WhirledView

Prerequisites for SYRIZA Success: Perspectives from a Greek in the German Heartland

By Lois Woestman, Guest Contributor

 Dr. Lois Woestman, both a Greek and US citizen, currently works as EU-Liaison Officer at a German university. She previously worked as Lecturer and as EU-Liaison Officer for two universities in Greece, as well as as a research/policy advice consultant (including for UNWOMEN, Europe-based WIDE+ Network, and the global Association for Women in Development – AWID). 

After a somewhat euphoric long weekend in Athens when I, along with many other Greeks, voted for and celebrated a Syriza win in the polls, my return to the German heartland has been a hard landing.

“I witness a growing call from a number of member states to stick to the legal framework that is in place now,” the German Finance Minister said on Tuesday, my first day back. “Changing the rule book would require a huge struggle to get the people on board in Germany, but also in other member states.”

What would it take to get people on board in Germany?

Talks with coworkers the week since my return suggest that Syriza faces multiple challenges, not the least “Greek fatigue,” skepticism and cynicism, austerity fixation and cultural blinders.

Tuesday morning the German university where I work had its annual new year’s reception for the administration. The Chancellor spoke of 2015 as being the year of the sheep in Chinese astrology. He underscored his desire and expectation that this would be a peaceful year, one without major upheavals or crises, as predicted by Chinese astrology. I could not help wondering: Does he not live in the Eurozone? Did he not follow the Greek election? I soon found out that my German colleagues shared this sentiment. Whereas in Athens over the weekend many of us sensed a whiff of revolutionary change in the air, my German colleagues were not interested in having their peace and quiet disrupted with “yet another Greek crisis.”

Over drinks after the talk, as we spoke about our weekends, I mentioned that I had been in Greece. When I asked if they had heard that we had had a vote, a colleague replied – with a strained look on his face: “How could we not? We are bombarded with it.” And then he clammed up. Another said: “Oh, the Greek problem” – as if that were already enough words wasted. All seemed to be suffering from a case of “Greek fatigue” - giving me glances that one usually saves for a precocious child that has pulled another stunt.

Colleagues more sympathetic to me as a person (whom they regard as flamboyantly Greek) and my political position – German leftists, some quite actively so – were more willing to talk, their glances showing pity as well as skepticism. The person I most expected solidarity from said she was sympathetic to the Greek people's plight.  But then added that she found it a pity that the Greek position was always presented so emotionally. “Greeks present their economic woes so emotionally, instead of coming up with logical proposals for how to change things. And anyway, these people were part of the system – did not pay taxes...” And then she said: “In any case, I wish you luck. Greece has very little room for maneuver.”

This reaction highlights another important challenge for Syriza vis-à-vis potential solidarity from German leftists. Many Germans brand views expressed with passion by “others” as illogical, hence not deserving of a serious hearing – as the information I was giving them about the elections, as the information Greeks interviewed on the street were also providing. At the same time, Germans remain blind to their own emotional reactions to “the Greek crisis.” Disaffection, skepticism and cynicism, amongst others. It does not bode well that a German leftist accustomed to thinking about how people are stuck in a system, and to supporting them when they try to change it, would be unable to feel solidarity because she was disaffected by perceived excessive emotion.

Is Ukraine the 21 Century Sudetenland?

By James Hinton, Guest Contributor

James Hinton is a former U.S. Army soldier and communications expert. He focuses a critical eye on International Affairs with the eye of a combat veteran seeking to avoid future conflicts wherever possible.

They are an ethnic minority here. They don’t speak the local language. Once members of a proud empire, the demise of that great state has left them on the wrong side of the border. They want to redress this error, and their former nation has taken keen interest. This neighbor is led by a demagogue who won’t stop at anything to see them reconnected with his great nation.

No one would be surprised if this were a description of the Russian separatist movements in Ukraine, backed by Vladimir Putin. In fact it’s a reference to the Sudetenland in 1938. The ethnic minority spoke German, wanted to separate from Czechoslovakia, and their champion was Adolph Hitler.

The Sudetenland Crisis.

In 1918 France and England had an axe to grind. Their combined casualties in WWI had included 2.5 million dead. They sought to cripple Germany and so they shattered their opponents with reparations and redrawn borders dividing the German people. Germans suddenly found themselves living inside of Poland, France, and Czechoslovakia.

