[15] Sarrail, pp. 152-4; Official statement by the Revolutionary Committee, Reuter, Salonica, 31 Aug., 1916.

[16] Du Fournet, pp. 99-104, 122-4, 127, 129.



{114}

CHAPTER XI

Rumania's policy had always been regarded by the Greeks as of capital importance for their own; and as soon as she took the field, King Constantine, though suffering from a recrudescence of the malady that had nearly killed him in the previous year, set to work to consider whether her adhesion did not make such a difference in the military situation as to enable him to abandon neutrality. Two or three days before the arrival of the Allied Fleet he had initiated conversations in that sense with the Allied Ministers.[1]

Simultaneously the question of a war Government came up for discussion; the actual Cabinet being, by order of the Allies, a mere business Ministry charged only to carry on the administration until the election of a new Parliament.

Two alternatives were suggested. The first, which found warm favour in Entente circles, was that M. Zaimis should lay down the cares of office and make place for M. Venizelos. Constantine was advised to "bend his stubborn will to the inevitable and remain King of the Hellenes"—that is, to become an ornamental captain—by abandoning the ship of State to the management of the wise Cretan. "It is now possible," the homily ran, "that the precipitation of events will prevent the return of M. Venizelos by the voice of the electorate." But that did not signify: "M. Venizelos can count on the backing of nine-tenths of the nation, given a semblance of Royal support." [1] In less trenchant language, the British Minister at Athens expounded the same thesis.

But Constantine showed little inclination to perform this noble act of self-effacement. On no account would {115} he have a dictator imposed upon him to shape the fortunes of Greece according to his caprice, unfettered by "military advisers of limited perceptions." If Greece was to have a dictator, the King had said long ago, he would rather be that dictator; though he had no objection to a Cabinet with a Venizelist admixture. In fact, he insisted on M. Venizelos accepting a share in the responsibility of war, either by himself sitting in the Cabinet or by permitting three of his friends to represent him in it. "It will not do," he said frankly, "to have his crowd standing out, trying to break up the army and making things difficult by criticizing the Government." [3]

The other alternative was that M. Zaimis should be invested with political functions; but for this the consent of the Allies and of their protege was needed. The latter, in his oration of 27 August, had magnanimously declared himself willing, provided his policy were adopted, to leave the execution of it in the hands of M. Zaimis, whose honesty and sincerity remained above all suspicion: "the Liberal Party," he had said, "are prepared to back this Cabinet of Affairs with their political authority." On being asked by M. Zaimis to explain precisely what he meant, M. Venizelos broached the subject of elections. As already seen, he and the Allies had reason to regret and to elude the test which they had exacted. It was, therefore, not surprising that M. Venizelos should stipulate, with the concurrence of the Entente Ministers, that the elections now imminent be postponed to the Greek Kalends.[4] By accepting this condition, M. Zaimis obtained a promise of support; and straightway (2 Sept.) proceeded to sound London and Paris.

Before making any formal proposal, he wanted to know if the Western Powers would at least afford Greece the money and equipment which she required in order to prepare with a view to eventual action. England welcomed these overtures, convinced that thus all misunderstandings between Greece and the Allies would vanish; {116} but, before giving a definite reply, she had to communicate with France. France manifested the greatest satisfaction; but M. Briand urged that there was no time for negotiations: the vital interests of Greece demanded immediate action: she should hasten to make a formal declaration without delay; after which he would do all that was necessary to provide her, as soon as possible, with money and material. M. Zaimis in his very first dispatch had said: "Unfortunately the state of our finances and of our military organization does not permit us to think of immediate action: we need a certain delay for preparation"; and all the exhortations of M. Briand to leap first and look afterwards failed to move him. Besides the matter of equipment—a matter in which the Entente Powers, owing to their own necessities, had been the reverse of liberal to their small allies, as Belgium and Servia had already found, and Rumania was about to find to her cost—there was another point Greek statesmen and strategists had to weigh very carefully before committing themselves: would Rumania co-ordinate her military action with theirs? Unless she were inclined and able to divert enough forces from the Austro-Hungarian to the Bulgarian frontier, her entry into the War could not be of any help to them. So, after nine days' correspondence, we find M. Zaimis still writing: "When the English answer arrives, the Royal Government will take account of it in the examination in which it will engage before taking a definite decision—a decision which will be subordinated to its military preparations and to the course of war operations in the East." [5]

Directly afterwards (11 Sept.) M. Zaimis resigned "for reasons of health." These reasons convinced no one: everyone agreed in ascribing his withdrawal to his discovery that he was the victim of duplicity; but as to whose duplicity, opinions differed. According to M. Venizelos, while the conversations about entering the War went on, King Constantine, in consequence of a telegram from the {117} Kaiser assuring him that within a month the Germans would have overrun Rumania and flung Sarrail's army into the sea, and asking him to hold out, reverted to the policy of neutrality; and M. Zaimis, realizing that he was being fooled, refused to play the King's game and resigned.[6] For this statement we have M. Venizelos's authority; and against it that of M. Zaimis, who, on hearing from Paris that his resignation gave rise to the supposition that the old policy had prevailed, replied: "My impression is that the Cabinet which will succeed me will not quit the line of policy which I have pursued." [7]

Another account connected the fall of the Cabinet with an incident which occurred at that critical moment and strained the situation to the utmost. In the evening of 9 September, as the Entente Ministers held a conference in the French Legation, a score of scallywags rushed into the courtyard, shouting "Long live the King! Down with France and England!" fired a few revolver shots in the air, and bolted. Immediately M. Zaimis hastened to the Legation and expressed his regrets. But that did not suffice to placate the outraged honour of the French Republic. Despite the objections of his colleagues, M. Guillemin had a detachment of bluejackets landed to guard the Legation; and next day a Note was presented to the Greek Premier demanding that the perpetrators of this grave breach of International Law should be discovered and punished, and that all Reservists' leagues should instantly be broken up. It was even proposed that the King should be asked to issue a Proclamation disavowing and condemning the demonstration. Inquiry proved that the demonstration was the work of agents provocateurs in the pay of the French Secret Service which acted in the interest of M. Venizelos.

Whereupon, M. Zaimis, realizing that the negotiations he was trying to conduct could not be sincere on the part of the French, begged to be relieved of his mandate. The King was loth to let him go. The British Minister was equally upset, and added his plea to that of the Sovereign. M. Zaimis said that, if M. Guillemin disavowed {118} the intrigue and displayed a willingness to continue the negotiations in a spirit of candour, he would remain; but M. Guillemin could not bring himself to go so far.[8]

Whatever may be the truth in this matter—for, owing to lack of documentary evidence, it is impossible fully to ascertain the truth—the whole position, for a man of M. Zaimis's character, was untenable: if sense of duty had prompted him to take up the burden, common-sense counselled him to lay it down. So he resigned; and the fat was once more in the fire—and the blaze and the stench were greater than ever; for his resignation synchronized with another untoward event.

Colonel Hatzopoulos with his own and the Serres Division had for some time past been isolated at Cavalla—the Bulgars occupying the forts on one side, while the British blockaded the harbour on the other. Suddenly, upon a false report that King Constantine had fled to Larissa and Venizelos was master at Athens, the demeanour of the Bulgars, which had always been harsh, became thoroughly hostile. They strengthened their outposts, cut off the food supplies that came from Drama and Serres, and, on 6 September, demanded that the heights immediately above the town still held by the Greeks should be abandoned to them, on the plea that otherwise they would be unable to defend themselves in case of an Entente landing: refusal would be considered an unfriendly act. As his orders forbade resistance, Colonel Hatzopoulos had no choice but to yield. Thus the Greeks were reduced to absolute helplessness; and their isolation was completed on 9 September, when British sailors landed and destroyed the wireless station.

The worst was yet to come. Next morning (10 Sept.) a German officer peremptorily notified Colonel Hatzopoulos on the part of Marshal von Hindenburg that, as the Greek troops scattered over Eastern Macedonia obstructed the operations of the Bulgarian army, they should all be concentrated at Drama. Colonel Hatzopoulos, perceiving that compliance meant captivity in the hands of the Bulgars, asked that, as his instructions were that all the troops should concentrate at Cavalla, and as he could not act otherwise without orders from the King, he might be {119} allowed to send a messenger to Athens via Monastir. This being refused on the ground that the journey would take too long, he pleaded his inability to decide about so grave a matter on his own initiative, but must call a council of the principal officers. Meanwhile, in order to avoid capture by the Bulgars, he asked if, should they decide to surrender, Hindenburg would guarantee their transportation to Germany with their arms. The German promised to communicate with headquarters and to let him know the answer on the following morning.

