Among the acts sanctioned by International Law, none is more worthy of
a philosopher's or a philanthropist's attention than the "pacific
blockade." The credit for the institution belongs to all the great
civilised communities, but for its pleasant designation the world is
indebted to the eminent jurist M. Hautefeuille--a countryman of the
ingenious Dr. Guillotin. It denotes "a blockade exercised by a great
Power for the purpose of bringing pressure to bear on a weaker State,
without actual war. That it is an act of violence, and therefore in
the nature of war, is undeniable";[1] but, besides its name, it
possesses certain features which distinguish it advantageously from
ordinary war.
First, instead of the barbarous effusion of blood and swift destruction
which open hostilities entail, the pacific blockade achieves its ends
by more refined and leisurely means: one is not shocked by the unseemly
sights of a battlefield, and the wielder of the weapon has time to
watch its effects as they develop: he can see the victim going through
the successive stages of misery--debility, languor, exhaustion--until
the final point is reached; and as his scientific curiosity is
gratified by the gradual manifestation of the various symptoms, so his
moral sense is fortified by the struggle between a proud spirit and an
empty stomach--than which life can offer no more ennobling spectacle.
Then, unlike crude war, the pacific blockade automatically strikes the
nation at which it is aimed on its weakest side first: instead of
having to begin with its manhood, one begins with its old men, its
women, and its infants. The merits of this form of attack are evident:
many a man who would boldly face starvation himself, may be reasonably
expected to flinch at the prospect of a starving mother, {173} wife, or
child. Lastly, whilst in war the assailant must inevitably suffer as
well as inflict losses, the pacific blockade renders him absolutely
exempt from all risk. For "it can only be employed as a measure of
coercion by maritime Powers able to bring into action such vastly
superior forces to those the resisting State can dispose of, that
resistance is out of the question." [2]
In brief, the pacific blockade is not war, but a kind of sport, as safe
as coursing, and to the educated mind much more interesting. The
interest largely depends on the duration of the blockade, and its
duration on the victims' physical and moral resources.
When the blockade was proclaimed on the 8th of December, Allied
journalists predicted that its persuasive force would be felt very
soon. The country, they reasoned, owing to the manifold restrictions
imposed upon its overseas trade by the Anglo-French Fleet, had been on
short commons for some time past. The total stoppage of maritime
traffic would bring it to the verge of famine within a week. And, in
fact, before the end of the month Greece was feeling the pinch.[3] As
might have been expected, the first to feel it were the poor. Both the
authorities and private societies did their utmost to protect them by
keeping prices down, and to relieve them by the free distribution of
food and other necessaries.[4] But, although the achievement was
great, it could not prove equal to the dimensions of the need. The
stoppage of all maritime traffic caused a cessation of industry and
threw out of employment thousands of working-people. As the factories
grew empty of labourers, the streets grew full of beggars. The
necessary adulteration of the flour produced epidemics of dysentery and
poisoning, especially among children and old people, while numerous
deaths among infants were attributed by the doctors to want of milk in
their mothers' breasts. Presently bread, the staple food of the
Greeks, disappeared, and all classes took {174} to carob-beans and
herbs.[5] On 23 February a lady of the highest Athenian society wrote
to a friend in London: "If we were in England, we should all be fined
for cruelty to animals. As there is no flour, our tiny portions of
bread are made of oats, and rather rotten ones, that had been reserved
for the cab-horses. Now the poor things have nothing to eat and have
become a collection of Apocalyptic beasts. We go on foot as much as we
can, as they really could not carry us."
Next to bread, the most prominent article of Greek diet is fish. The
French, who in their treatment of this neutral nation gave evidence of
a thoroughness and efficiency such as they did not always display in
their operations against the enemy, saw to it that this source of
subsistence also should, within the measure of their ability, fail
their victims. French cruisers stopped the fishing-smacks and asked if
their community had joined the Rebellion. When the answer was in the
negative, they sank the vessel and confiscated the tackle, often
accompanying the robbery of property with violence on the persons of
the owners and abuse of their sovereign. To the wretched fishermen's
protests, the French commanders replied: "If you want to be left alone,
you have only to drive out your King." [6]
These speeches confirmed the general suspicion that the ultimate object
of the blockade was to propagate rebellion. Other things spoke even
more eloquently. The few cargoes of flour that arrived in Greece now
and then were sequestered by the Allies and sent to the Salonica
Government, which used them as a bait, inviting the King's subjects
through its agents to sell their allegiance for a loaf of bread.