In Czechoslovakia most of the German speaking minority lived in the Sudetenland. They held that the allies’ principle of self-determination granted them the power to choose their allegiance. Vindictively, they were refused. This set the stage for twenty years of conflict in the Sudetenland.

(Image sourced from Wikipedia and used under Creative Commons.)

The Sudetenland’s economy was dependent on export. With Germany’s economy destroyed by the Treaty of Versailles and the Allies wracked with war debts there was no international market. The economy of the Sudetenland tanked. In Sudetenland Germans blamed the Czech government.

By 1938, 20 years after the Czech Republic was created, tensions remained high. When Adolph Hitler became Chancellor of Germany and a strong symbol of German power in 1933 a state of revolt formed in the Sudetenland. Between the threats of an increasingly powerful  Germany and the rising nationalism of ethnic Germans, Czechoslovakia began fortifying the Sudetenland. In March of ’38 Germany annexed Austria. It was a bloodless coup that united the two largest groups of German speakers. Germany was chastised by national leaders but no further steps were taken.

The message couldn’t have been clearer. Sudeten separatists presented the Czech government with 8 demands to redress perceived inequalities. Desperate to avoid an extended crisis, the government agreed.

It wasn’t enough. Sudetenland Germans wanted complete autonomy. By August things had spiraled out of control. The British government put pressure on Czechoslovakia to cede the Sudetenland to Germany. On October 1^st, the Sudetenland became a German holding. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain spoke with Hitler personally and concluded that British diplomatic efforts had been the key to ending the threat. Famously he declared that he had achieved “peace for our time.”

(image courtesy of LisaHistory.net)

Any student of diplomacy knows how well this ultimately worked out. The remainder of Czechoslovakia would be invaded and portioned within the year. Britain and France align themselves with Poland, leading to the start of World War II in 1939.

So how does this reflect on Ukraine?

The nation of Ukraine was formed in 1991 during the breakup of the Soviet Union. During the Soviet era, the Crimean Peninsula had been added to Ukraine, where it remained post U.S.S.R. Further, the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk were also within Ukranian borders. In these three areas Russians formed the largest single ethnicity, with large minorities seen throughout the rest of Southern and Eastern Ukraine.

 (Image sourced from Wikipedia and used under Creative Commons.)

Finnish Model isn’t a Solution for Ukraine

By Jyrki Iivonen, Guest Contributor

(Jyrki Iivonen was Director for Public Policy at the Finnish Ministry of Defense from 2002-13 and Minister Counselor at the Finnish Embassy in Washington, DC from 1996-2000.  He was editor-in-chief of Maanpuolustus (National Defense Journal) from 2007-2012 and is a columnist, writer and docent of international politics at the University of Helsinki and political science at the University of Tampere.) - See more at: http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/2014/03/russia-and-ukraine-a-view-from-finland.html#sthash.ogAFhTYZ.dpuf

(Jyrki Iivonen was Director for Public Policy at the Finnish Ministry of Defense from 2002-13 and Minister Counselor at the Finnish Embassy in Washington, DC from 1996-2000.  He was editor-in-chief of Maanpuolustus (National Defense Journal) from 2007-2012 and is a columnist, writer and docent of international politics at the University of Helsinki and political science at the University of Tampere.) - See more at: http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/2014/03/russia-and-ukraine-a-view-from-finland.html#sthash.ogAFhTYZ.dpuf

Jyrki Iivonen was Director for Public Policy at the Finnish Ministry of Defense from 2002-13 and Minister Counselor at the Finnish Embassy in Washington, DC from 1996-2000.  He was editor-in-chief of Maanpuolustus (National Defense Journal) from 2007-2012 and is a columnist, writer and docent of international politics at the University of Helsinki and political science at the University of Tampere.

This article was originally published by Ukraine Crisis Media Center in Kiev, June 27, 2014 in Ukrainian, Russian and English.  

