Greece and the Allies, 1914-1922

by G. F. Abbott

We have it on his own evidence that he looked for a solution of his difficulties, not to an election, but to a revolution. Further, he has told us that, eager as he might be for a revolutionary stroke, he could not lose sight of the obstacles. To those who held up French revolutions as a model, he pointed out that the analogy was fallacious: in France "long years of tyranny had exasperated the people to its very depths. In Greece the people had a king who, only two years earlier, had headed his armies in two victorious campaigns." [3] So he scouted the idea of intervention at Athens, convinced that any attack on the Crown would spell destruction to himself.[4] His project was to steal to Salonica and there, under General Sarrail's shield, to start a separatist movement "directed against the Bulgars, but not against the king," apparently hoping that the Greek troops in Macedonia, among whom his apostles had been busy, fired by anti-Bulgar hate, would join him and drag king and country after them. This project had been communicated by the French Minister at Athens to General Sarrail on 31 May:[5] but, as the British Government was not yet sufficiently advanced to countenance sedition,[6] M. Venizelos and his French confederate saw reason to abandon it for the present.

Thus all concerned were committed to a test of the real desires of the Greek people by a General Election, which they declared themselves anxious to bring off without delay—early in August. This time there would be no ambiguity about the issue: although the Allies in their Note, as was proper and politic, had again disclaimed any {107} wish or intention to make Greece depart from her neutrality, M. Venizelos proclaimed that he still adhered to his bellicose programme, and that he was more confident of victory than ever[7]: had not the Reservists been set free to vote, and were not those ardent warriors his enthusiastic supporters? With this cry—perhaps in this belief—he entered the arena.

It was a lively contest—rhetoric and corruption on both sides reinforced by terrorism, to which the Allies' military authorities in Macedonia, and their Secret Service at Athens, whose efficiency had been greatly increased by the dismissal of many policemen obnoxious to them, and by other changes brought about through the Note of 21 June, contributed of their best.

But even veteran politicians are liable to error. The Reservists left their billets in Macedonia burning with anger and shame at the indignities and hardships which they had endured. The Allies might have had among those men as many friends as they pleased, and could have no enemies unless they created them by treating them as such. And this is just what they did: from first to last, the spirit displayed by General Sarrail towards the Greek army was a spirit of insulting distrust and utterly unscrupulous callousness.

Unable to revenge themselves on the foreign trespasser, the Reservists vowed to wreak their vengeance on his native abettor. They travelled back to their villages shouting: "A black vote for Venizelos!" and immediately formed leagues in the constituencies with a view to combating his candidates. The latter did all they could to exploit the national hate for the Bulgars and the alarm caused by their invasion. But fresh animosities had blunted the edge of old feelings: besides, had not the Bulgarian invasion been provoked by the Allies' occupation, and who was responsible for that occupation? For the rest, the question, as it presented itself to the masses, was no longer simply one of neutrality or war. Despite M. Venizelos's efforts, and thanks to the efforts of his adversaries, his breach with the King had become public, and {108} the division of the nation had now attained to the dimensions of a schism—Royalists against Venizelists. Nor could there be any doubt as to the relative strength of the rival camps.

Thus, by a sort of irony, the action which was designed to clothe Venizelos with new power threatened to strip him of the last rags of prestige that still clung to his name. Therefore, the elections originally fixed for early in August were postponed by the Entente to September.

Such was the internal situation, when external events brought the struggle to a head.

With the accession of 120,000 Serbs, 23,000 Italians, and a Russian brigade, the Allied army in Macedonia had reached a total of about 350,000 men, of whom, owing to the summer heats and the Vardar marshes, some 210,000 were down with malaria.[8] Nevertheless, under pressure from home and against his own better judgment,[9] General Sarrail began an offensive (10 August). As might have been foreseen, this display of energy afforded the Bulgars an excuse, and the demobilization of the Greek forces an opportunity, for a fresh invasion. M. Zaimis, in view of the contingency, imparted to General Sarrail his Government's intention to disarm the forts in Eastern Macedonia, so that he might forestall the Bulgars by occupying them. But again, as in May, the Frenchman treated the friendly hint with scornful suspicion.[10] There followed a formal notice from the German and Bulgarian Ministers at Athens to the Premier, stating that their troops were compelled, by military exigencies, to push further into Greek territory, and repeating the assurances given to his predecessor on the occupation of Fort Rupel.[11]

The operation was conducted in a manner which belied these assurances. Colonel Hatzopoulos, acting Commandant of the Fourth Army Corps, reported from his headquarters at Cavalla that the Bulgarian troops were accompanied by irregular bands which indulged in murder {109} and pillage; that the inhabitants of the Serres and Drama districts were fleeing panic-stricken; and that the object of the invaders clearly was, after isolating the various Greek divisions, to occupy the whole of Eastern Macedonia. He begged for permission to call up the disbanded reservists, and for the immediate dispatch of the Greek Fleet. But the Athens Government vetoed all resistance, and the invasion went on unopposed.[12] By 24 August the Bulgars were on the outskirts of Cavalla.

Truth to tell, the real authors of the invasion were the Allies and M. Venizelos, who, by forcing Greece to disarm before the assembled enemy, practically invited him. But it was not to be expected that they should see things in this light. They, as usual, saw in them a new "felony"—yet another proof of King Constantine's desire to assist the Kaiser and defeat M. Venizelos[13]—and acted accordingly.