A Historic Perspective of the Macedonian Question and the EU’s Alienation from the Problem

Short title: “The Macedonian Question”

Abstract

 The objective of
this work is to provide some information and a scientifically true analysis on
the 8,000 years of Hellenic (Greek) history and to examine what this
information means to us and to the world as a whole. We will offer some
thoughts and unshaken historic events that may help to answer questions
concerning today’s conditions in south-eastern Europe,
the borders of the old ‘Christendom’ [currently, European Union (EU)]. It is
imperative that all scholars, politicians, decision makers, students, and
intellectual human beings have this information regarding the artificial state,
Skopje, created recently between Greece and Serbia; because we are responsible
for all young people of this planet and they must know the plain truth in
simple words, away from any expediency, propaganda, and anti-scientific
delusion. This new state has unlawfully chosen the Greek name ‘Macedonia’ for its nation and Greece is
objecting their aggressiveness, their robbery, and their expansiveness. It is
historically wrong for them to use Greek names and symbols because they have
nothing in common with Greeks and their old name is Vardarska.

I. Prologue

            Hellenic history
and culture have contributed a great deal to the European and the entire
western civilization that we find their seal everywhere, today. The democracy
of ancient Greece,[1]
the accomplishments of her people,[2]
the great ideas of her moral philosophers,[3]
scientists and artists,[4]
and finally, the dramatic events, which have unfolded in the glorious history
of the Greek nation because of its geographical position (connecting three
continents, Europe, Asia, and Africa) and its persistence in Christian truth
have always been a source of creative inspiration to all nations.[5]
Greece
has truly improved mankind.

The ancient Hellenic civilization is
called the ‘classical’ one; later the word ‘classical’ became the source of
standards by which subsequent achievements can be measured.[6]
‘There is a quality of excellence about Ancient Greece that brooks few
comparisons.’[7]
These peoples (Greeks) shared the same language (in an oral and written
literature) and they recognized a common heritage ‘Hellenes’, which they did
not share with other men. They belonged, as they felt, to ‘Hellas’.
The non-Greeks were ‘barbarians’. The achievement and importance of Greece
comprehended all sides of life. ‘The Greeks did more for future civilization
than any of their predecessors.’[8]  All Europe drew interest on the ‘capital’ Greece laid down, and through Europe
the rest of the world has benefited from what Greeks offered to human
civilization. Alexander, the son of Philip, is one of those historical Greek
figures called ‘Great’. He was a passionate Hellene,[9]
who believed Achilles[10]
was his ancestor and carried with him on his campaigns a treasured copy of
Homer. He had been tutored by Aristotle. Alexander the Great had a staggering
record of success, even though that he died at the age of thirty-three years
old. The history of Europe is the history of
the Western civilization (a Greek-Christian civilization).[11]
Indisputable, Roman civilization was descended from the earliest Greek
(Hellenic) civilization.[12]
Today, the European Union has changed drastically because of so many
influences by different sub-cultures. ‘European, or Western, civilization originated
from the fusion of German (barbarian) culture and Roman (Hellenic-Christian)
civilization during the Dark Ages from the 5^th to the 10^th
century A.D.’[13]
Of course, history repeats itself. There were even monetary and economic unions
in Ancient Greece, i.e., ‘the Common of Euboeans’, in 2^nd century
B.C.,[14]
where they issued a common currency, but they did not last for very long time
because of the oppression by Athens on their smaller member-states.[15]

            History, scientific
truth, divine justice, morality, and human respect are social necessities and
they require satisfaction. Each man enjoys existence according to his labor and
by himself he determines his future, his heritage, his nation and thus, affects
the world. Moral, ethical, and uncorrupted leadership is necessary to promote
patriotism and indigenous value system of a sovereign nation. Today, the
Hellenes (Greeks), even though that they are members of NATO and European Union
(EU), remain ever-vigilant against the expansionistic plans of their neighbors
and especially now, since the fall of the communism, Skopjeans have begun to
make claims against northern Greece.
They have spread far and wide propaganda that Macedonians are not Greeks and
they style themselves as the true Macedonians (sic). They have spread lies and
disinformation everywhere in the United States,
Canada, Australia, and Europe.
But the question remains, how can they be Macedonians without being Greeks?
And, how dared some nations to turn a blind eye to the historic and scientific
truth and recognize this pseudo-state as ‘Macedonia’?

