This notion succeeded to the extent that Greece proposed to offer to enter the war against Turkey with her naval forces only, reserving her army for her own protection against Bulgaria.[9] The Entente Powers intimated through M. Delcasse that they would accept such an offer, provided it was made without any conditions.[10] Before deciding, Greece wanted to be assured that the integrity of her territory during the War and in the treaty of peace would be respected, that all the necessary money and material would be forthcoming, and that the compensations in Asia Minor allotted to her would represent approximately the area indicated by M. Venizelos. If it was found that on these three points the Hellenic Government interpreted the intentions of the Entente Powers correctly, it would immediately submit a Note in which the three points would be mentioned as going of their own accord, so that the official reply of the Entente might cover, not only the offer, but also its interpretation thus formulated.[11] {38} M. Delcasse refused to listen to any points: Greece, he insisted irritably, should enter the alliance without conditions, coupling her offer simply with "hopes to have the benefit of full solidarity with her allies, whence results a guarantee of her territorial integrity," and "entrusting the full protection of her vital interests to the three Entente Powers." The formula was not incompatible with the best construction which one chose to put upon it; and Prince George—who had returned to Paris directly after the first offer and acted as a personal representative of King Constantine, together with the official representative of the Hellenic Government—warmly advocated its adoption, pleading that, if Greece did come in without delay and without conditions, she might safely trust the Allies.[12]

Whether Prince George's plea sprang from blind faith or from far-sighted fear, is a question upon which the sequel may throw some light; for the present enough to state that it produced no effect. In a matter concerning the integrity of national territory acquired so dearly, King Constantine felt that he could not afford to allow any ambiguity or uncertainty: he was willing to waive the other two points, but not that. He therefore begged his brother to see M. Poincare and solicit in his name the President's help to secure that indispensable assurance. "The essential thing," he said, "is that the Entente Powers should give us a solemn promise that they will respect and make others respect, until the re-establishment of peace, our territorial integrity, and that they will not permit any damage to it by the future Peace Treaty. Remark to him that Greece has the right to be astonished that friendly Powers ready to accept her as an ally decline to explain themselves clearly with her." [13] What was in the King's mind may be seen from the President's answer: The Powers did not wish to give a formal pledge in as many words lest the Bulgars should be stirred to {39} hostile action on realizing that Cavalla was lost to them.[14]

Prince George, in reporting M. Poincare's reply, added that the fear of any damage being inflicted on Greek territorial integrity by the future Peace Treaty was completely devoid of foundation; that, having himself expressed this fear, he had been answered: "How can you imagine that we could dispose of any part whatever of the territory of an allied State without its consent?" [15]

These fair words failed to reassure the Hellenic Government, which, after mature reflection, concluded that the formula suggested by M. Delcasse did not sufficiently safeguard Greece against combinations likely to affect her territorial integrity. Its misgivings, which sprang in the first instance from the refusal of an explicit promise, were strengthened by the reason given by M. Poincare for that refusal. Consequently, it regretted that the Entente Powers did not see their way to come to an understanding for a collaboration which both sides desired, and repeated the assurance of a most benevolent neutrality towards them.[16]

The Greek position was plain: Greece made proposals which constituted a break with the policy pursued deliberately since the beginning of the War—proposals for an active partnership, and in return put forward conditions which ultimately narrowed down to a mere pledge that she should not, as the end of it all, find herself robbed of Cavalla. There were certain things she could do and, therefore, wished to do. There were certain things she could not do, and must be assured that she would not be made to do them. The Entente Powers, on the other hand, would bind themselves to nothing: which is preferable, they said in effect, the elaborate letter of a bargaining bond, or the spirit of spontaneous co-operation; a legal obligation or the natural union of hearts? What Greece needs, rather than rigid clauses with a seal and a signature, is the steady, unwavering sympathy of her friends. If you come with us in a courageous forward campaign for the {40} liberation of the world and righteousness, how could we fail to be with you in every single question affecting compensations or the integrity of your territories? That's all very fine, said the Greeks. But——

The mistrust of the Greeks was only too well founded. Although Bulgaria received arms from Austria and allowed the free passage of German munitions which enabled Turkey to carry on the defence of Gallipoli, the Entente Powers, satisfied with her Premier's explanations and professions of sympathy, would not give up the hope of seeing her on their side. Indeed, they were more hopeful than ever; M. Poincare told Prince George he would not be surprised to see that happen "in two or three days," [17] and the British Minister at Sofia, being less hopeful and giving proofs of perspicacity, was replaced.

About the same time it came to the knowledge of the Entente Governments that the Greek General Staff had resumed its efforts to induce the Servian military authorities to concert measures for their mutual safety, pointing out that, the moment Bulgarian troops crossed the Servian frontier, it would be too late. Whereupon both Servia and Greece were sternly warned against wounding Bulgarian susceptibilities—and threatened with the displeasure of the Powers, who wanted to maintain between the Balkan States good fellowship—by the unhappy project which was once more to the fore. And ere the end of May both States learnt that their territories were actually on offer to Bulgaria.

They received the intelligence as might have been expected. The Servian Premier, after consulting with the King, the Crown Prince, the Cabinet, and all prominent statesmen, informed the representatives of the Entente that Servia, in spite of her desire to meet the wishes of her friends and allies, could not agree to put herself in their hands: the Constitution forbade the cession of territory without the sanction of the National Assembly. He asked them to understand that this decision was final, and that no future Servian Government could be counted upon to {41} give a different answer, seeing that the present Government embraced every political party.[18]

Not less uncompromising was the attitude of Greece. When the news reached Athens from Paris, the Hellenic Government could hardly believe it: "It is so contrary to the principles of justice and liberty proclaimed by the Entente Powers—it seems to us absolutely impossible to despoil a neutral State, and one, too, whose friendly neutrality has been so consistently useful to the Allies, in order to buy with its territories the help of a people which has hitherto done all it could to help the enemies of the Entente. By what right, and on what ground could they mutilate our country? The opinions once expressed by M. Venizelos, and since abandoned even by their author, do not constitute a sufficient ground for spoliation. The whole thing is an unthinkable outrage: it shows that our fears were justified and our demand for a guarantee was absolutely indispensable." [19]

France, through M. Delcasse, and England, through Lord Crewe, sought to dispel these fears by formally disclaiming any intention to press upon Greece a mutilation to which she objected, and explaining that the eventual cession of Cavalla was only envisaged on condition that she should consent of her own accord. M. Zographos, however, who had done his best to bring Greece in on reasonable terms, convinced of his failure, resigned; and after his departure the Gounaris Government would permit itself no further discussion upon the subject of intervention.

During the lull that ensued, the Greek General Staff once more, in June, approached the Servian Government with detailed suggestions for a common plan against Bulgaria, dwelling on the necessity of a preliminary concentration of sufficient Servian troops along the Graeco-Serbo-Bulgarian frontier to counterbalance the Bulgarian advantage in rapidity of mobilization. These steps proved as barren as all the preceding: while Servia would not try to conjure the Bulgarian peril by the sacrifices which the Entente recommended, she could not provide against it by entering into arrangements with Greece which the Entente disapproved.

{42}

Matters came to a head on 3 August, when the British Minister at Sofia made to the Bulgarian Government a formal offer of Cavalla and an undefined portion of its hinterland, as well as of Servian territory in Macedonia, stating that Great Britain would bring pressure to bear on those countries, and make the cession to them of any compensations elsewhere conditional on their consent to this transaction.

The shock lost nothing of its intensity by being long anticipated. M. Passitch, the Servian Premier, in an interview with the Greek Minister at Nish, expressed his profound dismay at the corner into which Servia was driven; much as she resented this proposal, the fact that she was entirely dependent on the Entente—whose high-handed methods he did not fail to criticize—forced her to give it consideration.

If Servia had been dismayed, Greece was enraged. M. Gounaris addressed a strongly-worded remonstrance to the British Minister at Athens, reminding him that in May his Government had protested against the offer of Greek territory to Bulgaria, and that both Lord Crewe and M. Delcasse had disavowed any intention to bring the least pressure to bear upon Greece, who had thus the right to count on her independence being respected. The Entente Powers, he went on, thought they could promise Bulgaria an agreement in which their own will took the place of Greece's consent, with the idea of exacting her acceptance afterwards. But they were greatly mistaken. The Hellenic Government, voicing the unanimous sentiments of the people as well as its own judgment, repelled with indignation the idea of making the national heritage an object of a bargain; and while thanking the Entente Powers for the courtesy which inspired their notification, it protested in the most energetic and solemn manner against the injury which they proposed to inflict upon the independence and integrity of Greece in defiance of international law.