Evidently the invaders, who would formerly have been more than content with the withdrawal of the Greek forces, were now—in violation of the pledges given to Athens by the German and Bulgarian Governments—resolved on making such withdrawal impossible. It is not hard to account for this change. The pledges were given in the belief that Greece would continue neutral. This belief had been shaken not only by the Venizelist movement, but more severely still by M. Zaimis's soundings of the Entente Powders. The Greek Premier had from the first insisted on secrecy, stating among the main reasons which rendered absolute discretion imperative, "the presence in part of our territory of the eventual adversary," and "the need to extricate two divisions and a large quantity of material" from their grip.[9] Nevertheless, the Entente Press gloried in the hope that the Allies would soon have the only non-belligerent Balkan State fighting on their side, and the principal Entente news agency trumpeted abroad M. Zaimis's confidential conversations.[10] Hence the desire of the Germano-Bulgars to prevent the escape of men and material that might at any moment be used against them.

On the other hand, the Greek officers' council decided {120} to try first every means of escape, and only if that proved impossible to comply with the German demand on condition that they should be taken to Germany and not be left in the hands of the Bulgars. Accordingly, Colonel Hatzopoulos addressed a most earnest appeal to the British for vessels to get his men away to Volo or the Piraeus, and, having received a promise to that effect, he secretly arranged for flight. In the night of 10 September all the men with their belongings gathered on the sea-front ready to leave. But they reckoned without the partisans of M. Venizelos in their midst. One of them, the Commandant of the Serres Division, a month ago had informed General Sarrail that he would fight on the side of the Allies,[11] and another on 5 September, in a nocturnal meeting on board a British man-of-war, had proposed to kidnap Colonel Hatzopoulos, arm volunteers, and attack the Bulgars with the aid of Allied detachments landed at Cavalla. His proposal having been rejected, it was agreed that all "patriotic" elements should be transported to Salonica. In pursuance of this agreement, only those were allowed to embark who were willing to rebel. Those who refused to break their oath of allegiance to their King were turned adrift. Some tried to gain the island of Thasos, but their boats were carried to the open sea and capsized, drowning many, the rest got back to the shore in despair.

As a last hope of escape, Colonel Hatzopoulos begged the British naval authorities, who controlled all means of communication between Cavalla and Athens, to transmit to his Government a message asking if he might surrender to the British and be interned in the isle of Thasos. The message was duly transmitted through the British Legation on 11 September, and in reply the Greek Minister of War, after an understanding with the British authorities, ordered him through the same channel to embark at once with all his men and, if possible, material for Volo, on Greek ships by preference, but if such were not available, on any other ships. Whether these orders were never forwarded, or whether they reached their destination too late, is not quite clear. It is certain, however, that during the critical hours when the fate of the unhappy soldiers hung in the balance, the British Fleet did not permit embarkation {121} except to the few who joined the Rebellion.[12] For the loyal majority there was nothing left but the way to Drama.

Nor was any time allowed for vacillation. When, in the morning of 11 September, Colonel Hatzopoulos met the German officer, the latter handed to him a telegram from Hindenburg, guaranteeing the transport of the Greeks to Germany with their arms, where they would be treated as guests. He added that the departure from Cavalla would not be enforced for the present. But in the afternoon he intimated that this was due to a misunderstanding, and that they should leave the same night. Their efforts to escape had obviously become known to the Germans, who, taking no chances, imposed immediate departure under threat to cancel Hindenburg's guarantee. Thus, the two Greek divisions were under compulsion huddled off to Drama, whence, joined by the division stationed there, they were taken to Germany and interned at Goerlitz.[13]

Nothing that had hitherto happened served so well to blacken the rulers of Greece in the eyes of the Entente publics, and the mystery which enveloped the affair facilitated the propagation of fiction. It was asserted that the surrendered troops amounted to 25,000—even to 40,000: figures which were presently reduced to "some 8,000: three divisions, each composed of three regiments of 800 men each." The surrender was represented as made by order of the Athens Government: King Constantine, out of affection for Germany and Bulgaria, and hate of {122} France and England, had given up, not only rich territories he himself had conquered, but also the soldiers he had twice led to victory.

In point of fact, as soon as the Athens Government heard of the catastrophe—and it did not hear of it until after the arrival of the first detachment in Germany—it addressed to Berlin a remonstrance, disavowing the step of Colonel Hatzopoulos as contrary to his orders, and denying Germany's right to keep him as contrary to International Law: "for Greece being in peaceful and friendly relations with Germany, the Greek troops can neither be treated as prisoners of war nor be interned, internment being only possible in a neutral country, and only with regard to belligerent troops—not vice versa." The dispatch ended with a request that "our troops with their arms and baggage be transported to the Swiss frontier, whence they may go to some Mediterranean port and return to Greece on ships which we shall send for the purpose." [14]

Berlin answered that she "was ready to meet the desire of the Greek Government, but actual and effective guarantees would have to be given that the troops under German protection would not be prevented by the Entente Powers from returning to their fatherland, and would not be punished for their loyal and neutral feeling and action." [15] This because the Entente press was angrily denouncing the step as a "disgraceful desertion" and asking "with what ignominious penalty their War Lord has visited so signal and so heinous an act of mutiny, perjury, and treason on the part of his soldiers" [16]—the soldiers who went to Germany precisely in order to avoid committing an act of mutiny, perjury, and treason. Truly, in time of war words change their meaning.



[1] See Constantine I and the Greek People. By Paxton Hibben, an American journalist who took part in these diplomatic transactions, pp. 281-90.

[2] See Crawfurd Price, Athens, 1 Sept., in the Pall Mall Gazette, 15 Sept., 1916.

[3] Paxton Hibben, p. 289.

[4] "La question de la dissolution de la Chambre fut ecartee. . . . De plus tout faisait supposer que de nouvelles elections ne seraient pas favorables an parti venizeliste, dont la cause etait si intimement liee a la notre."—Du Fournet, pp. 121-2; Paxton Hibben, pp. 278-9, 306-7.

[5] Zaimis to Greek Legations, Paris and London, 20 Aug./2 Sept.; Rome, Bucharest, Petrograd, 29 Aug./11 Sept. Romanos, Paris, 20 Aug./2 Sept., 22 Aug./4 Sept., 25 Aug./7 Sept., 26 Aug./8 Sept. Gennadius, London, 22 Aug./4 Sept., 25 Aug./7 Sept., 1916.

[6] The New Europe, 29 March, 1917.

[7] Romanos, Paris, 31 Aug./13 Sept.; Zaimis, Athens, 1/14 Sept., 1916.

[8] Paxton Hibben, pp. 313-19; Du Fournet, pp. 119-21, 129.

[9] Zaimis to Greek Legations, Paris and London, 20 Aug./2 Sept., 1916. All his dispatches are marked "strictly confidential and to be deciphered by the Minister himself." The replies are to be addressed to him personally, and for greater security, must be prefaced by some meaningless groups of figures.

[10] See messages from the Athens Correspondents of The Times and the Daily Chronicle, 3 Sept.; Reuter, Athens, 9 Sept., 1916. In view of the strict censorship exercised during the war and in view of the Franco-Venizelist anxiety to rush Greece into a rupture these indiscretions can hardly be considered accidental.

[11] Sarrail, p. 152.

[12] King Constantine has publicly taxed the Allies with not forwarding the orders (see The Times, 8 Nov., 1920). On the other hand, there is on record a statement by Vice-Consul Knox that the orders were forwarded from Athens and that he himself delivered them at Cavalla. Cp. Admiral Dartige du Fournet: "Au moment ou les Grecs virent les Bulgares en marche sur Cavalla, Us voulurent embarquer lews troupes et leur materiel. L'amiral anglais qui commandait en mer Egee leur refusa son concours, esperant sans doute les deeterminer a se defendre. Quand, se rendant un compte plus exact de la situation, il donna son assentiment a cette evacuation, il etaii trop tard: les Bulgares entraient a Cavalla le jour meme."—Du Fournet, p. 151.

[13] My chief sources of information concerning this event are a Report by Col. Hatzopoulos to Marshal von Hindenburg, dated "Goerlitz, 13/26 Oct., 1916," and another report drawn up at Athens in July, 1921, from the records of the judicial investigation instituted by the Venizelos Government in 1919, including the evidence of the British Vice-Consul G. G. Knox.

[14] White Book, No. 173.

[15] Telegram from Berlin reported by Renter's Amsterdam Correspondent, 23 Sept., 1916. I find this confirmed by a dispatch from the Greek Minister at Berlin (Theotokis, Berlin, 18/31 Oct., 1916), in which he gives an account of his efforts to obtain from the German Government the return of the troops and restitution of the war material, as well as the Greek officers' protests to Hindenburg and Ludendorff against the pressure under which they had been hurried from Cavalla. It is to be regretted that M. Venizelos did not find room for this document and for Col. Hatzopoulos's illuminating Report in his White Book.

[16] Leading article in The Times, 19 Sept., 1916.