II. A Concise Historical
Journey of Hellas

            Archeological
evidence suggests that the Hellenic peninsula, the island
of Crete, and the Aegean Cycladic
Islands had been
inhabited as far back as 6000 B.C. During the Bronze Age (3000-2800 B.C.) these
inhabitants developed great cities, powerful navies and rich commerce,
resulting in two great civilizations, the Cycladic-Minoan (2500-1400 B.C.) that
we can see in Thera (Santorini), Knossos, and Phestos, and the Mycenaean
(1600-1100 B.C.) found in Peloponnesos. The Iliad, the Homeric epic, written in
approximately the 9^th century B.C. illustrates this point through
the story of the famed Trojan expedition of the Mycenaeans and many other
famous Greek city-states led by the glorious king Agamemnon. Therefore, Greeks
are in Asia Minor since 11^th
century B.C.[16]  

            The Dorian
migration to the Greek mainland about 1100 to 900 B.C., marked the beginning of
the Geometric Period (900-700 B.C.), which is the first period of recorded
history. During the Geometric Period the various tribes developed a common
alphabet (that Greece
uses up to now)[17]
and religious system (the twelve Olympian gods),[18]
and a uniform, though separate (city-state), form of government. Also, cultural
unity was further enhanced by the establishment of the Olympic Games in 776
B.C., an athletic event involving all of the Greek city-states in peaceful
competition[19]
and social unity. Pan-Hellenic sanctuaries were also constructed.[20]
It should be noted that such unity included the cultural and commercial
development in the various colonies established by some of the city-states of
the mainland Greece
–spreading from the Black Sea and Asia Minor to Italy,
Sicily and expanding to the coastal areas of France and Spain.

            The Archaic Period
(800-550 B.C.) was a time, in which cultural integration progressed, though
tribes continued to divide politically into the two most powerful and rival
city-states, Athens and Sparta. Sparta
developed a semi-totalitarian society with a rigid military code based on
territorial conquest; while Athens,
a more loosely ordered and democratic society encouraged cooperation between
city-states and cultivation of the intellect and the fine arts. The two rivals
united for a time against a common foreign enemy, during the Persian wars,
which lasted from the battle of Marathon in 490 B.C. to the battle of
Thermopylae (480 B.C.) to the naval battle of Salamis (479 B.C.), and the
battle of Plataea in 479 B.C.[21] 

            The Classical
Period (480-323 B.C.) marked the height of Greek cultural development. As the
leader of the Delian Confederacy, an alliance among the main Greek city-states,
Athens
flourished both economically and culturally. The wealth that they accumulated
from shipping, trading, and tribute from allies enabled the Athenians to
beautify their city with buildings, temples, theaters, and other magnificent
monuments. Under their leader Pericles, architects designed and constructed
buildings on the Acropolis, in the Agora and the surrounding area. In the
cultural sphere, philosophers, poets, historians, orators, and artists produced
some of the greatest works of art and literature. The playwrights Aeschylus,
Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes; the architects Ictinus and Callicrates;
the sculptors Pheidias, Scopas, and Praxiteles; the historian Herodotus,
Thucydides, and Xenophon; the orator Demosthenes; the philosophers Socrates,
Plato, and Aristotle all lived during this time. The Golden Age of Athens.[22] 

            While Athens and Sparta struggled
for military supremacy, a new, more powerful political force began to emerge in
Macedonia (the Northern part
of Greece).
In the four decades before the Hellenistic Period (323-146 B.C.), the
Macedonians under King Philip II (359 B.C.) forcefully united most of the Greek
city-states after defeating Athens and Thebes in battle at Chaeronea,
and built a powerful Hellenic confederacy.[23]
The illustrious Alexander the Great, the son of King Philip, schooled by
Aristotle, embarked on a historic expedition in 336 B.C. to conquer the vast
empire of the Persians (punish them for their past invasions of Greece). In
only eleven years he subdued this mighty foe and extended Hellenic influence
far into Africa and Asia, as far as India.[24]
Alexander’s achievement marked the height of Hellenic military power.[25]

            Following
Alexander’s death (323 B.C.), violent and frequent warfare among rival Greek
leagues tore apart the Empire. These conflicts rendered the Greek city-states
vulnerable to invasion. Finally, in 146 B.C., after fifty years of war, Roman
legions conquered Greece.
Although conquered, the Greek culture ‘subjugated’ the Roman culture. During
and after the Hellenistic Period, the classical Greek culture and Greek
language were dominant throughout the Orient.[26]
In A.D. 50, Apostle Paul preached Christianity in Greece, and from the time when he
spoke to the Athenians about their ‘Unknown God’, for whom they already had a
temple, a common religion, the Hellenic Orthodoxy united them and made them an
inseparable group, the Greek-Orthodox people.[27]  Also, the use of the Greek language in
writing the Gospel and by the Eastern Church and her fathers gave a new
dimension to Hellenic culture and created the spiritual Medieval Hellenic
(Byzantine) culture.

            The
Christianization of the Roman Empire in 313 A.D. and the building of
Constantinople (325 A.D.) by Saint Constantine the Great launched Greece along a
different historical and cultural path. The relocation of the capital from Rome to the site of ancient Byzantium contributed to the preeminence of
Greek culture as a source of political power, and in the end the impact of
Hellenism proved irresistible. For the next eleven centuries, until the fall of
Constantinople on Tuesday, 29 May 1453, the Greek language and culture refashioned
by Orthodox Christianity, formed the sinews of the Byzantine
Empire, the Medieval Hellenic Empire.

