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| SECRET WAR |
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Introductory Thoughts
More than half a century has passed since we lived the great adventure.
Right after the Liberation, when we old close comrades met again, we felt that we’d rather keep our story to ourselves.
A purely emotional need drove us to this struggle, whose unforgettable moments offered us complete satisfaction. Any commotion about these experiences, full of emotion and exaltation, and linked to the memory of lost comrades, would disturb our contentment and peace of mind.
Even when the newspaper Ethnos (Nation) started publishing a series of articles on the activities of our Service, I requested in a letter published on March 3, 1945, that they condense and complete the story as soon as possible. And the series stopped after the fifth installment.
We only allowed ourselves to honor the memory of our dead with a public ceremony in a conference hall. This created a wider sensation for a few days, but shortly all commotion abated.
In the years elapsed since then, many references to Service 5-16-5 and its members — always honorable, but not always accurate — appeared in Greek and foreign books, newspapers, and magazines. No one could control or restrict them.
With the passage of time, the dust has settled, and today I have ceased viewing the struggle of that epoch through my personal feelings. Historical data do not belong to individuals. Likewise, the fascination, the agony, and the creations of an era do not belong to any single person.
Living in the intense conditions and the multifarious reactions of the period of Occupation and also from the standpoint of the head of an intelligence organization, I witnessed the tragic drama and grandeur of an unequal struggle, decisive and effective, with incredible political and social repercussions.
In the darkness of slavery I saw the bright glow of intellectual and spiritual flashes. I saw heroic deeds filled with grandiose simplicity, and simple deeds filled with heroic grandeur. I met figures who lived and died noiselessly, but who deserve a place in the memory and hearts of the people. I also witnessed painful errors and shameful actions by both Greeks and foreigners who did harm.
Starting from the history of some young men who constituted Service 5-16-5, I describe in this book these momentous situations and emotions as I lived through them moment by moment in Athens and in the Middle East, trying to be as objective as possible.
Many pages are filled with love and admiration, others are marked by pain. Every word is written with complete sincerity, without passion, but also without fear. They tell the clear and often bitter truth, a truth needed by our unsettled times and, most of all, by the restless and justifiably rebellious younger generation.
Events lose none of their importance when they cease being action and become history. There is always some hope that if people turn their eyes toward a clearly certified account of the past and unscramble its magnificent as well as its frightful teachings, they may be able to better experience the present and to more wisely shape the future.
R.R.
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