{123}

CHAPTER XII

Meanwhile the unfortunate King of Greece was faced by a state of things which he himself describes with admirable lucidity in a dispatch to his brother Andrew, then in London, labouring, vainly enough, to obtain a fair hearing for the Royalist side, while another brother, Prince Nicholas, was engaged on a similar mission at Petrograd. The document is dated 3/16 September, 1916, and runs thus:

"The resignation of the Cabinet of M. Zaimis, who enjoyed my absolute confidence, as well as the unanimous confidence of the country, and whom the Entente Governments declared to me that they surrounded with their entire sympathy, has rendered the situation very difficult.

"I charged M. Dimitracopoulos to form a new Cabinet. He declared himself ready to continue the conversations opened recently by M. Zaimis in the hope of bringing them to a happy conclusion. Before accepting definitely, he thought it necessary to sound the views of the Powers on important questions of an internal order, and went to the doyen of the Diplomatic Corps, the British Minister, whence he carried away a very clear impression that, not only the coercive measures would not be raised before mobilization, but that they might be intensified, notably by direct interference in personal domestic questions, and that, even after mobilization, the measures would be only relaxed. As to the question of elections, after having demanded by the Note of 8 (21) June the dissolution of the Chamber and new elections, which we accepted, now they demand that the elections shall not take place, without, at the same time, allowing the existing Chamber to meet. M. Dimitracopoulos has laid down his mandate.

"Under these conditions the situation becomes inextricable. The military and naval authorities of the Entente foment and encourage in the country a revolution and armed sedition, and they favour by every means the {124} Salonica movement by continuing the vexatious measures and restricting all freedom of thought and action. The Entente Ministers paralyze all Government. Thus the country is pushed towards anarchy.

"Such conduct not only conflicts with the assurances which they have given us, but excludes all practical possibility of reconsidering our policy freely to the end of taking a decision in a favourable direction. For the rest, Greece divided would not be of any use as an ally. It is necessary that there should return in the country comparative calm and the feeling of independence, indispensable for taking extreme resolutions. It is necessary that confidence in the sympathy of the Entente should be restored. A resolution to participate in the war taken under present circumstances would run the risk of being attributed to violence and of being received with mistrust. More, that resolutions may be taken without danger of disaster, there is need of circumspection and discretion, so as not to provoke an attack from the Germano-Bulgars who are in our territory, before we are ready to lend real assistance to the Entente. A more definite declaration of principle, which would have to be kept secret in the common interest, would be of no practical value.

"Under certain circumstances, rendering the participation of Greece useful and conformable to our interests, I have already declared that I am ready to enter into the war on the side of the Entente. I am ready to envisage negotiations in this sense. But, before all, I need, that I may be able to occupy myself usefully and with a certain mental calmness with foreign questions, to see comparative quiet restored at home, and so to save the appearances of liberty of action. In this I ask, for the sake of the common interest, the Powers to give me their help.

"I have charged M. Calogeropoulos to form a Ministry: he is equally animated by the best intentions towards the Entente."

The new Premier, who had already held office with distinction as Minister of the Interior and as Minister of Finance, possessed every qualification for the delicate task entrusted to him. On the day of his accession The Times Correspondent wrote of him: "In the Chamber he is highly esteemed. Although he is a Theotokist, and {125} therefore anti-Venizelist, M. Calogeropoulos, who studied in France, declared to me that all his personal sympathies are with the Entente. He is likewise a member of the Franco-Greek League." [1] In harmony with this character was his programme: "The new Cabinet, inspired by the same policy as M. Zaimis, is resolved to pursue it with the sincere desire to tighten the bonds between Greece and the Entente Powers." This declaration, made in every Allied capital, was supplemented by a more intimate announcement in Paris and London: "Sharing the views which inspired the negotiations opened by its predecessor, the Royal Government is resolved to pursue them in the same spirit." [2]

No sooner had M. Calogeropoulos spoken than M. Venizelos set to work to cast doubts on his sincerity, with remarkable success: "M. Venizelos does not believe that the composition of the new Ministry permits of the hope that a national policy will be adopted, since it springs from a party of pro-German traditions," [3]—this ominous paragraph was added by the Times Correspondent to his report the same day. And next day the British Minister, in an interview with the editor of a Venizelist journal, said: "The situation is certainly not an agreeable one. I have read in the papers the declaration of the new Premier. What has surprised me is to find that M. Calogeropoulos characterized his Ministry as a political one, whereas in their last Note the Allies required that Greece should be governed by a business Cabinet. This, as you see, makes a distinct difference." [4] Simultaneously, the Entente Press, under similar inspiration, reviled the new Cabinet as pro-German, clamoured for M. Venizelos, whom they still represented as the true exponent of the national will, threatened King Constantine with the fate of King Otho, and his country with "terrible and desperate things." [5]

{126}

It was in such an atmosphere that M. Calogeropoulos and his colleagues attempted to resume the conversations which M. Zaimis had opened. They realized that, since elections and like legal methods no longer commended themselves to the Allies, since they menaced the country with "terrible and desperate things," Greece might drift into chaos at any moment. They were anxious to avoid chaos. But how? A blind acceptance of the Venizelist policy of an immediate rush into the War, without regard to ways and means, might prove tantamount to burning one's blanket in order to get rid of the fleas: while saving Greece from the coercion of the French and the British, it might expose her to subjugation by the Germans and the Bulgars: the plight of Rumania afforded a fresh warning. They therefore adopted the only course open to sane men.

On 19 September Greece formally offered to the Entente Powers "to come in as soon as by their help she had accomplished the repair of her military forces, within a period fixed by common accord." But, "as her armed intervention could not, obviously, be in the interest of anyone concerned, unless it took place with chances of success, the Royal Government thinks that Greece should not be held to her engagement, if at the time fixed the Balkan theatre of war presented, in the opinion of the Allies' General Staffs themselves, such a disequilibrium of forces as the military weight of Greece would be insufficient to redress." [6]

Russia received these advances with cordiality, her Premier declaring to the Greek Minister at Petrograd that she would be happy to have Greece for an ally, and that the Tsar had full confidence in the sentiments of King Constantine. He added that he would immediately communicate with Paris and London.[7] There was the rub. French and British statesmen affected to regard the offer as a ruse for gaining time: they could not trust a Cabinet three members of which they considered to be ill-disposed towards the Entente: a "national policy" {127} should be carried out by a "national Cabinet"—that is, by M. Venizelos.[8]

While frustrating his country's efforts to find a way out of the pass into which he had intrigued it, the Cretan and his partisans did not neglect other forms of activity. We have seen that rebellion had already broken out at Salonica. In Athens itself the walls were pasted with Venizelist newspapers in the form of placards displaying headlines such as these: "A LAST APPEAL TO THE KING!" "DRAW THE SWORD, O KING, OR ABDICATE!" It was no secret that arms and ammunition were stored in private houses, that the French Intelligence Service had a depot of explosives in a ship moored at the Piraeus, and a magazine of rifles and grenades in its headquarters at the French School of Athens.[9] The Royalist journals threatened the Venizelists with condign punishment for their treasonable designs. The Venizelist journals, far from denying the charge, replied that they would be fully justified in arming themselves against the hostile Reservist Leagues. In short, the capital swarmed with conspirators, but the guardians of public order were powerless, owing to the proximity of the Allied naval guns, ready to enforce respect for the Allied flags under whose protection the conspiracy was carried on. By this time the French and British detectives had usurped the powers and inverted the functions of the police organs;[10] and the French and {128} British agents, after fomenting those fatal differences which divide and degrade a people, had developed into directors of plots and organizers of sedition.

But, in spite of such encouragement, the capital—or, indeed, any part of Old Greece—had never appealed to M. Venizelos as a starting-point of sedition. He knew that only in the recently acquired and as yet imperfectly assimilated regions—regions under the direct influence of the Allies—he could hope to rebel with safety. His plan embraced, besides Salonica, the islands conquered in 1912, particularly his native Crete. In that home of immemorial turbulence his friends, seconded by British Secret Service and Naval officers, had found many retired bandits eager to resume work. Even there, it is true, public opinion was not strikingly favourable to disloyalty; but the presence of the British Fleet in Suda Bay had much of persuasion in it.[11]

Our diplomacy did not openly commit itself. Sir Francis Elliot still nursed the hope of effecting a reconciliation between the ex-Premier and his King. When, in August, a conference was secretly held at Athens between M. Venizelos and a number of Cretan conspirators, the latter carried back the depressing intelligence that British official sympathy with their project lacked the necessary degree of warmth. And again, on 11 September, when the British Consul of Canea went over to Athens with some of those conspirators, he was ordered by the British Legation to stay there, so as to avoid any suspicion of complicity. This attitude of correct reserve on the part of the British Foreign Office, however, did not prevent the British naval authorities on the spot from working out, in concert with the insurgents, a plan of operations under which some chieftains were to invest the coast towns on the land side, while our men-of-war patrolled the sea in their interest.[12]

{129}

France, on the other hand, made no distinction between diplomatic and naval action. On 18 September M. Guillemin informed Admiral Dartige du Fournet that M. Venizelos was sailing for the islands, and orders were given for a French escort. But at the last moment M. Venizelos did not sail. He hesitated. The French Secret Service urged the National Leader to lead, instead of being prodded from behind; but he resisted their pressure and their plain speaking.[13] When questioned by the Associated Press Correspondent if there was any truth in the reports that he was going to put himself at the head of the revolutionary forces, he replied: "I cannot answer now. I must wait a little while yet and see what the Government propose to do."

