vengeance on the unfortunate Christian inhabitants on their route and
mercilessly butchered them. What remained of their army retired on
Veria, where it was reinforced by fourteen fresh battalions. On the
28th the Greek army resumed its march. In front of Veria it again came
in contact with the Turks, who were posted in a very strong position.
The issue was not long in doubt. The unhappy Turks were mown down by
the Greek guns. Officers and men again fled like a beaten rabble.
After these signal defeats the remainder of the Ottoman army crossed
the River Vardar on November 3rd, within a few miles of Salonika. On
the 8th that city capitulated to the Greeks, not without suspicion
of treachery. Hassan Pasha and twenty-five thousand men, the remains
of his army, were made prisoners. On the next day a division of the
Bulgarians, detached from their main army in Thrace, appeared on the
scene at Salonika, after a forced march, in the hope of being able to
claim a share in the capture of that important city. At the request of
its general, the Greeks gave permission to two regiments of Bulgarians
to enter the city. In spite of this limitation, ten regiments were sent
there, and were the cause of much subsequent trouble.
While these great and unexpected successes were being achieved by the
Greeks, the Serbians were advancing from the north. A Turkish army of
a hundred thousand men, under Zeki Pasha, had marched up the valley
of the Vardar River to meet them. The two armies, about equal in
numbers, met at Koumanovo on October 23rd, the day after the victory
of the Greeks at Sarandoporus. The Turks were well supported with all
modern implements of war, with machine guns, aeroplanes, and wireless
telephone apparatus, but they had not a staff competent to make use
of them. Their artillery was the best which Krupps’ celebrated German
works could turn out, and was superior in number to that of the
Serbians. The French Creüsot guns, however, of the latter proved to be
the better in action. But, worst of all, the commissariat arrangements
of the Turks were of a most primitive character. They relied mainly
on their men feeding themselves at the expense of the peasantry on
their route, with the result that they were underfed. The weather was
most inclement and the troops were only provided with light summer
clothing. The best of soldiers cannot fight with empty stomachs and
scanty clothing. As a result, in spite of a vigorous resistance in the
great battle, the Turkish lines were broken by the splendid infantry of
the Serbians. There resulted a rout and the precipitate retreat of the
Turkish army. It lost the whole of its artillery—a hundred and twenty
guns. Of the hundred thousand men, only forty thousand survived as a
military force. Uskub, the ancient capital of Serbia, was captured.
Another Serbian army advanced towards the Adriatic and captured Durazzo.
After the fierce and decisive battle at Koumanovo, what remained of the
Turkish army retreated down the Vardar Valley to Veles, and thence,
instead of marching to Salonika, where it might have been in time to
save that city from the Greeks, it marched westward to Prilip, on the
route to Monastir. The Serbians, after a brief delay, followed it up
and came in contact again at Prilip, where the Turks held an immensely
strong position. It was taken at the point of the bayonet, a striking
proof of the superb quality of the Serbian infantry.
The Turks retreated thence to Monastir, where they found
reinforcements. On November 17th and 18th, another great battle was
fought in front of Monastir, in which the Turks were again defeated,
with the loss of ten thousand prisoners. The remains of the army
retreated into Albania, where it was too late in the season for the
Serbians to follow them. They were ultimately, in the following spring,
brought back to Constantinople by sea from the Adriatic. There could
not have been a more completely victorious campaign for the Serbians.
Zeki’s army was virtually extinguished.
While these critical events were pending in Macedonia the Bulgarians
were equally successful in the east. They invaded Thrace on October
18th in great force, and on the 22nd encountered a Turkish army at
Kirk Kilisse and, after a two days’ battle, defeated it. On the 28th
they fought the main Turkish army, under Nazim Pasha, which was drawn
up in a line from Lulu Burgas to Viza. The Turks made an obstinate
resistance, but after forty-eight hours of fierce assaults by the
Bulgarians they gave way and retreated in terrible disorder, till
they found themselves behind the lines of Tchatalja, the celebrated
fortifications which protect Constantinople at a distance of nineteen
miles on a line from the Black Sea to the Marmora. On their advance
through Thrace the Bulgarian soldiers, assisted by irregulars of Bulgar
race, committed atrocities and cruelties on the Turkish population
which rivalled all that the Turks in the past had perpetrated.