In reply, the British Government quietly informed the Hellenic Government that the Entente Powers still hoped that Greece would come into line with their policy, and that, as soon as Bulgaria had accepted their offer, they would submit a concrete proposal dealing in detail with {43} the surrender of Cavalla and defining precisely the Asiatic concessions which Greece would receive in exchange.[20]

This brings the relations of the Entente Powers with M. Gounaris's Government to an end. It is a strange record. We have, to begin with, the curious reception of his first offer—the whole Greek Army, the intervention of which might have turned the Gallipoli tragedy into a victory. Doubtless, there were reasons for declining so considerable a reinforcement. We know that, although Russia had modified her objection to Greek participation, she still regarded the presence of a large Greek force in European Turkey with disfavour; that the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire was not agreeable to France; that the Allies could not at that time afford the military contingents stipulated by the Greek General Staff. There will be no disposition to underrate the complexities of the situation, or want of sympathy for those upon whom fell the task of finding a solution satisfactory to all the Powers concerned. But, though these complexities might be good reasons for not accepting the Gounaris offer, they were hardly reasons for not acknowledging it, even in the interest of ordinary courtesy.

Then came the sterile pourparlers through Paris. Here, again, political difficulties explain without justifying the attitude of the Entente Powers. Their refusal of the guarantee demanded by Greece as an essential condition of her entry into the war was, of course, a natural result of their Bulgarian policy—a policy for which very little could be said. Time perhaps was, at the beginning of the War, when Bulgaria might have been won; for it is not necessary to adopt the Graeco-Servian view that she had from the first decided to join the enemies of the Entente and that no amount of reasonable concessions would have satisfied her ambition; the Bulgars are a practical people, and there was at Sofia a pro-Entente party which might have prevailed, if the Entente Powers had, without delay, defined the proposed concessions and proceeded to press Greece and Servia to make them—to expect from either {44} State a voluntary self-mutilation was to expect a miracle. By not doing so, by shilly-shallying at Athens, Nish, and Sofia, they only lost the confidence of Greeks and Serbs without gaining the confidence of the Bulgars, who could hardly take seriously proposals so vague in their formulation and so uncertain of their fulfilment. If, on the other hand, the Allies were unable to define the concessions or afraid to shock public opinion by forcing them upon Greece and Servia, then they ought to have dropped their hopeless scheme, without wasting valuable time, and worked on the lines of Graeco-Servian co-operation against Bulgaria. Instead, they squashed, as we saw, every attempt which the Greek General Staff made to that end.

But it is not the only aberration with which history will charge our statesmen and diplomats.

Greece was going through an internal crisis; and those who know Greece will know what that means. In private life no people is more temperate, more moderate, than the Greek: a sense of measure always seasons its pleasures, and even the warmest passions of the heart seem to obey the cool reflections of the brain. In public life, by way of compensation, the opposite qualities prevail; and as citizens the Greeks display an astonishing lack of the very virtues which distinguish them as men. The spirit of party burns so hot in them that it needs but a breath to kindle a conflagration. That spirit, whose excesses had, several times in the past, brought the fundamental principles of the Constitution into question, and the country itself to the brink of ruin, was once again at work. Former friends had become deadly enemies: the community was rent with dissensions and poisoned with suspicions. Preposterous falsehoods were freely scattered and readily snatched at on both sides: the side of M. Venizelos and the side of M. Gounaris. Politicians who had been eclipsed by the Cretan's brilliance, came forth now to regain their lustre at his expense. For like all men who have played leading parts on the world's stage, M. Venizelos had gathered about him as much animosity as admiration; and hate is more enterprising than love.

M. Venizelos and his partisans were at least as resourceful as their opponents. The Cretan had never been able to bear contradiction. If his greatness had created him {45} many enemies, his pettiness had created him more. His tone of prophetic and impeccable omniscience was vexatious at all times, but particularly galling at this agitated period. It was now his constant cry that the situation called for the work of a statesman and not of an international lawyer or strategist. There were times when he declaimed this thesis in so violent a fashion that no self-respecting man could work with him. He had lost all the able collaborators of the great Reconstruction era, and nothing could make him forgive these "apostates." Everybody who could not see eye to eye with him was to M. Venizelos a traitor. It was impossible for M. Venizelos to admit that others besides himself might be actuated by patriotic as well as by personal motives; that he did not possess an exclusive patent of sincerity any more than of vanity. He found it easier to believe that the alpha and the omega of their policy was to undo him. He would undo them—even at the cost of the cause he had at heart: to see Greece openly on the side of the Entente. It is not that he thought less of the cause, but he thought more of himself. His egoism was of that heroic stature which shrinks from nothing. His nature impelled him to this labour; his privileged position as the particular friend of the Entente supplied him with the means.

M. Venizelos had taken a long stride towards that end when he insinuated that King Constantine's disagreement with him was due to German influence. Henceforth this calumny became the cardinal article of his creed, and the "Court Clique" a society for the promotion of the Kaiser's interests abroad and the adoption of the Kaiser's methods of government at home. M. Streit, though no longer a member of the Cabinet, was represented as its mainspring: a secret counsellor who wielded the power, while he avoided the title, of Minister; M. Gounaris, though in name a Prime Minister, was in reality a mere instrument of the sovereign's personal policy—so were the members of the General Staff—so was, in fact, everyone who held opinions at variance with his own: they all were creatures of the Crown who tried to hide their pro-Germanism under the mask of anti-Venizelism. Their objections to his short-sighted and wrong-headed Asiatic aspirations—objections the soundness of which has been amply {46} demonstrated by experience—were dictated by regard for Germany, the patron of Turkey. Their offers to fight for the dissolution of Germany's protege were not genuine: the conditions which accompanied them were only designed to make them unacceptable. The Entente should beware of their bad faith and learn that M. Venizelos was the only Greek statesman that could be trusted.[21]

The Powers who had long since adopted M. Venizelos found it convenient to adopt all his theories. M. Delcasse, when called upon to explain why the Greek offer met with such scant ceremony, did so by saying that it came from M. Gounaris, who was the instrument of the personal policy of the sovereign, and who combated among the electors M. Venizelos, the champion of rapprochement with the Entente; that the proposal for the dispatch of large contingents to the East, involving as it did a depletion of the Western Front, was calculated to please the imperial brother-in-law of King Constantine; that the territorial guarantee demanded by Greece would have become known to Bulgaria, thrown her into the arms of Germany, and precipitated her against Servia, whom King Constantine intended to leave to her fate; the trick was too gross to deceive the Allies, and they gave it the reception it deserved. Likewise in squashing the Greek efforts to concert with Servia measures for mutual safety against Bulgaria, while there was yet time, the Allies, said M. Delcasse, acted on the advice of M. Venizelos, who told them that the Graeco-Servian Treaty was purely defensive: that it did not provide for action unless Bulgaria attacked; and what a misfortune if Servia, by such measures, should appear to take an initiative which would give Bulgaria an excuse for the aggression she meditated. Therefore, they bade Servia devote her whole attention to the security of her Austrian frontier and not play Bulgaria's game by furnishing her with a pretext for attack.[22]

{47}

On this side of the Channel the inventions of M. Venizelos, it would seem, were accepted as discoveries with equal solemnity. During the Paris pourparlers, according to the French Ambassador in London at all events, England was much annoyed by the Greek Government's hesitations, which she attributed to King Constantine's opposition, and asked herself whether she could either then or in the future treat with a country governed autocratically. She was persuaded that Greece lay under the influence of Germany, and asked herself whether she could in future support a country which let itself be guided by Powers whose interests were absolutely contrary to her own.[23]

The Entente Ministers at Athens, as was natural, had greater opportunities of displaying their solidarity with M. Venizelos. They would perhaps have been better advised had they followed the example of their colleagues at Rome. It can hardly be questioned that the discreet and decorous aloofness of the Entente diplomats from the long-protracted struggle between the Italian advocates of war and neutrality, assisted by Prince von Buelow's indiscreet and indecorous participation in that struggle, facilitated a decision in our favour: nothing does so much to alienate a high-spirited nation as an attempt on the part of outsiders to direct its internal affairs. In Greece the need for discretion was even more imperative. All controversy at such a juncture was injudicious. But if preference had to be shown, it would have been better to have taken the King's side, for all that was valuable to us from the military point of view rallied round him; and, in any case, since the hopes of the Venizelists for oversea expansion depended on the goodwill of the Sea Powers, {48} they were tied to us securely enough: so if the land school represented by the General Staff could have been satisfied, the country would have remained united and on our side. Instead of adopting this sane attitude, the local agents of the Entente ostentatiously associated themselves with the Venizelists and boycotted the others, thus gratuitously contributing to a cleavage from which only our enemies could profit.

