Chapter XVIII.
TURKEY AND THE BALKAN STATES
Checking the Dominion of the Turk in Europe
The Story of Servia—Turkey in Europe—The Bulgarian Horrors—The Defense of Plevna—The Congress of Berlin—Hostile Sentiments in the Balkans—Incitement to War—Fighting Begins—The Advance on Adrianople—Servian and Greek victories—The Bulgarian Successes—Steps toward Peace—The War Resumed—Siege of Scutari—Treaty of Peace—War Between the Allies—The Final Settlement
In the southeast of Europe lies a group of minor kingdoms, of little importance in size, but of great importance in the progress of recent events. Their sudden uprising in 1912, their conquest of nearly the whole existing remnant of Turkey in Europe, and the subsequent struggle between them for the spoils are specially important from the fact that Servia, one of this group of states, was the ostensible—hardly the actual—cause of the great European war of 1914.
These, known as the Balkan States from their being traversed by the Balkan range of mountains, comprise the kingdoms of Roumania, Bulgaria, Servia, Montenegro, and the recent and highly artificial kingdom of Albania. Greece is an outlying member of the group.
THE STORY OF SERVIA
Of these varied states Servia is of especial interest from its immediate relation to the European contest. Its ancient history, also, possesses much of interest. Minor in extent at present, it was once an extensive empire. Under its monarch, Stephen Dushan (1336–56), it included the whole of Macedonia, Albania, Thessaly, Bulgaria, and Northern Greece, leaving little of the Balkan region beyond its borders. In 1389 its independence ended as a result of the battle of Kossova, it becoming tributary to the conquering empire of the Turks. In another half century it became a province of Turkey in Europe, and so remained for nearly two hundred years.
Its succeeding history may be rapidly summarized. In 1718 Austria won the greater part of it, with its capital, Belgrade, from Turkey, but in 1739 it was regained by the Turks. Barbarous treatment of the Christian population of Servia by its half-civilized rulers led to a series of insurrections, ending in 1812 in its independence, by the terms of the Treaty of Bukarest. The Turks won it back in 1813, but in 1815, under its leader, Milosh, its complete independence was attained.
After the fall of Plevna in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, Servia joined its forces to those of Russia, and by the Treaty of Berlin it obtained an accession of territory and full recognition by the Powers of Europe of its independence. In 1885 a national rising took place in Eastern Roumelia, a province of Turkey, which led to the Turkish governor being expelled and union with Bulgaria proclaimed. Servia demanded a share of this new acquisition of territory and went to war with Bulgaria, but met with a severe defeat. When, in 1908, Austria annexed the former Turkish provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the people of Servia were highly indignant, these provinces being largely inhabited by people of the Servian race. The exasperation thus caused is of importance, especially as augmented by the agency of Austria in preventing Servia from obtaining a port on the Adriatic after the Balkan war of 1912–13. The seething feeling of enmity thus engendered had its final outcome in the assassination of the Austrian Crown Prince Ferdinand in 1914, and the subsequent invasion of Servia by the armies of Austria.
We have here spoken of the stages by which Servia gradually won its independence from Turkey and its recognition as a full-fledged member of the European family of nations. There are several others of the Balkan group which similarly won independence from Turkey and to the story of which some passing allusion is desirable.