Generally the reply was: "We prefer to die." [7] Of this stubborn
endurance, the women of modern Greece gave instances that recall the
days of ancient Sparta. In a village near Eleusis, on the Sunday
preceding Lent, the matrons and maidens set up a dance, and while
dancing they improvised songs in praise of Hunger. At the end, {175}
the men who stood round listening with tears in their eyes, burst into
frenetic cheers for the King.[8]
Never, indeed, in the hour of his triumphs had King Constantine been so
near the hearts of his people as he was in this period of their common
affliction. Although the operation-wounds in his ribs were still open,
he met the emergency with dauntless fortitude, and never for a moment
forgot his part, either as a prince or as a man. "The King is
wonderful," wrote the correspondent already quoted. "He never
complains, and gives us all courage." Many a time, as the weary months
dragged on, he went over his past course, asking himself: "Could he
have been mistaken, after all?" No; the more he pondered, the more
convinced he felt that what he had done was the best for Greece. Now,
if the worst came to the worst, his sincerity at least could not be
questioned. When his friends ventured to express their admiration of
his stoicism, he answered simply: "I know that I am doing right." The
great source whence he derived consolation amidst all his calamities
was undoubtedly this consciousness of rectitude: a sense which in him
seems to have been as free from arrogance as it was from rancour.
The people who had formerly admired their sovereign as a hero, now
revered him as a martyr; and the man upon whom they visited their anger
was he whom they regarded as the true cause of their misery. After his
flight to Salonica M. Venizelos was never mentioned except by the name
of The Traitor; after the events of 1 December he was formally
impeached as one; and after the blockade had been in force for some
weeks, he was solemnly anathematized: on 26 December, the Archbishop of
Athens, from a cairn of stones in the midst of a great multitude,
pronounced the curse of the Church upon "the traitor, Venizelos." The
Government had forbidden the demonstration, but that did not prevent
myriads of people from going to add their own stone to the monument.[9]
One old woman was heard, as she cast her contribution, crying: "We made
him Premier; but he was not content. He would make himself king.
Anathema!" Subsequently, every village and hamlet repeated the
ceremony. "These {176} spontaneous ceremonies," observes an
eye-witness, "were vastly more indicative than any elections could ever
have been of the place to which the great Cretan had fallen in the
esteem of his countrymen." [10]
Appeals from the Holy Synod of the Greek Church to the Pope and the
heads of other Christian Churches availed as little as the appeals of
the Greek Government to Allied and neutral Governments. Month after
month the blockade went on, and each month produced its own tale of
suffering: deaths due directly to starvation; diseases due to the
indirect effects of inanition; a whole nation wasting for want of food;
horses starved to provide it; mothers praying to God for their daily
bread with babes drooping at their desiccated bosoms.[11] Yet of
yielding there was no sign: "Give in?" said a woman outside a
soup-kitchen at the Piraeus, in March. "We will eat our children
first!"
In such a manner this ancient race, which has lived so long, done so
much, and suffered so much, bore its martyrdom. By such an exercise of
self-discipline it defied the Powers of Civilisation to do their worst.
In spite of the licence given to brute force, in spite of the removal
of the machinery of civil control, in spite of the internment of the
army and its arms, in spite of the ostentatiously paraded support to
the Rebel, in spite of actual famine and the threat of imminent ruin,
the people held to the institutions of their country, rallied to their
King; and expressed their scorn for the usurper of his authority by
inscribing over the graves of their babies: "Here lies my child,
starved to death by Venizelos."
[1] See the article on "Pacific Blockade" in the _Encyclopaedia
Britannica_ (10th Ed.), Vol. XXXI, p. 401.
[2] _Ibid._
[3] _The Times_, 9, 19, 21, 30 Dec., 1916.
[4] Among these charitable organizations the foremost place belongs to
the "Patriotic League of Greek Women," which, under the competent
management of the Queen, was able to distribute 10,000 meals a day, as
well as clothes, blankets, medicine, milk for infants, etc.
[5] Zalocostas to Greek Legations abroad, 25 Jan./7 Feb.; 3/16 Feb.;
12/25 March, 1917.
[6] Zalocostas to Greek Legations abroad, 3/16 Feb.; to French Minister
at Athens, 16/29 March, 1917.
[7] Zalocostas to Greek Legations abroad, 25 Jan./7 Feb.; 15/28 Feb.;
12/25 March.
[8] The _Nea Himera_, 15/28 Feb., 1917.
[9] Zalocostas to Greek Legations abroad, 14/27 Dec., 1916.
[10] Paxton Hibben, p. 522.
[11] The Censorship succeeded in keeping these facts, as it kept many
others, from the British public; they were not suitable subjects for
war propaganda.
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