The Liberal regime, having few roots in the soil and those rotten, could
not but be ephemeral, unless the external force that had planted
continued to uphold it: in which case M. Venizelos might have lived to
weep over the triumph of his cause and the ruin of his country. This
contingency, however, was eliminated in advance by the clashing ambitions
of the Allies--the real guarantee of Greek independence. Foreign
interference, made possible by the War, had to cease with it. And that
was not all. M. Ribot, on 16 July, 1917, had declared in the French
Senate that the changes brought about in Greece would have to be ratified
by a Greek National Assembly. M. Venizelos also had, as we saw, stated
on his advent that the 1915 Chamber was but a temporary solution: that in
due time a Constituent Assembly would be elected to settle matters--a
statement which he repeated shortly afterwards in Parliament: "The
representatives of the Nation," he said, "watch with perfect calmness the
internal evolution of the political life of the country and wait for the
removal of the obstacles which do not permit the immediate convocation of
the National Assembly that will lay definitely the basis of the State."
After nearly three years of "internal evolution," the time for the
redemption of these pledges seemed to the people overdue. In vain did M.
Venizelos endeavour to put off the day of trial by arguing that it was
advisable to avoid the agitation inseparable from an election whilst
Greece was still at war with Turkey, and by promising that the elections
would follow close upon the signature of peace. It was natural that he
should adopt this course: he could not but hope that the fruits of his
foreign policy--fruits never even dreamt of a few years before--would
reconcile the people to his domestic administration. It was equally
natural that the people should be impatient: {218} Turkey may not sign
peace for ages, they protested; meanwhile are we to go on living under
martial law? They demanded the dissolution of the illegal and, at best,
long superannuated Chamber, and fresh elections. The call for freedom
grew louder, more insistent, more imperious and dangerous, until M.
Venizelos took a first tentative step towards a return to normality.
On 6 May, 1920--the day of the publication of the Turkish Peace terms
granted by the Allies at San Remo--a Royal Decree was issued at Athens
abolishing martial law. As at a signal, the Press turned its
search-lights on the inroads made into the Constitution. Abuses and
excesses hitherto held back by the Censorship gained publicity.
Political groups started organizing themselves for the electoral contest,
with every grievance of the past as an incitement to action in the
future. Most disturbing manifestation of all--though one that might have
been foretold--streets and taverns resounded again with the song in which
King Constantine was referred to as "The Son of the Eagle" leading his
army to glory. Evidently the efforts to root up loyalism had not
succeeded: far from it.
While M. Venizelos grew less by his elevation, King Constantine was
raised by his humiliation to a condition, if not actually divine,
half-way towards divinity. In many a house his portrait stood among the
holy icons, with a light burning before it, and the peasants worshipped
it much as their pagan ancestors would have done. It was but the
culmination of a process long at work--a process in which the historical
element was strangely mingled with the mythical.[1] Since the Balkan
Wars, King Constantine had been identified in the peasant mind with the
last Byzantine _Basileus_--his namesake, Constantine Palaeologus, slain
by the Turks in 1453; who, according to a widely believed legend, lay in
an enchanted sleep waiting for the hour when he should wake, break with
his sword the chains of slavery, and replant the cross {219} on the dome
of Saint Sophia. This singular fancy--whether a case of resurrection or
of reincarnation, is not clear--was strengthened by the fact that his
fall occurred on the very anniversary (29 May/11 June) of the day on
which that unfortunate Emperor fell in the ramparts of Constantinople.
The coincidence completed the association between the monarch who
sacrificed his life to save his people from subjection and the monarch
who, after leading his army in two victorious campaigns and doubling the
extent of his country, did not hesitate to sacrifice his crown to save
his people from disaster. Henceforth, even in minds not prone to
superstition, the two events were linked by the same date, the mourning
for the one rekindled the memory of the other, and King Constantine
acquired a new and imperishable title to the gratitude of the nation. If
all the efforts made in the past to blast his glory or to belittle his
services had only heightened his popularity, all the efforts made since
to blot out his image could only engrave it still deeper on the hearts of
the people. His very exile was interpreted, symbolically, as the
enchanted sleep whence he would arise to fulfil the ancient prophecies.
Mysticism apart, during the sad period preceding his departure, the
affection of the masses for their sovereign, intensified by compassion,
had assumed the quality of veneration. Now that he was gone, they
brooded over the wrongs which had driven him, a lawful and popular king,
into exile: wrongs which suffered for their sakes enhanced his claims on
their loyalty. They remembered wistfully the splendour of his victories,
his manly courage, his saintly patience, and perhaps most of all his
unfailing kindness to the humble and the weak. This was the quality
which drew men most strongly to Constantine, and the absence of which
repelled them most from M. Venizelos.[2] The experience of the last
three years had helped to emphasize the contrast: when the Eagle's Son
was up above, there were few vultures in the land; now there were
vultures only. So the name of Constantine became a synonym for orderly
government, loyalty to his person was identified with the principle of
liberty, and the people who had never regarded Alexander as anything more
than {220} a regent, who cried after the departing monarch from the shore
at Oropus: "You shall come back to us soon," hailed the return to
normality as presaging the return of the legitimate sovereign as well as
of a legal Constitution.
This, however, was the very last thing the powers that were contemplated
even as a remote potentiality. For them the monarch in exile was dead;
and the sooner his memory was buried the better. Accordingly, a police
circular, issued on 26 May, prohibited conversations favourable to the
ex-king, pictures of the ex-king, songs in honour of the ex-king, cheers
for the ex-king. And, these regulations having been found insufficient
to curb royalist fervour, five days later M. Venizelos demanded and
obtained from Parliament the re-establishment of martial law, on the
ground that "talk about the return of the ex-king was calculated to
excite public feeling; and then the Opposition might have cause to blame
the Government for not respecting the freedom of elections." The
question of the ex-king, he argued, was utterly irrelevant to the
forthcoming contest: the people would not be called upon to elect a
Constituent, but merely a Revisionist Assembly: "Who has said there is to
be a Constituent Assembly?" he asked.
