Konstantinos Karamanlis

"Greece belongs to the West."

"Who governs this country?"

"Hellas has been transformed to an endless bedlam."

"In democracies, prime ministers do not go to prison. They return home."

"In the history of all nations, there are instances in which the crisis of institutions and morals becomes so deep that, in order to save democracy, one should remake it."

"You made me come back on 24 July in order to save the country that was in danger. But if you do not mean to give me the ample majority I need to carry out my mission, then what is the point of having me back?"

"Greece is plagued by just one single problem: its politics. The misfortune of our people is caused by the unhealthy nature of the political environment and the defective organization of public life."

"It is our opinion that the misfortunes of our people are mainly due to the imperfect organization and shortcomings of public life [...] The problem is of a political nature [... and it can only be solved with the creation of] a new political force that will become the point of convergence of all progressive and healthy elements of our times [...] a force that will generate a new political and moral ethos."

"As you know, the functioning of democracy– and especially of parliamentary democracy presupposes the existence of parties with [long] traditions, steadfast principles, a program, as well as a leadership inspired by a sense of responsibility. Because political parties [...] have the most decisive role in democracies. In point of fact, one can claim that it is political parties rather than governments that peoples attach to; and that a regime’s fortune is more affected by the number and behavior of [its] political parties than by its formal institutional framework."

"What Right are you talking about? Am I the Right-winger? And who are the Leftists? Wasn’t it I who, as soon as I took over after the Civil War, stopped the executions and opened the prisons and exile camps? Wasn’t it the centrists who made Law 509, all the anti-communist legislation, the political loyalty declarations, the prisons, the exiles, and the executions? I took office just six years after the Civil War ended. And immediately, I found myself in the middle. On one side were my own people, the right-wingers, who wanted us to crush the communists, and on the other side were the communists, who refused to accept their defeat. So, gradually, I released them from prison; I didn’t carry out any executions, and I safeguarded the democracy of that time. So, I am the right-winger, and they are the democrats, who did all these things, which I found ready-made? And didn’t I also legalize the Communist Party after the dictatorship? Didn’t I withdraw from NATO when it was necessary? Didn’t I nationalize the companies of Andreadis, Onassis, and Niarchos? Didn’t I achieve the smooth and bloodless transition from dictatorship to democracy? Didn’t I contribute decisively to the abolition of the monarchy? Didn’t I guarantee the alternation of parties in power? Didn’t I draft the best Constitution Greece ever had? So what are you telling me now about being the leader of the Right? You all need to understand that the time has come to move away from slogans and labels, and for the parties to stop trapping people in rhetoric, in which they then become entangled themselves."

"I had often thought of the emotion I should feel when I set foot again on the soil of my country. And I may tell you that the thought brought tears to my eyes in anticipation. And yet never was I calmer, never did I have myself more completely under control, than the moment when I arrived at the airport. And the reason was that my sense of the responsibilities which I was about to undertake was so intense as to stifle, to banish every other thought."

"If a politician is capable and an honest servant, then it is you who need him and not the opposite. There is therefore no need for him to flatter you so that you vote for him. This is how I understand my relationship with the people."

"My loneliness, which is, as you know, inherent in my character, became almost absolute in politics. In politics it may have proved to be useful, since it freed me from weakness; however, it made my life depressing, because apart from anything else, it deprived me of the opportunity to have friends. Now that I need them it is too late to change, both because of ingrained habit and age."

"[He is] a special phenomenon: a man of humble origins, unremarkable intellectual endowment, infuriating obstinacy, but with an impeccable honesty, a statesmanlike flair in big issues and an accurate assessment of the needs and the motivations of his fellow countrymen which few politicians in our age have equalled. In the Greek context he was a Churchill."

"Karamanlis or the tanks"