By declaring that the United States “must come to the assistance of free peoples who refused to allow themselves to be subjugated by armed minorities and to submit to external pressures”, the President was in effect committing the United States to a policy which would lead them beyond beyond their traditional borders of influence and placed them at the head of the Western world in the fight against communism. On a practical level, this meant Congress voting some $250 million in economic and military aid to Greece.
After President Truman's statement and Congress's vote, the attacks by communist partisans turned into a real civil war; they wanted to snatch victory before the aid promised by the United States became a reality. In July they made a strong push towards Ioannina, Epirus, and soon controlled a large area in northern Greece, including the border. Then they tried twice to seize Konitsa, a town near the Albanian border, and they installed a government, thus forcing Athens into a new form of war against a solidly established base instead of fighting against very strong commandos. mobiles.
Throughout 1947, the guerrillas had exhausted and bewildered the Greek army, whose strategy, which consisted above all of defending key cities, was in no way suited to an insurrection. Of this genre. The democratic army, the name under which the partisans of the left had grouped themselves, saw its numbers double during this period; it numbered about 23,000 men.
Ships bringing American military aid began to arrive in August, and on November 18 a combined Greek-American staff took command.
At the end of 1947, Greece received very substantial American aid and nearly three hundred American officers served as instructors and advisers in the Greek army.
The war against the Communist partisans continued in a more or less covert fashion for two more years, although the American presence and the fact that Stalin understood that the United States would not let the partisans win made the inevitable outcome.
In February, General James A. Van Fleet arrived in Greece and unofficially took charge of the operations against the partisans; a new strategy was adopted:it consisted of clearing well-defined sectors and supporting these operations with more vigorous actions. Simultaneously, the partisans made the mistake of reverting to more traditional methods of fighting, and this just when their opponents were more numerous and better organized than before. The communists were, moreover, divided on the fundamental question of strategy.
At the beginning of July, 38,000 men, 135 tanks and 225 aircraft were concentrated on the Japanese side of the border, east of Khalkhin-Gol. The Soviet and Mongol forces numbered only 12,500 men, but Zhukov had 186 top-class tanks and 226 armored vehicles. He was going to need it. The Japanese plan