Comment About Continued Neutrality from the Balkan and Russian
Capitals
An elaborate argument that Italy is about to co-operate with the
Allies at the Dardanelles in order to influence Greece and the Balkan
States generally to intervene against the Germanic Powers appeared in
The Frankfurter Zeitung near the close of June. A dispatch from
Bucharest on July 12 announced that Austria had made concessions to
Rumania in the hope of averting intervention by that Power,
accompanying the offer with an ultimatum setting a month for Rumania's
reply. The German Social-Democratic paper Vorwaerts published on July
17 a statement that Rumania had definitely refused to permit German
arms and ammunition to traverse her territory to Turkey. This shows a
distinct turning away from the German propaganda in that kingdom,
which on May 26 spoke through the editorial columns of Moldova, a
daily of Bucharest, as follows:
We must tread in the path opened to us by the late King
Carol and the great Rumanian statesmen. We must always be
attached to the Central European Powers, from which we shall
secure the fulfillment of our aspirations, on that day when
we shall move against Russia.
From Lupte, a Nationalist daily of Bucharest, a definite declaration
of the kingdom's policy was demanded on June 4:
The smaller a nation is the more dangerous to her existence
are diplomatic intrigues. Mr. Bratiano's Government has for
the past eight months been coquetting with Petrograd as well
as with Berlin and Vienna. With which side are we in this
war? The two belligerent groups are asking this and the same
question is asked of Bulgaria and Greece. We must have a
sound national policy, for in this most modern war there is
no profit in the old Machiavellian tactics.
That a crisis is approaching in Balkan affairs is clearly indicated in
an editorial warning headed "Beware, ye Balkan Peoples!" appearing on
May 29 in Dnevnik, an independent Bulgarian daily of Sofia. It says:
The lust of Europe for territorial aggrandizement becomes
every day more pronounced. From a struggle for self-defense
this has become a war of conquest. Germany has appropriated
Belgium, Russia fights for the Bosporus and Constantinople,
Italy has almost taken Albania--with the approval of
Austria, as we have discovered. The westernmost edge of the
Balkan Peninsula has fallen; tomorrow the easternmost
extremity will fall, together with Constantinople. Will the
European Powers then spare us?... What the United States of
America did for the preservation of their independence
against foreign conquest we Balkan peoples must do unless we
would see our doom sealed.
"The Dangers of a Neutral Policy" is the theme of Mir, the organ of
the Bulgarian Nationalist Party of Sofia, which on May 29 said: "If
Bulgaria remains neutral to the end of the war, she runs the risk of
being condemned to live forever within the narrow limits she has
today, hemmed in on every side. The duty of the Balkan States is to
act in a war which will solve all pending political and national
problems."
Serbia's jealousy of Italy, despite that nation's late adhesion to the
Allies, was voiced on May 25 by Politika, a Nationalist daily of
Belgrade, which accuses Italy of trying to profit at Serbia's expense.
The Entente Powers must pay for Italian aid, this paper says; and
Italy may be "satisfied with Savoy, Corsica, Malta, Tunis, Algiers,
Asia Minor, or Egypt."
[Illustration: Balkan Newspapers
In the left upper corner, the Bulgarian daily Narodai Prava (National
Rights) of Sofia, semi-official organ of the Bulgarian Government of
Dr. B. Radoslavoff; upper right, the Athenian daily Athinae (Athens),
representing the extreme anti-Venizelists; at lower right, the daily
Politika (Politics), an independent paper of Belgrade, Serbia; lower
left, the Bucharest (Rumania) daily Dimineata (Morning), an
Interventionist paper, and, at center, the Constantinople Khavar
(Star), a Pro-Islamist daily.]
The Ottoman Empire being under martial law, comment by the Turkish
papers regarding military and political events is restricted by the
Government. But Enver Pasha, the all-powerful young Turk leader, and
his colleague for the Interior, Talaat Bey, early in May gave an
interview printed in the Vienna Neue Freie Presse. Enver Pasha
predicts the collapse of the Allied campaign on the Gallipoli
Peninsula, where the French and British hold a small corner against
overwhelming odds. "The bringing thither of provisions is extremely
difficult," he says, and "even the drinking water for the troops must
be brought from the ships." Both he and Talaat Bey report the morale
of the Turkish troops to be excellent, "as many of the older officers
have been replaced by energetic young men."
