Summary

Events of a History spanning two centuries: Most of them are unknown to us; some we learned in summary. In our schools, we heard almost nothing about bankruptcies and crises beyond what our parents and grandparents said. Most of the wars were glorious - even if we lost them. The others were unjust and uneven against us - that’s why we lost them.

We forgot the first of the civil wars in the excitement for the achievements of the heroes of 1821. We crammed the second one into a single event, the assassination of Kapodistrias. We learned very little about the mutual killings that he wanted to stop at the cost of his own life.

We named the third civil war "Division," even though it split Greece into two states, and the Church excommunicated the country's prime minister at a rally, after which the country had several thousand dead at rallies - and in pogroms - in the neighborhoods of Athens.

The fourth civil war was dubbed "the war against the bandits" by the victors, while the defeated made it a banner of revenge. If the Greek citizens had known the mistakes that led to our first six bankruptcies, we would have avoided the seventh. If our leaders understood how we arrived at the first three civil wars in our history, they would have renounced the civil war demagoguery.

These simple things are what I wanted to express in this book.

Contents:

Summary chronology of wars, crises, and bankruptcies in Greece: 1821-2016 || Preface to the new (12th) edition || Acknowledgment || Introduction || First period of bankruptcies and wars: 1821-1879 || A historical and geopolitical misfortune || Nationalism historically inevitable - and destructive || Second period of bankruptcies and wars: 1880-1898 || The "Division" that was a civil war || Third and fourth periods of bankruptcies and wars: 1899-1940 || Fifth period of bankruptcies and wars: 1940-2012 || Wars and civil wars: the Cain syndrome || The civil war mentality and the crisis || Sources || Index of main names and place names || Thematic index