            During those eleven
centuries of the Byzantine Period (324-1453 A.D.), Byzantine and Greek history
were virtually inseparable. All Greeks had abandoned paganism and adopted
Christianity. This led to a magnificent flowering of Byzantine spiritual
culture, hymnography, architecture, literature, art, mostly in the form of
monastic frescoes and new religious iconography. The fall of Constantinople to
the Ottomans propelled Greece
into her darkest period. Muslim Turks, who came from the Far East Asia and had
nothing in common with the Hellenic-Orthodox values, ruled Greece with a cruel and ruthless
hand throughout much of the Middle Ages. Even though, Greeks kept an
inextinguishable awareness of their glorious past and ethnicity and their true
faith through the Orthodox Church, monasteries, and the memories passed on from
generation to generation.

            Uprising against
the Turk conquerors occurred sporadically throughout the Middle Ages, but it
was not until the early nineteenth century that the modern Greek Sate evolved
(confined by her allies only on the European side of the Byzantine Empire),
commensurate with the decline of the Ottoman Empire. On 25 March 1821, Greeks
resumed their march through history again. A revolutionary army composed of
patriots from Peloponnesos, Sterea Ellada, and the Aegean Islands
began to battle the Turkish armies. Although both sides scored success, the
conflict soon reached a stalemate. At the request of the Sultan, the Egyptians
under Ibrahim Pasha invaded Greece,
thus allowing for intervention by the three great European powers –France, England,
and Russia-
on the side of the Greek insurgents.  

            In the nineteenth
century and the early part of the twentieth, the Greek government tried to
extend her sovereignty over all adjacent lands inhabited by Greeks for many
centuries (since the 10^th century B.C. and earlier, according to
historic evidences). Greece
was euphoric over the success of her armies in the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913
and in World War I. In spite of frustrating oppositions between King
Constantine and Prime Minister Venizelos, part of Greece had at least been
freed and was able to join the ‘entente’ and contribute to the allies’ final
victory, thus assuring the country’s good will, which future plans would
require. After all these war successes, came and the just ultimate objective of
the country, the ‘Great Idea’.[28]
Venizelos lobbied hard at the 1918 Paris peace
conference, urgently presenting his views for an expanded Greece not to include all the territories that
Medieval Greece had in the 15^th century, but to include only the
large Greek Communities in Asia Minor (today occupied, Western
Turkey). Most important was the real need to protect the Greek
population in that part of Asia Minor, which
was subjected to harsh treatment by the Turks during World War I.

            On 15 May 1919, the
Greek army landed on Asia Minor with the
objective to liberate this Greek land. The casualties on both sides were
enormous, after three years of hostilities. At the end, the enemy counter
attacked, and the Greeks fell back to where they started from, at Eski Shehir.
They were at a stalemate and low on military hardware and even in food
supplies, and their country was in difficult financial straits. A year later,
having gathered strength and aided by a supply of arms from Russia, Kemal
Pasha began his final offensive at the end of August 1922. Overwhelmed, the
Greeks retreated nearly 120 miles and tried to hold their lines. When that
failed, the retreat became a rout. The armed forces were evacuated from Chesme,
near Smyrna,
8-14 September 1922 and the massive Greek population tried to flee in panic
before the avenging Turks. It is estimated that as many as 30,000 civilians
lost their lives, and more than a million refugees fled to Greece as the
Greek, Armenian, and European quarters were burned to the ground in a huge
fire. These refugees joined half a million or so Greeks who had fled earlier.
The large Greek presence in the area had lasted nearly three millennia, but it
was now substantially at the end. The ‘Great Idea’ was another one of the
victims, at least for one more century. Under the terms of the new treaty of Lausanne, signed in June 1923, Turkey
kept Eastern Thrace, Constantinople, Bosporus (today’s European Turkey) and the
strategic Greek populated islands of Imvros and Tenedos that had been given to Greece under
the Treaty of Serves. Greece’s
borders with Turkey were
(unfairly for Greece)
confirmed. Most importantly, the treaty provided for the massive population
exchange that became necessary. Unfortunately, the Greek genocide by Turks
continued in Constantinople (1955) and in Cyprus (1974).[29]

            In 1939, World War
II broke out in Europe and by 1940 most countries of Europe
had surrendered and Hitler had the Continent of Europe in his grip. On 28
October 1940 Mussolini decided to take over Greece with an easy victory based
on his numbers and mechanized forces. He attacked Greece
from Albania.
The Greeks with their Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas stood up and said ‘Ochi’
(OXI = No, you shall not pass) and these heroic forefathers of today’s Greeks
fought with a will, hurling back the aggressors. The Duce’s divisions were soon
pushed back into Albania
and for six months were fighting to maintain a hold on the sea-cost,
desperately calling for help. When Germany
entered the war against Greece
with the most powerful army in Europe, the
Greeks continued to fight both of these great empires although reason must have
told them that their position was hopeless. Beside their British comrades, they
continued to resist stubbornly on the Island of Crete.

            Finally, Greece fell, but it cost Hitler thousands of his
finest youth, and delayed for two months his attack against Russia. German
troops ran into the dreadful Russian winter and the Russians imposed such
appalling losses that it contributed to the ultimate defeat of Germany.[30]
The occupation, great famine, resistance and subsequent liberation of Greece followed,
and then came the ‘December Movement’, in which Greek communists fought their
brother Greeks. This civil war (kommounistosymmoritopolemos) ended in 29 August
1949 with the defeat of communists. England
helped Greece first and
later, the United States
helped with the Marshall plan, which lent Greece to a new
era and made her one of the most important allies of the West.