And that was not all. Having begun by endeavouring to influence the Greeks, they ended by being entirely influenced by them. Forgetting that no correct perception of facts or estimate of motives is possible without a certain mental detachment, they allowed themselves to be swallowed up, as it were, in the atmosphere of suspicion and slander generated by party friction: they ceased to have any eyes, ears, or minds of their own; they saw and heard just what M. Venizelos willed them to see and hear, and thought just as M. Venizelos willed them to think. If the King refused to enter the War, his refusal was inspired by the desire to serve the Kaiser; if he offered to do so, his offers were prompted by the desire to dish M. Venizelos.[24]

Hence, every proposal made to the Entente by M. Venizelos's successors was rejected. Greece was kept out of the Allies' camp, and Servia was sacrificed. For it should be clearly understood that the fate of Servia was decided in the months of June and July, 1915, not only by the development of the Germano-Bulgarian plan, but also by the failure of all co-operative counter-measures on the part of the Serbs, Greeks, and Entente Powers while time was still available. If only there had been anyone of sufficient authority and independence of view to correlate and compose the clashing interests of the moment, a gallant ally might have been saved from destruction. But those best qualified to judge of what was coming, and in a position to frame the corresponding policy, had been driven into reserve by the storm of calumny, whereby their motives were misconstrued, their counsels derided, and their authority undermined; so that in the general uproar their voices were scarcely heard. And there were none—or {49} very few—to act as intermediaries; for the personnel of the Entente Legations, "wholly believing a lie," had withdrawn in a body from all intercourse with them, had nicknamed them "Boches," and were accustomed to assess as concocted in Berlin every notion that emanated from them. Even the few members of those Legations who had the moral courage to walk the streets without blinkers were subjected to every form of odious insinuation and attack. Venizelos in office, out of office, on matters technical or lay, to him and to him only would anyone listen, and as he knew rather less about the rudiments of the military art than most people, and refrained from consulting those that did, the results were not difficult to predict.

Yet, as late as June, the elements of a good plan were ready to hand in abundance. The General Staff was, as stated, continuing its efforts for co-operation with the Serbs. The King, though too ill to conduct business, would have assented to any military proposal put forward by the General Staff. The people would have followed the King as one man. And the enemy were not ready. All that was necessary was to study with attention and sympathy the advice of the experts: to call the soldiers of the countries concerned to council, and to inaugurate a joint campaign. It was not done—and it is difficult to say now to whom the failure proved most disastrous—to Servia, to Greece, or to the Entente Powers. But for this failure a proportionate share of blame must be laid upon those who, instead of striving to heal divisions in Greece, did everything they could to foment them.



[1] White Book, No. 34.

[2] "Conversation with M. Demidoff," Politis, 25 Feb./10 March, 1915.

[3] White Book, No. 35.

[4] The best proof is to be found in the Venizelist White Book, No. 36,—an exhaustive memorandum by M. Streit on the probabilities of the War, dated 13/26 March, 1915. It is both striking and illuminating that, while in dealing with the attitude of Bulgaria, the author considers three alternatives: (1) Bulgaria in alliance with the Entente. (2) Bulgaria as neutral. (3) Bulgaria as an enemy of the Entente. In dealing with the attitude of Greece he does not for a single moment contemplate more than two alternatives: (1) Greece as an ally of the Entente. (2) Greece as neutral. Further, in the course of the argument which follows, M. Streit discusses a possible understanding between Greece on the one part and Rumania and Bulgaria on the other, with the object either of a common neutrality or, failing that, of a simultaneous entry into war in favour of the Entente, "on whose side alone we can range ourselves."

[5] See the Nea Hellas, 22 March (O.S.), 1915.

[6] Conversation entre le President du Conseil et les Ministres des Puissances de la Triple Entente, 30 mars/12 avril, 1915.

[7] Zographos to Greek Minister, Paris, 1/14 April, with the Proposal of same date; Orations, pp. 67-9.

[8] Romanos, Paris, 17/30 April, 1915.

[9] Zographos to Greek Legations, Paris, London, Petrograd, 18 April/1 May, 1915.

[10] Romanos, Paris, 4 May (N.S.), 1915.

[11] Zographos to Greek Legation, Paris, 22 April/5 May, 1915.

[12] Prince George to Zographos, Paris, 24 April/7 May, 1915.

[13] King Constantine to Prince George, 27 April/10 May, 1915. From this document we also learn that on 7/20 April, M. Poincare had assured the Prince that such a guarantee would certainly be given to Greece, "pour la periode de la guerre et durant la periode des negociations de la paix."

[14] Prince George to King Constantine, 28 April/11 May, 1915.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Zographos to Greek Legations, Paris, London, Petrograd, 30 April/13 May, 1915.

[17] Prince George to King Constantine, Paris, 28 April/11 May, 1915. M. Delcasse, then and for months afterwards, strove to gain over Bulgaria coute que coute, deploring the possession of Cavalla by Greece. See Deville, pp. 163, 218.

[18] Alexandropoulos, Nish, 15/28 May, 1915.

[19] Zographos to Greek Legation, Paris, 15/28 May, 1915.

[20] Communication of Entente Powers to Greek Premier, 21 July/3 Aug.; Greek Premier's reply (No. 8118); Alexandropoulos, Nish, 23 July/5 Aug.; 25 July/7 Aug.; Communication by British Minister at Athens, 23 July/5 Aug., 1915.

[21] See the Nea Hellas, 20, 21 March (O.S.), 1915; Orations, passim.

[22] Journal Officiel, p. 76. To appreciate the community of sentiments between M. Venizelos and M. Delcasse fully, one must compare the above statement with that in Orations, pp. 68-9. The differences are equally instructive. The Venizelist orator, prudently suppresses from a Greek audience the fact that his Chief frustrated the General Staff's efforts to co-operate with Servia; he boldly surmises, on the other hand, that behind the General Staff's stipulations as to the sphere of Greek military action lurked the arriere pensee to confront the Allies with the risk of provoking Bulgaria, whom they still regarded as a potential friend: so the stipulations were, as they were intended to be, unacceptable. Again, while M. Delcasse, addressing a French audience nervous about the Western Front, reckoned that the Entente contingents demanded by the Greek General Staff would amount to at least 600,000 or 800,000 men, M. Politis, less fantastically, estimates them at 450,000 men: this force, which Greece deemed necessary for success, it will be seen, was not far removed from that which France and England eventually wasted in failure.

[23]Prince George to King Constantine, Paris, 28 April/11 May, 1915.

[24] See M. Poincare's statement to the Matin, reproduced in the Balkan Review, Dec., 1920, p. 386; Deville, pp. 161, 168-9.



{50}

CHAPTER V

On 23 August, M. Venizelos returned to power as a result of the General Elections held on June 13. The outcome of those elections proved how great his popularity still was. True, in 1910 he had obtained 146 seats out of 182, and now only 185 out of 314. But the majority, though diminished, remained substantial enough to show that he still was, for most people, the man who had cleansed Greece. Nor did M. Venizelos imperil his popularity by revealing his differences with the King. On the contrary, in his own country, his attacks were carefully confined to the statesmen and soldiers opposed to him: the King, M. Venizelos proclaimed, far from sharing their narrow, unpatriotic, pro-German views, "did not exclude exit from neutrality under given conditions, but accepted it in principle as imposed for the serving of the national rights." [1] By his organs, too, the King was described as "a worthy successor of the Constantines who created the mighty Byzantine Empire—imbued with a sense of his great national mission—Greek in heart and mind." [2] So anxious, indeed, was M. Venizelos not to lose votes by any display of ill-feeling against the popular sovereign that he even took some pains to have himself photographed calling at the Palace to inquire after the King's health.

As to policy, it is difficult to determine the part which it played in the contest. M. Venizelos refrained from publishing any sort of programme. His opponents asserted that a vote for Venizelos meant a vote for war. But his most prominent supporters declared that such was by no means the case: although, at a certain moment, he was ready to participate in the Gallipoli enterprise, circumstances had changed, and his future course would depend on the situation which he would find on returning to {51} power. This vagueness, though not very helpful to the voters, doubtless helped the voting; for there was hardly any pro-war feeling among the masses. The noble ideals emblazoned upon the Entente banners produced little impression on their minds. The experience of two thousand years has taught the Greeks that Governments never fight for noble ideals, and, if they relieve a small nation from a foreign yoke, it is, as often as not, in order to impose a new one. To them the War was a struggle for power and plunder between two European groups. It was matter of common knowledge that Constantinople had been allotted to the Russians, and the Greeks were not particularly keen on shedding their blood in order to place a Tsar on the Byzantine throne. Nor did the Smyrna bait attract them greatly, since it involved parting with Cavalla. At the same time, the lurid accounts of German frightfulness disseminated by the Entente propaganda, instead of inflaming, damped still further their enthusiasm.[3] The Venizelist candidates were, therefore, wise in repudiating the allegation that their victory would inevitably mean intervention in the conflict; and, on the whole, the people who voted for the Cretan statesman seem to have paid a tribute to his personality rather than to his policy.