The answer, of course, was easy: he himself had said so, on his
installation in 1917. But lapses of memory are permissible to statesmen
who mean business. M. Venizelos wanted a National Assembly which would
have powers to ratify the dethronement of the King, the suspension of the
irremovability of judges, and all other revolutionary illegalities,
besides perhaps altering fundamental articles of the Constitution--such
as the right of the Crown to appoint and dismiss Ministers and to
dissolve Parliaments--powers which essentially belong to a Constituent
Assembly. But he wanted it to be merely Revisionist. The paradox made
havoc of his logic; but it no way affected his purpose; which was that,
while as Constituent in its nature the Assembly should effect any
alterations in the government of the country that he desired, as
Revisionist in name it would not be competent to discuss the restoration
of the King, and, if it proved recalcitrant, would be subject to
dissolution by the {221} executive. Consistency and M. Venizelos had
been divorced long ago, and the decree was now to be made absolute.
While these eccentricities prevailed at home, abroad the gamester-spirit
of the Cretan scored its crowning triumph. By the Treaty of Sèvres (10
Aug., 1920), which embodied the territorial arrangements already made at
San Remo, Greece obtained practically the whole of Thrace outside the
enclave of Constantinople, and a mandate over Smyrna and its hinterland.
No doubt, this enormous extension of the kingdom, though still largely
problematical, appealed to that compound of idealism and greed (mostly
greed) which constitutes Hellenic, as it does all other, Imperialism.
But it did not fully compensate for the suppression of popular liberties
within its frontiers. Except among the followers of M. Venizelos the
national aggrandisement evoked but little enthusiasm: "What is a man
profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" wrote
one of the Opposition leaders, voicing a widespread sentiment--a
sentiment which, only two days after the publication of the Treaty (12
Aug.), found sinister expression. As he was about to leave Paris, M.
Venizelos was shot at and slightly wounded by two Greek ex-officers. The
assailants, on being arrested, declared that their object had been "to
free Greece from its oppressor and to ensure freedom for their
fellow-citizens." [3]
The Paris outrage had a sequel at Athens, as significant and more tragic.
The followers of M. Venizelos, like those of King Constantine, included a
set of fanatics who preached that the salvation of the country demanded
the extirpation of their adversaries. To these zealots the moment seemed
propitious for putting their doctrine into practice. "Hellenes!" cried
one of their journals, "our great Chief, our great patriot, the man who
has made Greece great and prosperous, the man who has made us proud to be
called Greeks, has been murdered by the instruments of the ex-King.
Hellenes, rise up all of you, and drive the murderers out of the
fatherland." The Hellenes in general remained unmoved. But some gangs
of hooligans did rise up (13 Aug.) and, under the eyes of the police and
the _gendarmerie_, wrecked a number of Royalist newspaper {222} offices,
clubs, cafés, and sacked the houses of four prominent anti-Venizelist
statesmen. The authorities, on their side, had a dozen leaders of
Opposition groups thrown into prison and, pending their conviction, M.
Repoulis, a Minister who in the absence of M. Venizelos acted as his
Deputy, declared that the attempt on the Premier formed part of a plot
long-planned for the overthrow of the regime: it had failed, but the
heads of the culprits would fall without fail. In fact, one of the
Opposition leaders--Ion Dragoumis, son of the ex-Premier of that
name--was assassinated by the Cretan guards who had arrested him. The
others, after being kept in solitary confinement for twenty-four days,
had to be released for want of any incriminating evidence.
M. Venizelos in Paris, when he heard of the riots, was reported as being
beside himself with righteous indignation; and he sent a strongly-worded
telegram to the Government, expressing the fear that part of the
responsibility for the disorders rested upon its organs, and assuring it
that he should exact full account from everyone concerned.[4] But when
he returned home he publicly embraced M. Repoulis, who explained in the
Chamber to the entire satisfaction of his Chief that the Government had
been overawed and very nearly overthrown by the extremists in its own
ranks (8 Sept.).
Everything that could be done--short of a massacre--to disorganize and to
intimidate the Opposition having been done, martial law was suspended (7
Sept.), and the question of Elections began to engage M. Venizelos's
attention seriously. It was a trial which involved his political life or
death, and therefore required the utmost care and vigilance: one
ill-considered step, one omission on his part might send him to his doom.
He began with the enfranchisement of Thrace (9 Sept.). This province,
still under military occupation and martial law, was to vote: further, a
political frontier was erected between it and the rest of Greece, which
only those possessing a special pass could cross, whilst a rigorous
censorship kept all anti-Venizelist newspapers out of it; and, lastly, it
was enacted, for the benefit of an electorate alien in its majority and
unable to read or write Greek, that the {223} Thracian votes, contrary to
the general rule, should be polled by ballot paper, instead of by a ball.
Another Bill enabled the army on active service, for the first time in
the history of Greece, to participate in elections, the assumption being
that among the soldiers Venizelist feeling predominated, or that, at all
events, they would be controlled by their officers.
As exceptional importance has always attached to the district and city of
Athens--"which," M. Venizelos said, "symbolizes the very soul of the
country," [5]--it was incumbent upon him to pay special attention to this
area. The difficulty was that the actual population was notoriously
unsympathetic. M. Venizelos hastened to overcome this difficulty by
three strokes of the pen: 18,000 refugees from all parts who lived on the
Ministry of Public Relief were enrolled as Athenian citizens; to these
were added some 6,000 Cretan gendarmes and policemen; and, to make up the
deficiency, 15,000 natives of Smyrna, supposed to have earned Greek
citizenship by volunteering in the war, had their names inscribed on the
electoral lists of Attica.
There followed promises and warnings. On the one hand, the people were
promised fresh labour legislation, the conversion of the great landed
estates into small holdings, and public works on a large scale. On the
other hand, they were warned that an adverse vote from them would have
disastrous consequences for the country: Greece had been aggrandized by
the Allies for the sake of M. Venizelos; if she discarded him, she would
forfeit their goodwill and her territorial acquisitions. But M.
Venizelos and his partisans did not trust altogether to the practical
sense and the Imperialist sensibilities of the people.
For months past the extremists among his followers openly threatened
that, if by any mishap Venizelos did not win the day after all, they
would make a _coup d'état_ and strike terror into the hearts of their
adversaries. This threat, which primarily presented itself as an
extravagance of irresponsible fanaticism, was on 7 September officially
espoused by M. Venizelos, who declared in Parliament that, should
perchance his adversaries obtain a majority in the new Assembly, and
should that Assembly decide {224} to convoke a Constituent Assembly, and
should this Constituent Assembly invite King Constantine back, the
"Reaction" would find itself confronted with the hostility of a large
political party which had become the mortal enemy of the ex-king; and he
went on to foreshadow a fresh schism in the army: that is, civil war.