It is possible that this was the reason why M. Venizelos paused irresolute on the brink. It is possible that he suffered, as the disrespectful Frenchmen hinted, from one of those attacks of timidity to which he was subject in a crisis. It is possible that the ambiguous attitude of England damped his martial spirit. For the rest, to make a revolution is a matter that may well give the strongest-minded pause. What wonder if, reckless, obstinate, and unscrupulous as he was, M. Venizelos, when faced with the irrevocable, felt the need to weigh his position, to reconsider whether the momentous step he was taking was necessary, was right, was prudent?

However, events soon put an end to his hesitation. The decisive event—the hair which turned the scale—according to M. Venizelos himself, was supplied, appropriately enough, by a barber. One day, whilst the Leader of the Liberals wrestled with his soul, a friend called and reported to him a talk he had just had with his hairdresser, "a terrible Venizelist, who spoke thus: 'We here, simple folk, say that Venizelos bears a heavy responsibility: he tells us we are going to the dogs. Eh, well then, why doesn't he stop us?' This conversation shook me deeply. My friend gone, I said to myself: 'Indeed, this barber speaks wisely, and my hesitations to discharge my duty to the end must vanish, because they may possibly spring from purely egotistical motives. Sir, I said to myself, having laid up from many struggles and many successes {130} a capital above the average, you don't wish to risk it and think it better to sit quiet, choosing to enjoy the moral satisfaction of seeing the fulfilment of your prophecies rather than make an effort to prevent it.'" [14] It is always interesting to trace mighty events to trifling causes; and it would have been particularly pleasant to believe that the destinies of Greece for once literally stood "on a razor's edge." [15] But we will do M. Venizelos the credit of believing him less childish than he represents himself. There were weightier things "to shake" him into a decision.

On 20 September, when, according to plan, he was due in Crete, the train laid there exploded. His friends had come down from the hills thirsting for the blood of Greek and Mohammedan victims: should the massacre they meditated take place, M. Venizelos would never leave Athens alive.[16] The news was of a nature to compel him at last to take the plunge; and in the small hours of 25 September, the National Leader stole out of Greece on a ship escorted by a French torpedo-boat. His flight had been organized by the French Secret Service like a carnival masquerade, on the painful details of which, says Admiral Dartige, it would be better not to dwell.[17]

His advent in Crete had been so efficiently prepared by the British Secret Service and naval officers—without whom there would have been neither mutiny nor insurrection—that, on landing, M. Venizelos had nothing to do but instal himself in the best hotel at Canea and proclaim himself with his confederate Admiral Coundouriotis the Provisional Government.[18]

Under the fostering care of the Allied men-of-war the movement spread to Samos, Mytilene, Chios, Lemnos, and Thasos, where the constitutional operations witnessed in Crete were duly repeated. But all the other islands and the mainland—that is, the whole of the Hellenic Kingdom, with the exception of the new territories—adhered {131} steadfastly to the person and the policy of their King. As for the armed forces of the Crown, Admiral Coundouriotis had hoped by his prestige, deservedly high since the Balkan wars, to bring away with him the whole or a large part of the Fleet: he brought away only two torpedo-boats and another small unit, the desertion of which was effected by a trick, "for which," says the French Admiral, "France would have cause to blush." [19]

In itself the Venizelist movement, as a disruptive force, was negligible.[20] But the co-operation of the French Republic and the British Empire invested it with an alarming significance.

M. Calogeropoulos and his colleagues who watched this rising tempest anxiously did everything they could to conjure it. Although to their offer no reply was given, on hearing informally that the Entente Powers would not accept the proffered alliance unless Greece declared war on Bulgaria at once, they signified their willingness so to do, if, content with that, the Entente would accord Greece adequate military and financial assistance during the struggle and support her territorial claims at the conclusion of peace; if, in addition, M. Briand deemed the Cabinet question of immediate importance, they were prepared to solve it definitely for the sake of restoring complete harmony between Greece and the Entente Powers.[21]

The authors of this message were given to understand that the reply would be handed to King Constantine himself, the Entente Governments declining to recognize the actual Cabinet; that it would be in the form of an ultimatum, demanding that Greece should declare war on Bulgaria within forty-eight hours unconditionally, after which they promised to supply her with money and munitions during the struggle and at the conclusion of peace to take into account her territorial claims as far as {132} circumstances would permit; meanwhile, they demanded the formation of a new Ministry, and, failing compliance, they threatened "most energetic measures." M. Briand kindly added that he delayed the presentation of this ultimatum in order to give His Majesty the advantage of making a spontaneous gesture without the appearance of compulsion.[22]

Whereupon (3 Oct.) M. Venizelos at Canea was sounded whether, if the Calogeropoulos Cabinet made place for one ready to declare war on Bulgaria, he would insist on presiding over such a Cabinet or would be satisfied with being represented in it by some of his partisans.

These overtures may be regarded as a last attempt on the part of Athens to take the Cretan at his word. For M. Venizelos had never tired of professing his willingness to support any Government which would adopt his policy of prompt action: it was not personal power he hungered after, but national prosperity. Even at the moment of going to head a rebellion, he had not ceased to proclaim his patriotic unselfishness.[23] We have seen to what extent hitherto his actions had accorded with his professions: how adroitly he had maintained abroad the reputation, without incurring the sacrifices, of magnanimity. Once more he gave proof of the same adroitness:

"True to his previous declarations, M. Venizelos replied that he was ready to give his support and that of his party to a Government which would declare war on Bulgaria, and that he asked neither to preside over such a Government nor to be represented in it by his partisans. As a patriot and a statesman, seeking only his country's welfare," etc., etc., etc. But—"the principal followers of M. Venizelos do not believe that this new step taken by the authorities at Athens indicates a change in the right direction in the councils of the Palace. They maintain that the idea behind this demarche is simply to gain time. I have pressed M. Venizelos on this, and, although he did not wish to appear to be as emphatic as his followers, he had to admit to me that he had no illusions and that he remained sceptical. If King Constantine is really {133} sincere, he can give a proof which will allay all doubts. Let him order a mobilization at once . . . and call in M. Venizelos to form a new Government." [24]

King Constantine, instead of treating the Cretan as a rebel, still wished to treat him as a responsible citizen, and by his moderation to give him an opportunity of a decent return to legal order. But he could not, even if he wished, call to power a man in open revolt: by so doing he would alienate the loyal majority without conciliating the disloyal minority.

After thus burning the last boat that might have carried him back to legality, M. Venizelos took the first boat that travelled in the opposite direction. He left Suda Bay on 5 October, amidst the cheers of the Allied squadrons, bound for Salonica by way of Samos and Mytilene. At Samos he received a fresh token of the approval with which the Entente viewed his operations: the commander of a British man-of-war, acting on instructions, officially called on him and paid his respects.[25]

And so he reached Salonica, took up his abode at the royal residence, and with Admiral Coundouriotis and General Danglis composed a Triumvirate which, having appointed a Ministry, began to levy taxes and troops, and to negotiate for a loan.

The metamorphosis of a Prime Minister into an insurgent chief, though a remarkable phenomenon, is no matter for surprise. M. Venizelos sprang from people among whom insurrection formed the traditional method of asserting political opinions. His father was a veteran of the Greek Revolution of 1821, and passed most of his life plotting. His grandfather is supposed to have been a refugee of the earlier Greek revolt of 1770.[26] He himself had grown up amidst vivid echoes of the Cretan Rebellion of 1866. While contact with the frock-coated world of {134} modern Europe during the latter period of his career had clothed him with a statesman's proper external circumstance, it had not eradicated the primitive instincts implanted in him by heredity and fostered by environment. Sedition was in his blood, which perhaps explains the flair—the almost uncanny flair—he had for the business.

Nor did he lack experience. After sharing in one Cretan insurrection against the Sultan in 1896, he led another against Prince George in 1905. This exploit—known as the Therisos Movement—deserves special notice, for it bears a curious and most instructive analogy to the enterprise with which we are now dealing.

