Greek Political Tensions High; Divide And Rule A Danger

Brit Dee, Contributor
Activist Post

The far-right politician who repeatedly slapped a female left-wing opponent live on television is in hiding, with police claiming not to know his whereabouts.

Ilias Kasidiaris, a spokesman for the ultra-nationalist Golden Dawn party, last Thursday threw a glass of water over a Syriza politician before slapping KKE communist Liana Kanelli three times during a live morning television show. He was then reportedly locked in a room at the television studio but managed to escape, subsequently issuing a statement saying he intended to sue the two women he had attacked for “provoking” him.

A state prosecutor issued a warrant for Kasidiaris’s arrest on charges of grievous bodily harm, and he was also due to appear in court today on charges relating to an unconnected attack on a student five years ago. He has instead disappeared and police claim they cannot find him.

Kasidiaris formerly served in the Greek military’s special forces and Golden Dawn has long been accused of having ties to, and collaborating with, the Greek police and Central Intelligence Agency, KYP. Golden Dawn’s general-secretary Nikolaos Michaloliakos has been accused of working for the KYP from the 1980s.

An intelligence service using far-right extremists to foment violence and disorder would certainly be nothing new. Operation Gladio ran for decades and involved security services around Europe funding and arming right-wing militants, who then carried out terror attacks which were blamed on the left. This was known as the “strategy of tension” and was originally intended as a European front against Communism; it was also used to cause more generalised chaos, which was then exploited by the ruling elite to further their own subversive agendas.

In Greece the local Gladio “secret army” was known as “LOK”, and they were involved in the 1967 Greek coup d’état when the military forcibly took power one month before democratic elections, which the centrist Centre Union party had been widely expected to win. In 1990 the Greek Defence secretary confirmed the existence of “Operation Sheepskin” in Greece, which he said had been active until 1988.

It is possible that the existence of such networks did not end in 1988, and that the clashes and violence we are seeing in Greece represent a continuation of an Operation Gladio-style strategy of tension. Such polarisation of society, with tensions being ratcheted up and left and right at each other’s throats, fits the model of “divide and rule” – where criminal elements within the ruling elite may be exploiting the chaos to consolidate power.

A population united against the corrupt politicians and financial institutions who destroyed Greece is dangerous to the elite; a society divided and fighting amongst itself is much easier for those in power to manipulate and control.

This article first appeared at ResistRadio.com

Brit Dee’s ResistRadio.com is an independent media website approaching global news, politics and conspiracy theory from a radical, but critical and rational perspective.