On November 17th the Bulgarians attacked these lines of Tchatalja with
great vigour. But the Turks had brought up fresh troops from Asia.
The lines were well defended with Krupp guns, and several successive
assaults were repelled.
On December 3rd, at the instance of the Great Powers, an armistice was
agreed upon between Turkey and Bulgaria and Serbia. War, however, was
continued with Greece and Montenegro. As a result of the campaign the
Turks had been defeated in every engagement by Greeks, Serbs, Bulgars,
and Montenegrins. They were driven from Macedonia and from nearly the
whole of Thrace and Epirus. They still, however, retained Adrianople,
Janina, and Scutari. It was only when in defence of such cities, or
behind such lines as those of Tchatalja that the Turkish soldiers
showed the tenacity and courage for which they had been famous.
Whenever they met the enemy in the open field they were always defeated.
It is almost incomprehensible [wrote Mr. Crawford Price, who was a
witness of this _débâcle_ of the Turkish army] that this warlike
nation, the stories of whose valour fill the most thrilling pages
of the military history of the world, could have degenerated into a
beaten rabble flying before the onslaught of despised Serbians and
Greeks, people who, till yesterday, scarce dared to lift their voices
when questions affecting their interests were discussed and settled.
The Greeks most effectually wiped out the stain of 1897. They showed
themselves the superior of the Turk in organization, strategy, and
even in personal courage.... I do not wish to dwell too strongly on
the lack of courage exhibited by the Ottoman soldiers. Words fail
me to describe the utter demoralization I found in the ranks of the
Turkish troops after their defeat.[48]
Among the chief causes of this demoralization of the Ottoman armies was
the complete absence of preparation for feeding them. It was the rule,
rather than the exception, for the troops to be left three or four
days without food. Another cause was that the Ottoman armies in this
campaign in Europe had in their ranks a large proportion of Christian
natives of the district who had been conscripted for the first time.
Their sympathies were all in favour of the enemy, and they undoubtedly
assisted in promoting the stampedes when the Turkish lines were broken.
The survivors fled to their homes.
The winter of 1912-13, after the conclusion of the armistice, was
spent in futile negotiations for peace at a Conference in London. The
main cause of failure was Adrianople. The Bulgarians insisted on its
cession to them as a condition of permanent peace. The Porte, in the
first instance, was not unwilling to give way on this. But a military
_émeute_ occurred at Constantinople. A deputation from the army, headed
by Enver Bey, insisted on entering the chamber where the Council
of Ministers were deliberating on the question, with the object of
protesting against the surrender of the stronghold. Nazim Pasha, the
Minister of War, and his aide-de-camp were killed in the endeavour to
resist this inroad. The Grand Vizier was thereupon terrorized into
resignation. In his place Mahmoud Shefket, who had proved to be so
loyal to the Young Turks at the early stage of their movement, was
appointed. He refused to surrender Adrianople. The negotiations in
London were broken off.
Early in 1913, on January 4th, the Bulgarians gave notice of the
termination of the armistice. War was renewed. On February 4th the
Bulgarian army commenced an attack on Adrianople, supported on this
occasion by fifty thousand Serbians. On the same day they fought a
battle near Bulair, defeated the Turks, and captured that important
fortress, threatening the command of the Dardanelles. The Greeks also
renewed the war. They sent an army into Epirus and, on March 6th,
captured Janina, making prisoners thirty-three thousand Turks and
seizing immense stores of guns and ammunition. On the 10th of the same
month their fleet captured the island of Samos.
On March 28th the Bulgarians captured Adrianople and its garrison of
twenty thousand Ottomans, and on April 21st the Montenegrins succeeded
in getting possession of Scutari, which they claimed as the capital of
their State. After these serious reverses the Porte was desirous of
coming to terms, and was willing even to cede Adrianople and almost
the whole of Thrace. It invited the mediation of the Great Powers.
