Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "The 1978 Battle of Larnaca Airport, Cyprus, and UK Diplomacy." Middle East Review of International Affairs 13, no. 2 (Jun. 2009): 95-104.Panagiotis Dimitrakis has a Website at http://www.pdimitrakis.com/.
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "The 1978 Battle of Larnaca Airport, Cyprus, and UK Diplomacy." Middle East Review of International Affairs 13, no. 2 (Jun. 2009): 95-104.
In 1978, when Egypt tried to stage an Entebbe-style raid on terrorists at Larnaca airport, the Cypriot National Guard opened fire on the Egyptian forces, "killing 15 commandos and destroying their C-130H transport.... The conclusion of this forgotten crisis may be relevant to today's war on terrorism strategy; no matter how weak a country is considered, no matter how high the terrorist threat might be, states planning a foreign intervention should obtain the agreement of the sovereign government first."
[OtherCountries/Arab/Egypt & Cyprus]
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "British Intelligence and the Cyprus Insurgency, 1955-1959." International Journal of Intelligence
and Counterintelligence 21, no. 2 (Summer 2008): 375-394.
"The British services had very good intelligence on the EOKA organization, methods, tactics, and operations.... Tactical intelligence on the whereabouts of the guerrilla leaders was, however, hard to come by.... [T]he guerrillas were able to maintain the military and political initiative."
[OtherCountries/Cyprus; UK/Postwar/Counterinsurgency]
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "Greek Military Intelligence and the Italian Threat, 1934-1940." Journal of Intelligence History 7, no. 1 (Summer 2007): 1-29. [http://www.intelligence-history.org/jih/7-1.html]
From 1934, "Greek generals and their staffs identified Italy as the most serious threat to Greek national security.... The Italian invasion of Greece in October 1940 was not a surprise but an anticipated hostile act Greek strategists had forecast[]." Nevertheless, the head of the Greek administration, Ioannis Metaxas, "chose not to mobilize on time and to call-up the reservists [Army General Staff chief Maj. Gen. Alexandros] Papagos had requested in the period of spring 1939-summer 1940." He "believed that a general mobilization prior to the actual Italian attack could have serious diplomatic and financial repercussions for Greece and could provoke Rome....
"The Greek Army did not have 'all the time in the world' for defence preparations, but at least it was not surprised. The machinery for call-up of conscripts was in place waiting Metaxas' and King George's II signing of the relevant royal warrants on 28 October early morning. In addition, since almost 1938, their staff officers had been operating under a war mentality."
[OtherCountries/Greece/Gen]
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "Greek Military Intelligence and the Turkish 'Threat' During the 1987 Aegean Crisis." Journal of Modern Greek Studies 25 (2007): 99–127.
The author argues that "during the 1987 crisis, Turkish armed forces did not constitute an imminent threat to Greece despite the hostile rhetoric of Ankara. Greek military intelligence was able to confirm Turkish passivity and inform Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou not to expect any Turkish hostile act over the Aegean Sea continental shelf before the Greeks might have taken precipitous action."
[OtherCountries/Greece/Gen & Turkey]
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "Intelligence for Crisis Management: The Case of the January 1996 Greek-Turkish Crisis." European Security 17, no. 4(Dec. 2008): 455-493.
From abstract: "[T]he author assesses the role of Greek military intelligence" during the January 1996 Greek-Turkish crisis over the sovereignty status of two Southeast Aegean islets. He "shows that during the crisis hours of 31 January 1996, the lack of tactical intelligence on Turkish deployment had a direct impact on the assessment of the operational status of the Greek armed forces and on the planned crisis response."
[OtherCountries/Greece/Gen & Turkey]
Dimitrakis, Panagiotis. "The Special Operations Executive and Cyprus in the Second World War." Middle Eastern Studies 45, no. 2 (Mar. 2009): 315-328.
"Poor co-ordination between the SOE and the 25th Army Corps was the main aspect of the SOE story in Cyprus. Regular staff officers did not believe in guerrilla warfare and it seems that the SOE officers did not successfully defend their role within the overall strategy on Cyprus. Besides, distrust of the Cypriots was so profound that the British plan was encapsulated in the phrase 'let the Germans first invade and then we will train our guerrillas.'"
[UK/WWII/Med]
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