The destruction brought about by the war of 1940-1944 was so extensive that, despite the relief supply sent by international organizations (UNRRA etc.), the country was unable to enter effectively in a rehabilitation course. The breakdown of communication networks and of the country’s public infrastructure, the shrink of the gross national product (GNP) and internal political instability led to a steep rise of inflation and undermined any attempt of recovery to prewar levels.

Moreover, political oppositions within Greece combined with international tensions due to antagonism between the two great powers (USA and USSR) that emerged after World War II, promoted the implication of the country in the rising Cold War. The declaration of the Truman Doctrine, in March 1947, brought the country under the influence and control of the USA and of the western coalition that was being formed, which aimed to restrain communism from spreading on a worldwide scale. Extensive financial aid to Greece, which was stipulated in the Marshall Plan, contributed to an evolutionary process in economy and politics after 1948. International isolation to which the communist leadership had been reduced, after the -until then- friendly Tito’s Yugoslavia had blocked its borders, stressed the incompetence of the Balkan policy of KKE (Greek Communist Party) and contributed to the governmental prevalence.

In the second half of the decade 1940-50 it is estimated that over 100,000 people lost their lives, while at least 700-750,000 left their homes, which situated mainly on the massifs of Central and North Greece because of the civil war. At the same time, a large number of citizens was exiled or imprisoned, while 80,000 people approximately fled to the eastern countries. In the beginning of 1950, both the social and physical physiognomy of the country had altered radically in regard to the prewar past. Many among those who had left the mountains, would never come back, as the social network had collapsed, ethnic minorities (in West Macedonia and Thrace) abandoned the country and social groups (mountainous rural population) resorted to urbanization and emigration.