Meanwhile, Servia, under pressure from the Entente, had decided to promise Bulgaria territorial concessions, and the communication of this decision to the Hellenic Government formed the occasion of M. Venizelos's first official act. Greece, he wrote in reply, not wishing to embarrass her friend and ally at a moment when imperative necessity forced the latter to submit to painful sacrifices, abandoned her objections. But she would be lacking in sincerity if she failed to tell Servia straightway that "the raison d'etre of the Alliance—namely, the territorial equilibrium and the mutual guarantee of their respective possessions—being profoundly affected by the contemplated changes, the reciprocal obligations of the Alliance could not survive except by virtue of a renewal." M. Passitch replied verbally that he thought like M. Venizelos. But, as it happened, the question did not arise; Servia's promise was coupled with so many stipulations and reservations, that, in the opinion of the Entente Powers, {52} it amounted almost to a refusal;[4] and the thread of the negotiations was very soon broken by events. Destiny moved too fast for diplomacy.

Hardly had these dispatches been exchanged, when Colonel Vlachopoulos, the emissary of the Greek General Staff to Servia, arrived in Athens, bringing a report of the gravest nature. After twelve months' evasions, the Servian Minister of War had at last mentioned to him the need for an understanding between the two Staffs, and the Servian Director of Military Operations stated that Servia, far from being able to contribute to a common struggle against Bulgaria the 150,000 combatants stipulated by the Graeco-Servian Convention, could not at the moment transport to the northern parts of the Bulgarian frontier more than one or two divisions, while as to the southern parts, which most immediately concerned Greece, they would have to be left with the eight regiments of 1915 conscripts—that is, raw recruits. Simultaneously, the fear which the Greek military authorities had expressed to their Servian colleagues in the previous spring—that delay might prove fatal—was being realized: from all sides came intelligence of the concentration of large Austro-German forces towards the Danube.

In the circumstances, after studying Colonel Vlachopoulos's report, the Greek General Staff submitted to the Government (14 September) the opinion that for Greece to embark on a war against Bulgaria, so long as she was not assured of the co-operation of adequate Servian forces, was tantamount to courting annihilation; and of such co-operation there was no prospect: the moment the Serbs found themselves faced by a superior Austro-German army, the Greeks would have to fight the Bulgars as well as, in all probability, the Turks alone.

As if in confirmation of this forecast, a week later (21 September), the Hellenic Government received from Sofia the official announcement of the conclusion of a Turco-Bulgarian agreement and of Bulgarian mobilization; the latter measure being, according to the Bulgarian Premier, purely precautionary: as the Austro-German {53} armies had just begun an attack on Servia, and the theatre of war approached the Bulgarian frontiers, his country was obliged to take up an attitude of armed neutrality.[5]

The news threw M. Venizelos into a fever of excitement. He had, meanwhile, become most solicitous about Greece-Servian co-operation, and had not permitted his mind to be impressed by Colonel Vlachopoulos's report. When Austria and Germany had their hands full elsewhere, Servia's peril had left him cold; it set him on fire now when they were ready to hurl their legions into the Balkan Peninsula—when it was no longer for Greece a question of fighting Bulgaria only, but Bulgaria and Turkey and the Central Empires. M. Venizelos was a statesman of broad ideas, a hater of dry facts, and an impenitent believer in his own star. For the matter of time he cared very little; considerations of odds did not weigh with him unduly; and he cherished a sovereign contempt for the cautious attitude of professional soldiers and other uninspired persons. Never did these qualities appear more vividly than on this 21st of September.

At 5 p.m. M. Venizelos went to Tatoi, the King's country residence, to confer with him, having previously arranged that a mobilization Order should be drawn up and presented to his Majesty for signature at 6.30 p.m., by which time he expected to have finished his conversation. The following is a synopsis of that memorable interview based on a report from M. Venizelos's own lips.[6]

The King readily agreed to mobilize, but firmly resisted the proposal to enter the war, on the ground that the odds were too heavy. M. Venizelos argued that, even if Germany had five million men available on other fronts, she could not bring them to the Balkans, and consequently there was no cause for fear: he spoke learnedly and at enormous length of geographical conditions and means of transport, of victualling, of guns and bayonets, of morale—he had allowed himself an hour and a half. How the King must have felt under this harangue, any expert who has had to listen to an amateur laying down the law to him on his own subject may imagine. On finding his military arguments fruitless, M. Venizelos shifted his ground; though, the military habit being too strong, he {54} could not get away from military phraseology: "I was then obliged," he tells us, "to bring forward my heavy artillery."

"Majesty," I said, "I have not succeeded in persuading you. I am very sorry; but it is my duty, as representing at this moment the Sovereignty of the People, to tell you that you have no right to disagree with me this time. The people by the last elections has approved my policy and given me its confidence. It knew that the basis of my policy was not to let Bulgaria, by crushing Servia, become too big and crush us to-morrow. You cannot therefore at this moment depart from this policy—unless you decide to set aside the Constitution; in which case you must say so clearly, abrogating the Constitution by a Decree and assuming the responsibility."

The King replied: "You know I recognize that I am bound to obey the popular verdict when it is a question of the internal affairs of the country; but when it is a question of foreign affairs—the great national questions—my view is that, so long as I consider a thing right or wrong, I must insist that it shall or shall not be done, because I feel responsible before God."

At this utterance, M. Venizelos narrates, "I remember that a feeling of distress came over me, and with clasped hands, I shook my head in a melancholy manner, saying: 'Alas! we are before the theory of kingship by the grace of God: poor Greece!'" [7] After a little, he told the King that, in the actual circumstances, he could not undertake a struggle for the Constitution; he could only tender his resignation.

The King expostulated: "How can you resign in the face of a Bulgarian mobilization? In these circumstances, as you know, we must not delay even twenty-four hours. After all, who assures us that Bulgaria will attack Servia? It is possible that she may maintain an armed neutrality; in which case our disagreement vanishes, and you can stay in power and carry on your policy." Whereupon M. Venizelos withdrew his resignation.

Of course, he was not deluded by the Sofia Government's {55} announcement of "armed neutrality," and he was determined to go for Bulgaria at once. But how? In his own mind, as he had already demonstrated to the King, no doubt existed that, if the Greeks attacked the Bulgars, they had every chance of crushing them and even of taking their capital. But there was that General Staff by whose opinions the King set such store. They objected Servia's inability to contribute, as she was bound by her Military Convention to do, 150,000 combatants. Therefore, in order to meet this objection, he said: "Don't you think we might ask the English and the French whether they could not furnish 150,000 combatants of their own?"

"Certainly," replied the King; "but they must send Metropolitan (European) troops, not Colonials."

By his own account, M. Venizelos did not take this as meaning that the King had agreed, if the English and the French supplied these reinforcements, to depart from neutrality. He left Tatoi with a clear perception of the divergence between their respective points of view: while they both concurred in the need of instant mobilization, one was for a defensive and the other for an offensive policy; but, as soon appeared, not without hopes of converting his sovereign by some means or other.

A busy, ambitious child of fortune never lets the grass grow under his feet:

"I returned to the Ministry at 7 p.m.," goes on the curious record, "and telephoned to the Entente Ministers to come and see me quickly. When they came, I informed them that a mobilization Order was being signed at that very moment and would be published that evening; but for our further course I needed to know if the Powers were disposed to make good the 150,000 combatants whom Servia was obliged by our Treaty to contribute for joint action against Bulgaria. They promised to telegraph, and immediately dispatched an extra urgent telegram, adding that they would let me know the answer. This happened at about 8 p.m., and at 8.15 there arrived M. Mercati (the Marshal of the Court) with a message from the King, asking me not to make this demarche to the Entente. I replied that the demarche had already been made." [8]

{56}

Forty-eight hours later arrived the Entente Powers' answer, that they would send to Salonica the 150,000 men asked for. M. Venizelos, on communicating this answer to the King, was requested by him to tell the Entente Ministers that, so long as Bulgaria did not attack Servia, and consequently the question of Greece going to Servia's assistance did not arise, no troops should be sent, as their landing on Greek soil would constitute a violation of Greek neutrality. M. Venizelos tells us that he communicated the King's wish to the Entente Ministers, who telegraphed it to their Governments.

King Constantine, it would seem, was left under the impression that the affair had ended; and the general belief was that the policy of neutrality still held good; when suddenly the report came that Allied troops were on their way to Salonica and that Greece was expected to assist in their landing.

The news would have astonished the Greeks in any circumstances; but the circumstances in which it reached them were of a nature to heighten astonishment into alarm. Just then (28 September) Sir Edward Grey stated in the House of Commons, amid loud applause, "Not only is there no hostility in this country to Bulgaria, but there is traditionally a warm feeling of sympathy;" and he reiterated the Balkan policy of the Entente—a Balkan {57} agreement on the basis of territorial concessions. The inference which the Greeks drew from this coincidence was that the Entente Powers were sending troops to despoil them on behalf of the Bulgars—that they intended to bid for Bulgaria's friendship at the twelfth hour by forcibly seizing the parts of Macedonia which they had endeavoured in vain to persuade Greece to yield.[9]

M. Venizelos himself carried the report to the King, inveighing, it is said, intemperately against the Allies: "I will protest with the greatest energy," he cried, trembling with anger. "I will protest against this unqualifiable violation of our soil."

