Churchill assassinated by Greek Partisans

  • Thread starter Deleted member 1487
  • Start date

Deleted member 1487

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War#Churchill_in_Athens
This outbreak of fighting between Allied forces and an anti-German European resistance movement while the war in Europe was still being fought was a serious political problem for Churchill's coalition government of left and right. It caused much protest in the British press and the House of Commons. To prove his peacemaking intentions to the public, Churchill went to Athens on December 25 to preside over a conference in which Soviet representatives also participated, to bring about a settlement. It failed because the EAM/ELAS demands were considered excessive and so rejected. The conference took place in the Hotel Grande Bretagne. Later, it became known that there was a plan by EAM to blow up the building, aiming to kill the participants, and the conference was finally cancelled.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/30/athens-1944-britains-dirty-secret
Cabinet papers at Kew trace the reactions in London: a minute of 12 December records Harold Macmillan, political advisor to Field Marshal Alexander, returning from Athens to recommend “a proclamation of all civilians against us as rebels, and a declaration those found in civilian clothes opposing us with weapons were liable to be shot, and that 24 hours notice should be given that certain areas were to be wholly evacuated by the civilian population” – ergo, the British Army was to depopulate and occupy Athens. Soon, reinforced British troops had the upper hand and on Christmas Eve Churchill arrived in the Greek capital in a failed bid to make peace on Christmas Day.

“I will now tell you something I have never told anyone,” says Manolis Glezos mischievously. On the evening of 25 December Glezos would take part in his most daring escapade, laying more than a ton of dynamite under the hotel Grande Bretagne, where Lt Gen Scobie had headquartered himself. “There were about 30 of us involved. We worked through the tunnels of the sewerage system; we had people to cover the grid-lines in the streets, so scared we were that we’d be heard. We crawled through all the shit and water and laid the dynamite right under the hotel, enough to blow it sky high.

“I carried the fuse wire myself, wire wound all around me, and I had to unravel it. We were absolutely filthy, covered [in excrement] and when we got out of the sewerage system I remember the boys washing us down. I went over to the boy with the detonator; and we waited, waited for the signal, but it never came. Nothing. There was no explosion. Then I found out: at the last minute EAM found out that Churchill was in the building, and put out an order to call off the attack. They’d wanted to blow up the British command, but didn’t want to be responsible for assassinating one of the big three.”

What if the EAM hadn't found out in time and blew up Churchill and the British command in Athens?
What impact would it have on the rest of WW2 and on the British-Soviet relationship, as well as British treatment of Greece?
 
Churchill was a real lout toward Greece, switching sides and attacking former Greek partisans because a big part of the partisan coalition was the Greek Communist Party,

even at the cost of slowing the war effort,

all the same, I don’t want to see him assassinated. Exposed, embarrassed, humiliated, yes, probably so, but not assassinated.
 

Deleted member 1487

Churchill was a real lout toward Greece, switching sides and attacking former Greek partisans because a big part of the partisan coalition was the Greek Communist Party,

even at the cost of slowing the war effort,

all the same, I don’t want to see him assassinated. Exposed, embarrassed, humiliated, yes, probably so, but not assassinated.
Well, it isn't about wanting to see him assassinated, rather what would happen IF he were by former allies.
 
That ELAS did almost blow up Grande Bretagne with Churchill inside is quite true. That mr Glezos was part of the demolition team is I think more suspect, earlier accounts did not mention him. Still say Stelios Zamanos (to chose the one member of the team who insisted for decades afterwards, that following orders and not blowing Churchill up was wrong) blows Grande Bretagne with Churchill inside to rubble, 700 kg on dynamite below the hotel should suffice. This seems pretty likely to backfire on EAM big time. The non communist factions within it were already less than enamored at the Communists dragging them into civil war and conflict with Britain, or for that matter at the Communist party taking over power within EAM. Blow Churchill and they are likely to break away from EAM en masse at the very time the British will be rushing more troops to Athens and Stalin will be officially condemning the act. And while the cadre of the party will for certain remain loyal, the majority of the professional officers and rank and file were former republicans not communists, likely to follow them on their way out. So Greek civil war is likely over by early 1945 with EAM imploding and no further fighting in 1946-49. You are still going to get a fair bit of political trouble in 1945-46 but more along republican-monarchist lines, the king was hated by way more people than just the communists.

Then you have the larger scale effects on the war and effects on Britain itself. The wartime alliance is not going to be broken down but it would hardly be surprising if Hitler calculates the exact opposite to this and believe the collapse of the alliance and conflict between the West and Soviets is imminent. Since this is in the middle of the Ardennes offensive does this mean that the Germans throw even more troops at the offensive? If they do it's going to be a net gain for the Soviets. In Britain I'd presume Anthony Eden becomes PM, only to lose the 1945 elections. And then Labour wins again in 1950 probably with enough of a majority to not be forced to repeat elections in 1951...
 