In 1899 M. Venizelos became a member of the first Cretan Administration appointed by the High Commissioner, Prince George—King Constantine's brother. The status of the island was provisional, and the fulfilment of the national desire for union with Greece depended partly on the policy of the Powers which had combined to act as its Protectors, partly on the prudence of the islanders themselves and of their continental kinsmen. Such was the situation when, in 1901, M. Venizelos suddenly conceived the idea of turning Crete into an autonomous principality. Prince George objected to the proposal, arguing that neither in Crete nor in Greece would public opinion approve it. M. Venizelos sounded the Hellenic Government and the Opposition, and was told by both that, from the standpoint of national interest and sentiment, his scheme was absolutely unacceptable. Nevertheless, he persevered and succeeded in forming a party to support his views. It may be, as he affirmed, that his scheme was a merely temporary expedient intended to pave the way to ultimate union. But the Greeks, interpreting it as a proposal for perpetual separation, remained bitterly hostile, and the fact that autonomy was known to be favoured in certain foreign quarters deepened their resentment. M. Venizelos was roundly denounced as a tool of foreign Powers, and Prince George was accused of complicity, and threatened with the lot of a traitor unless he dismissed him. The High Commissioner made use of the right which the Constitution of the island gave him, and M. Venizelos was dismissed (March, 1901).

A truceless war against the Administration and everyone {135} connected with it ensued. Prince George was attacked—not directly, but through his entourage—as a born autocrat holding in scorn the rights of the people, tyrannizing over the Press, persecuting all those who refused to bow to his will, aiming at the subversion of free institutions. At first this campaign met with more success abroad than at home. The Cretan people expressed its opinion by its vote: among the sixty-four deputies elected to the Chamber in 1903 there were only four Venizelists.

His defeat did not daunt M. Venizelos, who, after a brief repose, resumed operations. He hesitated at no calumny, at no outrageous invention, to get even with his adversaries. Charges of all kinds poured in upon the Prince. Speeches which he had never made were attributed to him, and speeches which he did make were systematically misreported and misinterpreted. At last, in 1904, when Prince George decided to visit the Governments of the Protecting Powers in order to beg them to bring about the union of Crete with Greece by stages, M. Venizelos, dropping the scheme which had lost him his popularity, rushed in with an uncompromising demand for immediate union, though he knew perfectly well that such a solution was impracticable. The Cretans knew it, too. On finding that they looked upon his change of creed with suspicion, he resolved to seize by violence what he could not gain by his eloquence. With some 600 armed partisans (out of a population of 300,000) he took to the hills (March, 1905), called for the convocation of a National Assembly to revise the Constitution, and meanwhile urged the people to boycott the impending elections. Despite his speeches and his bravoes, only 9,000 out of the 64,000 electors abstained from voting; and most of them abstained for other reasons than the wish to show sympathy with the insurgents.

The High Commissioner wrote to the Powers at the time: "If M. Venizelos was truly animated by the desire to defend constitutional institutions, he would have come before the electors with his programme and, whatever the result, he would certainly have earned more respect as a politician. But, instead of choosing the legal road to power, he preferred to stir up an insurrection, disguising his motives under the mask of 'The National Idea,' but, {136} as is proved by his own declarations, really inspired by personal animus and party interest. It mattered little to him how disastrous an effect this upheaval might have on the national cause by plunging the country into civil war or into fresh anarchy. Can anyone recognize in this way of acting the conduct of a genuine and serious patriot?"

M. Venizelos repelled these imputations, protesting that his movement was no way directed against the Prince. Yet it resulted in the departure of the Prince: the Powers who went to Crete to restore order entered into relations with the rebels; the manner in which these intimacies were carried on and the decisions to which they led made the Prince's position untenable, and he gave up his Commissionership in 1906. Likewise M. Venizelos affirmed that he had not stirred up an insurrection, but only headed a spontaneous outbreak of popular discontent. Yet even after his triumph he failed, in the elections of 1907, to obtain a majority.[27]

The Therisos performance in every point—plot and staging, methods and motives—was a rehearsal for the Salonica performance. Would the denouement be the same? This question taxed M. Venizelos's dialectical dexterity very severely.

At the outset he repudiated as a monstrous and malicious calumny the common view that his programme was to march on Athens and to dethrone the King. His movement was directed against the Bulgars, not against the King or the Dynasty: "We are neither anti-royalist nor anti-dynastic," he declared, "we are simply patriots." Only, after the liberation of Greece from the foreign invaders, her democratic freedom should be assured by a thorough elucidation of the duties and rights of the Crown—a revision of the Constitution to be effected through a National Assembly.[28]

So spoke M. Venizelos at the outset, partly because the {137} Allies, who did not want to have civil war in the rear of their armies, bade him to speak so,[29] and partly because he wished to give his cause currency by stamping upon it the legend of loyalty. He realized that for the present any suspicion that he wished to embark on a campaign against King Constantine would be fatal, and by declaring war only against the Bulgars he hoped to entice patriotic citizens anxious to help their country without hurting their sovereign. But when time proved the futility of these tactics, the same M. Venizelos avowed that his programme was, first to consolidate his position in Macedonia by breaking down resistance wherever it might be encountered, and then, "when we had gathered our forces, we meant to follow up our work, if need be by arms, on the remainder of Greek territory." If he had not given an anti-dynastic character to his enterprise, that, he naively explained, was "because the Entente had been good enough to promise me their indispensable aid under the express stipulation that the movement should not be anti-dynastic." However, the error was not irreparable: "After victory, grave internal questions will have to be solved," he said. "King Constantine, who has stepped down from the throne of a constitutional king to become a mere party chief, must accept the consequences of the defeat of his policy, just as every other defeated party chief." [30]

In other words, the Salonica sedition, though not solely revolutionary, involved a revolution within certain limits. M. Venizelos was far too astute to countenance the republican chimeras cherished by some of his followers. Republicanism, he knew well, found no favour in Greece and could expect no support from England. Therefore, with the monarchical principle he had no quarrel: his hostility was directed wholly against the person of the reigning monarch. A prince pliant to his hand would suit M. Venizelos. If he got the best of it, his avowed intention was to treat King Constantine precisely as he had treated King Constantine's brother in days gone by.

We now understand Prince George's earnestness in urging his brother, as long ago as May, 1915, to run before {138} the gale: he spoke from bitter experience of the Protecting Powers and their protege.

It is seldom that history repeats itself so accurately; and it is more seldom still that the historian has the means of tracing so surely a rebel's progress. In most cases it is hard to decide whether the hero was guided by events which he could not have foreseen, or whether he had from the first a clear and definite goal in view. In the case of M. Venizelos this difficulty does not exist. Each of his actions, as illuminated by his past, was a step to an end; and he has himself defined that end.



[1] The Times, 18 Sept., 1916.

[2] Carapanos to Greek Legations, Paris, London, Rome, Petrograd, 3/16 Sept., 1916.

[3] The Times, loc. cit.

[4] Exchange Tel., Athens, 17 Sept., 1916. Cp. Romanos, Paris, 5/18 Sept.

[5] See leading articles in The Times, 19 Sept., and the Morning Post, 20 Sept., 1916.

[6] Carapanos to Greek Legations, Paris and London, 6/19 Sept., 1916.

[7] Panas, Petrograd, 14/27 Sept., 1916.

[8] Romanos, Paris, 10/23 Sept. Cp. Reuter statement, London, 26 Sept., 1916. This view is crystallized in a personal dispatch from the Greek Minister at Paris to the Director of Political Affairs, at Athens: "L'appel au pouvoir par S.M. le Roi de M. Venizelos parait au Gouvernement francais le seul moyen de dissiper la mefiance que l'attitude des conseillers de S.M. le Roi ont fait naitre dans l'esprit des cercles dirigeants a Paris et a Londres. . . . L'opinion publique en France n' approuveraii une alliance avec la Grece et les avantages qui en decouleraient pour nous, que si l'homme politique qui incarne l'idee de la solidarite des interets francais et grecs etait appele au pouvoir."—Romanos to Politis, Paris, 29 Sept./12 Oct., 1916.

[9] Du Fournet, p. 116. Small wonder that the honest sailor's gorge rose at such proceedings: "Could I associate myself with manoeuvres of this sort?" he asks in disgust. "When German arms and bombs were seized in the bag from Berlin to Christiania, when similar things were discovered at Bucharest, and were detected in the United States under Bernstorf's protection, the Allies manifested their indignation. They were a hundred times right; but what was odious in America, was it not odious in Greece?"

[10] The British Intelligence Service demonstrated its sense of humour and shame by furnishing its secret agents with a formal certificate of their identity to be presented at the central office of the Greek Police: one such patent of British protection was issued to an ex-spy of Sultan Abdul Hamid who had also spent six months in German pay. Besides the certificate, was issued a brassard, which the rogue might wear to protect him from arrest when breaking the Greek Law on British account. Incredible, yet true. See J. C. Lawson's Tales of Aegean Intrigue, p. 233.

[11] Lawson, pp. 143-66.

[12] Lawson, pp. 168-78.

[13] Du Fournet, pp. 130-1.

[14] Orations, p. 190.

