Before the restoration of the Constitution, the Turkish army was entirely made up of the Mohammedans, but since (1908) non-Mohammedans also were drafted into the army.
From the beginning of the new régime, the Young Turks have been having some troublesome times. The first of these troubles was Austria’s annexing Bosnia and Herzegovnia, two Turkish provinces.[153] The inhabitants of these provinces were mostly of Slavonian origin, mainly speaking the Servian language—excepting the Mohammedans, whose forefathers were Christians, but who after the Mohammedan occupation of the country in 1401, and in 1463, had abjured their faith on account of the Turkish oppression.
This oppression and extortionate taxation caused a revolution of the Christians in 1849, but this rebellion was suppressed by Omar Pasha. A more determined uprising against the unjust government took place in 1875. This the Turks failed to put down, and this failure led to the occupation of these provinces by Austria-Hungarians. The Treaty of Berlin entrusted the administration of these provinces to Austria-Hungary, and she has been governing since 1880, finally annexing them.
This annexation was not resented by the Young Turks so much as it was by the Bosnians and Servians. Their desire and hopes of uniting these co-religionists and members of the same Slavonian stock, were now ended. This resentment was intensified after the conquests of the Servians in both of the Balkan wars. Some of these Bosnians and Servians, who had been thus disappointed, formed a conspiracy and committed the awful crime of assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, and his wife, while they were on a visit to Bosnia. The Servian government was accused by Austria of this conspiracy and assassination; then came Austria’s ultimatum to Servia and then the war.
The Powers did not consult the governed; the Bosnians wanted to unite with the Servians their kindred, both in religion and race. Why should not the people have the right to say who should rule over them? The refusal to allow this simple act of justice, like a spark set the world on fire.
The next trouble was Bulgaria’s declaration of independence.[154] Bulgaria had been a principality since 1878, and had been paying annual tribute to the Turkish government. Then came the resistless demand of the Greeks of Crete to unite with Greece. Then the war between Turkey and Italy in 1911-1912.
Still worse than the above incidents was the Balkan war between Turkey on one side and the Balkan States and Greece on the other side. The Balkan allies were Greece, Bulgaria, Servia, and Montenigro. The causes of this war were just the same: the Turkish oppression and massacres, and the ineffectual meddling of the European powers. “Macedonia was ceded by Turkey to Bulgaria in 1878 pursuant to the Treaty of San Stefano, but the Congress of Berlin in the same year revised (substituted) this treaty through the insistence of Great Britain and Austria, and restored the province to Turkey. In article XXIII of the Treaty of Berlin, the signatory powers bound themselves to establish an organic law providing for good government in Macedonia and to see that it was applied. During thirty-four years that followed, this promise was unfulfilled, despite the frequent complaints of the Christian peoples—Bulgars, Greeks, and Serbs—of Turkish misgovernment and atrocities.”[155]
It is the same old story. The Great Powers who made the treaty, article by article, and signed the instrument, then turned and left the Turks to do the rest. That “rest” was for them to go on as usual until the four Balkan states formed an alliance and declared war against Turkey in October of 1912.
The war was fortunately of short duration, but it was the most decisive and humiliating defeat that the Turks had received for a long time. Macedonia was freed from the bloody reign of the Turks, who for nearly five hundred years had held that beautiful country under their iron heel. Nearly two millions of people, three-fourths of whom were Christians, were emancipated from a worse form of slavery. The defeat of the Turkish armies was not due to lack of courage of the Ottoman soldiers. It was solely due to the Turkish unpreparedness, their lack of organization and arrangements for food supply for the army, and to the inferiority of the Turkish artillery. The non-Moslem soldiers for the first time fought alongside of the Moslem soldiers. “The bravery and loyalty of the Armenian soldiers in the Turco-Balkan war were commended by Nazim Pasha, then minister of war.” This Turco-Balkan war ended in May, 1913.
As the consequence of this war, many Mohammedans from Macedonia left their homes, unwilling to become subjects of their former “slaves.” They crowded into Constantinople and other places. The Young Turks tried to settle these refugees in Asiatic provinces of the empire where the Armenian populations made the majority. The object of the Young Turkey government was to reduce the Armenian majority so as to prevent them from asking or expecting any local reforms. The Armenians protested through their representative—the patriarch and the national council.