(Jyrki Iivonen was Director for Public Policy at the Finnish Ministry of Defense from 2002-13 and Minister Counselor at the Finnish Embassy in Washington, DC from 1996-2000.  He was editor-in-chief of Maanpuolustus (National Defense Journal) from 2007-2012 and is a columnist, writer and docent of international politics at the University of Helsinki and political science at the University of Tampere.) - See more at: http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/2014/03/russia-and-ukraine-a-view-from-finland.html#sthash.ogAFhTYZ.dpuf

Two eminent American diplomats and experts of international relations and diplomacy, Henry Kissinger and Jack Matlock, proposed in March of this year that a solution to the Ukrainian-Russian crisis after the annexation of Crimea by Russia should be based on a “Finnish model”.  They obviously believed that Russia would be trustworthy negotiating partner and that an escalation of the crisis was preventable.

The question is, however, what Kissinger and Matlock meant by the “Finnish model”. This reference has been used to describe the Finnish-Soviet relationship during the Cold War, during which time Finland accepted certain limitations on its sovereignty, especially in the areas of foreign and security policy. Because of these limitations, Finland did not join any Western military alliances and had difficulties gaining access to membership in some European economic arrangements.

A “Finnish model” is based on a hierarchical relationship between two parties. The weaker party is forced to accept that the stronger one has the power to dictate what the weaker one is able and allowed to do. To preserve its democratic political system and market economy, during the Cold War Finland did not have autonomy in foreign affairs. The model also required that Finland publicly endorse this model and praise the good nature of its relationship with its Eastern neighbor.

It is not surprising that the Soviet Union was happy with this arrangement. In official Soviet-Finnish communiqués the arrangement was described as “a positive example of the fruitful nature of peaceful coexistence between countries belonging to different social systems.” The formulation never mentioned the hierarchical nature of the relationship, but it was certainly present. Finland’s freedom and room for manoeuvre were limited and included an obligation to make sure that any dissatisfaction with the Soviet system could not emerge. So, when this Finnish model is given as a solution to Ukraine, six important points must be taken into consideration.

First, the model is based on Cold War structures. Its aim was to cement existing structures, to prevent any uncontrolled or undesirable changes to take place.

Second, the model is hierarchical, presuming that all parties are not equal. In the post-Cold War world, however, the relationships between states should be based on equality and on reciprocal and voluntary acceptance.

Third, the new European system has been built on new multilateral arrangements and agreements between all European states. If any party of that system breaks these rules, it cannot expect that its conduct will be accepted as a fait accompli.

Fourth, stable and reciprocally accepted arrangements in the long run benefit all parties. In the opposite case, the impact is negative for all parties.

Fifth, normal neighborly relations cannot be created if one or the other party is denied the right to decide matters belonging to its power as an independent state. For example, a membership in NATO or the European Union cannot and should not be an obstacle to having normal relations with Russia.

Sixth, Finland has today normal political and economic relations with Russia. But it is disturbing that in spite of assurances by the highest level of state leadership, there are voices in Russia that want to restrict Finland’s rights in this respect. Russia has also shown that it does not want to give such rights to all its neighbors.

To conclude, the so-called “Finnish model” that has been proposed is a solution that belongs to the past and does not solve the crisis in Ukrainian-Russian relations. Ukraine can build good relations with Russia. All that is needed is for Russia to accept proposals put recently forward by the Ukrainian leadership. This too would be in Russia’s interest.

Moscow and Mearsheimer – A Reality Check Needed: the West did not cause the Current Crisis in Ukraine

By James Schumaker, Guest Contributor

James Schumaker, a retired Foreign Service Officer, has served in various capacities in the United States Government over the past several decades, with professional experience in the Soviet Union, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia.

In this essay, Professor John Mearsheimer explains to us why the Ukraine crisis is all the West's fault, and why Putin's Russia is only reacting to Western aggressive moves, and justly so.

If I were on the editorial board of Foreign Affairs, after reading this draft I would have told Professor Mearsheimer to go back to the drawing board.  In particular, I would have recommended that he leave his Ivory Tower and try doing a little field work for a change, which might give him a more grounded sense of reality.

For those who are unfamiliar with Professor Mearsheimer's work, he is what is called an "offensive realist." In other words, he believes in amoral "balance of power" politics, where the Great Powers establish spheres of influence with only the faintest of consideration for the desires of the smaller powers who might get in the way.  Also, he does not believe that ideology or domestic politics should be considered when making foreign policy decisions, and he downplays the ability of individual personalities like, say, Hitler or Putin, to affect the course of world events.