III. Historic Perspectives of the Macedonian Problem

During communist rule in Yugoslavia,
southern Yugoslavia
usurped an ancient Greek name and rewrote history to suit their political
agenda. They are now promoting nationalist fervor that could unsettle Greece, Albania,
and Bulgaria.
At issue is the uneasy land
of Macedonia, a
geographic rather than political zone that has not been a stable nation-state
since the death of Alexander the Great. In the latest cycle of shifting
borders, at the end of World War II, the region was carved up among Bulgaria, Greece,
and Yugoslavia.

After the war, the new Yugoslavia regime chose to adopt
the name of ‘Socialist Republic of Macedonia’ for the southern region of the
country. On this point there have been no real arguments as this was
essentially an internal administrative arrangement decided upon by a sovereign
country, but it proved to be wrong from Greece’s side. After all, the same
name ‘Macedonia’ is also in
use in Northern Greece and defines the
northern geographical and administrative districts of the country since the
first millennium B.C. Seventeen centuries before the appearance of Slavs in
this region.

With the emergence, after World War II, of communist
federal Yugoslavia,
which proclaimed the existence of, and gave official recognition to a
‘Macedonian’ nation, the issue assumed an entirely new form. Before the War,
the Balkan communist parties had decided, under Comintern[31]
instructions, to fight for the establishment of a unified Macedonia and Thrace within the framework of a
Communist Balkan Federation. However, the terms ‘Macedonians’ and ‘Thracians’,
widely used at the time, did not define specific ethnic groups, but covered
populations of mainly Bulgarian stock, who inhabited Macedonia and Thrace. A
leading part in this movement was played by the Communist Party of Bulgaria
under Dimitrov, while the communist parties of Greece
and Yugoslavia
were obliged to toe the Bulgarian line. In 1935, however, the Soviet need to
foment popular fronts in Europe in order to confront fascism, led to the
substitution of the unpopular goal of a unified and independent Macedonia and Thrace
by the slogan ‘Equality of treatment of the Slav-Macedonians within the
framework of the Greek
State’.

In 1924, the Greek Communist Party (KKE) adopted the
Comintern policy for a unified Macedonia
and Thrace, but in 1935 it
called for ‘equality of treatment’ for Slav-Macedonians within the borders of Greece. During
the Nazi occupation it implemented its policy in the areas under its control by
establishing Slav-Macedonian schools, printing Slav-Macedonian publications and
endorsed the establishment of a Slav-Macedonian communist organization known by
its acronym as SNOF (Slav-Macedonian National Liberation Front). There is,
however, no evidence that during this period the KKE committed itself by
signing agreements, which envisaged the creation of a separate ‘Macedonian State’.

During World War II, in Yugoslav Macedonia, the
communist party of Yugoslavia
had a very difficult time trying to win over the local communists who had
joined the communist party of Bulgaria
during 1941-1942 when most of Macedonia
was under Bulgarian rule. By 1942, Tito’s partisans had taken control of the
situation. The solution adopted at a conference (1943), anticipated a federal
structure for post-war Yugoslavia
with ‘Macedonia’
figuring prominently as one of its six federated republics.[32]
At the same time by official decree a ‘Macedonian nation’ was sanctioned,
emerging as one more, the latest, Slavic nationality in the area.

Further, during the time when Yugoslavia
actively promoted the Macedonian issue (1945-1948), Bulgaria
confined its claims against Greece
to the area of Western Thrace (Paris Peace
Conference 1946-1947). In this policy, Bulgaria
had the support of both the Soviet Union and of Yugoslavia. Following Tito’s
excommunication by Stalin in 1948, Bulgaria decided the time had come
for her to take a lead on the Macedonian issue as well. As already mentioned,
she lost no time in launching a campaign for the establishment of a unified Macedonia
within the framework of a Balkan Federation. This implied that Bulgaria was
indirectly laying a claim to Greek Macedonia as well. Thus, in the 1950’s, when
Bulgaria started
internationally promoting the view that the inhabitants of Yugoslav Macedonia
were really Bulgarians, she included in this category the few remaining
Slavophone citizens of Greece.
In the early 1960s, this policy was somewhat softened. Sofia confined itself to sporadic reference
to a ‘Bulgarian speaking’ population living in border regions of Greek
Macedonia.

Furthermore, in July 1947, Marshal Tito and the
Bulgarian communist leader Georgi Dimitrov met in Bled and agreed to work
towards the establishment of a federation. As a result the Bulgarian
authorities appointed teachers from Skopje
to instruct children in the ‘Macedonian’ language, encouraged the publication
of ‘Macedonian’ newspapers, accepted the emergence of a ‘Macedonian’ theater
and other such cultural activities (sic). It was obvious that Dimitrov went out
of his way to make substantial concessions on the Macedonian issue in return
for a firm promise by Tito that Bulgaria
would acquire the Bulgarian region to be ceded and that Yugoslavia would support –as she did at the
Paris Peace Conference- the annexation by Bulgaria of Greek Western Thrace. 

