Greek shipowners have been in the news recently. The first instance came in the Greek Skai TV 6-episode documentary ‘Sto Xiliosto’ (‘At the Millimeter’) whose weekly screening has Greeks riveted in front of their televisions every Monday evening. It is based on the book ‘The last bluff: behind the scenes of the 2015 Conflict and Plan B’ originally published in Greek but available in English translation. The authors are reporters Eleni Varvitsiotis and Victoria Dendrinou, who covered the Greek economic crisis including its peak in Brussels in 2015. Varvitsioti worked for the Kathimerini newspaper and SKAI TV and Dendrinou for Bloomberg News. European and Greek officials and politicians talk on camera recounting the dramatic negotiations between the two sides.
At one point, Jean-Claude Junker, who was president of the European Commission at the time and in the thick of all the consultations, suggested to Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras that he should put an end to the favorable tax breaks enjoyed by Greek shipowners. Greek shipowners are taxed based only on vessel tonnage rather than actual corporate profits or freight revenues, a huge tax break. In the documentary, Junker expressed incredulity at the fact that Tsipras, a politician with communist roots ultimately rejected the idea of taxing the shipowners and instead choosing the alternative way of raising desperately needed revenue by taxing ordinary citizens.
Opinions may differ whether Greek shipowners should lose their privilege tax status and the effects of such a measure, but we can all agree that those businessmen are not averse to take great risks in securing their profits. We were reminded of this a few days ago by billionaire shipowner Procopiou, who was speaking at the Posidonia shipping trade fair in Athens. There had already been news reports that he was defying the dangers at the Strait of Hormuz and in a brazen move had sent at least five tankers through the embattled waterway.
At Posidonia Procopiou lived up to the fame he acquired defying the odds when he stated that Greece has a tradition of breaking blockades since antiquity, and by implication that they would continue to do so in the Persian Gulf and elsewhere. Although reports of his speech did not include any specific examples, the wheels in my historian’s head started turning. I can think of two examples in the modern era. In both cases, how proud Greeks can be of their fellow Greek seafarers’ exploits depends on one’s point of view.
The first was during the Napoleonic wars of 1806-1814. In an attempt to damage Britain’s economy, Napoleon introduced the Continental System which forbade mainland Europe, which was under his control, to trade with the British. The British, who ruled the waves, retaliated by imposing a blockade on French ports, thus dealing a blow to France’s commerce. At the time, even though they were ruled by the Ottomans, the Greeks had developed a very strong fleet of commercial vessels which shipped raw materials from the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean over to Western Mediterranean ports, including Marseilles in France. Eager to seize the opportunity and displaying an attitude similar to Procopiou’s towards the blockade in Hormuz, the Greeks were quick to act. The shipowners, who in many cases captained their own ship, defied the British naval blockades and supplied French ports, mainly Marseille, with much needed cereals and wheat. It was not an easy proposition to slip by British warships unnoticed, even at night, but the Greeks had small vessels that could meneuver deftly and they were also experienced navigating those sea routes. The profits these activities entailed were naturally very high and grew as the blockade continued, reaching almost 50% of the value of the cargo. Napoleon’s military defeats brought an end to his rule, the British blockade, as well as Greek profits.
The second instance of Greeks breaking a blockade I can recall came in 1966, after Britain imposed a United Nations-approved naval blockade on its African colony Rhodesia, present-day Zimbabwe. The reason was the white-minority government illegally declared independence in order to prevent a British handover of power to the country’s black majority. The blockade consisted of preventing tankers attempting to deliver oil to a pipeline that ran from Beira, a port in Mozambique, westwards into landlocked Rhodesia.
A tanker that infamously broke the blockade was the ‘Arietta Venizelos’ owned by the Greek shipping firm Venizelos based in Piraeus. On its way to Beira the ship changed its name to ‘Ioanna V’ and hoisted a Panamanian flag to avoid detection by the British Royal Navy. Nonetheless a British frigate spotted it and tried to divert the Greek ship. But its captain, a 30-year old Cretan, Yiorgos Vardinogiannis, defiantly steered the ship to Beira. The incident made world news. The embarrassed Greek government promptly annulled Vardinogiannis’ captain’s license. That did not prevent him eventually becoming one of Greece’s most important shipping magnates. As Mr. Procopiou would say, he was only doing what Greeks do, they break naval blockades.
