We reexamine the VAN-telegrams available to us, in terms of the seismological data observed in the candidate region before and after the relevant telegram. For the time period 1981--1985, the correlations are random. Earthquakes of any magnitude, from an extremely low threshold (i.e., M=2.5) at very short distances (i.e., a few kilometers), to large magnitudes (i.e., M=7.0) at very large distances (i.e., 500 km), or even teleseismic events (i.e., the Iran earthquake of 1981, at a distance of about 2000 km) were correlated by VAN with ''apparent'' SES, on the basis of the occurrence of an earthquake, anywhere, (from Italy to Aegean Sea, and from Albania to Crete island) and usually based on telegrams exchanged between the VAN-researchers. From 1986 onwards, the VAN-telegrams were restricted mostly to the area of Western Greece, which has the highest seismicity in Europe. By analyzing all of the VAN-telegrams available to us, we conclude that in no case was a mainshock predicted. Whenever the reported VAN-correlation seems to be satisfactory, the correlated event was either an aftershock or the correlation was not unique, meaning that any of several earthquakes in the same focal region could be arbitrarily correlated with the telegram. ¿ American Geophysical Union 1996