The allied States agreed to this. A second Conference was held in
London on the basis that the Porte was to give up all its possessions
in Europe, save the small part of Thrace south of a line drawn from
Enos, in the Ægean Sea, to Media, in the Black Sea, a few miles north
of the Tchatalja lines. Crete was to be ceded to Greece, and the
destination of the islands in the Ægean Sea lately in the possession
of Turkey, and some of which were necessary for its defence, was to
be left to the decision of the Powers. A treaty was effected between
the Porte and the Powers to this effect. But there was far greater
difficulty in determining how the ceded districts were to be divided
between the victorious Balkan States. The position was aggravated by
Roumania coming into the field and claiming compensation in territory,
in consideration of the important changes impending in the balance of
power in the Balkans.
The four States so lately in alliance against the common enemy, Turkey,
were now madly jealous of one another in the division of the spoils.
Serbia, which had contributed so largely to the result by the splendid
valour of its army against the main body of Turks under Zeki Pasha, was
not content with the small slice of Macedonia which it had agreed to in
the treaty with Bulgaria in 1912, before the war. The decision of the
Powers that Albania was to be an independent State deprived Serbia of
the much-hoped-for access to the Adriatic. The acquisition by Bulgaria
of Thrace, including Adrianople, would greatly alter the balance of
power in the Balkans to the disadvantage of Serbia and justified its
claim to a larger share of Macedonia. It was already in occupation of
nearly half of that province. Bulgaria was equally ambitious to revive
the big Bulgaria of the San Stefano treaty, and could also appeal to
long past history in favour of it. It was determined to get possession
of Salonika, and was madly jealous of Greece. The Greeks, on their
part, were in possession of that city and of the southern half of
Macedonia. They had got hold of these districts by force of arms and
were determined not to give them up. No agreement could be come to in
London. Russia in vain did its utmost to compose these differences.
It offered to act as arbitrator and invited the Balkan States to send
representatives to Petrograd to settle the questions.
We now know that the Bulgarian Government had no intention whatever to
make concessions to the other Balkan States. The pacific section of its
ministers were overborne by the more bellicose members. M. Gueshoff,
the able Premier, who had been responsible for the policy which
preceded the war, and who was now in favour of a peaceful settlement,
was compelled to resign. King Ferdinand, a most unscrupulous and
ambitious intriguer, backed up the war party, and was mainly
responsible for the treacherous policy pursued, which was fraught with
so much misfortune to his State. In spite of the warnings from Russia
that, if force were resorted to, Bulgaria would find itself confronted
by a Roumanian army, and that the Porte would also join in the war
against it, King Ferdinand and his Government decided on war with their
late allies. They had unbounded and arrogant confidence in their army,
and despised those of Greece and Serbia.
On June 29, 1913, at midnight, the Bulgarian army in Macedonia made
a sudden and unprovoked attack on the Greek and Serbian outposts,
without any warning or declaration of war. This treacherous action
was followed up the next day by an advance of the Bulgarian army of a
hundred thousand men on the right flank against the Serbian army, which
was nearest to them. For the moment this seemed to promise success,
and the Serbians were compelled to fall back. But on July 1st the
Serbians, whose forces, supported by the Montenegrins, were almost
equal in number to the Bulgarians opposed to them, rallied and decided
on a counter offensive. On July 2nd they attacked the Bulgarians on the
Bragalbabza River, defeated them, and captured many of their guns. On
July 4th another battle took place with much the same result. Istib was
captured on the 8th, and the Bulgarians were then compelled to retreat
towards their own frontier.
Meanwhile the main army of the Greeks, which was concentrated at
Salonika, a day’s march from the Bulgarians on the left flank, advanced
to attack them. The two armies were equal in numbers, each of about
seventy thousand men. They met at Kiltich, about half-way between the
Rivers Vardar and Struma, and a day’s march from Salonika. The Greeks
inflicted a very severe defeat on their foes. This was followed up a
few days later by victories at Doiran and Strumnitza. In the fortnight
which followed the Bulgarians were defeated in a series of engagements
as they retreated to their own frontier.
