Dodecanese over the islands. As a legacy of its former status as a jurisdiction separate from Greece, it is still considered a separate "entity" for amateur radio purposes, essentially maintaining its status as an independent country "on the air." Amateur Radio call signs in the Dodecanese begin with the prefix SV5 instead of SV for Greece. The 70th anniversary of the incorporation of the Dodecanese within Greece was marked in 2017, with the Greek Parliament holding a special celebratory session for the event. Today, Rhodes and the Dodecanese are popular travel destinations. The Dodecanese Prefecture was one of the prefectures of
Dodecanese campaign when Italian forces recaptured the island of Kastellorizo from British commandos. After the Battle of Greece in April 1941 and the Allied defeat in the Battle of Crete in May 1941, Greece and its many islands were occupied by the Axis powers. With the defeat of Axis forces in the North African campaign in spring 1943, Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister, who at least as far back as the Gallipoli campaign in World War I had a deep interest in the region, turned his sights on the islands. The British envisaged an operation to capture the Dodecanese and Crete,