Encouraged by so solemn a sanction, Venizelist candidates--notably at
Tyrnavo in Thessaly and Dervenion in Argolis--told their constituents
without any circumlocution that, in the event of a defeat at the polls,
the Government would not surrender its power, but would maintain it
through the Army of National Defence, which was pledged to a new
Revolution: the Parliamentary system would cease to function even in
name, and many a malignant would swing.
These appeals to the sovereign people, published in the Royalist and not
contradicted by the Venizelist Press, will doubtless seem startling for a
Government whose mission was to establish democratic liberties. But they
were justified by necessity. M. Venizelos and his partisans could not
afford to be very fastidious: their political existence was at stake:
they must make every effort, and summon every resource at their command.
Anyone who was in Athens at that time and saw the Cretan guards, often
with the Premier's photograph pinned on their breasts, assault such
citizens as displayed the olive-twig (emblem of the Opposition), or saw
the gendarmes, who patrolled the streets with fixed bayonets, protect the
excesses of Venizelist bravoes, would appreciate how far the Government
was prepared to stoop in order to survive.
In the midst of these electoral activities, King Alexander died--of blood
poisoning caused by the bite of a pet monkey. Alive he had neither
exercised nor been wanted to exercise any influence over the destinies of
his country: he had simply played the part required by the cast in which
a whimsical fortune had placed him. His death proved of more importance,
inasmuch as it forced the question of the throne upon M. Venizelos
irresistibly: the vacancy had to be filled. Anxious to perpetuate the
comedy, M. Venizelos sought a successor in a still younger and
less-experienced scion of the dynasty: Prince Paul, a lad in his teens,
who refused the offer on the ground that, until his father and his eldest
brother renounced their rights, {225} he could not lawfully ascend the
throne. After threatening to change the dynasty rather than admit any
discussion on the restoration of King Constantine, M. Venizelos, by one
of those swift turns characteristic of him, suddenly made that
restoration the main issue of the Elections. He challenged the
Opposition to this test of the real wishes of the Greek people. The
Greek people, he said, should be given the chance of deciding whether it
will have Constantine back; and if it so decided, he himself would go.
The Opposition, which consisted of no fewer than sixteen different groups
united only by a common desire to get rid of the Cretan Dictator, would
fain decline the challenge. Some of the leaders were ardent Royalists;
others were very lukewarm ones; and others still could hardly be
described as Royalists at all. Generally speaking, the politicians out
of office had found in the cause of Constantine a national badge for a
party feud. Moreover, they realized that the question of Constantine
possessed an international as well as a national aspect, and they did not
wish to compromise the future of Greece and their own; which would have
been nothing else than stepping into the very pit M. Venizelos had dug
for them. But neither could they repudiate Constantine without losing
popular support: to the Greek people the main issue of the fight was
indeed what M. Venizelos made it.
At length the day of trial arrived: a Sunday (14 Nov.)--a day of leisure
in a land of universal suffrage. From an early hour people of all
classes thronged the polling-stations quietly. They had clamoured for a
chance of expressing their sentiments; yet now that the chance had come,
they took it with an extraordinary composure. Even to the most expert
eye the electors' demeanour gave no indication of their sentiments: the
olive-twig had very curiously withered out of sight. Nor did the
behaviour of the voters in the last three years afford any clue to the
use they would make of their present opportunity. Greeks are past
masters of simulation and dissimulation. Openly some might have
pretended friendship to the Venizelist regime from hopes of favour,
others again dissembled hostility through fear; but the voting was secret.
Both Government and Opposition shared the suspense, {226} though the
Government anticipated an overwhelming majority;[6] which was natural
enough, since all the advantage seemed on its side.
Presently the votes were counted--and "it was officially announced that
the Government had been mistaken in its anticipations." The magnitude of
the mistake appeared on the publication of the figures: 250 seats to 118:
the Royalists had swept the polls, to the astonishment of all parties,
including their own.[7] The very men who had fought at the bidding of M.
Venizelos had pronounced themselves against him: having fulfilled their
duty as soldiers, they vindicated their right to live as free citizens.
His own constituency had rejected him. And would the rout stop there?
Among the millions who had submitted to his rule with sullen irritation
there were many whose hearts swelled with rage, in whom old wounds
rankled and festered: might not these men now have recourse to other
weapons than the vote in order to get even with the bully?
For a moment M. Venizelos felt stupefied: the edifice that had seemed so
solid was collapsing about him, and he was in danger of being buried
under the ruins. Then he wisely stole out of the country he had done his
best to aggrandize and to disintegrate.[8]
The result of the elections was virtually an invitation to King
Constantine to return and resume his crown. But the King, not content
with an indirect verdict, wanted an explicit plebiscite _ad hoc_, clear
of all other issues. The Allies, after a conference in London,
telegraphed (2 Dec.) {227} to M. Rallis, the new Greek Premier, that they
"had no wish to interfere in the internal affairs of Greece, but they
felt bound to declare publicly that the restoration of the throne to a
king whose disloyal attitude and conduct towards the Allies during the
War caused them great embarrassment and loss could only be regarded by
them as a ratification by Greece of his hostile acts." [9] This
message--yet another fruit of Franco-British compromise--was followed up
(6 Dec.) by a second Note, enumerating the consequences, political and
financial, of the Powers' displeasure. But it produced little effect:
out of the 1,013,724 electors who took part in the plebiscite (7 Dec.),
only 10,383 voted against the King.[10] M. Rallis, in acquainting him
with the result, stated that he considered it tantamount to a formal
request from the country to the Sovereign to come into his own again, and
invited him to respond to the clearly expressed wish of the nation.
Which King Constantine did, nothing loth.
Few of those who witnessed the event will ever forget it. On the eve of
the King's return (18 Dec.) Athens could scarcely contain her emotion.
All day long her beflagged streets rang with the cry: "_Erchetai!
Erchetai!_" ("He is coming! He is coming!")--hardly anybody failed to
utter it, and nobody dared to say "_Then erchetai_" ("He is not coming"),
even if referring to an unpunctual friend. At night the song in which
Constantine was alluded to as "The Son of the Eagle" echoed from one end
of the illuminated city to the other. But this was only a preparation
for next morning's welcome.