"Certainly," replied the King, "you must protest very energetically." [10]

{58}

And M. Venizelos hurried off to his office and drew up the following telegram, which, now printed for the first time, reveals many things:

"A grave misunderstanding threatens to develop between Greece and the Entente Powers on the subject of the despatch of international troops through Salonica to Servia. When I suggested the dispatch of 150,000 men destined to complete the Servian contingents in case of a common struggle against Bulgaria, I did not ask this succour for Greece, but for Servia in order to remove the objection raised against our Alliance, said to have become null by Servia's inability to fulfil her engagement. By accepting in principle to proceed to such dispatch the Powers rendered above all a service to Servia and to their own cause in the East. Likewise, I had clearly specified that, so long as Greece was neutral, the landing of international troops at Salonica could not have our official adhesion. Our neutrality imposed upon us to protest for form's sake; after which matters would go on as at Moudros." [11]

{59}

"It remained for us to take all the necessary measures for facilitating the landing and the direct passage to Servia of the international troops, combining these operations with the needs of our own mobilization. The Minister of Communications was to go at once to Salonica with a number of engineers to arrange on the spot these technical matters, very complicated from the paucity of means of transport in Macedonia. It was understood that, before any dispatch of troops to Salonica, we should have twenty-four hours' notice.

"Things were at this point, when the Military Governor of Salonica—on Wednesday—received a visit from the French Consul, the Commander of a French man-of-war, and two French officers from the Dardanelles, who told him that, in pursuance of a pretended understanding between the Premier and the French Minister, they were going to start reconnaissance work for the landing of French troops and the defence of Salonica against enemy submarines. Furthermore, on Thursday there arrived at Salonica General Hamilton with his Staff and notified the Governor that the Allies were going to occupy part of the town and port, and put them in a state of defence with a view to a landing of troops. General Moschopoulos, very firmly though very politely, declared to them that, without orders from his Government, it would be his painful duty to oppose any seizure of national territory.

"Such a misunderstanding inspires us with the liveliest alarm, for the contemplated landing has not yet been definitely accepted, and after being accepted it cannot be carried out, (1) without a preliminary protest for form's sake, which the British Government has informed us it does not want;[12] (2) without the absolute maintenance of the powers of our authorities, who alone would decide the measures for the use of the port and railways in such a manner as not to compromise the transport and concentration of our own armies."

{60}

"Moreover, the great emotion caused in the public by the recent speech of Sir Edward Grey compels the Royal Government to demand from the Entente Powers certain preliminary assurances. While people here expected to see the Powers, after the Bulgarian mobilization, proceed to decisive acts, and at the very least to a declaration that the territorial promises made to Bulgaria in August would be cancelled if within a very short time she did not agree to co-operate with the Entente, they were stupefied to see that to the most evident proof of Bulgarian duplicity and disloyalty they replied by redoubling their solicitude and goodwill. Sir Edward Grey's speech, followed closely by the visits made without notice at Salonica by the representatives of the French and British Staffs, gives birth to the fear that certain Entente Powers may harbour the design of using the troops which would be sent to Servia as the fittest instrument for giving practical effect to the territorial ambitions of the Bulgars in Macedonia. Well or ill founded, this fear exercises over people in Greece, and we have reason to believe in Servia also, a demoralizing effect and threatens to compromise the success of our mobilization.

"The Royal Government finds itself confronted with a situation created much against its will, which imposes upon it the duty, in order to calm as soon as possible the alarms of the people now in arms, of asking the Powers to dispel the fears inspired by their attitude towards Bulgaria by declaring, if possible, that the offers made to her are henceforth null, and that the eventual dispatch of international troops to Servia would in no case be turned to the detriment of the territorial integrity of Greece and Servia. Only formal assurances in this sense could justify in the eyes of Greek public opinion the Government which, while protesting for form's sake, would agree to facilitate the landing at Salonica and the passage across its territory of international troops destined for Servia.

"Please speak to the Minister for Foreign Affairs in the sense of this telegram." [13]

From the tenor of this interesting document we gather that, while fully aware of the King's attitude, M. Venizelos {61} went on negotiating with the Allies for immediate action; and that the Allies proceeded to act before any agreement had been reached. To judge by its tone, M. Venizelos seems to have been annoyed at the Allies' haste as at an unwarrantable attempt to commit him irretrievably without heeding his conditions or waiting for his definite consent: so grave a breach of propriety could not but pain him. But, however annoyed he might be on the surface, at bottom he was doubtless pleased: the move supplied the best means for the conversion of his Sovereign—no argument is so persuasive as an accomplished fact. That was what really mattered—the manner was a detail; and it is impossible to suppose that he meant to let his annoyance stand in the way of his high purpose.[14] Themistocles, to whom the Cretan statesman bears some affinity, it will be remembered, forced the Greeks to fight at Salamis by a similar stratagem.

This, of course, does not exculpate the Allies. Their conduct merits at least the appellation of irregular. But when foreign diplomats and native politicians become fused into a happy family, it would be strange, indeed, if irregularities did not occur. The whole of the Greek story is so thoroughly permeated with the spirit of old-fashioned melodrama that no incident, however startling, seems out of place.

What follows is something of an anticlimax. Next day, the French Minister—from this point onwards France takes the lead and England recedes into the second place—had the honour to announce to his Excellency the Greek Premier the arrival at Salonica of a first detachment of troops, declaring at the same time that the Entente Powers sent it to assist their ally Servia, and that they counted on Greece, who had already given them so many proofs of friendship, not to oppose measures taken in the interest of a country to which she also was allied.[15]

{62}

In reply, the Greek Premier had the honour to declare to his Excellency the French Minister that, being neutral, Greece could not authorize measures which violated her neutrality. The Hellenic Government was therefore obliged to protest against the passage of foreign troops through Greek territory. The circumstance that those troops were destined solely to the assistance of Servia, who was Greece's ally, nowise altered the case; for, before the casus faederis was realized, the neutrality of Greece could not be affected by the danger which menaced Servia.[16]

To return from formalities to realities. On the same day (2 Oct.), the Bulgarian forces began to mass on the Servian frontier, while the Austro-German battalions were fighting their way across the Danube; and on the 4th Russia launched her ultimatum on Bulgaria. This rapid fulfilment of their own prognostications roused the Greeks to the highest pitch of excitement. But all faith in the Entente had not yet been extinguished. On the very day on which the Petrograd Government delivered its tardy and ineffectual ultimatum at Sofia, at Athens the Chamber held a historic debate, in which M. Venizelos for the first time proclaimed that the Graeco-Servian Treaty imposed an absolute obligation upon Greece to make war on Bulgaria and Turkey; adding—in answer to a question, what he would do if on going to Servia's assistance he met the German and Austrian armies—that Germany and Austria must be fought as well, if necessary, and backing his thesis with those appeals to honour which, whether pertinent or not, seldom fail to move a popular audience. The debate lasted till four o'clock in the morning and ended with a vote of confidence in M. Venizelos's military policy—a policy which M. Venizelos, a civilian, expounded to an assembly of civilians as a settled plan, without waiting for the consent of the King and in defiance of the technical advice of the General Staff. In fairness to the Chamber, it should be added that the motion was carried on the assumption that the King was in agreement.[17]

{63}

But we know King Constantine's attitude; and if M. Venizelos hoped by these tactics to force his hand, he was speedily undeceived. No sooner was the debate over than the King summoned his Prime Minister and asked him to modify his policy or to resign. Faced by such a dilemma, M. Venizelos did the only thing he could do—he resigned; and his country shrank back on to the solid ground of neutrality.

It was a narrow escape—how narrow became evident a few hours later. The Allies had promised to send 150,000 combatants. Even if this promise had been kept, the Allied force would not have been, in any strategical sense, an adequate substitute for the Servian contingent. For it was not in place for covering purposes or subsequent offensive action; it was not trained to Balkan fighting; it was not equipped for mountain warfare; and, coming to the same ports as the Greeks, it would have delayed the process of concentration. But, be that as it may, the promise was not kept. What is more, it could not possibly have been kept. Politicians casting about for arguments wherewith to back their views may leave their hearers to imagine that Great Powers keep armies ready to be planked down at any point at a moment's notice; but the fact is that an army, even if it can be spared from other tasks, is a cumbrous affair to move about, requiring all sorts of tiresome things—food, arms, ammunition—the provision of which requires, in its turn, complicated processes, before the army is potentially effective for the role assigned to it in the creative mind of an excited orator. Something of the sort had, indeed, been intimated to the Hellenic Government by the Entente Powers themselves when they wished both Greeks and Serbs to avert Bulgarian hostility by territorial concessions—namely, that, as after the commitment of troops to Gallipoli, none remained to rescue Servia, there was nothing for it but to conciliate Bulgaria. Of course, it may be asked, such being the facts, what value had the promise of 150,000 men? This {64} is a question which M. Venizelos would have done well to ponder, as King Constantine and his military advisers pondered it. As it was, when that afternoon the Allied forces turned up at Salonica, the Greek people had the mortification to find that they amounted to 20,000. Nor did they approach the stipulated figure for months after.

