Demetracopoulos boasted that he was one of the journalists who had brought about the fall of the Karamanlis government and now had appreciative high-level connections. Modesty was not his strong suit, and he had an exasperating habit of overselling himself, even to friends: talking with notables at a cocktail reception over canapés might become “dining together,” for instance. Nevertheless, all of Elias’s exaggerations had a credible basis in fact, which greatly annoyed his enemies. Privately, American officials refused to call him a “phoney [sic],” especially compared to his “generally irresponsible” press colleagues, and described him as “one of the most able newspapermen of this area” who relied on a network of “excellent sources.”33
Elias’s three newspapers each provided him different benefits. Liberal Makedonia, his longest-standing relationship, extended his national reputation to the north and provided him his largest expense account. At his center-left English-language Athens Daily Post, with the smallest general circulation, he could write whatever he wanted and knew it would be read regularly by embassy officials and others in the American community. The widely read and respected Ethnos (Nation), founded in 1913 to be the leading republican voice, was his primary journalistic outlet. All three papers had endorsed the Center Union, and Demetracopoulos’s pieces were frequently supportive of government policies. When Papandreou opponents tried to undermine his economic plans by claiming that only buying gold and hoarding sovereigns could save their life savings from disaster, Elias wrote lengthy articles designed to calm the fears of panicked bank depositors and help stabilize the drachma.34
In April 1964, when the visiting Greek-American publishers of Greek Heritage requested an interview with the prime minister to discuss the Cyprus issue, Papandreou’s office asked Elias to handle it, telling the publishers that Demetracopoulos was an “official political counselor of the prime minister.”35 A bitter CIA accused him of having used unexplained “devious means” to “work his way into the good graces of Prime Minister Papandreou.”36
Elias often sparred with the American Embassy about its perceived hostility to the Papandreous, especially Andreas. In May, he was instrumental in publicizing a confrontation between Andreas and Vincent Joyce, the US public-affairs officer, over Voice of America broadcasts.37 Joyce also had had several clashes with Elias. However, when Ethnos published a harsh editorial that included a gratuitous attack on Joyce’s Turkish wife, Elias sharply opposed the provocation, earning Joyce’s thanks.38 Nevertheless, after Joyce was told by the Greek government to leave the country, word passed on the street that Elias had the clout to “get” anyone. Elias, who continually refined his knack of working all sides, never publicly clarified the facts of the Joyce episode, encouraging an air of mystery, even danger.
Demetracopoulos was not, however, a Papandreou government toady. He made headlines when he disclosed efforts of Lockheed and Northrop to bribe Greek officials to win military sales contracts. In the face of planned cuts in Greek military spending and renewed communal violence in Cyprus, he urged increased support for the navy, arguing that any Turkish invasion of the island would come by sea.
Elias would often say that Andreas’s self-centered approach to building his own political base put the Center Union Party’s reformist agenda at risk. He also acknowledged the effectiveness of opposition charges against Andreas’s personal integrity and did not defend Andreas when he became involved in a sex and financial scandal.39
Elias’s primary commitment was getting good stories with less concern for partisan consequences. In November, 1964 a mine exploded, killing thirteen and wounding fifty-one, during an anniversary picnic honoring Greek resistance veterans of the 1942 ELAS-British commando operation who blew up the Gorgopotamos railroad bridge to interdict German supply lines.40 Although it seemed to be just a tragic accident involving ordnance left over from that war or the civil war, Greek leftists wanted to make it into something sinister. The next August, Ethnos called Elias early one morning to tell him they’d received a copy of a letter purportedly sent by US Army attaché O. K. Marshall to Washington, taking credit for the success of the American-led secret operation.
Other papers also had copies of the same document, and Elias did not want to be scooped. It was an obvious forgery, and both Greek and US governments did not want the press to grab the bait and make more of it than it was. Other papers hesitated. Elias, believing the forgery itself newsworthy, pushed the US Embassy to issue a formal statement denouncing the forgery, which Ethnos printed in a special edition, along with the forged letter.
The government denounced the Ethnos publication as a “deliberate effort to disturb Greek-American relations.”41 Rightist newspapers speculated that the bomb had been set off by Communists, and leftist publications bruited CIA involvement. Radio Free Greece in Bulgaria also got involved, using Elias’s reporting for its propaganda. With Elias developing new angles to replay the story, the controversy continued for months, boosting Ethnos’s circulation and management praise for their star reporter.