Owing to stress of weather the cruiser carrying the King and Queen of the
Hellenes was compelled to put in at Corinth, where the exiles landed.
From that point to the capital their journey was a triumphal progress.
The train moved slowly between lines of peasants who, their hands linked,
accompanied it, shouting: "We have wanted him! We have brought him
back!" [3] When {228} the King stepped out at the station, officers
fought a way to the carriage with blue and silver dressed postillions
which waited for him and the Queen. He had to keep tossing from one hand
to the other his baton, as men and women pressed upon him for a
handshake. The carriage struggled forward, men and women clinging to its
steps and running with it, trying to kiss the hands and feet of the royal
pair, and baulked of this, kissing even the horses and the carriage
itself. All the way dense masses of people pressed round the carriage,
shouting: "He has come!" or singing the chorus, "Again our King will draw
the sword." An eye-witness had a vision of a soldier who, amid cries of
"We will die for you, Godfather!" clambered into the carriage head first
and fell to kissing the knees of the King and Queen, while around people
fainted and stretchers pressed through the crowd.[12]
And so the fight for the soul of Greece ended in a victory for
Constantine.
The character of this prince has been painted in the most opposite
colours, as must always be the case when a man becomes the object of
fervent worship and bitter enmity. But the bare record of what he did
and endured reveals him sufficiently. His qualities speak through his
actions, so that he who runs may read. His most conspicuous defect was a
want of suppleness--a certain rigidity of spirit which, when he
succeeded, was called firmness, and when he failed, obstinacy. Yet the
charge so often brought against him, that he allowed himself to be misled
by evil counsellors, shows that this persistence in his own opinion did
not spring from egoism nor was incompatible with deference to the
opinions of others. It arose from a deep sense of responsibility: he
stubbornly refused to deviate from his course when he believed that his
duty to his country forbade deviation, and he readily laid down his crown
when duty to his country dictated renunciation. For the rest, a man who
never posed to his contemporaries may confidently leave his character to
the judgment of posterity.
As for M. Venizelos, history will probably say of him {229} what it has
said of Themistocles: Though he sincerely aimed at the aggrandizement of
his country, and proved on some most critical occasions of great value to
it, yet on the whole his intelligence was higher than his morality--a man
of many talents and few principles, ready to employ the most tortuous and
unscrupulous means, sometimes indeed for ends in themselves patriotic,
but often merely for aggrandizing himself. By nature he was more fitted
to rule in a despotic than to lead in a constitutional State. Had he
been born an emperor, his fertile genius might, unless betrayed by his
restless ambition, have rendered his reign prosperous and his memory
precious. As it is, in his career, with all its brilliance, posterity
will find not so much a pattern to imitate as an example to deter.
[1] There is always so much of mystery surrounding the peasant mind, that
its workings must often be accepted rather than understood. But those
who wish to understand somewhat the psychological process which led in
antiquity to the deification of kings during their life-time could not do
better than study the cult of Constantine among the modern Greek
peasantry.
[2] See Vice-Admiral Mark Kerr, in the _Morning Post_, 13 Dec., 1920.
[3] The _Daily Mail_, Aug. 13, 1920.
[4] _Eleutheros Typos_, 5/18 Aug., 1920.
[5] The _New Europe_, 29 March, 1917, p. 327.
[6] "Even if the Opposition sweeps the Peloponnese and gains a majority
in Acarnania and Corfu, it is still doubtful whether it will have 120
seats in the new Chamber, which will contain 369 Deputies; and the
Venizelists anticipate that their opponents will emerge from the struggle
with less than 100 Deputies."--_The Times_, 15 Nov., 1920.
[7] The _Daily Mail_; The _Evening News_, 16 Nov, 1920; Reuter, Athens,
15 Nov.: "Not a single Venizelist was returned for Macedonia and Old
Greece, except in Epirus and Aegean Islands."
[8] We learn that his followers "urged upon him the advisability of a
_coup d'état_. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to
carry out, and with so much at stake for Greece and for democratic
principles generally, it seemed justifiable."--"M. Venizelos at Nice," in
_The Times_, 29 Nov., 1920. But, "fears are entertained, it is said,
that the regular Army--which is strongly anti-Venizelist--may get out of
hand."--The _Daily Mail_, 17 Nov.
[9] The terms of the Note were communicated to the House of Commons by
Mr. Bonar Law the same night.
[10] Reuter, Athens, 9 Dec., 1920.
[11] Another version of this refrain, which might be seen in crude
lettering over a café at Phaleron, is: "So we willed it, and we brought
him back" (_Etsi to ethelame, kai ton epherame_)--a distinct expression
of the feeling that the people, by bringing back its sovereign in the
face of foreign opposition, asserted its own sovereignty.
[12] See _The Times_, 20 Dec.; The _Daily Mail_, 21 Dec., 1920.
{230}
AFTERWORD
In default of a Providence whose intervention in human affairs is no
longer recognized, there still is a Nemesis of history whose operations
can scarcely be denied. International morality, strange as the
juxtaposition of the two words may seem, exists no less than the law of
gravity; and a statesman who offends against the one must expect much
the same catastrophe as an engineer who ignores the other. But it is
not often that this law of retribution asserts itself so swiftly as it
has done in the drama for which Greece supplied the stage to French
statesmen during the last few years; for it is not often that a
Government in the pursuit of practical interests overlooks so
completely moral principles, flouts so openly national sentiments, and,
while priding itself on realism, shuts its eyes so consistently to
realities.
The logic of French action is as above reproach, as its motives are
beyond dispute.
Nine decades ago the Duc de Broglie clearly explained that the aim of
France in assisting to liberate Greece from the Turkish yoke was to
have in the Eastern Mediterranean an instrument of her own ambition: "a
State disposed to turn her eyes constantly towards that Power who has
made her free--to watch for us over the ports of the Levant, to guard
with us the mouth of the Black Sea and the keys of the Bosphorus
[Transcriber's note: Bosporus?]";--it followed that the greater the
client, the better for the patron's purpose. After undergoing many
fluctuations and modifications, this idea was revived at the time of
the Balkan wars, when France, together with Germany, supported the
Greek claim to Cavalla, and it was fostered to an unhealthy growth
during the European War. Hence the identification of France with M.
