Architect of the dictatorship's security apparatus
In 1940, the police deployed a counterfeit KKE leadership and forged Rizospastis to confuse the party's members.
A former Greek Army officer, Konstantinos Maniadakis was a central official of Ioannis Metaxas's 4th of August dictatorship, organizing its security state and anti-communist repression. He combined the Asfaleia's intelligence network with torture and island exile to break the KKE's public activity and disable much of its leadership. In 1940, the police created a counterfeit KKE leadership and forged edition of Rizospastis to confuse party members. After liberation, he converted anti-communism into political capital and served as a parliamentarian, while his responsibility under the dictatorship went largely unaccounted for.
Also known as: Konstantinos S. Maniadakis
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1916Graduated from the Military Academy as an engineering second lieutenant
- 1919–1922Served in the Asia Minor campaign
- 1923Discharged after participating in the Leonardopoulos–Gargalidis coup attempt
- 1929Resigned from the army as a lieutenant colonel
- 1936–1941Deputy Minister of Public Security under Metaxas, organizing the security system
- 1941Deputy Minister of Public Security and Minister of the Interior under Koryzis and Tsouderos
- 1941–1949Supervisor of Greek diplomatic missions in Argentina and Latin America
- 1950–1964Right-wing member of parliament
Related historical events
The Asfaleia: expanded apparatus, torture and island exile
The Asfaleia that Maniadakis built between 1936 and 1941 became the skeleton of the Greek security administration. The Under-Ministry of Public Security he created evolved after the war into the Ministry of Public Order; under his supervision the Gendarmerie grew by 20 percent and the City Police also expanded. The political police itself, the Asfaleia, grew from 190 to 445 officers and to roughly 1,200 agents. He sent a subordinate to be trained by the German Gestapo, and the Gestapo and the Asfaleia shared techniques and experience in suppressing opposition. Cooperation with SS chief Heinrich Himmler earned him the name 'the Greek Himmler'.
The scale of the repression is documented. In the first few months of the dictatorship 1,330 people were arrested as political suspects and about 1,000 were sent to remote Aegean islands. Over the whole dictatorship more than 30,000 people were arrested, interned or forcibly exiled. The best-known method was the castor-oil torture (ricinolado) used in interrogation. The pre-emptive crushing of threats such as the 1938 Cretan uprising and a pro-German plot in 1940 is also recorded as his achievement.
His responsibility was not wound up until Greece fell. Before leaving Athens in April 1941 he sent units loyal to him to the Akronauplia camp so that the political prisoners would be handed over to the German occupation authorities, and he ordered all political prisoner camps to prevent escapes, by force if necessary. After Metaxas's death he served as under-minister of public security and minister of the interior in the Koryzis and Tsouderos governments, but on 2 June 1941 he was forced to resign from the government in exile. His methods of repression against the Communist Party of Greece, mass exile and forced "declarations of repentance", became the model for government policy after the liberation.