TruthfulPanda

Gone Fishin'
So, freed of Churchill, maybe the Tories win in 1945?
Also - dead men inspire sympathy - so again more votes?
Died doing his wartime duty?
The Germans cannot more into Ardennes than they did. They had nothing more.
Would Churchill's successor agree to the OTL sell-out to the Soviets at Yalta and Potsdam, or is the Stalin/FDR tandem too strong?
 

Deleted member 1487

Any idea of the impact of Churchill and FDR dying months from each other? More efforts to please Stalin?
 
So, freed of Churchill, maybe the Tories win in 1945?
Also - dead men inspire sympathy - so again more votes?
Died doing his wartime duty?
The Germans cannot more into Ardennes than they did. They had nothing more.
Would Churchill's successor agree to the OTL sell-out to the Soviets at Yalta and Potsdam, or is the Stalin/FDR tandem too strong?
The cost of Neville Chamberlain doomed the Tories as much as Churchill's Getaspo speech, Labour still wins in Landslide , maybe a few seats changed but Churchill's lack of tact and awareness of popular sentiment was just the cherry in in of Labours victory
 
. . . what would happen IF he were . . .
Churchill becomes a martyr and is praised to the skies.

There’s blame, meaness, angry, and desire to punish focused on Greece and Greek people in general.

And the cold war is likely far worse.

And don’t say it can’t be worse. With Winston Churchill assassinated with communists as the main culprits, the whole thing is likely ramped up. We in the West prop up every wretched dictatorship which says it’s anti-communist, the Soviets arm every rebel group which say they are. There’s McCarthyism on steroids, including in the UK which largely missed it. And the thing which I think is usually overlooked, a tremendous missed opportunity where East and West compete on who can do a better job at genuine economic development in the third world. Globalization comes decades earlier, and corporations as well as their Soviet counterpart (?) economic units are a damn sight better behaved, because their governments are serious about pushing them to be.
 
Last edited:
Any idea of the impact of Churchill and FDR dying months from each other? More efforts to please Stalin?

Eden probably becomes Prime Minister so Britain still has an experienced figure in foreign and military affairs at the helm in the aftermath of WW2.

Whether Eden's popularity and Churchill's martyrdom are enough to turn the tide in the 45 election, I do not know.
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War#Churchill_in_Athens


https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/30/athens-1944-britains-dirty-secret


What if the EAM hadn't found out in time and blew up Churchill and the British command in Athens?
What impact would it have on the rest of WW2 and on the British-Soviet relationship, as well as British treatment of Greece?
I don't know if there was a venue change, or if it's just the case of a Wikipedia article of dubious reliability, but there was a conference, on Boxing Day, in the Greek Foreign Ministry, or at least Churchill claims there was in his WW2 memoirs, and I would have thought that an event like this would be sufficiently attended that if there hadn't been such a conference that someone at the time of publication would have immediately contradicted it.
...About six o' clock that evening, December 26, the conference opened in the Greek Foreign Office...
('Christmas at Athens', The Second World War, Volume VI, 1954 edition)

That said, to return to the main question of the thread, does 'CHURCHILL ASSASSINATED BY COMMUNISTS!!!!' cause a complete breakdown in relations between the western allies and the Russians? I don't know. Something in the bigger picture, it seems to me, to consider is that in the west 'The Battle of the Bulge' is at this point underway, and Churchill's removal from the scene (even temporarily, if injured and not killed) is going to have ramifications for that. Indeed some speculation might start that the Russians have in fact done a deal with the Germans, which is why Churchill has been so conveniently attacked during 'The Battle of the Bulge'.


Edit:
re: The conference location, it occurred to me that possibly at that time the Greek Foreign Ministry might (due to the war) be located in a hotel; nevertheless, Wikipedia still claims the conference failed to take place, which is contradicted by Churchill's own account. This is getting off the main point though, apologies.
 
Last edited:
I don't know if there was a venue change, or if it's just the case of a Wikipedia article of dubious reliability, . . .
It certainly could be!

I’ve been a Wikipedia editor off and on for about ten years. And what I observe firsthand is that there’s a heck of a lot more energy for the formality of the writing, than there is for the accuracy of the information.
 
And I'm not saying the Greek communists are rosy red, salt-of-the-earth people who are defenders of the poor and dispossessed! :p Not by a long shot

What I am saying, is that the default option is, or rather should be, that we stay out of a civil war. And certainly not that we push one which I think was largely done in OTL in Greece.

And Churchill took a fearsome risk in delaying the war effort. This is quite different that being a good administrator and hiring and delegating persons to start solving post-war problems as you simultaneously go full-bore with the war effort.
 
Top