The Salonika Bay Murder: Cold War Politics and the Polk Affair

Abstract

Edmund Keeley makes a penetrating inquiry into the injustices of the affair--the sensational murder of the zealous American journalist George Polk during the Greek Civil War, and the subsequent trial of a scapegoat in whitewashed proceedings that involved not only Greek, American, and British government officials but also a committee of distinguished American journalists and their representatives in Greece. Keeley's account shows how Cold War politics and Greek civil conflict led to the torture, forced confession, and conviction of a Salonika journalist. [A] masterly reexamination of the affair...Keeley has done remarkable work in bringing to light a great deal that was not previously known. --C. M. Woodhouse, The New York Review of Books ...a compelling work of detection and analysis...a readable and provocative work. --Herbert Mitgang, The New York Times ...painstaking research, coupled with an admirable intellectual rigor, has produced a work that is a model of clarity and honesty.--Phillip Knightley, The Washington Post Book World