Greece, 1975 — military coup conspiracy
Event Summary
This entry is coded 24 February 1975, corresponding to the Pyjamas coup, a failed coup attempt by far-right Greek Army officers sympathetic to the military junta that had been deposed in July 1974. After the collapse of the Regime of the Colonels, brought down by the Cyprus crisis, former prime minister Konstantinos Karamanlis had returned to lead a civilian government, won the November 1974 elections, and overseen a referendum that abolished the monarchy. Die-hard junta sympathizers in the armed forces plotted to overthrow him, but the government, swiftly alerted by Major Ioannis Alexakis, the security director of the Central Intelligence Service, arrested the conspirators in the early morning hours of 24 February 1975, most of them at home in their nightclothes.
Defense Minister Evangelos Averoff coined the derisive name Pyjamas coup to ridicule the plotters. The failed attempt allowed the government to carry out a massive purge of junta loyalists from the army, cementing civilian control.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Sources
Editorial Note
Cross-Reference
Only one dataset carries it. One of the three reference datasets we check against carries this event; the others do not list it. That is not a contradiction — the datasets cover different periods and use different thresholds — but it means the record has had less outside corroboration.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
- Cline Center id
35002241975
How the match is made is described in crossref-report.md.
Outcome and Target
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: Karamanlis's civilian government survived; the plotters were arrested and the army purged of junta loyalists.
Baseline coding: Plot discovered and disrupted before execution. Recorded leader fate: remained in office; not physically harmed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Baseline Source-Document Entries
New York Times
Washington Post
Chicago Tribune
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →