Greek Civil War

The Greek Civil War (Greek: Εμφύλιος Πόλεμος, romanized: Emfýlios Pólemos, lit. 'Civil War') took place from 1946 to 1949. The conflict, which erupted shortly after the end of World War II, consisted of a Communist-led uprising against the established government of the Kingdom of Greece. The rebels declared a people's republic, the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece, which was governed by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and its military branch, the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE). The rebels were supported by Albania and Yugoslavia. With the support of the United Kingdom and the United States, the Greek government forces ultimately prevailed.

The war had its roots in divisions within Greece during World War II between the left-wing Communist-dominated resistance organisation, the EAM-ELAS, and loosely-allied anti-communist resistance forces. After the December events in late 1944 and the violence preceding the 1946 elections and referendum, the division escalated into a major civil war between the Greek state and the Communists. The DSE, despite a transition to conventional warfare in 1947 and military victories, was defeated by the Hellenic Army, under the command of Marshal Alexandros Papagos in its final stages. It was noted for the scale of war crimes, including massacres and child abductions, committed by both factions during the war, and its high casualty rate.

The war resulted from a highly polarized struggle between left and right ideologies that started when each side targeted the power vacuum resulting from the end of Axis occupation (1941–1944) during World War II. The struggle was the first proxy conflict of the Cold War and represents the first example of postwar involvement on the part of the Allies in the internal affairs of a foreign country, an implementation of the containment policy suggested by US diplomat George F. Kennan in his Long Telegram of February 1946. The Greek royal government in the end was funded by the United States (through the Truman Doctrine of 1947 and the Marshall Plan of 1948) and joined NATO (1952), while the insurgents were demoralized by the bitter split between the Soviet Union's Joseph Stalin, who wanted to end the war, and Yugoslavia's Josip Broz Tito, who wanted it to continue.

After the Civil War concluded, KKE leadership and DSE loyalists fled to the Soviet-dominated Eastern Bloc, while captured communist leaders were sentenced to death. With the KKE remaining banned and with Greece's vehement anti-communist security apparatus following the Greek state's victory, DSE or ELAS fighters and suspected sympathizers were often persecuted, imprisoned and exiled, most prominently in prison islands such as Gyaros and Makronisos, with purges and internments peaking during the military dictatorship (1967–1974). The KKE, which had ousted longtime leader Nikos Zachariadis in Tashkent in 1956 owing to de-Stalinization, was decriminalised following Greece's transition to democracy in 1974, and secured official recognition of the conflict as a "civil war", as opposed to the term Bandit War (Συμμοριτοπόλεμος), in 1989 along with the complete recognition of all Greek soldiers of the Resistance in 1982. With much of the mainland ravaged after a decade of warfare, the predominantly rural population began to move to urban areas, contributing to the subsequent Greek economic miracle. The Civil War remains a subject of political and historiographic debate.