OP: Greek Prime Minister's Speech to Congress
19 September 2022
Mustafa Niyazi
MPhil International Relations
Founder & Chief Editor of Cyprus Profile
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis addressing the US Congress. Following his speech, the Republic of Turkey government held a Cabinet meeting in Ankara, Turkey, Monday, 23 May 2022. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan spoke following and said he would cease talking to the Greek Prime Minister, consider him person-non-grata, and cancel a key meeting between their two countries, further reiterating Turkey's dis-satisfaction with Greece harbouring followers of U.S.-based Muslim cleric, Fethullah Gülen, who was behind the 2016 failed coup attempt, and of establishing military bases against Turkey, violating international law, violating Turkey's airspace and waters, and continuing its policy of abusive migrant pushbacks. (Image: GETTY)[/caption]
"There is no greater honour for the elected leader of the people who created the Republic, than addressing the elected representatives of the people who founded his country on the Greek model and then promotes and defends the nations secular values."
This is what our right honourable friend, the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, said during an impassioned and historically revisionist address to the United States Congress in May of this year.
In that address, he also openly called Cyprus Greek and aired a number of baseless accusations against democratic NATO ally Turkey, as well as lobbied the US Congress to impose sanctions on them.
But with all due respect, Mr. Mitsotakis, some of these points you’re making still need to be thoroughly addressed.
First of all, about your claim that the modern Greek people created the Republic model, and that the United States of America was founded on that model, I’m afraid I have a bubble to burst.
Greece is not that model.
The Greeks are not the people who conceived, designed or created that model.
The Greeks are not the ancestors or inheritors of that model.
And the Greeks do not even implement that model today, let alone these “secular values” or the substances of popular sovereignty, inalienable rights or inherent natural rights for all. Their oppression of the Thracian Turks being but one clear example.
Now you might also very understandably ask, "But isn't Greek civilisation the foundation of all western civilisation?" "Do we not all owe the idea of democracy to the Greeks?" "Where exactly are these claims of Greece not being that model coming from?" "And what is the purpose, the intention, the implications and meanings of contesting the idea that Greek civilisation is the model we all follow?"
While there are those who will surely try to confuse this with being "confused" or "uneducated", or part of some ambiguous nationalistic fervor led tit-for-tat born from an even more ambiguous "jealousy" for not being Greek, as the extreme far-right ethnic-purity fever dreamers in Greece often monotonously rhetoric, this topic does, whether they like it or not, require an honest and matter-of-fact scrutiny.
Because in order to understand what is truly wrong with this speech by Mr. Mitsotakis one needs to first have a basic understanding of modern Greek and American history, which understandably not everyone has to the extent that is necessary to build the required context regards what is being said.
And let this also be clear.
There will likely be those who would try to denote that me being a Turkish Cypriot credibly pre-disposes that I'd be "biased" regarding Greece generally speaking, or that I would have some sort of "reservations" and refuse to accept "facts" about Greece and Greek history that are otherwise incontestably "true", thus condemning myself to my own Thucydides trap of ignorance and one-sided arguments built upon baseless rhetoric and at best pigeon-hole research. But my motive in writing this is clear in the fact that Mr. Mitsotakis, by directly attacking Turkey and the TRNC, and therefore attacking me, is making this personal and forcing me to respond as I am. This is also not about being anti-Greek or pro-Turkish. It is simply about responding to what cannot be evidenced or verified, or dare I say, baseless bare-faced lies with "facts" that are grounded in ambiguous "truths", and which themselves are easily debunked.
To avoid any misunderstanding though, let's start with the latter: American history.