The prediction and warnings of the Russian Government were now
verified. The Roumanians, when they found that the Bulgarians were
involved in war with the other Balkan States, announced that they were
dissatisfied with the small concession of territory made to them at
the Conference in London—namely the fortress of Silistria and a belt
of land on the Danube. They insisted on a further cession of territory
to them in the Dobrudscha. They sent an army across the Danube, on
July 10th, to support this demand. It advanced without opposition to
within a few miles of Sofia. The Turks also saw the opportunity of
retrieving out of the scramble something of their recent great losses
of territory. They determined to tear up the treaty of London, signed
only a few weeks ago. They sent an army, under Enver Pasha, into
Thrace, on July 15th, to attack Adrianople. It had no difficulty in
recapturing that most important city, from which the Bulgarians had
withdrawn nearly the whole of its garrison in order to strengthen their
armies against Greece and Serbia. It also reoccupied Demotika and Kirk
Kilisse.
The Bulgarians found themselves in a most perilous position. Their
armies had everywhere been defeated and driven back. They were
surrounded by invading armies. They were compelled to sue for terms.
On July 31st an armistice was agreed to, and a Conference was decided
on, to be held at Bucharest, between the representatives of the Balkan
States, without the presence of those of the Great Powers. At the
Conference the Bulgarians found themselves in the position of being
hoist with their own petard. They were compelled by _force majeure_ not
only to give up all their ambitious projects, but also to make serious
concessions to all their rivals. Had they been willing to come to terms
at the Conference at London or, later, to submit to the arbitration
of Russia, they would undoubtedly have secured for themselves a large
slice of Macedonia. They would have retained possession of a great
part of Thrace, with Adrianople and Demotika, and the only concessions
they would have made were Silistria and the small belt of land on the
Danube. They were now compelled to agree to the division of the whole
of Macedonia between Greece and Serbia. They had to surrender a part of
the Dobrudscha to Roumania, and the larger part of their conquests in
Thrace, including Adrianople, to the Turks. All that remained to them
in return for their stupendous efforts in the recent wars was a small
portion of Thrace with a narrow frontage to the Ægean Sea, but without
a port of any value or importance. Never was there a case in which
base treachery and overweening arrogance were followed by more fatal
retribution.
Greece got the larger share of the spoil of Turkey in the two years
of war. It obtained rather more than half of Macedonia—namely 17,000
square miles, with a population of 1,697,000. It also secured the
final cession to it of the important island of Crete, and of Samos,
and other islands in the Ægean Sea. Its territory and population
were increased by more than one-half. Serbia obtained 15,000 square
miles, with 1,656,000 inhabitants, Bulgaria only 9,600 miles and
125,000 inhabitants. Roumania secured 2,600 square miles, with 286,000
inhabitants, and Montenegro 2,100 square miles and 251,000 population;
while the Turks lost 54,000 square miles, inhabited by a population of
4,239,000. But the recovery of Adrianople, Demotika, and Kirk Kilisse
was a great coup for them. It redounded to the prestige of the Young
Turks and their leader, Enver Pasha, who soon became Minister of War.
The German Emperor telegraphed his congratulations to the Sultan on
the recovery of Adrianople, and to the King of Roumania on the success
of his intervention. He also conferred on the King of Greece, his
brother-in-law, the bâton of a Field Marshal in the German army. The
King received this honour in person at Berlin in the presence of a
great gathering of German generals. In a speech on the occasion, he
attributed his success in the recent war, in the first place, to the
bravery of his army, and in the second to the training which he and
many of his officers had received in the military schools of Berlin.
Thenceforth, till the outbreak of the great war in Europe in 1914, the
influence of Germany in the Near East, and especially in Turkey, was
continually on the increase. Enver Pasha, who now predominated in the
councils of the Porte, was devoted to the interests of Germany, and was
probably in its pay. At his instance the Turkish army, which had so
conspicuously failed in the recent wars, was put under the control of
the German General Von der Goltz, and large numbers of officers were
lent by Germany for its better training. Secret drillings of troops
took place in many remote parts of the Empire. These measures were well
timed to coincide with the outbreak in 1914 of the great war, which, it
is now very certain, had been already determined on by the General War
Staff at Berlin.