Greece is in suspense. The Kairoi, an independent daily of Athens,
said on June 22 that, while Greece does not forget her debt to the
three protective powers, France, England, and Russia, she must
nevertheless weigh the promise of Germany to give full protection to
Greek interests in the event of her continued neutrality. "Just how
Germany keeps her promises," this paper says, is "shown by Cavalla,
the Macedonian city allotted to Greece after the second Balkan war at
the express instance of the Kaiser;" and it notes that the Entente
Powers are now eager to cede this territory to Bulgaria. The Embros,
an independent daily of Athens, prophesied on June 22:
We can afford to follow events with growing solicitude and
remain neutral as long as we may. Whether or not we maintain
this neutrality to the end our action can change neither the
fortunes of Greece nor the position of other Powers. It is
to be presumed that the power driving this giant conflict to
the conclusion has more remote motives and that to all
appearance, the war will end without any of the participants
suffering a crushing defeat.
While Russian aspirations are generally considered to be in harmony
with those of the Balkan kingdoms, the following extracts from Russian
papers representing varying shades of Muscovite opinion show now an
unfavorable or critical attitude. Thus the foremost organ of the
Panslavist Party, the Russian weekly Slavianski Izvestija, April No.
8, disapproved the Bulgarian plea to give Thrace and Adrianople
through Russian influence. Of the Macedonian question this paper
said:
Bulgarians expect that Russia will get for them Macedonia
Thrace, and Dobrudja, to reward their honest labors. Alas,
they must learn that not every day, but every hour,
Macedonia is receding from their grasp. For Russia the
Macedonian question hardly exists. If Macedonia finds it
hard to be under heroic and benevolent Serbia, what would
become of her on the day when she should fall into the hands
of Bulgaria? And should we Russians, in order to assure
Macedonia such a future, grieve now our dear ally Serbia?
The semi-official Novoye Vremya of Petrograd commented on May 27, on
the statement of the Bulgarian Premier Radoslavoff published in
Vienna, that Bulgaria cannot engage to intervene without a formal
treaty, a policy, it believes, that says but one thing, namely: "You
Russians tricked us Bulgarians once; you shall not trick us again."
This attitude of Bulgaria shows, the Novoye Vremya thinks, "how
thick-headed and insensate its people are." The Birjevaja Viedomosti,
a standpat Russian daily of Petrograd, on May 23 warned Serbia that,
whereas the war began in her behalf and on her account rivers of blood
are flowing, her complaints of the allotment of Dalmatia to Italy
should not "assert principles which have nothing to do with
actualities." The same newspaper says of the whole Balkan situation:
The German policy of von Buelow, having failed in Rome, is
courting failure in Bucharest. In fact, all the German
promises to Rumania seem to go no further than sharpening
the Rumanian appetite for Russian Bessarabia, while holding
out as a last bait the cession of a small parcel of
Bukowina--supposing the Hungarians never consent to yielding
Transylvania to Rumania.
On the other hand, Germany promises Bulgaria the Turkish
province of Thrace and Serbian and Greek Macedonia; but
these compensations have as much value as the cessions of
Corsica and Nice and Tunis in the early days of the war.
But Germany cannot give to Bulgaria Serbian Macedonia so long as the
Austrian armies are not masters of the whole of Serbia; she cannot
give her Thrace because Turkey objects to such cession, and Turkey is
her ally; and, finally, she cannot urge Greece too closely to cede
Cavalla to Bulgaria, because such a pressure may bring a contrary
result, i.e. make Greece to declare herself openly an ally of the
Entente. Therefore both Bulgaria and Rumania must perforce side with
the great European Alliance. Had Italy remained neutral matters would
be different, but as it is now Bulgars and Rumanians, and the Balkan
peoples in general, have to fight with us, unless they want the
diplomacy of the Entente to disappoint utterly the ever-growing
appetite of these small nationalities....
It will be noted that all the opinions quoted concerning the Balkans
relate to the division of territory as the price of neutrality or
intervention.