[15] "Now, to all of us it stands on a razor's edge: either pitiful ruin for the Achaians or life." Homer, Iliad, X, 173.

[16] Lawson, pp. 180-9.

[17] Du Fournet, p. 131.

[18] Lawson, pp. 198-226.

[19] Du Fournet, p. 136.

[20] A paragraph of the Debierre Report, adopted by the French Senate on 21 Oct., 1916, may be quoted in this connexion: "La revolution Salonicienne vue de pres, n' est rien. Elle est sans racine, sans lendemain probable. Venizelos est tres amoindri. La Grece, dont les officiers et les soldats ne veulent pas se battre, est avec Constantin."—Mermeix, Le Commandement Unique, Part II, p. 60.

[21] Romanos, Paris, 14/27, 15/28 Sept.; Carapanos to Greek Legation, Paris, 15/28 Sept., 1916.

[22] Romanos, Paris, 16/29, 17/30 Sept.; Gennadius, London, 17/30 Sept., 1916.

[23] See "Message from M. Venizelos," in The Times, 27 Sept., 1916.

[24] The Daily Telegraph, 5 Oct., 1916.

[25] The Daily Telegraph, 7 Oct., 1916.

[26] The authentic history of the Venizelos family begins with our hero's father; his grandfather is a probable hypothesis: the remoter ancestors with whom, since his rise to fame, he has been endowed by enthusiastic admirers in Western Europe, are purely romantic. In Greece, where nearly everyone's origin is involved in obscurity, matters of this sort possess little interest, and M. Venizelos's Greek biographers dwell only on his ascent.

[27] For one side of this affair see Memorandum de S.A.R. Le Prince Georges de Grece, Haut Commissaire en Crete, aux Quatre Grandes Puissances Protectrices de la Crete, 1905. The other side has been expounded in many publications: among them, E. Venizelos: His Life, His Work. By Costa Kairophyla, pp. 37-65; Eleutherios Venizelos. By K. K. Kosmides, pp. 14-16.

[28] See The Times, 27 Sept.; The Eleutheros Typos, 23 Oct. (O.S.), 1916.

[29] Du Fournet, p. 176.

[30] The New Europe, 29 March, 1917.



{139}

CHAPTER XIII

M. Venizelos had unfurled the standard of rebellion in the true spirit of his temperament and traditions. To him civil war had nothing repulsive about it: it was a normal procedure—a ladder to power. Naturally, he persuaded others, and perhaps himself, that he acted purely with the patriotic intention of devoting to the public benefit the power which, for that purpose only, it became his duty to usurp. Moved by the ambition to aggrandize Greece, he felt at liberty to use whatever means might conduce to so desirable an end. The sole question that troubled him was, whether this old ladder would serve him as faithfully as in the past. And once again the answer depended on the attitude of the "Protecting Powers."

Those Powers had hitherto blundered in all their Balkan dealings with depressing uniformity. First came the mistake about Bulgaria. The hate of the Greeks for the Bulgars was a psychological force which, properly estimated and utilized, could without any difficulty have been made to do our work for us. But that force was never properly estimated by our diplomacy. The Entente Governments, instead of enlisting it on their side, ranged it against them; thereby sacrificing Servia and estranging Greece. To that initial error was added a second. Until the truth could no longer be ignored, the Allies persisted in the egregrious [Transcriber's note: egregious?] fallacy that the popularity of King Constantine was as nothing compared with the popularity of M. Venizelos—to our detriment. "Two years before," observes Admiral Dartige du Fournet, "all the Greeks were the friends of France; in October, 1916, two-thirds of them were her enemies." That was the fact; and, according to the same witness—who described himself, not without reason, as "a Venizelist by profession"—the cause was this: "The mass of the people of continental {140} Greece was hostile to the Chief of the Liberals. When that mass saw that M. Venizelos started a sedition and that we supported him, it became plainly hostile to us." [1]

The Admiral mentions also German pressure, but he rightly regards it as a subsidiary cause. The Germans did little more than "blow on the fire kindled by our own clumsiness and violences." Baron Schenck, the director of the German propaganda at Athens, watched our coercion of King Constantine with that apparent indignation and secret joy which the faults of an enemy inspire, and when expelled by the Allies, said that he did not mind going: the Allies could be trusted to carry on his mission. They did.

What their plan was will appear from their actions. We cannot penetrate into the minds of men, and we cannot always believe their words; but their actions are open to observation and speak more truly than their lips.

As soon as he settled at Salonica, M. Venizelos applied to the Entente Powers for official recognition of his Provisional Government. They refused him this recognition: but instructed their Consuls to treat with the Provisional Government "on a de facto footing";[2] and, while pouring cold water upon him with one hand, with the other they gave him money. This mode of action was the result of a compromise, achieved at the Boulogne Conference, between France and her partners. A feeble and inconsequent way of doing things, no doubt. But to be consequent and powerful, a partnership must be bottomed on some common interest or sentiment; and such in the Greek question, as already explained, did not exist.

At Athens the action of the Allies was less open to the criticism of tameness.

After a life of three weeks passed in fruitless efforts to enter into relations with the Entente Powers, even by proposing to discard the Ministers obnoxious to them, the Calogeropoulos Cabinet resigned (4 Oct.), and King Constantine, having exhausted his stock of politicians, sought a candidate for the Premiership in circles which, remote from party intrigue, might have been thought immune from suspicion. Professor Lambros, who accepted the {141} mandate (8 Oct.), was known as a grave savant, generally esteemed for his kindly nature as much as for his intellectual eminence and administrative capacity. But Professor Lambros laboured under the universal disability of not being a Venizelist. Therefore, he was "believed to be Germanophile," and it was "questionable whether his Cabinet will be recognized by the Entente Powers." [3] However, in less than a week, he "established contact" with their representatives. It was "contact" in a sense of the term more familiar to soldiers than to statesmen.

On 10 October Admiral Dartige de Fournet resumed his activities by launching on the Hellenic Government an Ultimatum. Greece was summoned, within twenty-four hours, to disarm her big ships, to hand over to him all her light ships intact, and to disarm all her coast batteries, except three which were to be occupied by the Allies. In addition, the port of the Piraeus, the railways, and the police were to be placed under Allied control.

The demand for her Fleet, Greece was told, arose from uneasiness about the safety of the Allied armada—a pretext that exposed itself: the Greek Fleet consisted of only five battleships dating from 1891-2, except one whose date was 1908; two cruisers, dating from 1911 and 1914; and a microscopic light flotilla. "To see there a serious danger, it would be puerile," says Admiral Dartige himself; and far from feeling elated at the success of the operation, he tells us that he "suffered at being constrained by events to use force against a neutral and weak nation." But he had to do it: though not a matter to be proud of, it was a precaution not altogether unjustifiable. He could, however, neither justify nor qualify the other measures. They involved, he says, a high-handed encroachment on the internal affairs of the country—an abuse of power pure and simple: "We admitted officially the right of Greece to neutrality, and yet we laid hands upon part of her national life, even upon the secrets of the private life of every Greek. It was the execution of the plan which the admirals assembled at Malta had repelled in March, 1916. Well might the Germanophiles point out that Germany did not act thus in Denmark, in Sweden, in Holland; that a victor would not have imposed {142} harder terms of armistice." These measures were entirely the work of the French Government: the French Admiral himself disapproved of them as much as did the Ministers of England and Russia.[4]

The Hellenic Government could not be deceived by pretexts which their very authors despised. But neither could it argue with persons accustomed to

"Decide all controversies by Infallible artillery, And prove their doctrine orthodox By apostolic blows and knocks."

It could only protest and submit.