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PAPANDREOU’S VICTORY IN 1964 was not the only dramatic change that year. King Paul died in March, shortly after swearing in the new prime minister. His charming 23-year-old son, known more for his convertible sports car and 1960 Olympics yachting gold medal, assumed the throne as King Constantine II, and moved up his marriage to Princess Anne-Marie of Denmark. When Elias flew to Copenhagen to cover pre-nuptial ceremonies, he warned Danish officials about the Queen Mother and her influence over her son. Demetracopoulos also criticized the US Embassy’s policy of letting the CIA be the prime interlocutor with the Palace. A majority of Greeks were republican, he said, and siding with the royal family put the United States on the wrong side of history. The embassy shot back, chastising Ethnos for its “anti-American policy.”
That same year, Elias returned to Washington. Admiral Burke and General Quinn had successfully convinced CIA director John McCone to meet with the journalist privately. It was an unsatisfactory encounter in which Elias angrily complained about the CIA being “out to get him.”42 Naturally, McCone denied there was any evidence to support the charges. Afterward, at a black-tie Georgetown dinner given on December 10, 1964, by Greek ambassador Alexandros Matsas, Robert Komer, then Deputy National Security Advisor and former CIA liaison officer with the White House, approached Demetracopoulos and asked: “What’s your price? Everybody has a price.” Demetracopoulos, not knowing whether this might be a reference to the McCone meeting, a cryptic second offer to work with the CIA, or something else, tersely replied: “The truth.”
Komer told Elias, “Go fuck yourself,” and walked away.
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INITIALLY, THE PAPANDREOU government reform agenda created an atmosphere of national optimism. Political prisoners were released. The hated certificates of national probity were no longer impediments to getting jobs or benefits. Efforts were made to curtail the unbridled influence of the CIA.43 Those in the military who’d been identified as being involved in recent right-wing coup plots were not arrested but were scattered to more remote postings.44
For a while it seemed that George Papandreou might have effectively co-opted the Palace.45 After years of criticizing the Queen’s overspending, the prime minister increased the royal budget. And for the sensitive post of defense minister he selected General Petros Garoufalias, a wealthy beer baron popular with the King, though of uncertain loyalty to the prime minister.46
Each of Papandreou’s liberalizing actions disrupted entrenched relationships. Cutting the military budget 10 percent to provide social funding and planning to replace Army officers committed to the old regime with those loyal to the Papandreou government met fierce resistance from the military and its conservative allies.
One of those who sought to exploit these fissures for his own ends was dual citizen Tom Pappas, always seeking a business advantage. Described by his former managers as “a chameleon, with a keen instinct for survival and, ultimately, dominance,” who could “play the side that he thought was best suited to the situation,” he delighted in being known as the “the inside fixer.” However, his public persona as generous paterfamilias clashed with the ugly realities of his private life. The devout church lay leader fought often with his wife and his only child. He acted abusively toward Bessie, his spouse of more than three decades, and mercilessly hectored Charles for not demonstrating the academic prowess or business ambition that he demanded.47
During the early 1960s, Pappas spent increasing time away from Boston, setting up opulent residences in Athens at the Grand Bretagne and the Hilton, with an escape villa in suburban Kiffisia. He cultivated the image of a hard-driving bon vivant, a perpetual-motion machine making deals by day and entertaining beautiful women at night. He was not discreet in his extramarital relationships. As his businesses flourished and blue-and-white Esso-Pappas service station signs spread throughout the country, some Greeks faulted Pappas for being an overbearing “Ugly American” and sarcastically mispronounced Esso-Pappas as “Hesso-Pappas,” slang for “shitty-Pappas.” When the joke crossed the pond, one who took to using the expression with her friends was his wife, the refined but beleaguered Bessie Pappas.