Proclamation of American Independence. John Dunlap, Congress’ official printer, printed the broadside seen here, which was “to notify… all the good citizens of these United States” that the Treaty had been ratified, and that American independence was assured. The proclamation was also to serve as official notice of the Treaty, a task of particular importance in an era when communication was limited. Of the thirteen copies Dunlap printed—one for each state—only a handful are known to survive today. This copy, held at the Maryland State Archives, bears the embossed seal of Congress and the signatures of Thomas Mifflin, president of Congress, and Charles Thompson, secretary. Several others are in the collections of the Library of Congress. Another copy in private hands sold at auction for over $300,000 in December, 2007. (Image: Paris Broadside Collection MSA SC 5787)[/caption]
America has existed circa 1776, as a free, democratic, constitutional republic, while their origins can be traced to the thirteen British colonies that were established during the 17th and early 18th centuries in what is now a part of the eastern United States.
Now comes that very important comparison.
Modern Greece has existed circa 1830 as a foreign-ruled kingdom slave to feuding warlords and religious schisms, despotic oligarchies, totalitarian regimes and fascist military dictatorships, while their origins can be traced to the philhellenic movements during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Now it is not just from the knowledge of these facts but also from the context behind them that we can start to build a very clear picture of which state preceded the other - the US is half a century older than Greece, then there's the question of the ethnogenesis of the modern Greeks in play here, although not to go too far into that tangent, the American national consciousness also precedes them by centuries, it is also another key point that is very telling of who precedes who. Meaning it is simply not empirically practical or reasonable to suggest the Americans - born before the modern Greeks and their state, were influenced by such a state or group that, simply put, didn't even exist at that time.
It is also not surprising to learn that it is in fact the Greeks who were influenced by the enlightenment movements of the West and American democracy, as well as the secular values of British Parliamentary Democracy, one of the most dominant governmental systems in our world today, not the other way around.
Now you might be very well inclined to say you disagree with this, without looking into it any further, and with all the knowledge I have about Greek history, I would also certainly have my own from-the-hip response.
And I don’t know about you, but to have so strongly admired and based its foundations on the "Greek model" and "values", the US also certainly fell short of one vital criteria: to repeat it again, they pre-date the Greeks substantially in terms of identity, revolution and statehood. The US also sure took its time to recognise their independence, 7 whole years at the time in 1837, and even longer to establish diplomatic relations, 38 years to be exact, in 1868.
But maybe we're going a little fast.
Let's take a small step back and not get too ahead of ourselves here.
Any discussion on this topic would also have to coincide with a discussion on the ancient Anatolian origins of the US Congress.
What am I talking about you ask?
View of the exterior of the restored Council Chamber (Bouleuterion) at the ruins of the parliament in Patara (Lycian 𐊓𐊗𐊗𐊀𐊕𐊀), considered the world's first elected government. Patara was referred to as Patar in Hittite texts: "King Tudhaliya IV (1236-1210 BC), after the Lukka expedition, came to this city with his army and made offerings". Its semicircle of seats became a model for the Capitol. Patara was an ancient and flourishing maritime and commercial city, capital of Lycia, on the south-west coast of Turkey near the modern small town of Gelemiş, in Antalya Province. (Image: Carole Raddato from FRANKFURT, Germany. Source: Wikipedia. Original: Flickr. Taken on 30 March 2013)[/caption]
As Edward Rowe accurately remarks, notable American Founding Fathers and signatories of the iconic document took inspiration from the Luwian language speaking Lycian people who had historically inhabited the mountainous area known as Likya (Lycia), between the bays of Antalya and Fethiye on Turkey’s southern coast.
So does that mean America has its foundations in Turkey?
Not quite.
The ancient Romans had the original republic, which the Founding Fathers of the United States took a great deal of inspiration from.
Then there's the idea of popular sovereignty, the substance of the theory of inalienable rights and inherent natural rights, and the principals of independence and the consent of the governed, which though expressed in different terms, came from a combination of the positive echoes of the Magna Carta, the charter of liberty and political rights obtained by the English people in 1215, the Dutch when as early as 26 July 1581, they declared their independence from Philip of Spain, the British assertion of the same principles in their long struggle with the house of Stuarts, which culminated in the creation of the Bill of Rights, the seminal document of British constitutional practice, in 1689.