The Hellenic people proved less discreet. What could be the motive of such measures? they asked. Were they intended to prevent or to provoke troubles? The answer lay under their very eyes. From the moment when M. Venizelos left Athens, the Allies did everything they could to assist his partisans in following the Leader to Salonica. Their warships patrolled the coast picking up rebels, and giving them a free passage: even entertaining the more important among them as the personal guests of the Commander-in-Chief on his flagship. But now they took the movement openly under their direction. With an excess of zeal which the British Minister deplored and the French Admiral himself condemned, the French Secret Service at Athens organized convoys of insurgents which defiled through the streets of the capital escorted by French marines under French officers in uniform.[5]

The resentment of the Greeks was intense; but the consciousness of impotence served as a curb on their emotions. It is true that one day, as Allied aeroplanes flew over Athens, they were greeted with derisive shouts: "Not here; to Berlin!" another day, as a band of rebels were convoyed through the principal streets by the French, the crowds gave vent to lively protests; and every day the newspapers told the champions of Liberty and Justice what they thought of them so frankly that the French Chief of the Police Control had to warn their editors to desist on pain of suspension. But of active hostility, such as any western capital would have manifested in similar circumstances, there was no sign at Athens. The only impressive manifestations were manifestations of {143} loyalty to the King, who set his subjects the example of self-restraint. At a review of the crews of the warships taken by the French, he thanked them for their fidelity and expressed the hope that they would soon be able to return to their vessels. After this quiet ceremony, bodies of citizens paraded the streets carrying portraits of their sovereign.[6]

Had there been no popular demonstrations at all, one can fancy M. Venizelos and the Allies pointing to that fact as proof of their contention that the great majority of the people remained Venizelist. As it was, they derived what profit they could from the opposite fact. The various incidents were attributed by the Anglo-French and Venizelist journals to German intrigue. The consolation which the King administered to his sailors—men who had so brilliantly disappointed the rebels' expectations by not deserting—was twisted into a defiance of the Entente. The bodies of peaceful demonstrators were exaggerated into crowds of rioters. And so, "in the interests of public order," Admiral Dartige proceeded to land reinforcements for the police: 1,200 bluejackets. Some occupied the town hall at the Piraeus and the railway stations; some went to the forts on the heights; others were posted about the harbour, or were told off to patrol the streets (16 Oct.), while a detachment was quartered at Athens itself, in the Zappeion—a large exhibition building within a few hundred yards of the Royal Palace.[7]

Under such circumstances the diplomatic intercourse between the Entente and the new Greek Government went on. M. Lambros declared that he intended to continue his predecessor's policy of friendly relations with all the belligerents and of benevolent neutrality towards the Allies, dwelling on the fact that nearly everyone of his predecessors had plainly stated Greece's willingness to co-operate with the Entente on terms not contrary to her own interests, and recalling that the Calogeropoulos Ministry had set forth the conditions of co-operation, but the Entente Governments had given no reply. So the Premier spoke to the Entente representatives and asked that the coercive measures might be brought to an end, {144} expressing the fear lest, should these measures go beyond a certain limit, their acceptance by Greece might become very difficult, and emphasizing the sorrow which the Greek people felt at seeing its independence fettered.[8]

England found this declaration satisfactory; but before answering it definitely, she must take counsel with her allies.[9] France, by the mouth of M. Briand, pronounced the allusion to friendly relations with all the belligerents unfortunate: she was unable to understand how Greece could maintain friendly relations with Germany and even with Bulgaria after the occupation of Eastern Macedonia.[10] And so, having taken counsel together, the Allies set forth their views in a tardy reply to King Constantine's last offer. The gist of it was contained in this phrase: "The Greek Government has several times since the beginning of the War offered to come in on our side; but its offers, and particularly the last one, were accompanied by conditions which rendered them unacceptable." The Entente Powers added that they did not want Greece, unless she declared, on her own initiative, war against Bulgaria. It was the only way to gain their confidence.[11]

In other words, Greece should take the field without any agreement, so that she should have no claims either to adequate support during the war or to compensations at the conclusion of peace: nay, it was even hoped in Paris and London that Bulgaria might yet be seduced from the Central Powers, and in that case not only would Greece gain nothing in Thrace, but might very likely lose a portion of Macedonia.[12] It was the old story—to which King Constantine could never listen. He would suffer anything rather than plunge his country into war without even an assurance of its territorial integrity. When at this juncture a well-intentioned adviser warned him that his policy might cost him his throne, he answered promptly: "I do not care about my throne. I only think of Greece." [13]

{145}

At the same time, there was little he would not do to remove those fears and suspicions which were perpetually pleaded as reasons for coercion. The surrender of the Fleet had allayed once for all the Allies' uneasiness about their forces at sea. There remained their uneasiness about their forces on land. In spite of his repeated declarations that under no circumstances would Greece take up a hostile attitude, the King was credited with a treacherous design—to mass in Thessaly 80,000 men, lay up munitions and provisions, wait until the Allied Army should march on Monastir, and then attack it from behind.[14] After reading M. Venizelos's own avowal of his intention to follow up the conversion of Macedonia with an attack on the rest of Greece, particularly Thessaly,[15] one hardly needs to be told at whom King Constantine's precautions were aimed.

Yet, wishing to prove his good faith in a practical manner, the King called the British Minister and offered to reduce his army to less than half by disbanding about 35,000 men and to withdraw certain units from Thessaly. The British Minister, delighted by this spontaneous offer, thanked the King, expressing the hope that his action would be greatly appreciated, that all mistrust would vanish, and that the Powers would moderate their coercions. With a remark from the King, that the one thing he would not tolerate was a descent of rebels on Thessaly and the rest of Old Greece, and that he would attack them if they appeared, Sir Francis Elliot fully concurred.

Instead of the return which the King expected to this spontaneous proof of his sincerity, he received (20 October) an intimation that the Powers not only demanded what he had already granted, but in addition things which he could not possibly grant—the internment of the small remnant of his army in the Peloponnesus and a surrender of arms and war material equivalent to a complete disarmament. These measures, while exceeding all requirements for the security of the Allies, put the security of Greece in danger by leaving her a prey to revolutionary agitation. The King, therefore, begged the Powers not {146} to insist on concessions which neither could he make nor would his people let him make.[16]

Nothing, indeed, was better calculated to excite to the highest degree the passions fermenting against the Allies than an insistence on total disarmament at a moment when M. Venizelos at Salonica and his partisans at Athens were arming. Fortunately a mediator appeared in the person of M. Benazet, a French Deputy and Reporter of the War Budget, who was passing through Athens on his way to Salonica to inspect the sanitary condition of the Army. His connexions had brought him into touch with the most influential leaders of both Greek parties; and with the sanction of M. Briand, procured through M. Guillemin, who, himself no longer received at Court, saw an advantage in reaching it by proxy, he undertook to negotiate an amicable arrangement between King Constantine and the Entente.

M. Benazet's idea was to obtain from the King not only tangible pledges which would eliminate all possibility of danger from the Allies' path, but also positive reinforcements for them in arms and men; and as a price he was prepared to guarantee to Old Greece her neutrality, her liberty in the management of her internal affairs, and her immunity from aggression on the part of M. Venizelos. Young, eloquent, and refined, the spokesman brought into an environment corrupted by diplomatic chicanery a breath of candour. His manner inspired and evoked confidence. The King readily agreed, besides the reduction which he had already offered, to transfer the remainder of his army to the Peloponnesus, to hand over to the Allies a considerable stock of guns, rifles, and other war material, and to allow all men who were released from their military obligations, and all officers who first resigned their commissions, to volunteer for service in Macedonia. M. Benazet, on his part, made himself guarantor for the French Government as to the pledges which the King required in exchange.[17]

This agreement met, at least in appearance, with the approval of M. Briand, who sent a telegram of congratulations {127} to M. Benazet,[18] and with that of M. Guillemin, who was at last received by the King. Both the French Premier and his representative at Athens expressed themselves enchanted with the new turn of affairs, and even the fire-breathing Head of the French Secret Service declared that the result of the negotiation surpassed all hopes. As to Admiral Dartige, he could not but rejoice at an arrangement so consonant with his own ideas.[19] Thus all outstanding differences seemed happily settled, and the removal of mutual misunderstandings was celebrated by inspired pens in Paris and London.[20]

The only discordant note was struck by the Venizelist Press, which made no attempt to conceal its disappointment. And suddenly, just as the withdrawal of the royal troops from the north was about to begin, the troops of the Provisional Government attacked Katerini on the southern frontier of Macedonia. M. Venizelos had dropped the pose that his movement was directed solely against the Bulgars: he marched on Old Greece. Did he by this move try to force the hand of the Allies, as formerly by bringing them to Salonica he had tried to force the hand of the King? And was he encouraged in this move by those who were secretly opposed to an accommodation with the King? Admiral Dartige did not know. What he did know was that this coup de force was designed to compromise the arrangement with Athens; and as he could neither play nor appear to play a double game, he immediately telegraphed to Salonica demanding the retreat of the Venizelists. At the same time the King informed the French and British Ministers that he could not withdraw his troops from Thessaly until all danger was removed, and asked them to do everything that depended on them to remedy this state of things. Whereupon General Roques, the French Minister of War then at Salonica, disavowed the Venizelist action, and to prevent similar exploits in future decided to create a neutral zone under French occupation and administration. The Athens Government was not pleased to see part of its territory passing into French hands; but, after some demur, bowed to the decision.[21]

{148}

Not so the Salonica Government. M. Venizelos keenly resented this barrier to his impetuosity. The neutral zone, he complained, by blocking off his access to Thessaly, forbade all extension of his movement and prevented him from "carrying with him three-fifths of Greece and levying important contingents such as would have made him the absolute master of the country." [22] But the Allies were no longer to be deluded. They had discovered that "the mass of the people of continental Greece was hostile to the Chief of the Liberals." An extension of his movement could only be effected by overwhelming force, and as M. Venizelos had neither the men nor the arms required for the enterprise, the Allies would have to provide both. In other words, civil war in the rear of their armies would not only jeopardise their security but entangle them in a campaign for the conquest of Greece: a thing which they could not afford to do even to oblige M. Venizelos. They preferred a subtler and safer, if slower, way to the success of their common cause.

