The World War and What was Behind It; Or, The Story of the Map of Europe

by Louis Paul Bénézet

In the meantime, Bulgaria was bargaining with Austria, Germany, and Turkey. France, England, and Russia were ready to pay back Serbia for the loss of Macedonia, by promising her Bosnia and Herzegovina in case they won the war from Austria. In like fashion, Austria and Germany promised Bulgaria some Turkish territory and also the southern part of the present kingdom of Serbia, in case she entered the war on their side.

Now the king of Bulgaria, or the czar, as he prefers to call himself, is a German. (As these little countries won their independence from Turkey, they almost always called in foreign princes to be their kings. In this way it had come about that the king of Greece was a prince of Denmark, the king of Roumania was a German of the Hohenzollern family, while the czar of Bulgaria was a German of the Coburg family, the same family which has furnished England and Belgium with their kings.)

The Bulgarians themselves are members of the Greek Catholic Church, and they have a very high regard for the czar of Russia, as the head of that church. Czar Ferdinand had no such feeling, however. He wanted to be the most powerful ruler in the Balkan states, and it made no difference to him which side helped him to gain his object.

A Bomb-Proof Trench in the Western War Front

About this time, the Russians had been forced to retreat to a line running south from Riga, on the Baltic Sea, to the northern boundary of Roumania. The French and English had been pounding at the Dardanelles for some months, but the stubborn resistance of the Turks seemed likely to hold them out of Constantinople for a long time to come. The checked Italians had not been able to make much headway against the Austrians through the mountainous Alpine country where the fighting was taking place. In the west, the Germans were holding firmly against the attacks of the British and French. The czar of Bulgaria and his ministers, thinking that the German-Austrian-Turkish alliance could win with their help, flung their nation into its third war within four years. This happened in Octoher, 1915.

Now at the close of the second Balkan war, when Serbia and Greece defeated Bulgaria, they made an alliance, by which each agreed to come to the help of the other in case either was attacked by Bulgaria. Roumania, too, was friendly to Greece and Serbia, rather than to treaty Bulgaria, for the Roumanians knew that Bulgaria was very anxious to get back the territory of which Roumania had robbed her, in the second Balkan war. In this way, the Quadruple Entente (Russia, Italy, France, and England) hoped that the entry of Bulgaria into the war, on the side of Germany and Turkey, would bring Greece and Roumania in on the other side.

The Greek people were ready to rush to Serbia’s aid and so was the Greek prime minister. The queen of Greece, however, is a sister of the German emperor, and through her influence with her husband she was able to defeat the plans of Venizelos (vĕn ĭ zĕl′ŏs), the prime minister, who was notified by the king that Greece would not enter the war. Venizelos accordingly resigned, but not until he had given permission to the French and English to land troops at Salonika, for the purpose of rushing to the help of Serbia. (Greece also was afraid that German and Austrian armies might lay waste her territory, as they had Serbia’s, before England and France could come to the rescue.)

Meanwhile poor Serbia was in a desperate state. The two Balkan wars had drained her of some of her best soldiers. Twice the Austrians had invaded her kingdom in this war, and twice they had been driven out. Then came a dreadful epidemic of typhus fever which was the result of unhealthful conditions caused by the war. Now the little kingdom, attacked by the Germans and Austrians on two sides and by the Bulgarians on a third, was literally fighting with her back to the wall. She had counted on Greece to stand by her promise to help in case of an attack from Bulgaria, but we have seen how the German queen of Greece had been able to prevent this. Serbia hoped that Roumania, too, would come to her help. However, as you have been told, the king of Roumania is a German of the Hohenzollern family, a cousin of the emperor, and in spite of the sympathy of his people for Italy, France, and Serbia, he was able to keep them from joining in the defense of the Serbs.