From each of these cases the Americans were inspired to the idea of sovereignty through divine right being displaced by sovereignty through the consent of the people.
This is the clear inference of inalienable rights that led to the creation of the American Constitution.
The US Congress, the Constitution, the Republic... in not a single one of these cases was ancient Athenian democracy, the origin of modern Greek claims, a factor.
But do you know your American history, Mr. Mitsotakis?
Let's not stop there.
The Girne (Kyrenia) Beşparmak mountain range, in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), daubed with the Turkish Cypriot flag and a quote by the Republic of Turkey's late founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, "Ne Mutlu Türküm Diyene" (English: "How happy is the one who says I am a Turk"), overlooking the capital Lefkoşa (Nicosia) and clearly visible from the south of the island. (Image: AFP Photo / Amir MAKAR)[/caption]
You also repeated that popular modern Greek myth that Cyprus is a Greek island, expanding your assertions and opinions to the Eastern Mediterranean, no doubt yet another substance of that insatiable Greek desire for aggressive expansionism.
But my right honourable friend, one might also need reminding that never in the history of any country has Cyprus ever been a Greek island; it has never had political continuity with any Greek state, modern or otherwise, in any part of history; it has never been owned, ruled, governed or dominated by any Greek speaking population living there; any Greek settlers on the island always existed alongside whoever else was already there and actually owned, ruled, governed or dominated it; the only exception to these truths has been the bi-communal republic of 1960-1963 which the modern Greeks shared with the Turks, but which they rejected, refused to implement, attacked, illegally occupied and seceded from in 1963, and for their hubris are now currently confined to the south of the island circa 1974, their very fate awaiting a solution to the Cyprus Problem.
One might also need reminding that the island has been Turkish for almost 500 years, historically, de facto and de jure. We have to recognise that Turkish sovereignty has in different periods been interrupted in terms of administration and governance, albeit still under the purveyance of Turkish influence, culture and customs. The island has been predominantly populated by Turkic speaking peoples since the 11th and 12th centuries CE, the municipal structure in place since the time of the Turcopolier being symbolic of almost 1000 years of Turkification leading to the current date.
Now, considering it might be unfair to respond to any uneducated digression to a region hundreds of miles away from your country, perhaps it would also be worth taking this back home and asking how well you know your Greek history?
As you have opened just enough for a peeking-hole view of your personal Pandora's box, let's just lift the lid entirely and view your prejudiced assertions parallel to their compatriot parent, that is, the other claim you made that the Greeks are the foundation and cornerstone of all western civilisation.
Greece. The Cradle of Western Civilisation by Claudia Martin (ISBN 978-1-78274-975-2), published by Amber Books Ltd. It is described by the Daily Mail as taking "the reader from antiquity to modernity" in a "photographic exploration of the country that gave birth to Western democracy", "for a deeper understanding of Greece". But is Greece really the cradle of western civilisation?[/caption]
You also tie into your discourse that age-old falsely irredentist complex that the Greeks have a right and claim to anything even rhetorically relatable to ancient Greece, and anyone who has set foot where a Greek has or goes will, as you will no doubt also enthusiastically exalt, become a true Greek, the same justifications used for the atrocities in the Morea, Thessaly, Macedonia, Eastern and Western Thrace, Bulgaria, Crete, Anatolia and Cyprus, and where the support of great powers, including the United States, was repeatedly coerced and manipulated with political expedience and lies, as they were falsely made to believe they were doing something moral for the necessity of peace and protecting certain denominations of people... invasion, occupation, ethnic cleansing, war, wanton death and destruction, attempted genocide...
The cradle of western civilisation indeed.
