28th of October

Dawn was breaking on October 28, 1940. Greece awoke to the sirens of war. On the radio, the announcement was heard:

"The Italian military forces have been attacking our border patrol units on the Greek-Albanian border since 5:30 this morning. Our forces are defending the nation's soil."

A few hours earlier, around 3 a.m., at his residence in Kifissia, the Italian ambassador, Emanuele Grazzi, delivered a humiliating ultimatum to the Greek dictator, Ioannis Metaxas. Italy demanded the free passage of its troops into Greek territory, with the ultimatum expiring at 6 a.m.

As Grazzi describes in his memoirs, Metaxas read the text. When he finished, he looked the ambassador in the face and, in a sad but firm voice, stated the inevitable:

"Well then, we have war (Alors, c’est la guerre)."

Before the deadline had even expired, at 5:30 a.m., the Italian forces began their invasion from Albania. The Greek army, despite its shortages, not only stopped the invasion but, with a surging counter-offensive, crossed the border and drove the war deep into Albanian territory. Many Greek soldiers took their last breath in the frozen mountainous landscape.

The mountains of Albania thundered

Then melted snow to wash his body,

a silent shipwreck of the dawn

And his mouth, a small unsinging bird

And his hands, open plazas of desolation

The mountains of Albania thundered

They did not weep

Why should they weep

He was a brave lad!

— Heroic and Elegiac Song for the Lost Second Lieutenant of Albania, Odysseus Elytis