An anonymous Greek's soldier story PART II

[Manolis]

...continued from PART I...

It was 7:00 Sunday morning, when 2 military officers knocked my door and woke me up. I was still dizzy when I saw 2 really serious faces notifying me that I was about to be recruited to the Greek infrantry. It was a law which was issued right after the establish of the Communism in Greece. Two years of communism in the country and I was one of the first to be recruited. What a "luck"! Before the arise of communism in Greece, the army was being consisted only by volunteers and merceneries.

The reason was really simple. Russia invaded at 6 am and the cities Herakleia and Delphi which were near to the Greek-Russian borders where in danger of occupation. The II Infanrty division which was stationed in Thermopylae departed asap for Delphi and the city needed troops to cover their absense and of course to hold the city if the worse case scenario was a fact, the fall of Delphi and Herakleia. Thermopylae in that case would be next. So the Greek's Army General Stuff (GAGS) issued the order of immidiate recruitment in Thermopylae.

The problem was that the bigger part of the Greek Army was concetrated in the north borderline with Japan, as that nation was a continuous threat. Through the years, Japan was threating Greece's idependence, claiming territories and demanding gold and knowledge. Not to mention small aggressions in the borderline. The GAGS, though, in spite of they knew the fact that Russia had a luck of resources and a bad economy, didn't predict that the Russiand would one day "look" towards Greece's rich resources which they would gladly have in their hands. Through diplomacy they didn't achieve a lot, I think a mistake of the Greek government of not helping a bit the Russian nation, as they were trying to have as much strategic resources as they could and gold of course to support a defense towards the Japanese threat.

...to be continued...