He fled to Athens, where in April 1942 he founded EKKA along with other significant figures such as the politician Georgios Kartalis, Colonel Evripidis Bakirtzis and other army officers like Dimitrios Karachristos and Dimitrios Georgantas. The organisation's aims were to fight the Axis occupation forces as long as the occupation lasted and, after liberation, work for social change, in a social democratic direction. EKKA was also an anti-communist, liberal and Venizelist organisation. EKKA soon fielded its own guerrilla forces, named after the famed 5/42 Evzone Regiment and took action mainly in Central Greece, in the area of Mount Gkiona, but its forces were of small size (around 1,000 fighters at its peak) in comparison to the size of ELAS (with 50,000 fighters at its peak) and EOEA (military arm of EDES, about 14,000 fighters).