The arguments which had prevailed with many some hours before were suddenly exploded, and to the feeling of confidence which had prompted the Chamber's vote immediately succeeded a feeling of panic. What! cried everybody at Athens, are we to stake our liberty—our national existence—on such a chance: 150,000 Greeks, plus 200,000 half-exhausted Serbs, plus 20,000 Allies, against 200,000 Austro-Germans, plus 300,000 Bulgars, plus 100,000 Turks? Nay, if the French and the English love gambling, we don't: we cannot afford the luxury. Venizelos has allowed himself to be duped, said some; others, Venizelos has tried to dupe us.

Such were the circumstances under which the Allies landed at Salonica. Their action has been pronounced immoral and perfidious by some English and even by some French critics; and as it was attended with ill success, it brought double shame upon the contrivers.[18] Certainly, it will not bear investigation from the standpoint of political tact: it was the first of the many performances which little by little alienated a friendly nation from them and discredited M. Venizelos with his countrymen.



[1] M. Venizelos in the Nea Hellas, 22 March (O.S.), 1915.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Deville, p. 174.

[4] Venizelos to Greek Legation, Nish, 18/31 Aug.; Alexandropoulos, Nish, 19 Aug./1 Sept.; 20 Aug./2 Sept.; 22 Aug./4 Sept., 1915.

[5] White Book, No. 41.

[6] Orations, pp. 131-8.

[7] This utterance, for the exactness of which we have to rely entirely on M. Venizelos's memory, was the origin of the charge henceforth brought against King Constantine that he claimed to reign by Divine Right.

[8] According to another and ampler version of these events, it had been agreed between the King and M. Venizelos that, while the latter opened conversations with the British and French Ministers about the possibility of sending 150,000 combatants, the former should simultaneously open conversations with the German Emperor relating the steps taken in regard to the Entente, and asking what Germany would give for Greek neutrality. But when M. Venizelos returned to Athens, he sent a letter to the King informing him that he had changed his mind and that, as a responsible Minister, he could not sanction the projected negotiations with Germany. Whereupon the King forwarded by M. Mercati a reply that, in such a case, he retracted the permission to approach the Entente with regard to reinforcements. See the Balkan Review, Dec., 1920, pp. 387-8. Yet another version supplies some additional details: M. Venizelos assured M. Mercati that his demarche was of a strictly personal character and did not commit the State in the least; next day he repeated this assurance to the King himself and, at the King's instance, promised to cancel the demarche; and two days afterwards the French Minister, M. Guillemin, formally declared to the King that M. Venizelos's demarche was considered as null and void—nulle et non avenue.—See S. Cosmin's Diplomatic et Presse dans l'Affaire Grecque (Paris, 1921), pp. 123-4.

[9] The Greek Ministers abroad had for some time been informing their Government of a contemplated occupation by Allied troops of the territories which were to be ceded to Bulgaria; and the suspicion that a dispatch of Entente Forces to Salonica might have for its object "really to occupy for Bulgaria, until the conclusion of peace, the territories coveted by her," has been expressed even by a French diplomat.—See Deville, p. 129, n. 1.

[10] I venture to borrow this little scene from S. Cosmin, p. 125. M. Venizelos at this stage of the proceedings is more eloquent than coherent. He tells us (Orations, p. 139), that on informing the King that the Allied troops were on their way to Salonica, his Majesty said: "That's all right. Only please let your protest be in any case, emphatic," and that he replied: "Emphatic—yes, but only up to a certain point, considering what lies beneath." Now, as on M. Venizelos's own showing, the King was no party to the Allies' step, it is not very easy to see how he could have spoken to him as if the King had a secret understanding with them. The episode is one on which more light could be shed with advantage. The same may be said of an allegation that King Constantine secretly informed Bulgaria that, even in the event of an attack on Servia, she would meet with no opposition from Greece. This allegation is supported chiefly by a telegraphic dispatch from the Bulgarian Minister at Athens to Sofia (White Book, No. 43), which somehow (it is not stated how) fell into the hands of M. Venizelos's friends and was produced by them in the Skouloudis Inquiry. The authenticity of this document was publicly denied by its alleged author, and its portentous length (three large pages of close print), as well as its unusual style render it very suspicious: it begins: "To-day, 9th instant," and it is dated "23"—as if the author did not know that the difference between the Old and New Calendar was 13 days. In face of these difficulties, strong evidence would be required to establish its genuineness: the more because that Inquiry witnessed a number of similar curiosities—among them an alleged dispatch from the Turkish Minister at Athens to the Grand Vizier, regarding the conclusion of a secret Graeco-Turkish treaty. When challenged, M. Skouloudis declared that such treaty never was even thought of and denounced the dispatch as "from beginning to end a forgery," whereupon nothing more was said. (See Skouloudis's Apologia, pp. 85-8). These matters are of interest as illustrating the atmosphere of mistrust that poisoned Greek politics at this period, and particularly the relations between the King of Greece and her leading politician.

[11] In pursuance of a decision taken by the War Council on 16 Feb., a British force was sent to Lemnos to support the naval attack on the Dardanelles, landing at Moudros on 6 March. Greece told the British Government that she considered the action irreconcilable with her position as a neutral. The British Government justified it by saying that, as Turkey had not accepted the verdict of the Powers whereby Lemnos and the other islands conquered in 1912 were assigned to Greece, England had the right to treat them as Turkish territory: at the same time declaring that this did not entail any diminution of Greek sovereignty. Thus, whilst Turkey was a friend, the British Government had decided that these islands did not belong to her; it recognized her claim to them when she became an enemy; but not altogether—only for the duration of the War: it was merely a temporary expedient to meet a temporary exigency. By the same line of reasoning, England in the following July justified the occupation of Mytilene. The Greek answer was that "without consenting to the occupation of part of her territory or admitting the arguments put forward by the British Government to justify its action from the standpoint of International Law, Greece had to bow before an accomplished fact."—Elliot to Greek Premier, Athens, 9 March, 25 July; Minister for Foreign Affairs to Greek Legations, London and Paris, 16/29 July, 1915.

[12] Sir Edward Grey objected to a protest because it would enable Germany to say that we had violated Greek neutrality.—Gennadius, London, 29 Sept., 1915.

[13] Venizelos to Greek Legations, London, Paris, Petrograd, Rome, 18 Sept./1 Oct. 1915. (Confidential.)

[14] "For my policy the arrival of the Anglo-French was a most material asset. I went for war against Bulgaria and had made up my mind, if Bulgaria attacked Servia, to fight. It was in my interest, besides the 150,000 Greek and the 200,000 Servian bayonets, to have 150,000 Anglo-French, consequently it was a political move absolutely necessary for the prosecution of my own policy."—Orations, p. 140.

[15] Guillemin to Venizelos, Athens, 19 Sept./2 Oct., 1915.

[17] Venizelos to Guillemin, Athens, 19 Sept./2 Oct., 1915. This merely formal protest—quite distinct from the confidential dispatch given above—is the only one of which the world has hitherto been allowed to hear.

[17] M. Venizelos had insisted that the reports spread through the Press concerning the divergence of views between him and the Crown should be contradicted, and, by telling the King that otherwise the mobilization would have no effect on Bulgaria, had obtained the King's permission to publish a communique in which he stated that "the Crown is in accord with the responsible Government not only as regards mobilization but also as regards future policy."—Orations, p. 136.

[18] See House of Commons Debate, in The Times, 19 April, 1916; Chambre des Deputes, secret debate of 20 June, 1916, in the Journal Officiel, p. 77.



