Nov. 17 Terrorist Group; Not One Arrest

A T H E N S, Greece, Dec. 19 -- “Mr. Welch?” a man asked in Greek.

The CIA station chief opened the car door. He stood for a secondand squinted at the figure in the shadows. Then came three shotsfrom a .45-caliber pistol, one of which tore into Richard Welch’sheart.

It was the bloody birth of the November 17 terrorist group.

“He got out of the car because he thought it was a friend,”said Welch’s widow, Cristina. “I rushed to him. But he was gone.”

The masked killer and two accomplices, who blocked Welch’s caron the way home from a Christmas party the night of Dec. 23, 1975,sped away without a trace.

And that’s how it remains, a quarter of a century later.

A Quiet Revolution

There have been no arrests or firm leads during a generation ofbombings, rocket attacks and shootings that have killed 22 people,including three American officials: Welch, Navy Capt. GeorgeTsantes in 1983 and defense attache Capt. William Nordeen in 1988.

With each strike and getaway, November 17 — named for the 1973date that Greece’s military junta crushed a student uprising — enhanced its reputation as Europe’s most slippery and cunning urbanguerrilla group.

“I think the Greek attitude is: ‘Let’s not talk about it. Let’sput it under the rug,“‘ said Cristina Welch, who lives inArlington, Va., and has never returned to Greece. “I have verylittle hope they will ever do anything. ... I’m very pessimistic.”

American officials, including former CIA Director R. JamesWoolsey, claim Greeks are unwilling or unable to take aggressiveaction against November 17. Some congressional leaders have evencalled for sanctions on the country.

The price tag for security in Athens is the highest of any U.S.diplomatic community in the world. In May, the State Departmentlabeled Greece “one of the weakest links in Europe’s effortsagainst terrorism.”

Five weeks later, November 17 claimed its most recent victim —the British defense attache, Brig. Stephen Saunders. An unexpectedstatement by the group last week called the slaying its mostimportant, claiming Saunders participated in British “imperialistinterventions” around the world, including the NATO bombing ofYugoslavia last year.