Baulked in his design on continental Greece, M. Venizelos demanded from Admiral Dartige the light flotilla in order to promote his cause in the islands. But here, also, he met with a check. The Admiral had a different use for those vessels in view. Many months back he felt the want of patrol and torpedo-boats to cope with the growing submarine peril, and had suggested asking Greece for the cession of her light flotilla. The matter was postponed in the expectation that the vessels would go over to the Allies spontaneously as a result of the Venizelist movement, and on this expectation being disappointed they were, as we have seen, sequestered under the pretence of security for the Allied armada. Another excuse was needed for their appropriation; and it came in the nick of time: two Greek steamers at that moment struck mines, presumably sown by an enemy submarine, in the Gulf of Athens. With the promptitude that comes of practice, Admiral Dartige announced to the Hellenic Government his decision to employ, at a valuation, its light flotilla in the submarine {149} warfare, and to use the Salamis arsenal for repairs (3 November.)[23]

M. Lambros replied that compliance with the Admiral's request involved a breach of International Law, which forbade the sale of naval units by a neutral State to a belligerent, as well as a breach of a Greek law which forbade the alienation of ships possessing military value. Besides, public opinion would never endure to see the country stripped of its naval means of defence and exposed to possible aggression. He was, therefore, regretfully obliged to refuse the Hellenic Government's consent.[24]

The Admiral could not let a refusal stand in his way: "It would be unpardonable," he wrote in answer, "to leave these vessels unutilized whilst German submarines, heedless of the neutrality of Greece, came and sank her merchant ships in her waters, thus stopping maritime traffic and seriously prejudicing the life of the country." [25]

Having got over these little formalities, he hoisted the French flag on the vessels and seized the arsenal (7 November). The Hellenic Government's protest against this fresh outrage,[26] naturally, had no effect. Only the British Minister made it clear that the act was exclusively the work of France.[27]

Nothing done by one group of belligerents, needless to say, escaped the attention of the other; and the representatives of the enemy Powers, besides fulminating against a step which, "in flagrant contravention of the principles of neutrality came to augment the armed forces of their adversaries," improved the occasion by reciting all the proofs of "a benevolent neutrality without parallel," which Greece had been giving those adversaries since the beginning of the War: the free passage of munitions and provisions for Servia; the facilities accorded to Entente shipping; the toleration of recruiting bureaux and wireless stations in Greek territory; the use of isles and ports as naval bases. Then the landing of the Allies in Macedonia {150} had inaugurated a period of continuous violations of neutrality and the establishment of a regime of terror towards them: their Consuls were arrested, members of their Legations were assaulted, great numbers of their nationals were led into captivity or driven into exile, their merchant ships were seized, and the Ministers themselves were deprived of all means of communicating with their Governments. Last of all came the installation of Allied troops in Athens itself and the sequestration of the Greek navy, now transformed into a definite cession; and, according to trustworthy intelligence, the Entente Powers meant to exact shortly the disarmament of the Greek army also. They ended with a hint that the indulgence of their Governments might reach its limit.[28]

A more painful position for a free people and its rulers could not be imagined. But King Constantine comforted himself with the thought that the "pledges of friendship" exacted from him by the Allies would be followed by corresponding pledges from them. His negotiation with M. Benazet had received its finishing touches in the evening of 7 November: the Entente Powers would present to the Greek Government a Note setting forth their demands in the form of a "Summons," the terms of which were, word for word, agreed upon between the two parties. By this document the Allies bound themselves "to repeal the coercive measures taken up to now and never to tolerate that armed Greek bodies which had declared to have as their sole aim a struggle for the vindication of national ideas should turn aside from that aim in order to engage in acts of sedition." [29]

This clause formed the corner-stone of the whole pact. "It is clear," telegraphs M. Benazet to Paris, "that some sort of compensation is admitted in principle,"—for very good reasons: "The King's sole fear—and a very intelligible one—is lest his own arms should be handed over to Greeks who would use them to march on Athens and overthrow his dynasty." Moreover, without such guarantees it will be impossible for the King and his Premier "to make disarmament acceptable by the Royalist Party, {151} which constitutes the great majority of the nation." He added that neither the King nor his Premier was unaware of the hostility with which these efforts for conciliation were viewed by certain personalities: but both were resolved to show the greatest patience until the agreement had produced all its effects. The negotiator himself, equally aware of the hostile forces at work, left Athens with a heart full of misgivings.[30]



[1] Du Fournet, pp. 132, 171.

[2] The New Europe, 29 March, 1917; The Times, 17 Oct., 1916.

[3] The Times, dispatch from Athens, 8 Oct., 1916.

[4] Du Fournet, pp. 138-9, 141-3.

[5] Du Fournet, pp. 133-5, 146.

[6] The Times, dispatch from Athens, 16 Oct., 1916.

[7] Du Fournet, pp. 146-8.

[8] Zalocostas to Greek Legations, Paris, London, Rome, Petrograd, 3/16 Oct., 1916.

[9] Gennadius, London, 6/19 Oct., 1916.

[10] Romanos, Paris, 7/20 Oct., 1916.

[11] Gennadius, London, 10/23 Oct., 1916.

[12] Romanos, Paris, 26 Aug./8 Sept., 1916; Cp. Deville, pp. 221. foll.; Du Fournet, p. 171.

[13] P. E. Drakoulis, in The Times, 30 Nov., 1920.

[14] Du Fournet, p. 149.

[15] The New Europe, 29 March, 1917.

[16] Zalocostas to Greek Legations. Paris, London, Rome, Petrograd, 7/20 Oct., 1916. Cp. Du Fournet, pp. 149-50.

[17] Du Fournet, pp. 152-4, and Appendix 5.

[18] Du Fournet, p. 316.

[19] Du Fournet, pp. 155-6.

[20] The Times, 28 Oct., 1 Nov., 1916.

[21] Zalocostas to Greek Legations, Paris and London, 12 Oct./3 Nov.; General Roques to Greek Premier, Athens, 2/15 Nov.; Zalocostas to Greek Legation, Paris, 4/17 Nov., 1916. Cp. Du Fournet, pp. 169-70, 182.

[22] The New Europe, 29 March, 1917.

[23] Du Fournet, pp. 135-6, 165, 167, 183.

[24] Lambros to Dartige du Fournet, Athens, 23 Oct./5 Nov., 1916.

[25] Dartige du Fournet to Lambros, on board the Provence, 7 Nov., 1916.

[26] Zalocostas to the Entente Legations, Athens, 25 Oct./7 Nov., 1916.

[27] Du Fournet, p. 168.

[28] Mirbach, Szilassy, Passaroff, Ghalib Kemaly, Athens, 26 Oct./8 Nov., 1916.

[29] Du Fournet, p. 177.

[30] Du Fournet, pp. 174-8.



{152}

CHAPTER XIV

A week had hardly elapsed since the conclusion of the agreement between the King of Greece and the French Deputy, when (16 November) Admiral Dartige du Fournet addressed to the Hellenic Premier a letter, claiming 18 batteries of field and 16 of mountain artillery with 1,000 shells for each gun; 40,000 rifles with 220 cartridges for each rifle; 140 machine-guns with ammunition; and 50 motor-vans. The claim was presented as "compensation" for the war material abandoned to the Germano-Bulgars in Cavalla: about guarantees not a word.[1]

The King called the Admiral (19 November) and, with perfect courtesy, yet with a visible change in his attitude, expressed his astonishment at so unexpected a version of the "Summons" agreed upon. The Admiral had no explanation to give to the King. But to us he explains everything. The French Minister at Athens was hostile to M. Benazet's amicable arrangement, and repudiated his pledges, notably the one concerning the spread of sedition. "We are not made to defend kings against their peoples," he said. The French Government likewise completely ignored the agreement, and the French Minister of War had dictated the lines on which the claim was drafted. Admiral Dartige's comments on this volte-face are interesting: "Without wanting to give the Greek Government the two guarantees which it demanded, they claimed from it the fulfilment of the engagements of which those guarantees were the counter-part. It was a truly draconian and unexpected pretension," he says, and to base that pretension on the Cavalla affair was "to misconstrue in part the reality of facts." [2]

Why, then, was M. Benazet encouraged to negotiate? Probably there were in France moderate elements strong enough to make it necessary to throw a sop to them. But the extremists were the stronger party; and when it came {153} to a decision they carried the day. However, be the motive of the mission what it may, its repudiation meant that the old policy still held the field. It was an essential part of that policy not to allow Greece any attitude other than that of a belligerent. So, while the Entente Cabinets continued disclaiming all desire to drag an unwilling country into war and declaring that the only thing they asked for was the observance of a benevolent neutrality, the practical exponents of their policy on the spot continued to take steps in which Greece could acquiesce only if she contemplated a rupture with the Central Powers.