{65}

CHAPTER VI

M. Zaimis formed a Government pledged to the policy which Greece had pursued since the beginning of the European War: her future course would be guided by the course of events: meanwhile, she would seek to safeguard her vital interests by remaining armed.[1]

As regards Servia, the new Premier had an opportunity of expressing his views at length soon after his accession to office. The Servian Government, judging that the imminent attack from Bulgaria realized the casus faederis, asked him if, in conformity with her alliance, Greece would be ready to take the field. M. Zaimis answered that the Hellenic Government was very sorry not to be able to comply with the Servian demand so formulated. It did not judge that in the present conjuncture the casus faederis came into play. The Alliance, concluded in 1913, for the purpose of establishing an equilibrium of forces between the Balkan States, had a purely Balkan character and nowise applied to a general conflagration. Both the Treaty and the Military Convention accompanying it showed that the contracting parties had in view only the case of an isolated attack by Bulgaria against one of them. Nowhere was there any allusion to a concerted attack by two or more Powers. Nor could it be otherwise: it would have been an act of mad presumption for either of the contracting parties to offer the other the manifestly powerless and ridiculous assistance of its armed forces in the case of a war with several States at once. And such was the present case. If the Bulgarian attack apprehended by the Servian Government took place, it would be in concert with Germany, Austria, and Turkey: it would be combined with the attack already carried on by the two Central Empires: it would be an episode of the European War. {66} The Servian Government itself had recognized this in advance by breaking off diplomatic relations with Bulgaria in imitation of the Entente Powers, her European Allies, without a previous understanding with Greece, her Balkan ally. In these circumstances, the Hellenic Government was convinced that no obligation weighed upon it.

Further, Greece was persuaded that her armed assistance freely offered at such a moment would ill serve the common interest of the two countries. Greece had remained neutral in the European War, judging that the best service she could render Servia was to hold in check Bulgaria by keeping her forces intact and her communications open. The common interest demanded that the Greek forces should continue in reserve for better use later on: that Greece should remain neutral and armed, watching the course of events carefully with the resolution to guard in the best possible way, not only her own vital interests, but also those which she had in common with Servia.

The Hellenic Government, while deeply and sincerely regretting that it was materially impossible for it to do at present more for Servia, wished to assure her that, faithful to their friendship, it would continue to accord her every assistance and facility consistent with its international position.[2]

The Entente Powers took no exception to this attitude; which is not to be wondered at, seeing that they had hitherto uniformly ignored the Graeco-Servian Treaty, and, by their project of territorial concessions to Bulgaria, had laboured, as much as in them lay, to annul a pact made for the defence of the territorial status quo against Bulgaria: not until Bulgaria had been at open war with Servia for some days (14 Oct.), could they bring themselves to declare that the promises of Servian and Greek territory which they had made to her no longer held. Unable, therefore, to tell Greece that she was under any obligation to enter the War on Servia's behalf, Sir Edward Grey attempted to induce her to do so for her own benefit by offering her the island of Cyprus. This offer, made on 17 October, Greece felt compelled to decline: what would it have profited her to gain Cyprus and lose Athens? And what could an acceptance have profited Servia either? As {67} M. Zaimis said, by intervening at that moment Greece would perish without saving Servia.

Servia could have been saved had an Anglo-French expedition on an adequate scale taken place at any of the times which the Greek General Staff proposed for Graeco-Servian co-operation—indeed, at any time except only the particular time chosen by the Entente. When their troops arrived at Salonica, the Servian army—what had been left of it after fourteen months' fighting and typhus—was already falling back before the Austro-Germans, who swarmed across the Drina, the Save, and the Danube, occupied Belgrade and pushed south (6-10 Oct.), while the Bulgars pressed towards Nish (11-12 Oct.). On the day on which the English offer was made (17 Oct.), the Austro-Germans were fifteen miles south of Belgrade, and by the 2nd of November there was no longer any Servia to save, the Bulgars having on that day entered Monastir.

The co-operation of Greece might still have been obtained if the Allies could even then have sent to Salonica forces large enough to assure her that the struggle would be waged on more equal terms.[3] There had always been an influential group among the principal military leaders at Athens who held that it was to the vital interest of their country that Bulgaria should be attacked, and who, to secure the help of the Entente Powers against Bulgarian pretensions in the future, were prepared to run great immediate risks. As it was, the dilatoriness of the Allies imposed upon M. Zaimis a policy of inaction.

This policy, besides being imposed by circumstances, also accorded with the new Premier's character.

M. Zaimis stands out in the political world of Greece as a singular anomaly: a politician who never made speeches and never gave interviews: a silent man in a country where every citizen is a born orator: an unambitious man in a country where ambition is an endemic disease. To find a parallel to his position, one must go back to the days when nations, in need of wise guidance, implored reluctant sages to undertake the task of guiding them. This thankless task M. Zaimis performed several times to everybody's temporary satisfaction. On the present, as on other occasions, he enjoyed the confidence of the Entente Powers, {68} as well as the confidence of the King and the people of Greece. Even the journals of M. Venizelos, and the Anglo-French Press which M. Venizelos inspired, paid the customary tribute to M. Zaimis's integrity and sagacity. The homage was due to the fact that M. Zaimis was neither a Venizelist nor an anti-Venizelist, but simply a Zaimist. In domestic affairs he belonged to no party; in foreign affairs to no school: he neither sought nor shunned a change of course.

That explains why he succeeded in ruling Greece for four weeks, and also why he failed to rule her longer.

M. Venizelos had not abandoned his standpoint. Of M. Zaimis's person he spoke with much respect; but of his policy he spoke just as one might have expected M. Venizelos to speak: M. Zaimis had broken the Servian Treaty and would go down to history as a man who had dishonoured the signature of Greece. With regard to the Entente Powers, M. Venizelos thought that M. Zaimis meant honestly—the fact that he was as well known to them as M. Venizelos himself, having served as their High Commissioner in Crete for two years (1906-08), exempted him from the imputation of duplicity—and since the Entente Powers tolerated him, he would do likewise. He only taunted the Zaimis Government in Parliament for not obtaining for its policy a price from those whom that policy unintentionally helped: Greece, to be sure, did not remain neutral to serve Germany's but her own interests, nevertheless, as Germany benefited by that neutrality, she should be asked to give a quid pro quo.[4]

It was not the first time that M. Venizelos expressed this idea. At the Crown Council of 3 March he had suggested, if his own policy of intervention was not adopted, to ask from Germany compensations for the continuance of neutrality; and he urged that the King should personally bargain with the Kaiser's Minister. Again on 21 September, when sounding the Entente Powers on the {69} possibility of sending troops to Salonica, he advised the King simultaneously to sound the German Emperor on the price of neutrality.[5] King Constantine had always shrunk from entering into any understanding whatever with Germany. And, although the advice may have been given in good faith, it is easy to guess the use to which its acceptance might be turned by M. Venizelos, who, even as it was, did not hesitate to whisper of "pledges" given to Germany. So M. Zaimis endured the taunt and avoided the trap.

This state of truce lasted for a month. Then strife broke out afresh. Early in November a member of the Government insulted the Opposition. The Opposition demanded his dismissal. This was refused and matters were pushed to a crisis—whether by the adversaries of M. Venizelos, anxious to get rid of a Chamber with a hostile majority, or by M. Venizelos himself, anxious to get rid of a Cabinet that had succeeded in establishing friendly relations with the Entente, it is impossible to say. Both conjectures found favour at the time, and both seem probable.[6] In any case, M. Venizelos made of that incident an occasion for an attack on the Government's foreign policy, which, ending in an adverse vote, led to the resignation of M. Zaimis and the formation of a new Ministry under M. Skouloudis (7 November).

There ensued a dissolution of the Chamber (11 November) and a fresh appeal to the people; the King, on the advice of M. Skouloudis, inviting M. Venizelos to the polls, as who should say: When you got your majority in June, the nation was with you; many things of the gravest national concern have happened since; let us see if the nation is with you now. M. Venizelos declined the invitation: "The elections," he said, "will be a farce. All my supporters are detained voteless under arms, and the only votes cast will be those of the older and more timid men." How many supporters he had under arms the near future was to show. Meanwhile, he and his partizans reinforced this reason for abstention from the polls with other arguments.

{70} King Constantine, they alleged, was guilty of unconstitutional behaviour. He had twice disagreed with a Government supported by a majority of the representatives of the people, and twice within a few months had dissolved a Parliament duly chosen by the people. Was such a thing ever heard in a constitutional State? The Constitution had been violated: openly, insolently violated.

In Greece this cry has always been among the Opposition's common stock-in-trade: it is enough for a Minister to misapply fifty drachmas to acquire the title of a violator of the Constitution, and nobody ever is the wiser or the worse for it. M. Venizelos himself had often been accused by his opponents of aiming at the subversion of Parliamentary Government. But in this instance the cry was destined to have, as we shall see, epoch-making results, and for this reason it merits serious examination.

The King's supporters denied that any violation of the Constitution had taken place. The Constitution of Greece, they pointed out, gives the Crown explicitly the right to dismiss Ministers and to dissolve Chambers.[7] M. Venizelos himself had, no longer ago than 5 March, at the second sitting of the Crown Council, declared himself an adversary of the doctrine that the Parliamentary majority is absolute, and recognized the right of the Crown to choose another Government; "On the other hand," he said, "the necessary consequence of the formation of a Cabinet not enjoying a majority in the Chamber is the dissolution of the Chamber." [8] It was in pursuance {71} of this advice that the King, who, as M. Venizelos on that occasion emphatically stated, "has always absolutely respected the Constitution," [9] dissolved the Chamber.