This is essentially an elitist view of foreign policy that has a certain congruence with the later views of George Kennan, but in the case of Europe, lacks Kennan's depth of knowledge of the Soviet Union and its successor states. In some cases, Mearsheimer's policy prescriptions have been spot-on, as when he supported the 1991 Gulf War and opposed vigorously the 2003 invasion of Iraq.  In other cases, particularly when it comes to European affairs, Mearsheimer seems to have lost his way.

For example, in 1990 he predicted the imminent demise of NATO.  We're still waiting. 

Similarly, while he does have a story to tell with regard to the current Ukraine-Russia crisis, it is almost laughably out of date, and gets the story of what has happened almost completely wrong.  The only people who might agree with Mearsheimer's account would be Putin apologists like Dr. Stephen Cohen or the editors of Russia Today, since he repeats Putin's propaganda line virtually word for word.

Mearsheimer also fails to analyze the Ukraine-Russia problem correctly because ideology (democracy vs. messianic Russian nationalism) and personality (Putin) have tremendous roles to play in the current crisis, and upset all of his tidy social-science calculations.

Mearsheimer would do well to go to Ukraine and actually talk with a few Ukrainians before he dismisses their interests as unimportant as compared to those of Russia. The current crisis in Ukraine is not the West's fault, and it is not because of some mythical Western desire to surround Russia and bring Ukraine into NATO.

The fault lies wholly with Putin's Russia, and with Putin. As Kennan himself said, "Russia can have at its borders only enemies or vassals."  Ukraine doesn't want to be a vassal anymore, and so it is an enemy. That's not our fault, and it's not Ukraine's, either.  Mearsheimer should revise his theory of international relations to reflect that reality.

See also: Anders Aslund, “Is the West to Blame for Russia’s Aggression in Ukraine?  Of course not” August 20, 2014

Contributor Note: Excerpts from James Schumaker's personal memoirs can be found on his blog.

 

 

 

Thoughts on Mike McFaul's Op-ed on Ukraine, and the Putin apologists who follow him around

By James Schumaker, Guest Contributor

(James Schumaker, a retired Foreign Service Officer, has served in various capacities in the United States Government over the past several decades, with professional experience in the Soviet Union, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia.)

I don't agree with everything Ambassador McFaul says in his recent New York Times op-ed, but I do believe he is on the right track.

I also see that a lot of the featured commenters on his Op-ed are swallowing whole the Russian line that somehow Eastern Ukraine is naturally Russian because a majority there speaks Russian, and that Ukraine is not really one country but two.  The fact is that while a minority of Eastern Ukrainians would like to move closer to Russia, a majority are for a united Ukraine, and favor closer connections with the West.

This is why Putin has had to move in Russian equipment and "volunteers" to keep the separatist movement going, and this is why the separatist leaders themselves are mainly Russian citizens with ties to Russian intelligence (Strelkov, Bezler, Borodai, et al),  I can understand why NYT readers would want to avoid war, but it cannot be done at the expense of sacrificing another country to Vladimir Putin's brand of messianic nationalism. 

After all, Putin has already indicated that he wants to reverse the results of the Cold War.  He has his eye not just on Ukraine, which he has repeatedly said is not a state, but on all the formerly Soviet-dominated countries on Russia's border. 

We'll have to stand up to him sooner or later, and sooner would be better. In my opinion, neither the Europeans nor the Americans have been sufficiently active in supporting Ukraine.  This does not mean that we have to intervene militarily, but it does mean that we should step up our economic and military assistance markedly. 

For example, while it is obvious that Ukraine could not win a conventional war against Russia,  if Ukraine's ability to conduct a guerrilla war against invading forces were significantly enhanced, this would act as a strong deterrent to some of Putin's darker fantasies. 

 We also need to be ready to step up the penalties on Putin’s Russia should he opt to continue making trouble in Eastern Ukraine.  Russia’s suggestion to open “humanitarian corridors” from Russia into separatist-controlled areas is just the latest gambit to prolong the instability there and give Moscow’s agents a chance to recover.  The longer we delay in exercising leadership, and in leading the way to help Ukraine, the more Putin will take advantage of the chaos he has created.

Excerpts from James Schumaker's personal memoirs can be found on his blog.