It only remains to add that when, soon after the commencement of the
war, the Porte, at the instance of Enver Pasha, declared itself against
the Allied Powers, the British Government at once proclaimed the
independence of Egypt, under its protectorate, and the annexation of
Cyprus. These were the last territorial losses of the Ottoman Empire
which can be counted as _faits accomplis_. It has been shown that, in
the past, there were due to the régime of the Young Turks, during the
six years of its predominance, from 1908 to 1914, the loss in Europe
of Macedonia, Epirus, and Albania, and of a large part of Thrace;
of Crete, Cyprus, and many other islands in the Ægean Sea; and the
suzerainty of Bulgaria, Bosnia, and Herzegovina; and in Africa of the
province of Tripoli and the suzerainty of Egypt. These great losses
rivalled in extent of territory and population those incurred either
by Mahmoud II or by Abdul Hamid II. It needs no prophet to predict a
further shrinkage of territory, or loss of independence, after the
conclusion of the existing war in Europe, whatever may be its other
results.
[Illustration:
SOUTH EASTERN EUROPE
AND ASIA MINOR
1914.
London: T. Fisher Unwin. Ltd. _Stanford’s Geog.^l Estab.^t London._]
XXIII
A RETROSPECT
IT has been shown in preceding chapters that the two great historic
movements of the growth and decay of the Turkish Empire extended over
periods not differing much in length. Reckoning its birth from the
accession, in 1288, of Othman, as chief of a small tribe of Turks
in Asia Minor, nearly three hundred years elapsed before the Empire
reached its zenith. During these years ten eminent Sultans and one
Grand Vizier (Sokolli) of a degenerate Sultan were concerned in its
extension. It was a period of almost continuous victory and conquest.
The Ottoman armies, during these years, met with only a single serious
disaster, that at Angora in 1402 at the hands of Timur and a host of
Mongolian invaders, which seemed at first to have struck a fatal blow
to the Empire. But it soon rallied, and the process of aggrandizement
was renewed. With this exception the Ottomans were almost uniformly
successful. The number, however, of pitched battles in the field,
which decided the fate of States successively invaded, was not great.
Thrace was won by the defeat of the Byzantines by Murad I at Eski
Baba in 1361. The Bulgarians were conquered at Samakof in 1371, and
the Serbians at Kossova in 1389, by the same Sultan. The Hungarians
were overthrown at Mohacz in 1529. The Persians were defeated at
Calderan, 1514, near Tabriz, and the Egyptians at Aleppo, 1516, and
Ridania, near Cairo, under Selim, 1516. The crusaders from Europe
were defeated in three great battles—at the Maritza, 1363, Nicopolis,
1396, and Varna, 1444. At most of these battles the Ottomans had great
superiority of numbers, and as against the Persians and Egyptians they
were provided with a powerful artillery, of which their opponents were
wholly deficient. The other very numerous campaigns consisted mainly
of successions of sieges by invading armies of Ottomans, where the
invaded, with inferior forces, protracted the defence, often over long
terms of years.
The Ottomans were almost equally successful at sea, with one notable
exception, at Lepanto, at the very end of the period we are referring
to, when they met with a terrible disaster from the combined navies
of Europe, much inferior in numbers of ships and men. But before this
their naval supremacy had enabled them to extend the Empire over
Algiers and Tunis. Nothing resulted from the great battle of Lepanto
except loss of prestige to the Ottomans. The combination against them
was dissolved, and for many years they maintained supremacy in the
Eastern Mediterranean.
At the close of this period of growth the Ottoman Empire reached its
zenith and extended over the vast countries described in the chapter
on the Grand Vizier Sokolli. The whole of its immense area, however,
was not in full ownership of the Ottomans. Parts of it, such as North
Hungary, were autonomous States with native rulers paying tribute to
the Porte. Other parts, such as the Crimea, Wallachia, and Moldavia,
were vassal States, whose princes were appointed by the Sultan, and
which were bound to send contingents in support of the Ottoman armies
when at war. The really integral parts of the Empire in Europe were
Thrace, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Bosnia, and Albania; in
Asia, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and a great part of Arabia; and
in Africa, Tripoli. Egypt, Tunis, and Algiers very early acquired a
practical autonomy under the suzerainty of the Porte, though they
were still nominally integral parts of the Empire. The Empire thus
constituted was one of the greatest in the then world. It may be worth
while briefly to review the causes which led to its aggregation.