Classical Spies: American Archaeologists with the OSS in World War II Greece

Epilogue

Epilogue during world war ii, occupied Greece fell under the umbrella of the Middle East theater of operations, which the British controlled. Thus, Britain’s imperialist vision dominated activities in this sphere, and American foreign policy deferred to Britain’s. However, during the postliberation period, the American foreign policy makers slowly shed the shackles that bound them to England. They were able to do so, in part, because of independent political intelligence provided by Rodney Young and the archaeologists of the OSS Greek Desk. What inspired Rodney Young to set aside his archaeological research and participate in the war was the desire to relieve suffering. As a result of his years and shared experience of suffering with the Greek people during the occupation, Young had, from the ‹rst draft of the “Greek Project” onward , combined relief with intelligence gathering. It formed an important part of his vision for the Greek Desk and his postliberation intelligence blueprint, the “Young Plan.” Eventually, it caused him to abandon OSS to concentrate on the relief and reconstruction of Greece with United Nations Relief and Rescue Administration (UNRRA). To be sure, Young’s primary motive was military—to rid Greece of the Germans. Yet Young was not omniscient. He expected direct U.S. military involvement in an invasion of Greece that never occurred. Because of the passivity of the United States in the Mediterranean arena until the successful conclusion of Operation Torch in 1943, Young’s logic and that of his original superior, Col. Ulius Amoss, was colored by that of their dominant ally, Britain, and the Greek government-in-exile. 271 The chief problem—the lack of a clear U.S. foreign policy for Greece and the Balkans—affected the strategy of the U.S. military and, eventually, OSS. Despite Greece’s importance to Donovan and predominance in the early days of COI, after January 1943 and the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s subsequent refusal to deploy U.S. troops in the Aegean, Greece plummeted on the list of priorities in the American war effort. Because the United States did not have imperialistic aspirations in the eastern Mediterranean, as did Britain, it had never been vitally interested in Greece.1 In fact, Washington had no ulterior motives for a deeper commitment to Greece other than exploiting certain commercial opportunities. Having only recently emerged from isolation, the United States, in spite of an active Greek-American population, did not have Greece on its radar screen and would not commit troops there.“The area to the east of the Adriatic was regarded by American strategists with something akin to the superstitious dread with which medieval mariners once contemplated the monster-infested reaches of Western Ocean.”2 In many ways, America’s dilemma was rooted in the mutually exclusive aims of the Atlantic Charter, wherein the signatories, the United States and Britain, eschewed territorial ambition in occupied countries and promised to return prewar rulers to their rightful positions while respecting the right of the occupied peoples to self-determination. The United States was interested in supporting democracy over monarchy, and Churchill’s support of the Greek king over the wishes of his people was a thorn in Roosevelt’s side. Because of America’s antiroyalist tradition, Greeks looked to the United States for leadership, but Roosevelt generally deferred to Churchill and turned a deaf ear to Greece. This conundrum partly stemmed from the lack of an effective ambassador for the occupied country and begat apathy and ignorance. As a result, Roosevelt did not take Greece seriously. Despite his investment of MacVeagh as minister to the Greek government-in-exile in September 1943, the president subsequently declared Greece “a minor objective ” in the greater context of global war and compared Yugoslavia and Greece to ‹ghting dogs. Moreover, his paternalistic treatment of King George II betrayed his disregard of the gravity of the political crisis in December 1943.3 In spite of a lack of leadership from Washington and its diplomatic representative in Cairo,Young did not shy from grappling with the internal political dilemmas that beset the country. Indeed, his ‹rst major intelligence assignment was to analyze the political movements in occupied Greece. In August 1943, Young set aside his other work to apprise Washington of the 272 • classical spies crisis with the British Foreign Of‹ce, the Greek king and his cabinet, and the guerrilla delegation in Cairo. He adhered scrupulously to the principles of...