See also David Remnick's "Watching the Eclipse" in the August 11 & 18, 2014 New Yorker.

 

RUSSIA AND UKRAINE: A VIEW FROM FINLAND

 By Jyrki Iivonen, Guest Contributor

(Jyrki Iivonen was Director for Public Policy at the Finnish Ministry of Defense from 2002-13 and Minister Counselor at the Finnish Embassy in Washington, DC from 1996-2000.  He was editor-in-chief of Maanpuolustus (National Defense Journal) from 2007-2012 and is a columnist, writer and docent of international politics at the University of Helsinki and political science at the University of Tampere.)

Analyzing the Crimean crisis is not an easy task, particularly because the situation changes almost daily. Some conclusions can be made, however. It is clear that Russia has violated both international law and many treaties it had earlier concluded. In addition to the UN Charter and the principles of the OSCE, Russia has violated the treaty according to which Ukraine gave up nuclear weapons left on her territory after the end of the Cold War. Ukraine was then promised that after that no military force will be used against it. However, this is precisely what has happened. In spite of that, the crisis has in many cases been portrayed as if the responsibility of the situation should be divided equally between Russia and Ukraine.

In addition to what has been said above, some conclusions can already be drawn.

• First, Russia’s conduct in Crimea has created an atmosphere of mistrust, and trust – as is well known, is not easily rebuilt. One could, of course, argue that trust even before the present crisis was already vague. Russia acted in the same way in Georgia in 2008 and has repeatedly declared that NATO’s expansion towards the East has been a threat towards Russia’s security interests. But until now, NATO and Russia have cooperated and the US-Russian dialogue has continued without major breaks.

• Second, Russia is not as strong as it has pretended to be. It is true that sanctions against a limited number of Russian oligarchs and politicians are not very effective, but that is known in the West as well. Much more damaging for Russia is the mistrust that has already spread to the global financial institutions. Russia’s credit rating is about to go down and investments have been withdrawn from the country. Economic consequences will be tough. Russia’s economic growth had already dropped before the crisis and now it will decline even more.

• Third, the Russian military and its capabilities have not been tested because Ukraine has consistently avoided military confrontation, partly because of the weakness of her own defense forces. Russians may have interpreted this as a proof of their strength, but it is not so. Russia no doubt has a large number of troops and materiel near the Ukrainian border but in Crimea they were able to carry out their task unobstructed. Russia’s military reform is still unfinished and its future depends very much on economic factors. An extensive military confrontation would slow it down.

• Fourth, the Crimean crisis also has a domestic dimension. Many analysts have argued that president Putin was concerned  about the spread of the democratic movement from Ukraine to Russia that had to be contained. It is indisputable that Putin has limited democratic rights of Russian citizens and has, at the same time, tried to replace democratic rights with a growing national ecstasy. Now 80% of Russians accept his conduct but the situation can change quickly if the negative economic consequences become stronger.

• Fifth, during the last days it has become obvious that Russia  is also more prepared  to find a solution through negotiations. Whether that includes retreating from Crimea is not known yet. But that U.S and Russian presidents are talking about the situation  by phone and their foreign ministers are meeting in Paris is - as such - a positive thing. But as long as Ukraine is not sitting at these tables the long process will be unfinished.

• Sixth, thanks to Russia’s conduct, Western governments have found each other. Russia’s policy to separate them and utilize their disunity has clearly failed. No deviations from the common line have appeared. Neither did Ukraine collapse but has, instead,  closer links with the West than before. The European Union and the International Monetary Fund have promised extensive aid programs to help rebuild Ukraine’s shattered economy. Even in Finland, the support for NATO membership has grown. This definitely was not Russia’s goal.

Some eminent U.S diplomats and experts have proposed that Ukraine should adopt the same line as Finland did after the Second World War. Both Henry Kissinger and Jack Matlock have proposed such a solution. Usually the Finns feel flattered when they are presented as an example. In this case, however, I must be skeptical and point out that an analogy to Finland’s policy is not the best possible. Finland’s relationship to the Soviet Union since 1944 was based on a contractual relationship that was accepted by the international community. Finland was then left alone and had no other choice. Today Finland has good working relations with Russia, but so have Norwegians and Germans, both NATO members, as well.

