Venizelos was a great reformer in Greece, and had helped pull the country out of many economic problems. He was also an expansionist and with that, the Great Idea was thrown into all of Venizelos's foreign policies. During the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, he led the Greeks into battle against the Turks and gained territories that increased the size of Greece by two-thirds. This pleased the Greek people because they saw that their idea of re-establishing the Byzantine Empire was coming true. However, they felt that the goals were still incomplete because there were still millions of Greeks under the sovereignty of the Ottoman Empire.
After an allied victory in WWI Greek nationalism swelled throughout the country. With so many victories between 1912 and 1918, the Greeks became infatuated with the Megali Idea. Seth Blacksburg said: .
"The diplomatic machinations that accompanied the entrance of the smaller nations in the World War had now nearly destroyed the Greek royal family. The people's loyalty to their monarch was an affirmation of their belief in the Megali Idea; when Venizelos' visions seemed to offer its fruition, Greece braced itself as the Byzantine eagle soared overhead" (www.ase.tufts.edu).
What was meant by this saying was that the people became so enraptured in this nationalistic ideology that Greece, no matter, what would re-take the Empire that they had once had. Their minds were on a single track, to Re-establish the Byzantine Empire and unite all Greek speaking peoples between the two continents and five seas. .
In the treaties following WWI, the fractured Ottoman Empire began to crumble. Italy had made claims to regions in Asia Minor which alarmed the French, British and American governments, therefore they agreed to let Greek troops land in Smyrna (Izmir). The Greek's amazed that the Powers would allow this, agreed to occupy the port city. To the Greeks it had seemed that the goals of the Megali Idea would finally be ascertained.
