The demonstrations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, in Croatia-Slavonia, and in the Banat were in favour of a Yugoslav Federation. This was the idea that united the various peoples of Yugoslav race, of whose aspirations Serbia had made herself the standard-bearer. It would have been more difficult to raise similar enthusiasm for the purely pan-Serb idea, which the Government, and above all the Army, always had in mind, even though they did not proclaim it openly. To this fact are due, to a large extent, the conflicts which subsequently divided the different parts of the new kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.
It should be borne in mind that the Serbian advance was enormously facilitated by the events on the Italian front. If Austria could only send weak and totally inadequate reinforcements to stem the Serbian advance, it was because her whole Army was nailed down on the Piave and on the Asiago Plateau by the menace of the coming Italian offensive, and afterwards overwhelmed in the irreparable disaster of Vittorio Veneto. The last vigorous resistance of the enemy in Serbia was at Parachin on October 23rd and 24th. On the 24th the Italian offensive was launched. The latter also contributed very largely to the outbreak of the revolt of the Yugoslavs, who until that moment had been the most faithful subjects of His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty.
There were still the other two tasks to be accomplished—Roumania and Constantinople. General Allenby had been rapidly conquering Northern Palestine and Syria,[48] and the moment seemed to have arrived to deliver the coup-de-grâce against Turkey by an attack on Constantinople. Britain attached great importance to the new expedition, which might be regarded as the long-expected retribution for the bloody but heroic check at the Dardanelles. General Sir George Milne was to command it. He brought back his G.H.Q. from Janesh to Salonica, and preparations were at once commenced in Eastern Macedonia, which had just been evacuated by the Bulgars. The expeditionary force, officially described as the “Oriental Section of the Allied Armies,” was formed on October 6th, and comprised the 22nd, 26th and 28th British Divisions (the 26th was at Mustafa Pasha on the Turco-Bulgarian frontier, and the other two between Stavros and Dede-Agatch), the Italian Sicilia Brigade, which had been brought back to Salonica from the Monastir-Prilep area, and was commanded by General Garruccio, the 122nd French Division (General Topard), the I Greek Corps (General Ioannou), to which two more divisions of the National Defence Corps were to be added. The British divisions, greatly reduced in strength after the very heavy fighting at Lake Doiran, had been reinforced by some Indian battalions, which had arrived too late to take part in the offensive.
According to reliable information, the scanty forces detailed for the defence of Constantinople had been strengthened by four Caucasus divisions,[49] already arrived or en route, and by some others from Anatolia, while Germany was sending German troops by way of the Black Sea. But the Turkish units were greatly reduced in strength by battle losses, sickness, and above all by desertions, and it was estimated that their total number of rifles was not more than 12,000 to 15,000. Towards the end of October it was known that the German troops were already leaving Thrace for Roumania, perhaps on their way to the Western front. The plan of operations of the new Allied expeditionary force was the following: The river Maritza was to be crossed by a surprise movement, and three bridge-heads were to be built on its banks, whence three columns would advance on Adrianople, Kuleli Burgas and Ipsala respectively. Immediately afterwards the bulk of General Milne’s forces would cut the Turkish Army in two, separating those in the Gallipoli Peninsula from those in Thrace, and occupying the Lule Burgas-Muradli-Rosdosto line, while the Allied fleets would bombard the enemy batteries in the Gulf of Enos. Finally, the Isthmus of Bulaïr would be attacked, with the object of seizing the whole of the European shore of the Dardanelles. Then the artillery fire would be concentrated on the batteries on the Asiatic shore. Once the Dardanelles were conquered the fleets could penetrate into the Sea of Marmara, whence it would be easy to force Constantinople to capitulate.
In the meanwhile, General Allenby was advancing by leaps and bounds; he had conquered the whole of Syria, and captured two Turkish armies, with many guns and immense booty. The expeditionary force in Mesopotamia was also pushing ahead rapidly. The Turkish Army was visibly dwindling away, and the deserters numbered several hundreds of thousands, so that it was obvious that Turkey was not in a position to resist the blow which General Milne was about to strike; he had indeed already seized the bridgehead at Ipsala and was about to cross the Maritza at other points. On October 29th, General Townshend, who had been taken prisoner by the Turks at Kut-el-Amara in 1916, was set free, and sent to the inter-Allied Naval Command at Mudros, bearing a request for an armistice. The Turkish Cabinet, which emanated from the notorious Committee of Union and Progress, had fallen, and was succeeded by another, constituted with the express object of concluding peace. Enver and Talaat, the two evil geniuses of Turkey, had fled with their most compromised satellites and large funds embezzled from the Government Treasury and from private persons. The Turkish proposals were considered, and as soon as the Turkish plenipotentiaries arrived, among whom was Raouff Bey, the Minister of Marine in the new Cabinet and a well-known Ententophil, negotiations were commenced between them and Admiral Calthorpe, Commander of the British Naval Forces in the Ægean, as representing the Allies. After a short discussion, the Armistice was concluded on October 30th, and came into force on the 31st. The order to advance from the Maritza was therefore suspended.
The Allied fleets, commanded by Admiral Calthorpe, passed through the Dardanelles on November 10th, and anchored in the Bosphorus off the Sultan’s palace at Dolma Bagshe. It was the first time that a hostile fleet passed through the Straits and trained its guns on the Ottoman capital since the conquest in 1453. The previous day, General Sir Henry Wilson, Commander of the British XII Corps, had reached Constantinople, where he had been sent with a small Staff by General Franchet d’Espérey as his representative in Turkey. He was given command of all the Allied troops destined for the occupation of the city and of European Turkey (including the Asiatic shores of the Straits). These forces comprised the 28th British Division, the 122nd French and later an Italian regiment (the 61st) and a Greek battalion, besides some detachments of gendarmes. The points occupied were the city itself, Scutari, and various places on the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. Subsequently the occupation was extended to other areas.
A few weeks later Sir George Milne removed to Constantinople with his whole Staff, and on February 8, 1919, General Franchet d’Espérey also arrived with the C.A.A. The further vicissitudes of the Allied occupation of Turkey belong to another chapter of history.
GERMAN PRISONERS CAPTURED BY THE ITALIANS ON HILL 1050.