Pappas was omnivorous in his political largesse. To assure his success, he boasted about funding competing candidates to make sure he would maintain his influence no matter the winner. Travelling in a big American car with cash in hand, he was a regular visitor to Peloponnesian villages and other strongholds, identified by his minions as worthwhile targets. With an assortment of hugs, kisses, backslaps, and playful pinches, he bestowed koumparos blessings and sowed the seeds of rousfeti, expensive political favors that must be repaid.48
Pappas’s patronage found fertile ground among the old-line forces who bitterly opposed the Papandreou center-left agenda. According to a secret CIA intelligence cable, King Constantine began plotting a coup to get rid of Papandreou as early as January 1965.49 He planned to “exert pressure on, but not flatly ask” for the prime minister’s resignation as early as the end of February. The tipping point, according to Constantine, was the new law requesting the resignation of about 60 percent of the captains and majors in the gendarmerie. Constantine feared that if he waited beyond the winter of 1965, Papandreou would have attained sufficient strength in the military, police, and government to resist a demand for his resignation. The King planned to force the prime minister’s hand by attacking his son with a press campaign to “destroy” Andreas’s image, while distancing himself from any blame if the attack failed.50
In February, before the King acted, Papandreou presented to Parliament the findings of an official inquiry into allegations of fraud in the 1961 elections and misuse of a NATO defense program, the “Pericles Plan.” Striking back, the rightist opposition attacked the government for weakening the nation’s defense and aiding Communists, then advanced a conspiracy theory that targeted Andreas. Driving the right’s attack were allegations that a cabal of Greek intelligence officers stationed in Cyprus, led by Andreas Papandreou, were plotting to take over the army, jettison the constitution, and create a Nasserite or Communist dictatorship. The group in question was Aspida (“Shield”), an acronym for “Officers, Save the Fatherland, Ideals, Democracy and Meritocracy.” This small group of about two dozen reform-minded army officers and politicians was politically sympathetic to Andreas. Defense minister Garoufalias endorsed the conspiracy theory and took it to the King.
The charges were absurd, as was demonstrated when the case eventually came to trial.51 The Palace and Parliament presented no credible evidence that Andreas was the mastermind of Aspida, but targeting Andreas served the King’s purpose well. George, with a parliamentary majority and popular support, had reckoned that the King and his advisors would not want to raise the specter of a constitutional crisis or the “national schism” that had torn the country apart half a century earlier, as this would put the monarchy itself at risk. But he misjudged the depth of animosity he’d stirred among longtime members of his own coalition who were jealous that their own desire for power was being thwarted by a father’s desire to promote his ambitious son.
In May, the prime minister told the King to dismiss Garoufalias and a list of officers. The King refused, and Garoufalias would not leave voluntarily. George Papandreou then named himself defense minister, an appointment the King rejected, claiming it would interfere with the investigation of Aspida and Andreas.
On July 15 Papandreou announced he would resign, in anticipation of new elections. Constantine accepted the resignation without even waiting for it to be formally tendered. Instead of calling for new balloting, which Papandreou was expected to win, the King meddled directly, cobbling together a coalition government from the existing parliament, trying to unite ERE conservatives and Center Union defectors who became known as “Apostates” or renegades. Enough new ministerial posts were created to provide one for every defector.52 An outraged George Papandreou accused the monarch of unconstitutional interference and prepared to lead another “unrelenting struggle.” Massive crowds of demonstrators took to the streets shouting, “The King reigns, but the People rule.”53
The showdown between the King and George Papandreou gave Tom Pappas openings for revenge and a route back to greater power. Richard Barham, a controversial State Department diplomat thought to be a covert CIA agent, went to work at Esso-Pappas, where he allegedly played an important role.54 After several failed attempts, enough politicians eager to be “purchased pure and simple,” often with funds from Pappas, gave the Apostate-infused coalition a tiny governing majority.55
Over the next year and beyond, would-be prime ministers attempted to form viable coalitions and struggled to govern. Pappas was especially frustrated with the instability. “I had to buy four governments in five years to get the [Esso-Pappas] deal going,” he later complained.56
During the rule of the Apostates, Elias did not write about Pappas’s activities but criticized the United States in a variety of articles, notably for its role in the resignation of Papandreou. He distinguished between the State Department, which he said was “opposed to a coup d’etat,” and the CIA, which supported political intervention by Greek military officers and whose views “hold sway.”57 The American Embassy objected that Elias’s articles were an attempt to make the United States the scapegoat. The embassy explained to Washington that Ethnos was considered a house organ of Andreas Papandreou and that Elias’s articles paralleled the position of Margaret Papandreou, Andreas’s wife, with whom Elias reportedly met frequently.58
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THOUGH HE COMPLAINED about the instability of the Greek government, Tom Pappas took full advantage of the political chaos. He returned to Washington as needed to nurture contacts and make sure that the pipeline of federal support for his projects remained open. With his brother John working their Democratic connections, the Pappases did not suffer while Republicans remained out of power. John Pappas was made part of the US delegation to the funeral of King Paul. Tom was a regular at diplomatic receptions and big events in Athens, especially when prominent visiting Americans such as Jackie Kennedy arrived. Fellow Bostonian John McCormack arranged an “off-record” private meeting in March 1966 at the White House for Tom with President Johnson.59
Construction of the $200,000,000 Esso-Pappas oil refinery and steel and chemical industrial complex was completed in early 1966, using mostly American funds. Thousands, including leading politicians and other notables, attended the opening ceremony, described as “the largest public-relations event in modern Greek history.”60 The royal family came, this time without the impediment of a liberal Greek government, to sit under a canopy on two gold thrones.