It is clear that there is no absolute freedom of action in international policy, but Russia’s demands have so far gone far beyond the limits of national sovereignty. It is clear that it is always better to keep on talking with the Russians and that must be understood in the Ukraine crisis as well. But at the same time, Russians must also understand that Ukraine is an independent country and has its own legitimate goals and interests. Only through mutual acceptance of this can a peaceful solution be found. Without that all parties and the entire international community would lose a lot.

Letting Terrorists Wander Off

By Brady Kiesling, Guest Contributor

Brady Kiesling served two tours as political officer at the U.S. Embassy in Athens before resigning in 2003 over USG policy. He is the author of “Diplomacy Lessons” (2006), and “Greek Urban Warriors,” his booklength study of Greek political violence, should be out later this year.

People in the USA who follow Greek political violence may wonder how Christodoulos Xiros, a man sentenced to six life terms as a member of a deadly terrorist group, “Revolutionary Organization 17 November” (17N), was allowed out of prison on furlough, not once but seven times.

How could the Greek state not have expected that he would at some point disappear? And then, of course, after he did disappear in early January 2014, Xiros made it worse by releasing a videotaped call for the public to rise up and overthrow the Greek state that had been so generous with him.

Actually, there is sort of an answer to that question, but it’s a long, odd one that may make readers uneasy. First there is a major societal difference: Greek politicians have a different set of incentives from U.S. politicians.

American voters tend to divide the world into good people, resembling themselves, and criminals, who are quite different. U.S. politicians (including elected judges, elected district attorneys, and/or elected sheriffs in many jurisdictions) are rewarded with large checks and motivated voters when they devote taxpayer dollars to locking up as many young black and Hispanic males as possible for as long as possible. Influential groups in this process include the owners of private for-profit prisons, the prison guards union (in California), and the National Rifle Association, which by espousing the need to lock up criminals before they misuse their constitutional right to concealed handguns obfuscates the fact that its true purpose is to sustain a hugely profitable arms race between police and drug dealers.

Greek politicians, however, are uneasily aware that they themselves and all their voters are criminals. Greek law is vast, draconian, and self-contradictory, because it is designed to protect everyone from everything while collecting an impossibly large share of GDP in taxes and making certain very specific things very briefly legal for very specific people. With mild exaggeration, every important action in a Greek person’s life is at least slightly illegal; a bribe, illegal to receive and illegal to pay, will temporarily legalize that action while criminalizing everyone involved in it.

Greek prisons are a product of this gentle, somber philosophy.

Though the courts are clogged and dysfunctional, at some point ordinary Greek citizens go to jail, and then, after a certain amount of time, they must emerge from it. There are no private prisons, no death sentences (in Greece or anywhere in the civilized world Europe), and no real life sentences. You can be sentenced, as one 17N member was, to 21 life sentences plus 2109 years, but the maximum you will serve is 25 years, possibly as few as 17 with good behavior.

Note that the Greek state has a strong incentive to let people out early, because existing prisons are hugely overcrowded, there is no money to build more (you can’t float a bond issue when everyone knows you are bankrupt), and even if there were money, any local group can and will use the Greek court system to block prison construction in its backyard for a decade or more.

In the boom years of the Greek welfare state, the Greek penal system hired sociologists and psychologists who read the latest scientific studies in Europe, most of which suggested that re-arrest rates dropped when families were kept intact through regular contact. The possibility of periodic furloughs also turned out to be a powerful incentive for good behavior in prison. A mixed committee of prosecutors, social workers, and prison staff evaluates the behavior of each prisoner and grants furloughs once a certain percentage of the sentence has been served, unless the committee detects (and justifies in writing) that there is a risk of flight or resumed criminality.

This generous penal system evolved to reconcile Greeks to their problematic legal/judicial system during a more prosperous, less violent time (though even now, the Greek murder rate is a third of ours – 1.5 per 100,000 to 4.7).

A system in need of adjustment?

One can make plausible arguments that the system needs urgent adjustment, since the majority of prisoners are now foreigners, many of whom lack social and family structures to justify the risk of letting them out on furloughs. A handful of disastrous furlough decisions have been made, with vicious armed robbers released to commit new and heinous crimes.

