At 3 a.m. on October 28, 1940, Italian ambassador Emanuele Grazzi knocked on the door of Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas ...

At 3 a.m. on October 28, 1940, Italian ambassador Emanuele Grazzi knocked on the door of Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas with an ultimatum from Mussolini: let Italian forces march freely through Greece to occupy strategic positions, or face war. Metaxas, still in his robe, replied in French, the diplomatic language of the era: "Alors, c'est la guerre." Then it is war. By sunrise, Greek newspapers had printed three letters across their front pages, and the streets of Athens were full of people chanting them: OXI. The tension had been building for months. Just ten weeks earlier, on August 15, 1940, an Italian submarine had torpedoed and sunk the Greek cruiser Elli while it was anchored off the island of Tinos during one of the most sacred religious celebrations in the Orthodox calendar. Greece stayed quiet, absorbed the insult, and waited. Metaxas knew what was coming. By 5:30 a.m. on October 28, Italian forces were already crossing into Epirus and the Pindus mountains. What Mussolini expected to be a three-week walkover turned into a disaster. The outnumbered Greek Army held, pushed the Italians back, and then drove deep into Italian-held Albanian territory, handing the Axis its first land defeat of the war. Back in Athens, singer Sofia Vembo became the voice of the resistance. Her song "Duce Puts His Uniform On" mocked Mussolini openly and became an anthem of defiance heard across the country. Germany was forced to divert forces and invade Greece itself in April 1941. Many historians argue the delay that intervention caused pushed back Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union by critical weeks, with the Russian winter arriving before German forces could finish the job. Metaxas himself told the Greek people that morning, in a radio address: "The moment has come that we will fight for the independence of Greece, its integrity and its honor. Greeks, now it is time for us to prove if indeed we are worthy of our ancestors." They proved it. #OxiDay #Greece #WWII