During the Nazi occupation, the Yugoslav partisans had
tried hard to convince the Greek Communist leadership to accept the idea for
the cession of Greek Macedonia to a unified Macedonia
state within Yugoslavia.
Undeterred by their failure to achieve this, they continued to promote the
motion of a unified Macedonia
throughout the period 1945-1948. The Bulgarian leader, Georgi Dimitrov agreed
to the scheme in Bled (1947) as already mentioned. It was also concluded that
in the not too distant future Greek Macedonia –as a whole or in part- would be
incorporated in the unified Macedonian
State.

In July 1948, Yugoslavia became an outcast of the
international communist movement. In the aftermath of his rift with the
Cominform, Bulgaria
sided immediately with Stalin. With regard to Macedonia, however, the reversal of
Bulgarian policy was somewhat more gradual while Dimitrov was alive. To start
with, the teachers from Skopje
were sent packing and the ‘Macedonian’ schools and newspapers were closed. But
the concept of a unified Macedonia
was not officially denounced. The difference was that now the ‘undivided Macedonia’
became a slogan firmly integrated in the wider plan for a Balkan Communist
Federation promoted by the Cominform in its anti-Yugoslav campaign. The
implication was that this unified Macedonian
Republic –which was endorsed also by the
Greek Communist Party (KKE)[33]-
would be controlled by Sofia and Moscow.

After their defeat of 1949, the leadership of the KKE in
exile continued to distinguish the Slav-Macedonians from the Greeks among the
ranks of the refuges who had fled to the Communist countries of Eastern Europe,
after all these atrocities that they committed for five years to Greece and her
citizens. During the early years of its life in exile, the Party maintained
separate Slav-Macedonian schools and until 1974 the last page of the party’s
newspapers was printed in Slav-Macedonian. It was not until the great bulk of
Slav-Macedonians finally migrated to Yugoslavia that the Greek Communist
party got rid of this rather unpleasant problem.

In the wake of the establishment of friendly
Greco-Yugoslav relations in 1951, Belgrade
ceased to promote the unity of Macedonia
as a political objective. The societies founded in Skopje by ‘Aegean Macedonians’ were disbanded
and their newspaper was closed down. Yugoslavia
confined itself to merely demanding that the ‘Macedonians’ living in Greece be
granted minority rights. This demand, despite the departure of Slav-Macedonians
in 1949, was never forsaken by Belgrade even
during the halcyon days of the Tripartite Balkan Pact (1954) between Athens, Belgrade, and Ankara. The conclusion is
that after the turbulence of the decade 1940-1950, the three sections of Macedonia
devoted themselves in the healing of their wounds and pursuing with peaceful
inquiries such as political, economic, and social evolution of the countries to
which they belonged.

It saw only in 1955, after Khrushchev’s visit to Belgrade, that a major change took place in relations
between the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia.
Polemics ended and Bulgaria
followed suit, stopping the anti-Yugoslav propaganda over Macedonia. But
in 1957, Tito condemned the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956 and the
Bulgarians did not miss the opportunity to accuse Belgrade of trying to turn
the people of the Vardar valley into Serbs while maintaining that these ‘Macedonians’
were really Bulgarians. Such bitter polemics lasted up to 1961, during which
year a new rapprochement took place between Moscow
and Belgrade while the 22^nd Congress
of the Communist Party of the USSR
was being prepared. Khrushchev visited both Belgrade
and Sofia
within the space of a few months. In the wake of these visits Sofia’s policy with regard to the Macedonian
question reverted almost to that of 1955 with one significant exception. The
inhabitants of the Pirin area were never re-baptized as ‘Macedonians’.

Since 1963, all references to Greek Macedonia and its
present inhabitants stopped altogether. In the bilateral negotiations of 1964,
which led to a complete normalization of relations between Greece and Bulgaria and the final settlement
of all issues arising out of the war, the Bulgarian side solemnly declared that
it had no claims on Greek territory. This policy remained unchanged during the
period of the dictatorship (1967-1974). After the restoration of parliamentary
democracy in Greece and on the occasion of meetings between Karamanlis and
Zivkov, the Bulgarian leader made it repeatedly clear in public, that his
country had no claims regarding Greece either on territory or with respect to
minorities. This is particularly the context within which relations with the
new Greek governments are being promoted.

After 1976, Belgrade and Skopje launched a
vociferous campaign against the Bulgarians, accusing them of persecuting
minorities and of coveting Yugoslav territories. By the end of 1977 Bulgaria
discreetly briefed foreign observers on her policies on the issue, always
insisting that she had no territorial claims against any of her neighbors. She
also intimated that such false accusations as were leveled against her by Belgrade would not be
tolerated indefinitely. This campaign reached its climax with President
Zivkov’s speech in Blagoevgrad (July 1978), in which the Bulgarian leader
publicly proposed to Tito that the two countries sign an agreement on the issue
pledging themselves not to raise any territorial claims against each other.
This proposal was rejected by Yugoslavia
while the verbal onslaught against Bulgaria for her treatment of the
‘Macedonian’ minority in Pirin continued unabated. In response to this
attitude, Bulgaria’s
policy stiffened. Instead of merely rejecting Belgrade’s accusations, the Bulgarians
launched a campaign to inform international public opinion on the merits of
their case. Until Tito’s death (May 1980), the dispute continued in the open
with mutual recriminations on every conceivable level (press, politics,
science, history, diplomacy, etc.).

