Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1940-11-11
Modern Marathon

Greece's killed highland regiments,
another brand of Ladies from He'll"
have won notable victory over Italy's
crack Alpine mountain troops. In
the gloomy, rain-lashed gorges of the
VioSa River, an Italian force of some
$4,000 men were trapped by Greek
mountaineers lining the precipitous
heights and were either captured or
destroyed. Furthermore, this out
standing triumph was the culmina-
ton of a series of minor Greek sue
cesses along almost the entire front
since the start of Italy'S wanton
attack on Greece a fortnight ago.
Our military experts have been
warning the American public not to
OvereStimate the Importance of the
opening phases of the Greco-Italian
war. Still, the military effects of
these Greek successes should be
considerable. The whole Italian
drive evidently has been halted,
and the mechanical equipment
which is its mainstay threatens to
be begged down by autumn gales
which herald a four month rainy
season. This Pindus Mountain region
of Western Greece, wild and roadleSs,
is some of the toughest terrain in
the Balkans. With growing British
aid, it is possible that the doughty
Greeks may be able to hold up the
Italians for long time.
If Britain can spare enough air
and naval power for this sector of
the far-fung Mediterranean theater
of war, the Italians may find them
selves in a bad fix When the war
started, they probably did not have
more than 100000 men in Albania,
and all their supplies have to come
across the Adriatic Sea, entering by
only two good harbors which inten-
sive bombing might effectively wreck.
A sustained Greek offensive coupled
with weakened Italian morale could
conceivably lead to an Italian dis
aster of the first magnitude.
There seems to be curious parallel
between the Italian attack on Greece
and last winters Russian assault on
Finland. Mussolini may have been
as much fooled about Greek resist
ance as Stain was about the Firms.
Italian prisoners all say they ex-
pected the Greeks to give in after,
them to cross the frontier as light
heartedly as did the Soviet troops
into Finland. In both cases the sur
prisingly hot reception they got
seems to have been equally devastat-
ing on military morale.
Indeed, the Italians probably got
the greater shock, because all the
evidence tends to reveal the existence
of a well-organized fifth column in
Greece, with the pro-aXis Prince
Paul, heir apparent to the Greek
throne, ready to head a new govern
ment and turn the country over to
MuSsolini. That iron-fiSted Premier
Metaxas was able to smash internal
disaffection and galvanize his coun-
trymen to effective resistance so
speedily speaks volumes for his hold
on his nation.
What the repercusSions of Greek
success and Italian failure will be
upon the larger war situation, it is
difficult to say. Short of an Italian
debacle in Albania, the Italian
conflict will presumably continue to
be a side-show. Nothing as yet in
dicates that Yugoslavia is altering its
policy of strict neutrality or that
Turkey is moving to Greece'S aid.
Any such favorable developments in
the Balkans would probably occur
only because of major diplomatic
shifts such as a rift between Russia
and the axis, which, with Premier
Molotoff scheduled to visit Berlin,
seems improbable. Nevertheless,
Greece today stands with Finland in
the proud rank Of small nations with
great souls. The heroism of those
killed highlanders on the wind-swept
Pindus Mountains is every whit as
fine as the courage of the ancient
Greek hoplites who smashed the
Persian host on the plain of
Marathon