Here is a brief history of the land where modern Greece currently stands, to help you put the history of that land and your country into perspective:
• Mycenaean Greece: 1600 - 1050 BCE
• Ancient Greece: 1100 - 146 BCE
• Archaic Greece: 800 - 500 BCE
• Classical Greece: 499 - 338 CE
• Macedonian Greece: 338 - 323 BCE
• Hellenistic Greece: 323 - 31 BCE
• Roman Greece: 31 BCE - 1460 CE
• Ottoman Turkish Greece: 1460-1832
• Russian Instigated Orlov Revolt: 1770
• Philhellenism Founded: 1789–1792
• Philhellenes Sought French Support: 1793
• Puristic Language Conceived: Late-18th Century
• Independence Movement Started: 25 March 1821
• Independence Declared: 15 January 1822
• Capital Established in Nafplio: 1829
• Independence Recognised: 3 February 1830
• Otto’s Despotic Oligarchic Monarchy Installed: 1831
• Policy of De-Romanization and De-Turkification Accelerated: 1830s
• Philhellenism Accelerated in the US: 1830s
• US Recognised Greek Independence: 9 November 1837
• First Insurrection & Revolt Occurred: 1 February 1862
• George I’s Monarchy Anti-Democratically Installed: 30 March 1863
• Greece Became Crowned Republic: 1864
• US Established Diplomatic Relations: 1868
• Applied Concept of Parliamentary Majority: 1875
• Public Insolvency Declared: 1893
• The Greek Language Dispute: Early-19th Century
• Greek Theatre is Born: Early-19th Century
• Greek Military Coup: August 1909
• Monarchy Toppled by Turkey: 25 March 1924
• Military Dictatorship: 1925 - 1926
• Venizelist Revolt Against Democracy: March 1935
• Metaxas Totalitarian Single-Party Regime: 4 August 1936 - 23 April 1941
• Nazi Occupation: April 1941 - October 1944
• Greek Civil War: 1944 - 1949
• Economic Miracle (US Grants & Loans): 1950s and 1960s
• Regime of Colonels: 21 April 1967 - 20 July 1974
• Abolition of Monarchy: 1 June 1973
• Fascist Military Dictatorship Toppled by Turkey: 20 July 1974
• Third Hellenic Republic: 24 July 1974
• Current Constitution: 11 June 1975
• Current (Dimotiki) Language Adopted: 1976
• Blackmailed the EU: 2004
• Policy of Abusive Migrant Pushbacks: 2008 - 2022
• Economic Crisis & Bailout from Western States: 2009
• Hellenism (Religion) Recognised: 2017
The Mycanaeans were clearly an imported steppe people and culture. The ancient through to classical periods were politically, culturally and linguistically diverse with no single homogenous identity. They all knew they were different. The Macedonian period was exactly that. Macedonian. Which championed and kickstarted Hellenism but itself was a "barbarian" culture, according to the ancient Greeks themselves. Anyone who knows any of the Greek languages or ancient Greek history knows that means they were not culturally "Greek". The Hellenic period was culturally early-medieval Greek and by no means saw the ethnogenesis of any Greek speaking people or the advent of a common homogenous "one-Greek" identity... then there's the modern Greeks who are actually the children of the Ottoman Turks and owe their patrilineal and matrilineal heritage to primarily non-Greek speaking peoples and cultures from different parts of Europe and Asia... and their history is by no means "clean" or simple... nor connected to that of the ancient Greeks or this rhetoric of the Hellenes...
One only needs to look at this simple yet turbulent timeline to understand, and I’m stunned to have to point out this very important fact, but a path that needs treading in the search of answers about modern Greek history and influence around the globe is that of empirical reason.
Where is yours?
To quote the wise words of the founder of the modern Republic of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk:
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"To write history is as important as to make history. It is an unchanging truth that if the writer does not remain true to the maker, then it takes on a quality that will confuse humanity."
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"The biggest battle is the war against ignorance."
They may say ignorance is bliss but that is only short lived. Those who refuse to open their eyes to everything that goes on around them will always contribute to the ruin of societies.
