Greek Military Coup Averted ( possibly) in past hour.

Sponge Bob

It appears that The Heads of the general staff, the army, the navy and airforce have been replaced in Athens this evening and at least a dozen army and navy officers have been discharged according to a defence ministry statement. The airforce is historically loyal to PASOK I understand...not like the army and navy.

Still doesn't mean there won't be a coup mind. The Greek military have a loooooong history of coups.

The Ministry website unsurprisingly seems to be down or overloaded right now ( www.mod.mil.gr) gave me a 404 but the general staff site is up. http://www.geetha.mil.gr/ as is the army site http://www.army.gr/default.php?pname=Home&la=2

Hmmmmmmm

Confirmed now

http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/8/49916

In a surprise move, the defence minister proposed on Tuesday evening the complete replacement of the country’s top brass.

At an extraordinary meeting of the Government Council of Foreign Affairs and Defence (Kysea), which comprises the prime minister and other key cabinet members, Defence Minister Panos Beglitis proposed the following changes to the army, navy and air force and the general staff:

General Ioannis Giagkos, chief of the Greek National Defence General Staff, to be replaced by Lieutenant General Michalis Kostarakos
Lieutenant General Fragkos Fragkoulis, chief of the Greek Army General Staff, to be replaced by lieutenant general Konstantinos Zazias
Lieutenant General Vasilios Klokozas, chief of the Greek Air Force, to be replaced by air marshal Antonis Tsantirakis
Vice-Admiral Dimitrios Elefsiniotis, chief of the Greek Navy General Staff, to be replaced by Rear-Admiral Kosmas Christidis

It is understood that the personnel changes took many members of the government and of the armed forces by surprise.

[MOD]Please note that while the change in defence personnel is true, any claim of a coup is entirely the OP's speculation.[/MOD]

ei.sdraob

My post from earlier today

ei.sdraob wrote: »

A bit of historical perspective is missing here

Greece has defaulted many times in past and the world did not end, Greece has also relatively recently emerged from military rule and is still heavily militarized


The choice for the Greeks is

a) Yes, endure 10+ (!!!) years of more austerity (real austerity that is none of that Crooked park austerity) as an EU vassal, with a possibility of the country reverting to military dictatorship in order to prevent civil war and unrest

b) No, go Icelandic with a sharp shock for a month and then be out the doldrums in few years, be ejected from euro (somehow! maybe be pegged initially) and go back to drachma, then promptly devalue


They are in a deep hole thanks to their politicians and incompetent EUro politicians, option a) could go very very wrong with the country reverting to its old self, that is a much scarier option than going thru' what Iceland did.

Judgement Day

Hardly surprising given the mess things are in. I note RTE have not mentioned it on the 9pm news. :rolleyes:

Sponge Bob

Nice one ei.sdroab, the CIA also warned of the possibility back in June.

http://blogs.wsj.com/source/2011/09/19/greece-dont-discount-role-of-military/

Pity we don't have a Martin McGuinness as president to chair a troika to deal with them, he would be the only equivalent to a Greek Generalissimo in western Europe.

It is also possible that the new Junta chiefs promised not to shoot the PASOK politicans after the coup where their predecessors gladly would have.

OS119

its also quite possible that the head shed have been replaced because they weren't quite as 'co-operative' as the government wanted them to be.

personally, i find it unlikely that a coup was in the offing - simply because Papandreaou (sp?) was doing the business when he sacked the senior officers. the referendum stunt, and the almost inevitable defualt/chaos/new drachma are the things most likely to provoke a coup - but they weren't on the cards while these officers were in post.

much more likely that they have told him that the Greek armed forces won't be used to 'put down' mass civil unrest/demonstrations/strikes, and the government have got the hump at being informed that the Army won't clear the streets to the last bullet.

new, eager to please, General Staff may see things differently - but they may also see the above action as indicative of a tin-pot banana republic, and take matters into their own hands.

E2A: also possible that the GS told the PM that they could not accept whatever defence cuts are in the offing - new, contracted equipment aquisitions notwithstanding. so he sacked them.