Occupation Forces and Ultimatums. It’s not just a history chapter. Every year, since 2010, we experience the same thing: ultimatums by the country’s lenders. Every time, when the country should receive the ‘rescue bailout tranche’: ultimatums. Say YES or there is no money. Modern times ‘axis’ forces: so-called “Task EU Forces” with Reichenbachs and Fuchtels, and Troikans like Thomsens & Co.
Every three months a “celebration”: We go bankrupt and we’re saved by our lenders. But we go bankrupt anew. Again and again. And dive deeper into political, economic and moral decay.
28. October 1940 Greeks said NO to Axis Forces.
28. October 2012 some Greeks say YES to international lenders.
Since the country signed the agreement of surrender. Without any form of resistance. National OXI-Day is more actual than ever. Every year, since Greece sought international ‘rescue’ by the IMF…
OXI-Day (also spelled Ochi Day, Greek: Επέτειος του «’Οχι» Epeteios tou “‘Ohi”, Anniversary of the “No”) is celebrated on October 28 each year, to commemorate the rejection by Greek dictator Ioannis Metaxas (in power from August 4, 1936, until January 29, 1941) of the ultimatum made by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini on October 28, 1940.
This ultimatum, which was presented to Metaxas by the Italian ambassador in Greece, Emanuele Grazzi, on October 28, 1940, at dawn (04:00 am), after a party in the German embassy in Athens, demanded that Greece allow Axis forces to enter Greek territory and occupy certain unspecified “strategic locations” or otherwise face war. It was allegedly answered with a single laconic word: όχι (No!) However, his actual reply was, Alors, c’est la guerre (Then it is war).
In response to Metaxas’s refusal, Italian troops stationed in Albania, then an Italian protectorate, attacked the Greek border at 05:30 am—the beginning of Greece’s participation in World War II (see Greco-Italian War and the Battle of Greece).
On the morning of October 28 the Greek population took to the streets, irrespective of political affiliation, shouting ‘ochi’. From 1942, it was celebrated as Ohi Day.
One of the greatest inspiration songs of the War “Sons of Greece”
Singer Sofia Vembo was the “national voice of Greece” during the WWII, as she inspired with her patriotic songs the Greek soldiers during the Greco-Italian War and also later during the Nazi occupation.
Her reputation skyrocketed after the Italian attack on Greece on 28 October 1940, when her performance of patriotic and satirical songs became a major inspiration for the fighting soldiers. At the same time, she offered 2,000 gold pounds from her own fortune to the Hellenic Navy. Following the German invasion and occupation of the country in April 1941, she was transported to the Middle East, where she continued to perform for the Greek troops in exile.
PS German occupation in 1940 and 2012: A coincidence of bad taste…