“We cannot hold the Dardanelles without the military support of Bulgaria.”
This meant, of course, that unless Bulgaria aligned herself with Turkey and the Central Empires, the Gallipoli expedition would succeed, Constantinople would fall, the Turkish Empire would collapse, Russia would be reëstablished as an economic and military power, and the war, in a comparatively brief period, would terminate in a victory for the Entente. Not improbably the real neutrality of Bulgaria would have had the same result. It is thus perhaps not too much to say that, in September and October of 1915, the Bulgarian Government held the duration of the war in its hands.
This fact is of such preëminent importance that I can hardly emphasize it too strongly. I suggest that my readers take down the map of a part of the world with which they are not very familiar—that of the Balkan States, as determined by the Treaty of Bucharest. All that remains of European Turkey is a small irregular area stretching about one hundred miles west of Constantinople. The nation whose land is contiguous to European Turkey is Bulgaria. The main railroad line to Western Europe starts at Constantinople and runs through Bulgaria, by way of Adrianople, Philippopolis, and Sofia. At that time Bulgaria could muster an army of 500,000 well-trained, completely organized troops. Should these once start marching toward Constantinople, there was practically nothing to bar their way. Turkey had a considerable army, it is true, but it was then finding plenty of employment repelling the Allied forces at the Dardanelles and the Russians in the Caucasus. With Bulgaria hostile, Turkey could obtain neither troops nor munitions from Germany. Turkey would have been completely isolated, and, under the pounding of Bulgaria, would have disappeared as a military force, and as a European state, in one very brief campaign.
I wish to direct particular attention to this railroad, for it was, after all, the main strategic prize for which Germany was contending. After leaving Sofia it crosses northeastern Serbia, the most important stations being at Nish and Belgrade. From the latter point it crosses the River Save and later the River Danube, and thence pursues its course to Budapest and Vienna and thence to Berlin. Practically all the military operations that took place in the Balkans in 1915-16 had for their ultimate object the possession of this road. Once holding this line Turkey and
Germany would no longer be separated; economically and militarily they would become a unit. The Dardanelles, as I have described, was the link that connected Russia with her allies; with this passage closed Russia’s collapse rapidly followed. The valleys of the Morava and the Maritza, in which this railroad is laid, constituted for Turkey a kind of waterless Dardanelles. In her possession it gave her access to her allies; in the possession of her enemies, the Ottoman Empire would go to pieces. Only the accession of Bulgaria to the Teutonic cause could give the Turks and Germans this advantage. As soon as Bulgaria entered, that section of the railroad extending to the Serbian frontier would at once become available. If Bulgaria joined the Central Powers as an active participant, the conquest of Serbia would
TCHEMENLIK AND FORT ANADOLU HAMIDIÉ
The latter, the works in the background, was the chief fortification on the Asiatic side. It inflicted the most damage on the Allied fleet and was the chief object of the fleet’s attack. It was almost entirely manned by German officers and men.