From 1975 on, a significant shift of emphasis became
evident. Not only public criticism against Greece for not recognizing a
‘Macedonian minority’ was on the increase, but once again, a press campaign
went as far as to allege ill treatment of ‘Macedonians’ by the Greek
authorities. Numerous books on the subject were published in Skopje
and in 1978 the Secretary of the Communist Party of Yugoslav Macedonia thought
it proper to openly criticize Greece
to foreign journalists. Party documents of this period, including resolutions
of various congresses, especially in Yugoslav Macedonia, insisted on the need
for the rights of the ‘Macedonian minority’ to be guaranteed in Bulgaria, Greece,
and Albania.
As a result of the strong Greek response by all major political parties, and in
view of the increasingly venomous dispute with Bulgaria
on this subject, the Yugoslav press reduced polemics concerning a nonexistent
minority in Greece.
Occasionally, however, new flare ups occur, which should be mainly attributed
to internal pressures within the Yugoslav federation.

Beside internal political considerations, the policy was
common to Skopje and Belgrade. Yugoslavia’s Macedonian policy aims
at promoting abroad the notion of a separate, distinct and well defined
‘Macedonian’ nation on the cultural level. It is for this reason that Belgrade always insisted
on the participation of representatives from the ‘Socialist Republic of
Macedonia’ when cultural agreements were signed with any country. It was for
this reason that Belgrade was financing chairs
and conferences or seminars on the ‘Macedonian’ language in foreign
universities, publishing a large number of books and trying to organize as many
visits to Skopje
by foreign leaders as it possibly could, so as to promote some kind of ‘de
facto’ recognition of Yugoslav Macedonians as a distinct nation.[34]    

Greek policy on the Macedonia question has been fairly
consistent. Greece has no
territorial claims and makes no demands concerning the fate of any Greek
minority in the Macedonian regions of Yugoslavia
and Bulgaria.[35]
But she does not accept the existence of a ‘Macedonian’ minority on her
territory either, particularly after the mass exodus of Slavs in the inter-war
years and in 1944-1949. As far as the Yugoslav views on the Macedonian question
are concerned, the Greeks cannot recognize the existence of a ‘Macedonian’
nation. They insist on this line for the simple reason, that ‘Macedonian’ is an
ancient Greek name, which in modern times has become a purely geographic term,
in constant use in Greece
as well. Any attempt to appropriate it for defining exclusively a
newly-constructed Slav nationality is bound to meet with strong Greek
objections.[36]
If another name had been adopted, there would be no difficulty in accepting the
emergence of one more Slav ethnic group in Yugoslavia as separate from the
others.

The Macedonian Question in the 1980s was a political
dispute between Yugoslavia
and Bulgaria, in which Greece was only
indirectly involved. The fact that Yugoslavia
tried to involve Greece by
raising the issue of a non-existent minority should be attributed mainly to Belgrade’s tactical
maneuvering and has nothing to do with realities in Greek Macedonia. Yugoslavia’s occasional criticisms of Greece could be
interpreted as an evenly balanced policy towards all occupiers of
‘Macedonians’, be they Bulgarians, Greeks or Albanians. In addition to this,
the need to counteract internal centrifugal trends in a country with so many
nationalities, made it imperative for Belgrade to be seen to cater openly and
publicly to each one’s particular national aspirations. Of course, we saw what
happens after the fall of the communism.[37]
Certainly in so doing, it often gave Greece good cause for offense.
Fully aware of these internal problems and motives, the Greek side refrained,
as best as it could, from aggravating the situation by indulging in public
invective, unless openly provoked.

Unfortunately, EU (where Greece is a member since 1981) does not have a
European foreign policy and a security policy; it is divided into small
powerless member-states and is manipulated; presently by the U.S. and later
might be by some other power. A main example can be the Yugoslavia case, which
has created serious other problems; like, the Kosovo,[38]
the Great Albania, Muslim countries in Balkans, and the famous ‘Macedonia
Question’, with the arrogant Slavs of the South former Yugoslavia, Vardarska,
having expansive prospects towards Greece, the true Macedonia.[39]  This artificial nation is constituted by
800,000 Albanians, 500,000 Bulgarians, 100,000 Serbs, 100,000 Gypsies, 250,000
Greeks, and 300,000 Muslims of various nationalities. How can this mixture call
itself as ‘Macedonians’?[40]
The most amazing was the alliance of Skopje with
the enemies of Greece.
Delegation from Skopje (Vardarska) went to North
Cyprus (pseudo-state
of Turks) to celebrate
with these conquerors of the Greek Cyprus. Unfortunately, supporters of the
enemies of Greece
became their north ‘friends’, the pseudo-‘Macedonians’. This is a Sacrilegious
or Unholy Alliance (anieros summachia) among the enemies of the Hellenic
Orthodox civilization and its only true values and history.[41]
Of course, there will be no future of this fabrication! ‘Europe
was felt, too, to have failed in its handling of the Yugoslav question, which
it saw virtually taken out of its hands by American intervention at the end of
1995, and the deployment of NATO’s forces as peace-keepers in a way
unanticipated by its founders. There were still then, therefore, major
obscurities over the future of European integration.’[42]
Since, for more than half a century, the United States has been pursuing a
grand imperial strategy with the aim of staking out the globe. The U.S.
leaders have shown themselves willing to follow the dream of dominance no
matter how high the risks. Their politics are of global control –from
unilateralism to the dismantling of international agreement to state terrorism-
cohere in a drive for hegemony that ultimately threatens our existence.[43]
EU has been completely alienated from the Macedonian Problem, which
destabilizes its south-eastern borders.