Venizelos, who stood for a policy of expansion at all hazards, and her
hostility to King Constantine who, preferring safety to hazardous
ventures, stood for Greece's right to shape her course without
dictation from Paris any more than from Berlin.
{231}
By the methods which she employed, France succeeded in gaining Greece
and losing the Greeks. Nothing else could have been expected: friends
are sometimes to be won by good offices; sometimes by the promise of
good offices; and sometimes by good words. They are seldom won by
injuries, and by insults never. It is curious that so elementary a
lesson in human nature should have been unknown to the able men who
guided the policy and diplomacy of France during the War, who raised
her military prestige and re-established her position in the first rank
of the European Powers. Yet it is a fact--a fact which can be easily
verified by a reference to their utterances: they are upon record.
Brute force, and brute force, and again brute force: such is the burden
that runs through them all; and it embodies a doctrine: the Greeks are
Orientals and must be wooed with terror: on the notion, enunciated by
an English humorist as a paradox, and adopted by French statesmen as an
axiom, that terror sown in the Oriental heart will yield a harvest of
esteem--even of affection. With this mad dogma nailed to her mast,
France set out upon her voyage for the conquest of the Hellenic heart.
It was the first of her mistakes--and it was accompanied by another.
Even if Greece were willing to play the part of a French satellite, she
could not do so; for her geographical situation exposes her to the
influence of more than one Power. Italy, who has her own ambitions in
the Eastern Mediterranean, opposed during the War a policy the object
of which was Greek expansion over territories coveted by herself and a
readjustment of the balance of forces in favour of France; and it was
partly in order not to alienate Italy during the War that French
statesmen wanted Greece to come in without any specified conditions,
leaving the matter of territorial compensations for the time of
settlement. Russia showed herself not less suspicious of French
diplomacy for similar reasons. But it was with England chiefly that
France had to reckon. In the past the rivalry between France and
England in the Eastern Mediterranean, though often overshadowed by
their common antagonism, first to Russia and subsequently to Germany,
was a perennial cause of discord which kept Greece oscillating between
the two Powers.
{232}
During the War England, of necessity, lent France her acquiescence and
even assistance in a work which she would rather not have seen done.
But, once done, she endeavoured to secure such profit as was to be
derived therefrom. The Greeks in Asia Minor--it was thought--could
serve to check the Turks from troubling us in Mesopotamia and other
parts of the Near and Middle East. Hence the Treaty of Sèvres, which
provided for the aggrandizement of Greece at the expense of the Ottoman
Empire in Asia as well as in Europe, to the seeming satisfaction of
both French and British interests. But the adjustment--even if it had
been forced upon Turkey--could, by the nature of things, be only
temporary. Owing to her geographical situation, Greece must inevitably
move within the orbit of the Power who dominates the sea.
Psychology accelerated a movement imposed by geography. While France
based her action upon an English humorist's paradox, England based hers
upon a French thinker's maxim: _Lorsqu'on veut redoubler de force, il
faut redoubles de grâce_. Although her diplomatic, military, and naval
representatives did participate in every measure of coercion and
intimidation as a matter of policy, they (if we except the Secret
Service gentry) never forgot the dictates of decency: they never,
figuratively, kicked the person whom they deemed it necessary to knock
down. The ordinary British soldiers, too, for all the relaxation of
moral rules natural in war, maintained throughout the campaign a
standard of behaviour which contrasted so favourably with their
comrades' that it earned them among the inhabitants of Macedonia the
honourable nickname of "the maids." It was particularly noted during
the fire which devastated Salonica that, while others took advantage of
the turmoil to loot, the British soldier devoted himself wholly to
rescuing. Some of these things were perhaps resented by our allies as
weak, and some were ridiculed as naïve; but they must be judged by
their effect. At the end of the War one nation was respected by the
Greeks as much as the other was hated and despised. British prestige
rose exactly in proportion as French prestige sank. And the object
which France elected to seek, and sought in vain, by {233} means of
violence and terror, England attained by a conduct which, if not more
lawful, was much more graceful.
Still, French statesmen counted on M. Venizelos--"_l'homme politique
qui incarne l'idée de la solidarité des intérêts français et
grecs_"--to keep his country on their side. And as in the first
instance they had made the alliance conditional on his being placed in
control, so now they made the benefits accruing from it to Greece
dependent on his remaining in control. That M. Venizelos could not
always remain in control does not seem to have occurred to them. Nor
that he might not always be content to be a mere puppet in their hands.
Murmurs at his pro-British leanings were indeed heard occasionally.
But on the whole the Cretan possessed in an adequate measure the
faculty of adapting himself to rival points of view, of making each
Power feel that her interests were supreme in his regard, and of using
the ambitions of both to promote his own. As long as he remained in
control, France, with whatever reservations, felt sure of her share of
influence.
The collapse of M. Venizelos and the demand of the Greek people for
King Constantine's return, came to French statesmen as a painful
surprise. That they had for several years been laboriously building on
illusions could not be disguised, and being made to look absurd before
those of their own compatriots who had all along advocated a policy
based on the preservation and exploitation of Turkey, rendered the
situation doubly awkward. Unable to rise above personal pique, they
would fain veto the return of a prince whom they hated and whom they
had wronged beyond hope of conciliation. England, however, free from
petty animosities, and sensible that, under whatever ruler, Greece
would be with her, refused to sanction lawlessness in the midst of
peace; and her view that, if the Greeks wanted Constantine, it was
their business and not ours, prevailed. But, on the other hand, by way
of compromise, France obtained that he should return to an empty
treasury, with foreign credits cut off, and the loans made by the
Allies to the Venizelist Government, to facilitate the waging of a
common war against Turkey, revoked.
It was an impossible position which King Constantine was called upon to
face: a position none of his own making, {234} yet one from which there
was no retreat. The Greek people's imperialism had been roused. The
leaders who once criticized M. Venizelos's Asiatic policy as a
dangerous dream, opposed to economic, strategic, and ethnic realities,
might still hold those views and mutter in secret that Smyrna would
prove the grave of Greece; but they no longer dared express them, out
of deference to public opinion. To the masses M. Venizelos's wild game
of chance seemed vindicated by its results, and while they rejected the
man they clung to his work.
