He studied civil engineering at the Athens Polytechnic, but the German invasion followed by the British occupation drew him into the Resistance, activities from which he would end up near fatally wounded, losing one eye, then later condemned to death. Forced to escape his country, Xenakis ended up in Paris, wanting to study music, but earning a living working as an engineering assistant for Le Corbusier. As I write, the greek troops are commencing their evacuation of Eastern Thrace. They have abandoned their thatched huts, their camouflaged gun positions, their machine guns nests, and all the heavily wired, stru g out fortified ridges where they had planned to make a last stand against the Turk. Heavy wheeled baggage cars drawn by muddy flanked buffulo with slanted back horns drag along the dusty road.
Some soldiers lie on top of the mounds of baggage, while others goad the buffulo along.
Even in the evacuation the Greek soldiers looked like good troops. There is a sturdy doggedness about them that would have meant a hard time for the Turk if Kemal's army would have had to fight for Thrace instead of having it handed to them as a gift at Mudania. These officers had many of them been promoted from the ranks, were good soldiers and splended leaders. They were removed and their places filled with new officers of the Tino party, most of whom had spent the war in excile in Switzerland or Germany and had never heard a shot fired. That caused a complete breakdown of the army and was responsible for the Greek defeat.