People need to open their minds and start accepting the truth as it is.
That includes you too, Mr. Mitsotakis.
*Bibliography & Further Reading
(1) The Greek language question was a major dispute on whether the official language of Greece should be the archaic Katharevousa, created in the late-18th century and used as the official state and scholarly language, or the Dimotiki, the form of the Greek language which evolved naturally from the Greek languages spoken in the Eastern Roman Empire and was the language of the people. This was resolved when Dimotiki was made the only official variation of the Greek language.
(2) Other modern Greek languages today include The Pontic dialect which came to Greece from Asia Minor. The Cappadocian dialect which is endangered and is barely spoken now. The Tsakonian dialect, which derives from Doric Greek instead of Koine Greek.
(3) It is perhaps shameful, yet never dutifully admitted, that it was not until the subsequent Nazi invasion and occupation of Greece, followed by the surrender of the Metaxas regime, that the totalitarian regime was finally put to an end, only to be replaced by a new regime of German-origin.
(4) It is similarly interesting to note that it was the Turkish Intervention against the Greek Invasion of Cyprus, triggering a political crisis in Greece, which led to the regime's collapse and the restoration of democracy through Metapolitefsi, and led to the promulgation of the current democratic and republican constitution, as well as the choice to not restore the monarchy. This was just 5 decades after the Turkish War of Independence also had the effect of triggering events which led to the collapse of the monarchy.
(5) Otto's monarchy was overthrown on 23 October 1862. From 19 November 1862 a plebiscite in Greece was held in support of adopting Prince Alfred of the United Kingdom, later Duke of Edinburgh, as king. The results were announced in February 1863. Of the 240,000 votes reported, over 95% were in favour of the appointment. The previous king, Otto, who had been deposed in a popular revolt, received one vote. There were six votes for a Greek candidate and 93 for a Republic. Despite the apparently overwhelming result, the Great Powers of Britain, France and Russia refused to permit any member of their respective royal families to accept the Greek throne. Eventually, Prince William of Denmark, who had received six votes in the referendum, was appointed as the new "King of the Hellenes", assuming the name George I.
(6) The Second Hellenic Republic, known officially as the Hellenic Republic, saw some of the most important historical events in modern Greek history emerge; from Greece's first military dictatorship, to the short-lived democratic form of governance that followed. It began after the fall of the monarchy was proclaimed by the country's parliament on 25 March 1924, a direct result of their humiliating defeat during the Greek Invasion of Turkey and the Turkish War of Independence, also referred to by the Greeks as the Anatolian Disaster. The Second Hellenic Republic was abolished on 10 October 1935, and its abolition was confirmed by referendum on 3 November of the same year which is widely accepted as having been mired with electoral fraud. The fall of the Republic eventually paved the way for Greece to become a totalitarian single-party state, when Ioannis Metaxas established the 4th of August Regime in 1936, lasting until the Axis occupation of Greece in 1941.
(7) Since its founding at the expense of the Ottoman Turkish empire and their historical heartlands and territories, the modern state of Greece has been involved in multiple wars and conflicts, violated the sovereignty of other nations, hyped up tensions, and caused brutal revolts often built on the back of religious crusades and ethnic cleansing campaigns, as well as participated in genocides with neighbouring allies, often with the enlisted support of malignly connived at and misled nations, most nominally the great powers of Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy and the United States. These include: the procurement of the Ioanian Islands from Britain (1864), the instigated Cretan Revolt (1866–1869), the annexation of Thessaly (1881), the First Greco-Turkish War, also known as the 30-Day War (1897), the de facto annexation of Crete (1908), the Balkan Wars (1912 - 1913), the annexation of Epirus, Macedonia, the Aegean Islands & Crete (1913), the Second Greco-Turkish War (May 1919 - October 1922), the annexation of Western Thrace (1919), the annexation of the 12 Dodecanese islands (1947), the occupation of Cyprus (December 1963), the invasion of Cyprus (15 July 1974), the occupation of south Cyprus (16 August 1974)...
