Nike!

The word from the mountains was nike --victory. The Grammos battle was officially over. Clambering up the stark, grey slope of Grammos' highest peak, weary, tattered Greek soldiers unfurled the blue and white national flag. Some crossed themselves gratefully; others wept.

The Greeks who won at Grammos had defeated more than a handful of rebels. United Nations observers found ample evidence that the guerrillas had received aid from Communist-dominated Countries. At several points well inside Albania the U.N. observers saw deep trenches, mortar emplacements, pillboxes, ammunition and food. Just inside Greek territory observers found Hungarian canned vegetables and fruit, Yugoslav canned meat and Albanian cigarettes. In the bushes on either side of the border were Bulgarian books on such subjects as "Thirty Years in the Soviet Army," "This Is How We Fought at Stalingrad" and "The American Plan for the Enslavement of Europe."

Not Even a Goat. Captured guerrillas told of foreign aid. Said 27-year-old Elefterios Tsakales, a former shoemaker of Soufli: "I left Greece on Nov. 26, 1946, stayed a few days in Sofia and went on to a camp at Bulkes, Yugoslavia, where I remained until a month ago. One night we were called up and told that we would free Greece from the American fascists."

Other Bulkes alumni described the indoctrination course given at the camp. Lecture topics included "The Communist Victory in the Chicago Strikes," and "The Ineffectiveness of the Atomic Bomb." (Students were told that the bomb had been tried out in the U.S. and had not even killed a goat.) The Russian language was taught because "it was bound to become the universal language."

Said one: "We had a cleanup before the U.N. commission visited us last year. Slogans were wiped off the walls and military jackets were replaced with peasant coats."

The Sun & the Moon. Following army spearheads the next day, the observation group visited Markos' former capital, Aetomilitsa, a typical mountain village of about 100 grey, slate-roofed stone houses nestling against the peak of Mavri Petra (Black Stone). So hasty was Markos' retreat that he left over 2,000 pounds of bread in the village ovens. All the houses in Aetomilitsa had Communist slogans painted in red. The wall of the lecture hall in the largest building, the military academy, bore the slogans, "Men Are Judged by Their Deeds" and, just below, "Long Live Markos!"

All the villagers had fled or been carried away by the retreating guerrillas except crippled, 50-year-old Katina Kitsiki. Asked if she had seen Markos there, Katina replied: "He was here, but no one saw him. The sun did not shine on him by day, nor the moon at night."

The Greek Government believed that Markos had fled into Albania. Wherever he was, the backbone of his.government of "Free Greece" was broken. Greek army sources reckoned that it would take a few weeks to complete mopping up in the Grammos area; they expected the roundup of other rebel groups scattered throughout the country to be completed by the end of the year.

U.S. supplies and the military advice of General James A. Van Fleet's men were essential elements in the victory. The main credit, however, belonged to the hard-bitten Greek infantrymen, like those who wept last week on Grammos.

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