It is well known and provable that, the
name of the province of Skopje (currently and wrongly, FYRM) was ‘Vardarska
or Vardar with capital Skoplye’.[44]
There is nowhere the word ‘Macedonia’. During the German
occupation the name of the region was ‘Banovina Vardarska’. But, Tito, in 15
August 1944, gave to this province the name ‘Makedonija’. Today, the true history
is falsified and delineated.[45]
 If we do not teach the true
history, in a few years no one will know anything about the historical truth.
The new generations will learn only what serves the future plan of this
suspicious global injustice.[46]
Lately, in December 2007, the little state of Skopje started an embargo for the
Greek products because on the boxes it was written ‘FYRM’ and the customs,
there, return them back to Greece by saying that ‘there is no state with this
name, return to sender’.[47]
Also, the U.S. through ‘NATO
pressed Greece to let Macedonia join
the alliance.’[48]
But the problem, here, is that Skopje usurps the
Greek name ‘Macedonia’ and
the Greek history and symbols, which can be used only by Greece for her
north geographical region and not by any other nation. They are, actually,
thieves of Greece
identity. This is a very serious crime and the international community must be
informed and isolate the robbers of history. Of course, Greeks have the right
and the obligation not to allow Skopjeans encroachers to use the Hellenic name Macedonia for
their artificial state. 

Finally, after the dissolution of Yugoslavia nothing is the same in Balkans
anymore, but the so called ‘Macedonian question’ would have died at its birth
if Greece
had hurried to inform international public opinion with the historic scientific
truth. Greece
did not do this from superficiality or because it suited the politics of her
‘allies’ in Balkans or because she was certain that the world could not accept
this falsification of history. This was a major mistake on the part of Greece and as we can see during the last few
years, the Skopje propaganda has transferred its
chair to West Europe, United States,
Canada, Australia, and other countries and it still
continues its criminal tactics against Greece and the science of history.

IV. Epilogue and Historic
Inferences

            The role of
Hellenism is historic and humanistic –and as time passes the vast majority of
people will realize it- because it was able many times in the past to re-orientate
humanity. Hellenism is a global movement of ancient moral philosophy combined
with the revealed truth of Christianity, the Holy Orthodoxy. Its advantage
exists in the adoption of the moderation, the spiritual, the eternal, and the
truthful, and at the same time in the rejection of the exaggeration, the
materialistic, the transitory, and above all the bold lie. How many today
understand this unique culture, which is called the Hellenic Orthodox Culture
(Hellinorthodoxos Paideia)? The race, which possesses this culture, has the
unique ability to reach the highest accomplishments and surpass the pathless
degeneration of the human civilization left behind in every historic period.
The universal ideas of Hellenism constitute an inexhaustible source of alternating
everlasting values. The principles of Hellenism that have changed the
intellectual trends of humanity throughout history, have been born to this
small geographical region, which for three thousand years obstinately resists
the undermining efforts of the ‘civilized’ world and the hordes of barbarians.
One representative of this race is Alexander the Great, the Macedonian Greek
commander of the army who civilized the world and refined and united Hellenism.

            As we have
mentioned above, the name ‘Macedonia’
was given by Tito and was used for this Yugoslav democracy only since 1945, but
it was identified for many centuries with Greek civilization and Greek history.
Their neighboring Greeks are reasonably disturbed when the name of Macedonia
becomes subject to abuse by a region, which ethnologically is not Greek, but
Albanian, Vlach, Serb, Gypsy, Turkish, Slavic, and Bulgarian. It is
characteristic and suspicious that the two first countries recognized this new
government was Bulgaria and Turkey. The
stability of the region would be better served by the denial of recognition or
by saying to these people and the entire world the historic truth. Finally, if
Skopjeans feel that they are Macedonians, let them open their borders and unite
with Greece,
then, they will become Greeks and at the end they will be Macedonians.