The Greek Government had no choice but to carry on the conflict under
enormous disadvantages. As France anticipated, with foreign credits
cut off and a progressive fall in the exchange, the expense of
maintaining a large army on a war footing proved too heavy for the
National Exchequer. And that was not the worst. France, who since the
Armistice had betrayed a keen jealousy of England's place in a part of
the world in which she claims special rights, presently concluded a
separate agreement with Turkey--an example in which she was followed by
Italy--and gave the Turks her moral and material support in their
struggle with the Greeks; while England, though refusing to reverse her
policy in favour of their enemies, contented herself with giving the
Greeks only a platonic encouragement, which they were unwise enough to
take for more than it was worth.
Everyone knows the melancholy sequel: our unhappy "allies," left to
their own exhausted resources, were driven from the Asiatic territories
which in common prudence they should never have entered; and the
overseas Empire which M. Venizelos had conjured up vanished in smoke.
The rout in Asia Minor had its repercussion in Greece. For nearly two
years the people, though war-worn and on the edge of bankruptcy, bore
the financial as they had borne the famine blockade, trusting that
England would at any moment come forth to counter the vindictiveness of
France, and sturdily resisted all the efforts of the Venizelist party
to shake the stability of the Royalist regime: Constantine again
appeared in their eyes as a victim of the Cretan's intrigues. But the
loss of Ionia and the danger of the loss of Thrace; the horror and
{235} despair arising from the sack of Smyrna, whence shiploads of
broken refugees fled to the Greek ports; all this, reinforced by an
idea that the maintenance of the King on the throne prevented the
effective expression of British friendship and his fall would remove
French hostility, created conditions before which questions of
personalities for once faded into insignificance, and put into the
hands of M. Venizelos's partisans an irresistible lever.
On 26 September an army of 15,000 insurgent soldiers landed near Athens
and demanded the abdication of the King. The loyal troops were ready
to meet force by force. But the King, in order to avert a fratricidal
struggle which would have dealt Greece the finishing stroke, forbade
opposition and immediately abdicated, "happy," as he said, "that
another opportunity has been given me to sacrifice myself once more for
Greece." In fact, once more Constantine was made the scape-goat for
disasters for which he was in no way responsible--disasters from which
he would undoubtedly have saved his country, had he been allowed to
pursue his own sober course.
M. Venizelos would not go back to Athens until the excitement subsided,
lest people should think, he said, that he had had any part in the
revolution: but undertook the defence of the national interests in the
Entente capitals. His mission was to obtain such support as would
enable him to save Greece something out of the ruin which his insane
imperialism had brought upon her, so that he might be in a position to
point out to his countrymen that he alone, after the disastrous failure
of Constantine, had been able to secure their partial rehabilitation.
That accomplished, he might then hope to become a perpetual Prime
Minister or President.
France made it quite clear that no changes in Greece could alter her
policy: however satisfied she might be at the second disappearance of
the antipathetic monarch, it should not be supposed that, even were a
Republic to be set up, presided over by the Great Cretan, her attitude
on territorial questions would be transformed: Thrace, after Ionia,
must revert to Turkey. French statesmen longed for the complete
demolition of their own handiwork. M. Poincaré, in 1922, was proud to
do what the Duc de Broglie ninety years before scoffed at as an {236}
unthinkable folly: "_Abandonner la Grèce aujourd'hui, détruire de nos
propres mains l'ouvrage que nos propres mains ont presque achevé!_"
England's expressed attitude was not characterized by a like precision.
It is true that after the Greek debacle she dispatched ships and troops
to prevent the Straits from falling into the hands of the Turks; but in
the matter of Thrace she had already yielded to France: and how the
restoration of Turkish rule in Europe can be reconciled with the
freedom of the Straits remains to be seen.
What the future may have in store for Greece and Turkey is a matter of
comparatively small account. What is of great and permanent importance
is the divergence between the paths of France and England revealed by
the preceding analysis of events.
From this analysis have been carefully excluded such superficial
dissensions as always arise between allies after a war, and were
especially to be expected after a war in which every national
susceptibility was quickened to a morbid degree: they belong to a
different category from the profound antagonisms under consideration.
These--whatever the philosopher may think of a struggle for
domination--present a problem which British statesmen must face
frankly. It is not a new problem; but it now appears under a new form
and in a more acute phase than it has ever possessed in the
past--thanks to the success of the "knock-out blow" policy which
governed the latter stages of the War.
With the German power replaced by the French, the Russian for the
moment in abeyance, French and Italian influences competing in Turkey,
French and British aims clashing in the Arab regions wrested from
Turkey--while indignation at Occidental interference surges in the
minds of all the peoples of the Orient--the Eastern Mediterranean
offers a situation which tempts one to ask whether the authors of that
policy have not succeeded too well? Whether in pursuing the success of
the day--to which their personal reputations were attached--they did
not lose sight of the morrow? Whether they have not scattered the seed
without sufficiently heeding the crop? However that may be, unless
this situation was clearly foreseen by its creators and provided for--a
hypothesis {237} which, with the utmost goodwill towards them, does not
appear very probable--they have an anxious task--a task that, under
these conditions, demands from British statesmanship more thinking
about the Near Eastern question and the Greek factor in it than was
necessary before 1914.
As a first aid to an appreciation of the problem by the public--which
the present crisis found utterly unprepared--it would have been well if
the fundamental differences between the respective attitudes of France
and England towards each other and towards the peoples concerned had
been candidly acknowledged, and all pretence of Franco-British
co-operation in the Near East abandoned. Lasting co-operation cannot
be where there is neither community of interests nor consonance of
ideas: where the loss of one party is welcomed as gain by the other,
and the wisdom of the one in the eyes of the other is folly. Pious
talk of a common Allied mission in the Near East has only served to
obscure issues and to render confusion in the public mind worse
confounded. It was idle to make a mystery of the support given by
France to the Turks and of her insistence on the revision of the Sèvres
Treaty--preliminary steps to her demand for the evacuation of Chanak
and the consequent elimination of British sea-power. The object of
these tactics was evident to every serious student of history: France
pursues now the plan laid down by Louis XIV, continued by Napoleon,
fitfully carried on throughout the nineteenth century, and facilitated
by her installation in Syria--the equivalent of the German _Drang nach
Osten_: a plan incompatible with the safety of the British Empire in
the East. This is the truth of the matter, and nothing has been gained
by hiding it.
