Athens Polytechnic uprising

SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athens_Polytechnic_uprising

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The Athens Polytechnic uprising in 1973 was a massive demonstration of popular rejection of the Greek military
junta of 19671974. The uprising began on November 14, 1973, escalated to an open anti-junta revolt and ended
in bloodshed in the early morning of November 17 after a series of events starting with a tank crashing through the
gates of the Polytechnic.

The causes[edit]
Greece had been, since April 21, 1967, under the dictatorial rule of the military, a regime which abolished civil
rights, dissolved political parties and exiled, imprisoned and torturedpoliticians and citizens based on their political
beliefs.
1973 found the military junta leader Georgios Papadopoulos having undertaken a "liberalisation" process of the
regime, which included the release of political prisoners and the partial lifting of censorship, as well as promises of
a new constitution and new elections for a return to civilian rule. Opposition elements including Socialists were
thus given the opportunity to undertake political action against the junta.
The junta, trying to control every aspect of politics, had interfered with student syndicalism since 1967, by banning
student elections in universities, forcibly drafting students and imposing non-elected student union leaders in the
national student's union, EFEE[citation needed]. These actions eventually created anti-junta sentiments among students,
such as geology student Kostas Georgakis who committed suicide in 1970 in Genoa, Italy as an act of protest
against the junta. With that exception, the first massive public action against the junta came from students on
February 21, 1973.
On February 21, 1973, law students went on strike and barricaded themselves inside the buildings of the Law
School of the University of Athens in the centre of Athens, demanding repeal of the law that imposed
forcible drafting[1] of "subversive youths", as 88 of their peers had been forcibly drafted. The police were ordered to
intervene and many students were reportedly subjected to police brutality. The events at the Law School are often
cited as the prelude to the Polytechnic uprising.[citation needed]
The student uprising was also heavily influenced by the youth movements of the 1960s, notably the events of May
1968 in France.[citation needed]

The events[edit]
On November 14, 1973 students at the Athens Polytechnic (Polytechneion) went on strike and started protesting
against the military regime (Regime of the Colonels). As the authorities stood by, the students, calling themselves
the "Free Besieged" (Greek: , a reference to a poem by Greek national poet Dionysios
Solomosinspired by the Ottoman siege of Mesolonghi), barricaded themselves in and constructed a radio station
(using laboratory equipment) that repeatedly broadcast across Athens:
Here is Polytechneion! People of Greece, the Polytechneion is the flag bearer of our struggle and your struggle,
our common struggle against the dictatorship and for democracy! [2]"
Maria Damanaki, later a politician, was one of the major speakers. Soon thousands of workers and youngsters
joined them protesting inside and outside of the "Athens Polytechnic".
In the early hours of November 17, 1973, the transitional government sent a tank crashing through the gates of
the Athens Polytechnic.[3] Soon after that, Spyros Markezinishimself had the humiliating task to request
Papadopoulos to re-impose martial law.[3] Prior to the crackdown, the city lights had been shut down, and the area
was only lit by the campus lights, powered by the university generators. An AMX 30 Tank (still kept in a small
armored unit museum in a military camp in Avlonas, not open to the public) crashed the rail gate of the Athens
Polytechnic at around 03:00 am. In unclear footage clandestinely filmed by a Dutch journalist, the tank is shown
bringing down the main steel entrance to the campus to which people were clinging. Documentary evidence also
survives, in recordings of the "Athens Polytechnic" radio transmissions from the occupied premises. In these a

young man's voice is heard desperately asking the soldiers (whom he calls 'brothers in arms') surrounding the
building complex to disobey the military orders and not to fight 'brothers protesting'. The voice carries on to an
emotional outbreak, reciting the lyrics of the Greek National Anthem, until the tank enters the yard, at which time
transmission ceases.
An official investigation undertaken after the fall of the Junta declared that no students of Athens Polytechnic were
killed during the incident. Total recorded casualties amount to 24 civilians killed outside Athens Polytechnic
campus. These include 19-year-old Michael Mirogiannis, reportedly shot to death by officer G. Dertilis, high-school
studentsDiomedes Komnenos and Alexandros Spartidis of Lycee Leonin, and a five-year-old boy caught in the
crossfire in the suburb of Zografou. The records of the trials held following the collapse of the Junta document the
circumstances of the deaths of many civilians during the uprising, and although the number of dead has not been
contested by historical research, it remains a subject of political controversy. In addition, hundreds of civilians
were left injured during the events.[4]
Ioannides' involvement in inciting unit commanders of the security forces to commit criminal acts during the Athens
Polytechnic uprising was noted in the indictment presented to the court by the prosecutor during the Greek junta
trials and in his subsequent conviction in the Polytechneion trial where he was found to have been morally
responsible for the events.

Aftermath of the uprising[edit]

Monument to the uprising

On November 14, the uprising triggered a series of events that put an abrupt end to the regime's attempted
"liberalisation" process underSpiros Markezinis. Papadopoulos, during his liberalisation process and even during
the dictatorship, attempted to re-engineer the Greek political landscape and failed repeatedly. Ironically, in his
biographical notes published as a booklet by supporters in 1980 it is mentioned that he attended Polytechneion,
the prime Engineering School in the country, but did not graduate.
Taxiarkhos Dimitrios Ioannides, a disgruntled Junta hardliner,[5][6] used the uprising as a pretext to re-establish
public order, and staged a counter-coup that overthrew George Papadopoulos and Spiros Markezinis on
November 25 the same year. Military law was reinstated, and the new Junta appointed General Phaedon
Gizikis as President, and economist Adamantios Androutsopoulos as Prime Minister, although Ioannides remained
the behind-the-scenes strongman.
Ioannides' abortive coup attempt on July 15, 1974 against Archbishop Makarios III, then President of Cyprus, was
met by an invasion of Cyprus by Turkey. These events caused the military regime to implode and ushered in the
era of metapolitefsi. Constantine Karamanlis was invited from self-exile in France, and was appointed Prime
Minister of Greece alongside President Phaedon Gizikis. Parliamentary democracy was thus restored, and
the Greek legislative elections of 1974 were the first free elections held in a decade.
17 November, the date of the event, later became the name of a Greek terrorist group, in reference to the
uprising.