The neighbouring communist countries tried to
use the Greek civil war in order to promote their territorial claims against
Greece. The plan was made by Comintern back to 1923 when defeated
Bulgaria had a strong Communist
party, led by Georgi Dimitrov who was also Comintern’s general secretary.
Comintern adopted Bulgaria's views
on the Macedonian Question, in an attempt to help the Bulgarian Communist party
expand its influence. In 1922-25, Comintern and the federation of Balkan
Communist parties announced a plan for the creation of a Bulgarian-dominated
independent state in Macedonia and Thrace, formed by lands taken from
Greece, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. The
decision was reluctantly approved by the Greek and Yugoslav Communist parties.
For the Greek Communist Party (KKE), this development was accompanied by a wave
of resignations and a drop in the polls, especially in Greek-Macedonia. KKE was
the only political party in Greece that recognized a
Slavo-Macedonian national identity but as far as KKE remained a small,
well-disciplined and active, party it was able to
impose its policy on its members, without any concern for the views of the rest
of society. The fact is that in order to find more followers the Greek Communist
Party in its Sixth Congress (December 1935), adopted a new policy supporting
equality for all national minorities in Greece, including the
Slavo-Macedonian.
In the Yugoslavian part of Macedonia the
citizens who most of them were feeling Bulgarians the communist party did not
faced similar problems. During the Second World War the Yugoslavian part of
Macedonia was occupied by
Bulgaria and most of the local
communists were incorporated in the Bulgarian communist
party.
The occupation of Greece by the axis forces (German, Italian and
Bulgarian) and the national cleansing policies of the Bulgarians in
Thrace and Eastern Macedonia against Greeks forced KKE to appear with
less anti-patriotic views. While maintaining its commitment to social
revolution, it also tried to attract a large number of non-communist patriots.
They also urged the Slavo-Macedonians to join the Greeks in a common struggle
with the Bulgarians and Serbians against the fascists and help
USSR, as well as for their own
national and social liberation. Some Slavo-Macedonians responded but many
preferred to respond to the calls of the Italian, and
mostly Bulgarian occupation authorities and of Vanco Mihailov's Internal
Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO), who provided food and promised
them liberation from Greek rule in the form of a union with Bulgaria. The Bulgarians succeeded in
arming many paramilitary bands, (called komitatzides) to fight on their side.
After the battle of Stalingrad when the axis
defeat was obvious these bands started to change side towards Tito in order to
be on the winner’s side.
The Yugoslavian communist leader Tito, in order
to expand its influence decided to create a pro-Yugoslavian communist party in
the area. So he created a new communist party in the area creating also and a
new ethnic group, the “Macedonians”. Tito’s plan was to revive the old Comintern
plan slightly altered with a Macedonia under his control. So he
helped to the creation (in Greece) of Slavo-Macedonian partisan
groups in order to appear that the few Greek citizens, who had pro Bulgarian
feelings, were fighting as an autonomous partisan organization against the
Nazis. So was created the National Liberation Front (Naroden Osloboditelen
Front, or NOF), which sought the role of an autonomous ally and partner, of the
Communist Party of Greece (KKE). They were natural allies. They shared a common
ideology, they both rejected the status quo and wanted to replace it with a
communist regime, and, they seemed to agree that this aim could be attained only
through force of arms.
For KKE, the struggle was primarily ideological
and its aim was the seizure of power in Greece. For NOF it was primarily for
the national liberation of the Slavo-Macedonians in Greek Macedonia and also a
communist revolution. KKE almost never opposed the Slavo-Macedonian claims. On
the contrary in many cases helped the Slavo-Macedonian death squads to kill
Greek citizens who would oppose Tito’s plan for a non-Greek Macedonia. The
Slavo-Macedonians knew that their claims against Greece could only be achieved after a victory of
the KKE, the only party in Greece that had recognized their
existence and national identity.
After liberation when the third round of the
civil war in Greece broke
out, KKE could not win without direct support from their communist neighbours to
the north, Yugoslavia, or
Bulgaria. Since Stalin was reluctant
to directly oppose the western allies helping KKE large scale help from
Bulgaria was inevitable.
Aid from Yugoslavia, would hardly be forthcoming unless
the Greek Communist Party would submit to Tito’s claims against
Greece. It was easy for KKE to do so
since it had already accepted similar claims against Greek Macedonia in 1924,
when in the Third Extraordinary Congress of KKE, (November 26 to December 3),
endorsed the Comintern line for a united Macedonian state (under Bulgarian
dominion) in a future Balkan communist federation. This position was in basic
accord with the demands of Slavo-Macedonian activists but it was extremely
unpopular among Greeks. But many KKE supporters in a typical communist attitude
considered as primary enemy the political one.
When Tito came collided with Stalin and in
order to find support from the West stopped supporting the Greek communist
partisans, KKE accepted again the old Comintern plan for a united
Macedonia under Bulgarian
dominion.