The only question, therefore, is about the dissolution of the Chamber elected on 13 June, 1915, which gave M. Venizelos a majority of 56. This action, it was alleged, violated the spirit, though not the letter, of Constitutional Law, because the dissolved Chamber represented the will of the people. But, the other side retorted, it was precisely because there was ground for believing that the Parliamentary majority had ceased to represent the will of the people that the King proceeded to a dissolution; and in so doing he had excellent precedent. His father had dissolved several Chambers (specifically in 1902 and 1910) on the same ground, not only without incurring any censure, but earning much applause from the Venizelist Party.[10] In fact, the last of those dissolutions had been carried out by M. Venizelos himself under the following circumstances: The General Elections of August, 1910, had given a majority to the old parties: King George, however, in the belief that public opinion really favoured M. Venizelos, called him to power, though he was only the leader of a Parliamentary minority. M. Venizelos formed a Government, but, as the majority in Parliament obstructed his policy, he persuaded the Sovereign to dissolve it,[11] declaring in the House (11/24 October, 1910): that "it is impossible to limit the prerogative of the Crown to dissolve any Chamber." Obviously, what was {72} lawful for King George could not be unlawful for King Constantine; and the fact that M. Venizelos's majority of 56 had since the recent elections dwindled to 16, was reason sufficient for the belief that he no longer represented the will of the people, even if it were conceded that the issue of war had been clearly put before the electors who had voted for him in June, and that, at best, a majority of 56 in an assembly of 314 was an adequate expression of the will of the people on so grave an issue. Events had moved so fast in those months and the situation changed so abruptly that King Constantine would have been guilty of a dereliction of duty had he not, by exercising his indisputable prerogative, given the nation an opportunity to reconsider its opinion.

Sophisms suited to the fury of the times apart, the whole case of M. Venizelos against his Sovereign rested, avowedly, on the theory, improvised for the nonce, that the Greek Constitution is a replica of the British—a monarchical democracy in which the monarch is nothing more than a passive instrument in the hands of a Government with a Parliamentary majority.[12] It is not so, and it was never meant to be so. The Greek Constitution does invest the monarch with rights which our Constitution, or rather the manner in which we have for a long time chosen to interpret it, does not. Among these is the right to make, or to refrain from making war. That was why M. Venizelos in March, 1915, could not offer the co-operation of Greece in the Dardanelles enterprise officially without the King's approval, and why the British Government declined to consider his semi-official communication until after the King's decision. Similarly M. Venizelos's proposals for the dispatch of Entente troops to Salonica in September, so far as that transaction was carried on above-board, were made subject to the King's consent. Of course, if the King exercised this right without advice, he would be playing the part of an autocrat; but King Constantine always acted by the advice of the competent authority—namely, the Chief of the General Staff. In truth, if anyone tried to play the part of an autocrat, it was not the King, but M. Venizelos. His argument seemed to be that the King should acquiesce in the view {73} which a lay Minister took of matters military and in decisions which he arrived at without or in defiance of technical advice.

In this again, M. Venizelos appears to have been inspired by British example. We saw during the War the responsibility for its conduct scattered over twenty-three civil and semi-civil individuals who consulted the naval and military staffs more or less as and when they choose, and the result of it in the Gallipoli tragedy. We saw, too, as a by-product of this system, experts holding back advice of immense importance because they knew it would not be well received. The Reports of the Dardanelles Commission condemned this method. But it is to a precisely similar method that the Greek General Staff objected with such determination. "Venizelos," they said, "does not know anything about war. He approaches the King with proposals containing in them the seeds of national disaster without consulting us, or in defiance of our advice. Greece cannot afford to run the risk of military annihilation; her resources are small, and, once exhausted, cannot be replaced." The King, relying on the right unquestionably given to him under the terms of the Constitution, demanded from his chief military adviser such information as would enable him to judge wisely from the military point of view any proposal involving hostilities made by his Premier. It was this attitude that saved Greece from the Gallipoli grave in March, and it was the same attitude that saved her a second time at the present juncture.

But, in fact, at the present juncture the King acted not so much on his prerogative of deciding about war as on the extreme democratic principle that such decision belongs to the people, and, finding that the Party which pushed the country towards war had only a weak majority, he preferred to place the question before the electorate, to test beyond the possibility of doubt the attitude of public opinion towards this new departure.

From whatever point of view we may examine Constantine's behaviour, we find that nothing could be more unfair than the charge of unconstitutionalism brought against it. M. Venizelos himself a little later, by declaring that he aimed at the "definite elucidation of the obligations and rights of the royal authority," through a "new {74} Constitution," [13] unwittingly confessed that the actual Constitution could not bear his interpretation. As things stood, the charge might with a better show of justice be brought against M. Venizelos, who, it was pointed out, had violated the Constitution by inviting foreign troops into Greek territory without the necessary Act of Parliament.[14]

Nor should it be forgotten that King Constantine had suffered grievously both as a Greek and as a general from too punctilious an observance of parliamentary etiquette by his father in 1897. At that date the policy of M. Delyannis was supported by the whole Chamber. It was a policy which the late Lord Salisbury very aptly summed up at the time in the one word, "strait-waistcoat." But, for lack of a man at the top strong enough and courageous enough to take the responsibility of opposing it, it was carried out: Greece rushed headlong into war with a superior power and was smashed. Upon King Constantine, then Crown Prince, had devolved the tragic duty of leading the Greek army to self-destruction, and it was upon his devoted head that afterwards the nation visited the criminal levity of M. Delyannis. Was he to suffer calmly a repetition of the same catastrophe on an infinitely larger scale—to see his country trampled under German and Bulgarian heels—for M. Venizelos's sake?

The practical wisdom and patriotism of the King's conduct cannot be questioned; but we should guard ourselves against exaggerating its moral courage. King Constantine, in turning an inattentive ear to the warlike outpourings of the People's Chosen, knew perfectly well that he ran no risk of wounding the people's conscience—just {75} as in offering to lay the question before the tribunal of public opinion he knew that he ran no risk of finding it at variance with his own. He could afford to act as he did, because the country trusted him implicitly. Writing about the middle of November, an English observer described the situation as follows: "The people generally are afraid, waiting and leaving everything to the King. . . . No one now counts in Greece but the King." [15] And the absence of any popular murmur at the rejection of the offer of Cyprus, to anyone who knows how deeply popular feeling is committed to the ultimate union of that Greek island with the mother country, speaks for itself.

This does not mean that M. Venizelos had as yet lost caste altogether. On that fateful 5th of October his reputation as a serious statesman among his countrymen had received a severe blow. The idolatrous admiration with which he had been surrounded until then gave way to disenchantment, disenchantment to bewilderment, and bewilderment to dismay: the national prophet from whom fresh miracles had been expected, was no prophet at all, but a mere mortal—and an uncommonly fallible mortal at that. Nevertheless, while many Greeks found it hard to pardon the Cretan politician for the ruin into which he had so very nearly precipitated them, there were many others who still remained under the spell of his personality. Yet it may well be doubted whether, had a plebiscite been taken at that moment, he would have got anything more than a substantial minority. Fully conscious of the position, M. Venizelos, in spite of advice from his Entente friends to stand his ground, boycotted the polls, and the new Parliament, returned by the elections of 19 December, was a Parliament without an Opposition. M. Skouloudis remained at the helm.



[1] White Book, No. 45.

[2] White Book, No. 46.

[3] See The Times, 1 Nov., 1915.

[4] Orations, pp. 143-50. It would hardly be credited, did it not come out of his own mouth, that the compensations and guarantees which M. Venizelos thought, or at least said, that Greece could obtain from Germany in return for her neutrality (a neutrality always benevolent towards Germany's enemies) exceeded those which the Entente had refused to grant Greece for her active alliance!

[5] The Balkan Review, Dec., 1920, pp. 384, 387; Orations, p. 266.

[6] It may not be irrelevant to note that the end of the truce coincided with the end of the Allies' uncertainty as to whether they would persist in the Salonica enterprise or give it up.

[7] Art. 31, 37.

[8] Extracts from Minutes in The Balkan Review, Dec., 1920, p. 385. Not for the first time had M. Venizelos expounded that thesis. Here is a speech of his on 2/15 May, 1911.

"We are accused of seeking the destruction of Parliamentary Government, because we conceive that one of the foundations of the Government is that those who represent the majority do everything, that it is enough for them that they represent the majority to impose their will. But we, the Liberal Party, entertain an entirely opposite conception both of the State and the Laws and of the powers of majorities, because modern progress has proved that humanity cannot prosper so long as the action of those in authority is not subjected to rules and restrictions preventing every transgression or violation of justice. We shall make the Greeks truly free citizens, enjoying not only the rights which emanate from the Constitutional ordinances, but also those which emanate from all the laws. We shall defend them against every tyrannical exercise of Government power derived from a majority."