By the capture of Kirk Kilissé the Bulgarians gained enormous stores. They had a railway line open to them towards Constantinople. The only menace to a successful investment of Adrianople was removed. The victory, so easily purchased, was far beyond their dreams. But it would not have been possible had it not been for the willingness of the Bulgarian soldiers to charge without tiring or faltering at the point of the bayonet. The victory was earned, in spite of the Turkish panic. For the Bulgarian steel had much to do with that panic.
As soon as he realized the extent of the victory of Kirk Kilissé, General Savoff ordered a general advance of the three Bulgarian armies. Only enough troops were left around Adrianople to prevent a sortie of the garrison. Notwithstanding the unfavourable condition of the roads, the Bulgarian armies moved with great rapidity. The cavalry in two days made reconnaissances on the east as far as Midia, and on the south as far as Rodosto. The main—and sole—armies of the Turks were thus ascertained to be along the Ergene, and beyond in the direction of the capital. On the left, the third army of General Dimitrieff, not delaying at Kirk Kilissé, was in contact with the Turks at Eski Baba on the 28th. On the afternoon of the same day the Bulgarians drove the Turks out of the village of Lulé Burgas, on the railway to Constantinople, east of the point where the Dedeagatch-Salonika line branches off.
For three days, October 29-31, the Turkish armies made a stand along the Ergene from Bunar Hissar to Lulé Burgas. Since Gettysburg, Sadowa, and Sedan, no battle except that of Mukden has approached the battle of Lulé Burgas in importance, not only because of the numbers engaged, but also of the issue at stake. Three hundred and fifty thousand soldiers were in action, the forces being about evenly divided. For two days, in spite of the demonstration of Kirk Kilissé, the Turks fought with splendid courage and tenacity. Time and again the desperate charges of the Bulgarian infantry were hurled back with heavy loss. Not until the third day did the fighting seem to lean decisively to the advantage of the Bulgarians. Their artillery began to show marked superiority. From many points shells began to fall with deadly effect into the Turkish entrenchments. The Turks were unable to silence the murderous fire of the Bulgarian batteries. The soldiers, because they were starving, did not have it in them to attempt to take the most troublesome Bulgarian positions by assault.
The retreat began on the afternoon of the 31st. On November 1st, owing to lack of officers and of central direction, it became a disorderly flight, a sauve qui peut. Camp equipment was abandoned. The soldiers threw away their knapsacks and rifles, so that they could run more quickly. The artillery-men cut the traces of their gun-wagons and ammunition-wagons, and made off on horseback. Everything was abandoned to the enemy. Nazim pasha, generalissimo, and the general staff, who had been in headquarters at Tchorlu, without proper telegraphic or telephonic communication with the battle front, were drawn into the flight. The Turkish army did not stop until it had placed itself behind the Tchatalja line of forts, which protected the city of Constantinople.
The battle of Lulé Burgas marked more than the destruction of the Turkish military power and the loss of European Turkey to the Empire. It revealed the inefficiency of Turkish organization and administration to cope with modern conditions, even when in possession of modern instruction and modern tools. With the Turks, it is not a question of an ignorance or a backwardness which can be remedied. Total lack of organizing and administrative ability is a fault of their nature. Courage alone does not win battles in the twentieth century.
The Bulgarians were without sufficient cavalry and mounted machine-guns to follow up their victory. The defeat of the Turks, too, had not been gained without the expenditure of every ounce of energy in the army that had in those three days won undying fame. The problem of pursuit was difficult. There was only a single railway track. Food and munitions for the large army had to be brought up. The artillery advanced painfully through roads hub-deep in mud. It took two weeks for the Bulgarian army to move from the Ergene to Tchatalja, and prepare for the assault of the last line of Turkish defence.
An immediate offensive after Lulé Burgas would have found Constantinople at the mercy of the victorious army. The two weeks of respite changed the aspect of things. For in this time the forts across the peninsula from the Sea of Marmora to the Black Sea were hastily repaired. They were mounted with guns from the Bosphorus defences, the Servian Creusots detained at Salonika at the beginning of the war, and whatever artillery could be brought from Asia Minor. The army had been reformed, the worthless, untrained elements ruthlessly weeded out, and a hundred thousand of the best soldiers, among whom the only redifs were those who had come fresh from Asia Minor, and had not been contaminated by the demoralization of Kirk Kilissé and Lulé Burgas, were placed behind the forts. The Turkish cruisers whose guns were able to be fired were recalled from the Dardanelles, and anchored off the end of the line on either side.
On November 15th, the Bulgarians began to put their artillery in position all along the Tchatalja line from Buyuk-Tchekmedje on the Sea of Marmora to Derkos Lake, near the Black Sea. At the same time, they entrenched the artillery positions by earthworks and ditches, working with incredible rapidity. For they had to take every precaution against a sudden sortie of the enemy. In forty-eight hours they were ready.
The attack on the Tchatalja lines commenced at six o'clock on Sunday morning, November 17th, by machine-gun and rifle fire as well as by artillery. The forts and the Turkish cruisers responded. In the city and in the villages along the Bosphorus we could hear the firing distinctly. On the 17th and 18th, the Bulgarians delivered assaults in several places. Near Derkos they even got through the lines for a short while. These were merely for the purpose of testing the Turkish positions, however. Several of the assaults were repulsed. The Bulgarians suffered heavily on the 18th, when the first and only prisoners of the war were made. On the 19th, the artillery fire grew less and less, and there were no further attacks. Towards evening it was evident that the Bulgarians had abandoned their advanced lines, and did not intend to continue the attack. No general assault had been delivered.
It seems certain that General Savoff had in mind the capture of Constantinople on November 17th. Turkish overtures for peace, opened on the 15th, had been repulsed. Every preparation was made for the attempt to pierce Tchatalja. Why was the plan abandoned before it was actually proven impossible? Did General Savoff fear the risk of a reverse? Was he short of ammunition? Had the Turkish defence of the 17th and 18th been more determined than he had expected? Was it fear of a cholera epidemic among his soldiers? Or was the abandonment of the attempt to capture Constantinople for that is what a triumph at Tchatalja would have meant, dictated by political reasons?