[Whether any corruption was involved I have no idea. There is a lovely case from 1986 where an international drug dealer, sentenced to 19 years, was mistakenly released after 19 months. The prosecutor who accused the judicial panel of bribery was herself convicted of slander, while those responsible for the “mistake” walked free. In 1992, 17N contemplated an attack on another clique of judges accused of taking such bribes, and its rival revolutionaries from ELA actually bombed the Thessaloniki courthouse on March 31, 1992 for the same reason, a protest designed to show that revolutionary justice was superior to the Greek state’s.]

Most furlough decisions, however, work out perfectly well. Remember too that Greek law did not, before 2004, dare to define a category of “terrorists” distinct from the rest of humankind. This was a prudent hesitation, if you consider Menachem Begin, Nelson Mandela or even Kostas Simitis, an estimable Greek prime minister (1996-2004), who had to flee Greece in 1969 after a feeble bomb attack against an Esso Pappas filling station and other U.S.-linked targets.

Compared with their fellow inmates, all thirteen 17N convicts were model prisoners, non-violent, intelligent, diligent in their prison chores, and self-controlled (with two exceptions: in 2009, an internal feud led to Christodoulos’s biting on the leg the man police said was 17N’s leader; in 2011, it was again Christodoulos who set fire to his mattress to win transfer out of the special 17N wing and into the main prison).

All but three of these 17N detainees were permitted furloughs, and all of them scrupulously observed the terms until now. Of these ten, seven have since been released after serving 3/5 of their sentences. They have integrated productively and so far harmlessly back into society.

But what about the 23 people 17N murdered: four Americans, two Turks, one UK citizen, and 16 Greeks? Blood calls out for blood. Yes, but Greek law, like U.S. law pre-9/11, allots punishment based on the degree of participation in specific criminal acts. Most people believe that cold-blooded killers should stay in jail, and Christodoulos Xiros was convicted of direct involvement in 10 killings between 1985 and 1992, based largely on a confession he himself signed.

In Tribute to John Charles Dyer (November 22, 1948 – November 21, 2013)

By Patricia H Kushlis and Patricia Lee Sharpe

With great sadness, we must report that our UK correspondent John Charles Dyer died on November 21, 2013 in Lytham, St. Anne’s, a village next to England’s Irish Sea just a day short of his 65^th birthday, after a several month struggle against aggressive brain cancer.

John’s political astuteness and analysis, his wit and way with words, his voice of conscience for the underrepresented and his ability to explain UK politics to a foreign audience made John’s weekly WV commentaries significant parts of this blog’s voice.  So too, did his lighter travel posts in which he transported us by bus, rail, car and foot to less visited places in the UK and the US through personal stories and glorious photographs.

His posts are part of this blog’s permanent archives and will remain an important part of WV.  They are accessible through the following link: http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/john-c-dyer/

He described himself on WhirledView as follows:    John C. Dyer, UK correspondent Public Policy "wonk" with over 34 years public service experience, over 17 as state level policy counsel, legislative advocate and analyst.  Writer.  Poet.  Dual citizen relocated to UK 2010.

What John did not say is that throughout his lengthy public service career he was Chief Counsel to the California Department of Food and Agriculture from April, 2004 through August, 2007, and prior to that he was a counsel for the department from July, 1996. This special expertise is reflected in the first two posts he wrote for WhirledView. Entitled “How Is Water Like Booze” they appeared on February 11 and 18, 2010 and placed in perspective the contents of a feature in the Economist on water problems in California’s heartland. 

His poetry was published in Poetry Cornwall while he was living in Florida before relocating to the UK – another ambition achieved.  

John Dyer grew up and was educated in California’s Central Valley – he graduated from the University of Pacific’s Raymond College and McGeorge Law School - but he was also a dual citizen, had traveled extensively in the UK prior to relocating there and, in truth, always had a foot on both sides of the Atlantic.  His all too short marriage to Victoria Buchan brought him much love, caring and a special safe haven for the last three and one-half years of his too short life.  So did his close relationship with Ed and Jessica Dyer, his two children, and grandchildren Rickie Surber and Haley Dyer.   

 May he rest in peace.  We will sorely miss him.    

(Photos of John Dyer by Victoria Buchan, of Victoria and John by Jessica Dyer and of the gull over the Irish Sea by John C. Dyer.)