The people who fought a ruinous war without quite knowing the ends
aimed at, had a right to know at least the results obtained; and after
France's separate agreement with Turkey, the denial to them of any part
of that knowledge could not be justified on any principle of honour or
plea of expediency.
{239}
INDEX
Achilleion, 92
Albania, Suggested partition of, 19
Alexander, King, 197, 203, 205-7, 219, 224
Andrew, Prince, 123, 200
Asia Minor, Concessions to Greece in, 19, 22-26, 32, 34, 35, 37,
221, 232.
---- ----, Greeks driven from, 234
Athens, Naval demonstrations against, 82, 102, 110, 111
----, Fighting at, 159-161
----, Bombardment of, 160
----, Occupation of, 204
----, Conspiracy at, 216
----, Riots at, 221, 222
---- electorate, 223
Austria and Greece, 9
---- and Servia, 7, 17, 22
Averoff, M., 183
---- gaol, 209
Balkan League, 4, 19, 20, 24, 27
Benazet, M., Negotiation of, 146, 147, 150-152
Blockades, 82, 101, 164, 172-176, 184
Boulogne, Conference at, 140, 185
Bratiano, M., 22
Briand, M., 76, 86, 89, 100-103, 105, 116, 131, 132, 146
Broglie, Due de, 188, 230, 235
Bucharest Treaty, 7-9, 18
----, Conference at, 18
Bulgaria and Greece, 7, 8, 21, 23, 67
---- ---- Servia, 7, 17, 21, 62
---- ---- Turkey, 21, 52
---- ---- Central Powers, 27, 40
---- ---- Entente, 21, 28, 38, 40, 43, 57, 60, 66, 144
Bülow, Prince von, 47
Callimassiotis, M., 92
Calogeropoulos, M., Premier, 124-132, 140, 192
Canea, 92, 128, 130, 132
Castellorizo, 85, 86
Castoria, Metropolitan of, 209
Cavalla allotted to Greece, 10, 230
----, Proposed cession of, to Bulgaria. 20, 23-25, 39, 41-42
---- surrendered to Germano-Bulgars, 118-21
Cephalonia, 86, 177
Cerigo, 177
Chanak, 237
Chios, 130
Church, Greek, 175, 176, 208, 209
Churchill, Mr. Winston, 13
Cochin, M. Denys, 81
Constantine, King: his popularity, 1, 2, 75, 131, 175, 198, 218-220
----, ----; policy, 5, 8-12, 13, 14, 15, 19, 34, 35, 38, 55, 81,
114, 124, 144, 146, 150, 156, 181, 230
----, ----: defeat in 1897, 1, 74
----, ----, and M. Venizelos, 5, 14, 15, 53-57, 115, 133, 145, 181
----, ----, and the Kaiser, 9, 10, 56, 69, 95, 96, 170
----, ----, Agitation against, 70, 121, 127, 143, 145, 167, 181, 182
----, ----: dethronement, 186, 191-199
----, ----: restoration, 227, 228
----, ----: character, 198, 199, 228
----, ----: abdication, 235
Constantinople, Russia and, 31, 32
Constitution, Greek, 70-74, 191, 201, 205, 220
Corfu, 85, 86, 91, 177
Corinth, 186, 190, 192, 195, 227
Coundouriotis, Admiral, 103, 131, 133, 183, 209
{240}
Crete, 2, 86, 128, 130, 133-136, 208
Crewe, Lord, 41, 42
Crimean War, 103
Crown Councils, 29, 68, 170, 192
Cuninghame, Sir Thomas, 82
Cyprus, 66, 75
Danglis, General, 133
Dardanelles, 14, 15, 27-31, 34, 59, 72. _See also_ "Gallipoli"
Dartige du Fournet, Admiral, 91, 92, 110, 112, 129, 130,
131, 139, 141, 143, 147, 148, 149, 152, 153-160, 163-164
Delcassé, M., 32, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 46, 76
Delyannis, M., 74
Demidoff, Prince, Russian Minister at Athens, 32, 35, 104, 112
Demir-Hissar, Bridge of, 85
Deville, M., quoted, 13, 28, 40, 51, 57
Dimitracopoulos, M., 123, 192
Dousmanis, General, 81, 112, 200
Dova-tépé, Fort, 99
Dragoumis, Ex-Premier, 192, 210
----, Ion, 222
Drama, 109, 118, 121
Elections of June, 1915, 33, 50
---- ---- December, 1915, 75
---- demanded and eluded (June-September, 1916), 102, 106-108,
114, 115, 123
---- of November, 1920, 222-226
Eleusis, 111, 174
Elliot, Sir Francis, British Minister at Athens, 35, 88, 104,
114, 117, 123, 125, 128, 142, 145, 149, 156, 165
England, Policy of, 13, 20, 22, 31, 42, 56, 77, 102, 104, 106,
128, 144, 185, 186, 232-234, 236
Esslin, M., 209
Evangelismos hospital, 210
Falkenhayn, General von, 95-97
Fleet, Greek, 131, 141, 148, 149
Florina, 85
France, Policy of, 13, 31, 46, 77, 87, 103, 129, 144, 153, 155,
183-185, 230, 231, 233-235, 237
Gallipoli, 14, 30, 31, 36, 43, 50, 63, 73. _See also_
"Dardanelles"
Gauchet, Admiral, 164, 190
George, King of Greece, 71
----, Prince, 35, 38-40, 134-137, 156, 211
Gerakini, 91
Germany and Greece, 11, 87, 89, 95-98, 121, 122
Goerlitz, Greek troops interned at, 121
Gounaris, M., Premier, 33-46, 200
Grey, Sir Edward, 22, 23, 25, 35, 56, 59, 60, 66, 101, 102
"Guarantee" of Greek constitution, 187-189
Guillemin, M., French Minister at Athens, 37, 56, 61, 82, 88,
102, 104, 106, 110, 117, 118, 129, 146, 152, 164
Hamilton, General, 59
Hatzopoulos, Colonel, 108, 118-121
Hautefeuille, M., 172
Hindenburg, Field-Marshal von, 118, 119, 121, 170
Holy Synod, Appeals from, 176
---- ---- deposed, 208
Ionia, 234, 235
Italian troops in Macedonia, 108
---- ---- ---- Epirus, 203
