafing under the
restraints Caramanlis had imposed in an effort to give the
left a legitimate political voice--were ready to take action.
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