N17: Decades of deadly terror

N17 has claimed responsibility for 23 killings since its first in 1975

(CNN) -- The Greek police have been taking no chances with the courthouse appearances of the 14 men now held as suspected leading figures in the shadowy terrorist group November 17.

These are the first arrests since the group embarked in 1975 on a campaign that has killed 23 diplomats, politicians and businessmen.

N17 was formed in 1973 after more than 20 students died when the right-wing Greek military dictatorship sent tanks into Athens Polytechnic to crush a student revolt.

The group is anti-American because it believed the United States backed the right-wing junta running Greece at the time. It has been hard to crack because it remained small, secretive and only occasionally active.

The first victim of N17 was CIA Athens station chief Richard Welch, in 1975. In 1988, U.S. naval attaché Capt. William Nordeen was killed by an N17 car bomb. Two years ago, British diplomat Brigadier Stephen Saunders was killed by an N17 gunman on a motorbike.

But some say the group has lost focus.

"The ideology of the founding members of November 17 was based according to their proclamation on the revolutionary left and the establishment, against the present political system," says Greek journalist Labis Tsirigotakis.

"But it seems now in the later stages the new members were more interested in bank robberies, crimes, protection money."

Last month, police discovered several caches of arms in N17 safe houses.

Since then 14 alleged members of N17 have been arrested. Police say they have crippled the organization.

But while the group conceded Wednesday it had lost several members of its family, it remained defiant in a written statement: "It postpones our actions, but it has to be understood there is no end to our operations."

Security experts underline that warning, saying the group will have no trouble replacing its arms. .

"I think there will be a resurgence," says Paul Slaughter of Task International. "I think that the political makeup of November 17 dictates that it won't lie down, that it will keep trying to destabilize the Greek political spectrum.

"It may take some time, maybe 12 months to do so, but I believe they will be there."

With Athens preparing to host the next Olympics in two years, and with Greece due to take on the EU presidency next year, those are words which will worry the country's leaders.

Police say some November 17 suspects have confessed to plans to disrupt the Olympics by hitting favoured tourist spots.

The question is whether they have been crippled or merely winged by the arrests -- and whether authorities can insure they never again have the men and the means to carry out their threats.