Pappas, however, was the true center of attention. His easy access to the movers and shakers on both sides of the Atlantic enhanced his image, and he was never shy about letting Greeks know how high his connections ran, although some dismissed his intimations as braggadocio. He indicated that some of his executives were or had been on the CIA payroll, and said he planned to recruit more. At least one of his non-profit foundations was used as a CIA front, and he explained his CIA relationships to a Greek newspaper as part of his pride “to do all I can for my country.”61 Rumors of a military takeover didn’t disturb Tom Pappas. To the contrary, he welcomed one, expecting it to be orchestrated by the King and his generals.
The political stalemate in Greece worried Elias. After reporting trips to European capitals and visits to Lisbon, Angola, and other parts of Southern Africa as a guest of the Portuguese government, he wanted to return to Washington to explore American attitudes toward the changing situation in Greece. He also thought he should expand his trip on account of the US escalation in Vietnam, which he had not yet experienced first-hand.
His papers liked the idea of a world trip by their star reporter but didn’t want him to run up travel expenses where he couldn’t confirm advance appointments. So, he accepted a long-standing invitation from the Japanese government to visit Tokyo as its guest and interview economic and political leaders. He arranged to have meetings in Hong Kong en route. But when he tried to schedule meetings in Vietnam with Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge as well as US and South Vietnamese generals, the State Department blocked him.62 They also blocked meetings he tried to set up in Bangkok and elsewhere and closely monitored his travels, although careful surveillance did not prevent the CIA from reporting erroneously on his schedule.
Interest in Elias was as strong as ever. On March 14, 1966, Elias’s old nemesis Tom Karamessines, then deputy director of plans at the CIA, sent a memorandum to the CIA director warning about Elias’s planned stay in Washington. A SECRET March 17 message from the US Embassy’s public-affairs officer to USIA headquarters in Washington offered strategies on how best to handle Elias on the upcoming trip to Washington and fretted that he might not leave by June 1 “but…stay…indefinitely.”63
Elias’s four-month American trip of 1966 involved more than just business. In some circles, he was becoming a celebrity. When he arrived from Asia in April, friends in Los Angeles honored him with a black-tie dinner attended by Hollywood stars and entertainers like Dinah Shore and Ed Sullivan, actresses Virna Lisi and Mona Freeman, and actor Hugh O’Brien.64 But a dark shadow continued to follow him.
A Los Angeles attorney with connections to US intelligence warned Elias that Pierre Salinger was spreading vicious lies about him. After leaving the West Coast, Elias also heard from one of his hosts, Nancy Jackson, that her friend Pierre had not only been aghast that she was going to visit Elias on her upcoming trip to Greece but claimed that Demetracopoulos “works for the other side.”65 When Jackson protested, Salinger promised to show her intelligence reports (which never materialized). Why, Elias wondered, was Salinger continuing to traduce him, even now, long after he was out of the White House? Was there no statute of limitations to Kennedy vendettas?
In D.C., much of Elias’s time involved “wining, dining, and interviewing” a score of American senators, cabinet members, high-ranking US policymakers, and other important personalities, despite efforts to block him from exclusives. Some of the common themes in the interviews provoked sharp commentary back home: American notables expressing the wish that Queen Mother Frederika would lend her influence to come up with a democratic solution to the domestic political crisis, criticism of the Greek government’s non-settlement of pre-war debt, references to the CIA being an invisible government, and warnings about the dangers of a dictatorship in Greece. Washington sent an urgent request to Athens to get copies of the Athens Daily Post series “as soon as possible.” According to the State Department, the deprecations of the Queen Mother raised a “storm of protest” and caused her and King Constantine “considerable embarrassment.”
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ACCORDING TO AMERICAN intelligence reports, tracking his US visit, Demetracopoulos this year “had some of his finest hours.”66 Elias would have agreed. He enjoyed summertime in Washington, staying at the Fairfax, expanding his Georgetown circle of friends and news sources, and spending hours with Louise Gore. They dined regularly at local restaurants, and she invited him to black-tie parties and informal family gatherings at her Marwood estate.67 In 1966, Elias’s Republican Party friend was deeply involved in the hotly contested governor’s race in Maryland. Louise Gore knew Spiro Agnew from his early years as Baltimore County commissioner and later rise in Maryland politics. He sought her out when considering his run for the state’s top job, and she encouraged his fellow Greek-American Tom Pappas to become his leading contributor.
