Office of the Historian

740.0011 European War 1939/8801: Telegram

The Minister in Greece (MacVeagh) to the Secretary of State

Athens, March 4, 1941—2 p.m.
[Received March 5—8:40 p.m.]

117. The Military Attaché reports that after attending a conference of the King, Mr. Eden and the Prime Minister, the Economic Director of the Greek Foreign Office,33a now charged with questions of military supply, informed Major Craw34 as follows:

1.
The German southward movement35 is proceeding rapidly. (This is confirmed by Greek G–2.) By the night of March 2 some 5 divisions had already entered Bulgaria together with 400 airplanes.
2.
A German reconnaissance airplane on a photographic mission made a forced landing near the Nestos River south of Xanthe on March 2. The crew consisting of an officer, pilot, and an observer were interned. The plane was undamaged. Another German machine performing such work north of Salonika made a similar descent in Yugoslavia, but was not interned.
3.
Including 1 division recently organized the Greeks have now 5 divisions in Macedonia plus miscellaneous fortress troops or a total numerical strength of about 6 divisions. This felt to be entirely inadequate to withstand a German attack, but so long as the weather continues to prevent an advance to a shorter line in Albania no reinforcements can be drawn from that front.
4.
The difficulty of transporting British troops across the Mediterranean places the maximum British ground assistance possible to Greece at 3 divisions only and this cannot be provided in less than 2 months.

The Royal Air Force here expects that the Germans will attack Greece as soon as they are prepared and that the date will coincide with improved weather conditions, which should be in about a month.

Please inform War Department.

MacVeagh
  1. A. Argyropoulos.↩
  2. Maj. Demos T. Craw, Assistant Military Attaché for Air at the Legation in Greece.↩
  3. Through Bulgaria, which began March 1, upon adhesion of Bulgaria to the Tripartite Pact; for text of pact, signed between Japan, Germany, and Italy, September 27, 1940, see League of Nations Treaty Series, vol. cciv, p. 386.↩