Modern history’s most consequential “David vs. Goliath” victory for freedom and democracy — the forgotten story of Greece’s profound role in WWII — will be presented in great detail before top Washington policymakers and opinion leaders at a gathering at the US Institute for Peace. It will be presented by one of the most highly-regarded experts on Greece’s decisive role in WWII, Dr. Andre Gerolymatos, Director of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Center for Hellenic Studies at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada.

This invitation-only presentation and roundtable discussion, from the 5th floor Board Room of the US Institute for Peace (overlooking the National Mall), will take place on October 25 as part of the Second Annual Washington Oxi Day Celebration. It is sponsored by the Onassis Foundation.

U.S. Institute for Peace Advisory Council Member and former U.S. Ambassador to Belgium, Tom Korologos, will offer opening remarks and introduce professor Gerolymatos. Other expected participants will include policymakers from the State Department, Defense Department, White House and US Congress, scholars from DC area think tanks and universities and leaders in the Greek-American community.

To see pictures from last year’s presentation click here.

This presentation will, among other things, remind these policymakers that Greece:

• inspired the world as the first country to stop the Axis horror, inflicting the wound that eventually brought down the Axis forces in David vs Goliath fashion;
• caused more Nazi fatalities in one day in the Battle of Crete than had fallen on any one day during the previous 15 months’ conquest of 11 countries; and
• was the only country whose religious leader publicly challenged the Holocaust during a brutal Nazi occupation of Greece.

And that it led these world leaders to say:

• “If there had not been the virtue and courage of the Greeks, we do not know which the outcome of World War II would have been.” — Winston Churchill
• “When the entire world had lost all hope, the Greek people dared to question the invincibility of the German monster raising against it the proud spirit of freedom.” — Franklin Roosevelt
• “Historic justice forces me to admit, that of all the enemies that stand against us, the Greek soldier, above all, fought with the most courage.” — Adolf Hitler

Dr. Gerolymatos is a respected scholar of Greek military and diplomatic history. In addition to chairing the Niarchos Foundation Hellenic Studies Center, he is also the Hellenic Canadian Congress of British Columbia Chair of Hellenic Studies at Simon Fraser. Dr. Gerolymatos has published several books on Greek military history including “Red Acropolis, Black Terror: The Greek Civil War and the Origins of Soviet-American Rivalry” and “Guerrilla Warfare and Espionage in Greece 1940-1944”. Gerolymatos was named to the prestigious Hellenic Republic Order of the Phoenix in 2011 for his research and work.

Attendance at this event is by invitation only due to space constraints.

For more information on the Second Annual Washington Oxi Day Celebration, visit www.oxidayfoundation.org.