Greece: Politic Reprieve

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Desertion is not an act calculated to win sympathy from senior officers. Neither, for that matter, is an attempt to blow up the nation's Premier and overthrow the government by armed rebellion. Thus when Alexandros Panaghoulis stood before Judge Panayotis Voughas in Athens Special Military Court, it seemed hardly surprising that the death sentence was pronounced. Greece's ruling colonels were proud of the fact that there had been no executions under the 19-month-old regime, but in this case there seemed ample reason for breaking precedent.

Panaghoulis himself was of little help to the defense. He boasted of his plan to destroy Premier George Papadopoulos' car, and he proudly pleaded guilty to the charges of desertion and sedition —the two counts bearing a possible death sentence. "Condemn me to death," he challenged the court. "For me, the best swan song is the death rattle before the firing squad of a tyranny."

Pleas for clemency poured in, however, from both within Greece and from abroad. U.N. Secretary-General U Thant, Pope Paul VI and the U.S. Government added their voices to the cam paign. In Athens, the response was stony. The controlled Greek press was not even allowed to refer to the mounting appeals for clemency. Final defense pleas for a reprieve were denied. Slowly, Pa-naghoulis' last hours ticked away.

Then, in a startling about-face, the regime announced that it had decided to spare the 30-year-old deserter. Instead of death, he faced a long term in a prison on the island of Aegina. What had happened?

The fate of Panaghoulis was known to have bitterly divided the ruling junta into hawks and doves. Possibly as a result, there was a government shake-up involving four of the original junta officers. Hard-lining former Colonel Ioannis Ladas was switched from the Public Order Ministry to the Interior Ministry, in the process losing direct control of the nation's police. He refused his new post. Ladas, and two other junta members, were balking at their reassignments. Premier Papadopoulos, intent on avoiding further damage to his government's reputation abroad, seemed to have sided with the doves, who wanted to spare the condemned man. The decision to do just that suggested that he had in fact tightened his hold on the government by one more notch.