Georgios Zoitakis

Georgios Zoitakis (Greek: Γεώργιος Ζωιτάκης, January 1910 – 21 October 1996) was a Greek Army general and regent of Greece from 13 December 1967 to 21 March 1972, during the period of the military regime of the Colonels.

Georgios Zoitakis was born in Nafpaktos. He graduated from the Hellenic Army Academy in 1932, and fought in the Greco-Italian War and the Battle of Greece in an Evzone battalion with the rank of lieutenant. During the Axis Occupation of Greece, he joined the EDES guerrillas in his native Aetolia-Acarnania. During the civil conflict between EDES and the leftist EAM-ELAS in late 1943, his father Konstantinos was killed by ELAS fighters. In fall 1944, he too was captured by ELAS and kept prisoner until the Varkiza agreement in spring 1945. He then re-joined the Army, and fought in the Greek Civil War, rising to the rank of major. For his military service, he thrice received, among other awards, Greece's highest medal for bravery, the Gold Cross of Valour, an extremely rare honour.

In the 1950s he attended staff officer courses in the Superior School of War and the School of National Defence in Greece parallel to NATO military seminars in West Germany and in the United States. During this period he served as adjutant to King Paul, then chief of staff to the First Army as Brigadier, CO of the I Army Corps as Major General and of the III Army Corps in Thessaloniki, then the most important Greek military formation, as Lieutenant General. On 21 April 1967, the day of the Colonels' coup, he was in Athens. Like most of the senior military leadership, he was caught by surprise at the events, but he quickly moved to support the coup. On the same day, he was placed as Deputy Minister of National Defence in the new government.

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