---- policy, 231, 234
Jagow, Von, 97
Jonnart, M., his mission to Greece, 186, 189-206
Kaiser, The, and King Constantine, 9, 10, 117, 180, 181
----, ----, ---- Queen Sophie, 169, 170
Kara-Burnu, 85
{241}
Katerini, 96, 147
Kerr, Admiral Mark, 10, 14, 15, 219
Kitchener, Lord, 13
----, ----, on French policy, 76
----, ----, in Greece, 81
Krivolak, 79, 95
Lambros, Prof., Premier, 141, 143, 149, 154, 158, 181, 200, 210
Larissa, 118
Lemnos, 58, 130
Leucas, 178
London, Treaties of (1863 and 1864), 86
----, Conference in, 186
Macedonia, Allies in, 76-80, 82-85, 108
----, Germano-Bulgarian invasion of, 94, 97, 98, 108, 109
----, Elections in, 94, 109
----, British soldiers' conduct in, 232
Mercati, M., 55, 56
Metaxas, Colonel, 29, 8l, 112, 200
Milne, General, 101
Milo, 82, 111
Monastir, 67, 77, 95, 145
Moschopoulos, General, 59, 82
Moudros, 58
Mytilene, 58, 94, 130, 133, 208
Near East, Franco-British rivalry in, 231, 237
Neutral zone, 147, 148, 168, 178, 180
Nicholas, Prince, 123, 200
Oropus, 220
Otho, King, 103, 125, 187
Painlevé, M., 186
Palaeologus, Emperor Constantine, Legend of, 218
Passitch, M., 18, 40, 42, 51
Paul, Prince, 224
Peloponnesus, 146, 167, 169, 171, 192, 195
Phaleron, 198
Piraeus, 103, 110, 120, 127, 141, 143, 159, 165, 176, 190, 202, 213
Poincaré, M., 38, 40, 235
Politis, M., 47, 183
Rallis, M., 30, 80, 210, 227
Regnault, General, 190, 203, 204
Repoulis, M., 222
Reservists, 107, 117, 127, 171, 184, 203
Ribot, M., 184, 186, 190, 217
Rome, Conference at, 169, 185
Roques, General, 147, 152
Rufos, M., 209
Rumania, 9, 10, 18, 21-24, 113, 116
Rupel, 97, 98, 99, 210
Russia and Greece, 31, 32, 43, 104, 126, 157, 184, 185, 189
---- ---- Bulgaria, 62
---- ---- Servia, 18
---- ---- Turkey, 19, 27
Salamis, 111, 149, 190, 195
Salisbury, Lord, on Greek policy in 1897, 74
Salonica, Allies' landing at, 56, 58-62, 64, 74
---- in state of siege, 100
----, Revolt at, 110
----, Fire at, 232
Samos, 130, 133
San Remo, 218
Sarrail, General, 79, 82, 99, 100, 102, 106, 107, 108, 110, 164,
178, 179, 181, 183, 202
Sazonow, M., 18, 19, 31
Schenck, Baron, 140
Secret Services, French and British, 90-93, 107, 112, 117,
127-130, 179
Serres, 109, 118, 120
Servia, Greek alliance with, 7, 8, 17, 33, 51, 52, 55, 58, 65, 66
----, Entente and, 18, 22, 23, 40, 41, 42, 51
Sèvres, Treaty of, 221, 232, 237
Skouloudis, M., Premier, 69
---- and Entente, 77-79, 8l-84, 88, 89, 99, 100
---- ---- Germany, 87, 89, 95-98
{242}
Skouloudis, M., Premier, placed under surveillance, 200
---- impeached, 209, 210
Smyrna, 35, 36, 221, 223, 234, 235
Sophie, Queen, 160, 169, 170, 173
Staff, Greek General: Dardanelles, Plans of, 15, 16
----, ---- ----, and Servia, 17, 40, 41, 49, 52
----, ---- ----, ---- King Constantine, 13, 31, 35, 72, 73
----, ---- ----, ---- M. Venizelos, 25, 28, 29, 45, 55, 62, 73, 81
----, ---- ----, ---- Lord Kitchener, 81
----, ---- ----, on Gallipoli enterprise, 28, 29, 31, 36, 47
----, ---- ----, opposed to Asiatic expansion, 25, 26
Straits, Russia and the, 31
----, France and the, 230
----, England and the, 236
Stratos, M., 192, 193
Streit, M., 8, 12, 13, 15, 34, 45, 112, 200
Struma, 85, 97
Submarines, German, Alleged fuelling of, 90-92
Suda Bay, 86, 128, 133
Syngros gaol, 209
Syra, 177
Syria, 237
Talaat Bey, 18
Tatoi, 53, 55
Thasos, 120, 130
Therisos movement, 134, 136
Thessaly, 145, 147, 168, 178, 180, 181, 186, 190, 192
Thrace, 19, 221, 222, 234, 235, 236
Turkey and Entente, 4, 13, 19, 232, 233, 235, 236
Turkey and Germany, 10, 13, 18, 19
---- ---- Bulgaria, 19, 52
---- ---- Greece, 13, 18, 19, 217, 218, 232, 233, 234
Venizelos, Eleutherios: early career, 2-5, 133-136
----, and King Constantine, 5, 14, 15, 29, 50, 53-57, 109, 110,
136, 137, 183, 220, 225.
----: policy, 7, 8, 12-14, 20, 21-27, 28-32, 51, 53, 55, 61, 68,
127, 205, 207, 221, 230
----: first resignation, 31
----: return to power, 50
----: popularity, 5, 50
----: second resignation, 63
----: unpopularity, 75, 94, 107, 108, 175, 176
----: agitation, 44-48, 70-74, 92-94, 99, 127
----: rebellion, 106, 110, 128-131, 133, 136-138
----: Salonica Government, 133, 140, 147, 148, 168, 169, 174,
177, 178
----: anathematization, 175
----: elevation, 202-206
----: rule, 207-216
----: attempt on his life, 221
----: fall, 226
----: character, 229
----: representative of Greece in Entente capitals, 235
Vlachopoulos, Colonel, 52, 53
Volo, 120
Wellington, Duke of, 188
Zaimis, M., Premier, 65-69, 102, 108, 114-119, 181, 190-203
Zalocostas, M., 210
Zante, 177
Zappeion, 143, 159, 160
Zographos, M., 33, 37, 41
End of Project Gutenberg's Greece and the Allies 1914-1922, by G. F. Abbott