 On 20 April , the commander of Greek forces in Albania — General Georgios Tsolakoglou — accepted the hopelessness of the situation and offered to surrender his army , which then consisted of fourteen divisions . Generals Ioannis <unk> and Georgios <unk> had already warned General Papagos on 14 April that morale in the Epirus Army was wearing thin , and regrettably combat stress and exhaustion had resulted in officers taking the decision to put deserters before firing squads . Nevertheless , Papagos condemned Tsolakoglou for his decision to not continue fighting . General Blamey also criticized at the time , Tsolakoglou 's decision to surrender without permission from General Papagos . Historian John Keegan writes that Tsolakoglou " was so determined ... to deny the Italians the satisfaction of a victory they had not earned that ... he opened [ a ] quite unauthorised parley with the commander of the German SS division opposite him , Sepp Dietrich , to arrange a surrender to the Germans alone . " On strict orders from Hitler , negotiations were kept secret from the Italians and the surrender was accepted . Outraged by this decision , Mussolini ordered counter @-@ attacks against the Greek forces , which were repulsed , but at some cost to the defenders . The Germans Air Force intervened in the renewed fighting , and Ioannina was practically destroyed by Stukas . It took a personal representation from Mussolini to Hitler to organize Italian participation in the armistice that was concluded on 23 April . Greek soldiers were not rounded up as prisoners of war and were allowed instead to go home after the demobilisation of their units , while their officers were permitted to retain their side arms . 