(8) Edward Rowe. The Anatolian origins of the US Congress. T-Vine. 8 November 2018. https://www.t-vine.com/the-anatolian-origins-of-the-us-congress/
(9) The Romans viewed their republic in contrast to what had existed earlier: monarchy or rule by a king
(10) This philosophy of independence in the Americas was further reiterated in the assertion of the Rev. Thomas Hooker of Connecticut as early as 1638, when he said in a sermon before the General Court that: “The foundation of authority is laid in the free consent of the people. The choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God’s own allowance.” And again in what John Wise was writing in 1710, when he said: "Every man must be acknowledged equal to every man.” “The end of all good government is to cultivate humanity and promote the happiness of all and the good of every man in all his rights, his life, liberty, estate, honor, and so forth..." “For as they have a power every man in his natural state, so upon combination they can and do bequeath this power to others and settle it according as their united discretion shall determine.”
(11) The foundations of the attempt to depose an undesirable king, of daring to change relations between the monarch and the various estates of the realm, and the forerunner of the doctrine of equality and the "best ideas of democracy", came from Simon de Montfort’s Parliament in 1265 to the outbreak of the English Civil War in 1642, and the British Parliamentary democracy it gave birth to.
(12) The doctrine of equality and the "best ideas of democracy" was later partially realised in the Commonwealth of Virginia, which became the forerunner to the US Declaration of Rights, prepared by George Mason and presented to the general assembly on 27 May 1776.
(13) Tatian is Latin for Tatianus, meaning "honourable". Tatian of Adiabene, or Tatian the Syrian or Tatian the Assyrian, was a Christian Assyrian of Greek descent, writer and theologian of the 2nd century AD. Tatian was educated in Greek philosophy. As a young man he travelled extensively. Disgusted with the greed of the pagan philosophers with whom he came in contact, he conceived a profound contempt for their teachings. Tatian's most influential work is the Diatessaron, a Biblical paraphrase, or "harmony", of the four gospels that became the standard text of the four gospels in the Syriac-speaking churches until the 5th-century, after which it gave way to the four separate gospels in the Peshitta version.
(14) The ancient Greeks were not a homogenous ethnic group but a series of unique and independent people, cultures and civilisations, mostly thriving in their own city-states, that were all naturally unique inter-ethnic people with origins in the Yamnaya tribes and culture. While many historians attribute ancient Greek connections to modern day languages and cultures, it is in-fact the Yamnaya that provides this connection. In addition, the Mycenaeans and Minoans who are normally considered the progenitors of Greek culture by historians are in-fact an imported steppe people and culture - mostly from the Northern Forest Steppe, that intermingled with the natives to create what is called Greek culture.
(15) The modern Greeks are often credited with influencing the modern world through the contributions of the ancient Greeks. There are three points however that need to be mentioned. One. The modern Greeks are not the ancient Greeks. They are also not a direct unbroken continuity of the ancient Greeks, and whatever continuity they do have is based chiefly on rhetoric. Two. Similarly, although the ancient Greeks are often credited with making vast contributions to the world, although nothing they did is to be discounted, they also owe these contributions to the contributions of others. For example, it was their increasing contact with non-Greek speaking peoples in the Archaic period, especially in the Near East, which inspired developments in art and architecture, the adoption of coinage, and the development of the Greek alphabet. In particular they were fascinated by ancient Egyptian culture and wisdom, and many ancient Greek intellectuals traveled to Egypt to study at the feet of Egyptian priests and scholars. Meaning ancient Greek wisdom and philosophy actually incorporated and built upon ancient Egyptian teachings. Religion. History. Philosophy. The Calendar. Art. Astrology. Mythology. All appropriations from ancient Egyptian and other cultures and peoples.