            As Professor
Argyrios Varonides has said, ‘If the Skopje regime really seeks recognition and
respect as a democratic state, it needs first to learn how to respect history
and not to adopt old faded political arguments of past and collapsed regimes.
Do they really want to be Macedonians? Then, they are welcomed with open arms
to the Greek culture, which after all has been known, thanks to the
Thessalonian brothers Methodios and Kyrillos. Otherwise, they ridicule
themselves and become irritating.’ Consequently, for someone to become
Macedonian, he has, first, to become Greek because the true Macedonians were,
are, and will be only Greeks (Hellenes of North Greece).

            It is clear when,
objectively examined, that the ‘Macedonian Question’ for Greece cannot
exist and the ‘Macedonian Problem’ is a non-issue.[49]
The legal status quo of the northern borders of Greece are determined with
international treaties, like the Treaty of Bucharest (1913), which ended the
second Balkan War, and the Peace Treaties at the end of the two World Wars, of
Neigy (1919) and of Paris (1947). Also, Macedonia is a geographic concept
and not an ethnic notion. In fact, only one country can identify herself, for
historical reasons, with Macedonia.
That country is Greece,
which has been inextricably linked with Macedonia for more than 4,000
years.

            For these reasons, Greece has opposed the recognition of an
independent nation on her northern border, which will bear the Hellenic name ‘Macedonia’. Of
course, this does not mean that Greece
is against the Skopjeans right to establish their own independent nation and
have their own language, history, and traditions. All people have the right to
self-determination of their future; of course, this choice is confined within
the limits of international law (or legality). Greece, however cannot accept the
use of the Macedonian name by any nation, which is in all other respects
Slavic. The terms ‘Macedonia-Macedonians’ and names of similar relevance belong
to Hellas and Hellenes (Greece
and Greeks). They constitute Greece’s
national and cultural inheritance and as such have been recorded in history for
many centuries before the appearance of Slavs in the area of Balkans and
especially in the area of Macedonia.

            Large sections of
countries that dream the non-existent historically ‘Aegean Macedonia’ were
historically under Greek control and those countries that transgress against Greece today
are ‘inhospitable of the history’. Greeks will never cease, as the Greek race
to claim their lost national lands. It is their national duty to state matters
concerning Greek Macedonia, both inside and outside of Greece, exactly
as they are to restore the historical truth that expediency, and misguided and
calculating interest continue to counterfeit and distort. It is necessary for
the preservation of their unique Greek Orthodox Culture, that every one be in
good conscience and that Greece
permanently ‘guard Thermopylae’. This duty
must not be the subject of a transient alert or mobilization, but the constant
care of the current and future citizens of the historic country, Hellas.

            The fact, that the
ancient Macedonians belong to the world of Greeks, is very difficult to dispute
any longer. The new archeological treasures in connection with linguistic
analyses and the findings of a great number of new inscriptions –all Greek–
with rich samples of Greek names prove that there is no discontinuation of
either cultural or linguistic of the unity of the Macedonians with the rest of
the Greeks.[50]
Also, the spreading of the Greek language and the Greek civilization and
culture to the entire known world from the Macedonians of the Alexander the
Great constitutes the most categorical confirmation of this event. This event
is confirmed every year by the new archeological findings that are coming to
light either at the large excavations of Pella, Vergina, Dion, and Sindos, or
in dozens less known, like in areas of Voion, Aeani, Kozani, Kastoria, Florina,
Edessa, Aridaea, Kilkis, Kavala, and of course, Thessaloniki and Chalkidiki
(Petralona), and others.

            Greece, every Greek, and every one who has an
objective knowledge of history are opposed to Skopje’s
name as ‘Macedonia’.
Skopje’s
peoples are not properly a distinct nation, but belong, by language and
culture, to one or another, or perhaps all three of the neighboring Slavic
states (they have nothing in common with Hellenic Macedonians). Recognition of Skopje as ‘Macedonia’
is historically, scientifically, and morally wrong. Skopjean propaganda in the
New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and other papers around the world is
unconscionable, constant, and provocative.[51]  If Skopje were to give up the policy of
misappropriating the term ‘Macedonians’; if she were to adopt, for instance,
another term, (such as ‘Vardarians’ or ‘Dardanians’ or ‘Sclavinians’)[52]
in order to designate the Slav inhabitants of Yugoslav Macedonia and possibly
certain émigré groups who share her views; the Greeks, naturally, would have no
quarrel with this state of affairs.

            Nevertheless, despite
differences on these issues and Europe’s
alienation, Greek-Serbian relations are positive on many domains as both sides
realize the mutual benefits of good, friendly, and cooperative and neighborly
relations. But both nations realized that Skopje
has been put between Greece
and Serbia
by other powers, which are against these two homodox nations. Greeks, Serbians,
Bulgarians, Russians, Rumanians, and all the other Eastern European nations
have something in common that is not common to this world, we cannot find it
anywhere else. They are ‘brothers in Christ’, Christian Orthodox nations. We
hope that Skopje
will realize its historic and anti-scientific mistake and go back to its true
name, ‘Vardarska’. After the collapse of communism, the cosmos awaits these
peoples’ contribution to its history and Greece can play once more an
important role in their re-Christianization and promotion of peace and
prosperity in the Balkans, independent from the oppressive European Union.

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Endnotes

.