The Modern Greek State: 1898–1913 – Glory Days

On March 25, 2021, the Modern Greek State celebrated the 200th anniversary of the War of Independence, which ultimately led to its establishment. It is thus an excellent opportunity to reconsider some of the main events of Greek history over these 200 years and how they shaped the character of modern Greece. This article covers the period from 1898 and 1913 and looks at what happed in Crete, the Greek political, and scene, the Balkan Wars, and how ultimately it was a positive period for Greece. Thomas Papageorgiou explains.

You can read part 1 on ‘a bad start’ 1827-1862 here and part 2 on ‘bankruptcy and defeat’ 1863-1897 here.

A lithograph of the Battle of Yenidje/Giannitsa in the First Balkan War.

The story narrated so far for Greece is not unique. (Papageorgiou, History Is Now Magazine, 2021) (Papageorgiou, History is Now Magazine, 2021) By the turn of the 20th century, all modern Balkan countries (Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria) had suffered indebtedness and political instability, and the maneuvering of the great powers restricted their foreign policy options. The governments of all three were committed to schemes of territorial expansion, but the restraining influences of disorganized armies, chaotic public finances and great power pressure inhibited them. Only through cooperation with one another could they realize their expansionist dreams.  The cooperation process culminated to the inferno of the first and second Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913. For the Greeks, these were good wars. (Glenny, 2012)

I. Introduction

Cooperation between the Balkan States was not easy. Under the guiding hand of Bismarck, the Congress of Berlin in 1878 subordinated all interests and demands of the Balkan States to three expanding spheres of interest – Austro-Hungarian, Russian and British. This created confusion and resentment in many parts of the Balkans. Especially Bulgaria was reduced from 176,000 square kilometers, after the Treaty of San Stefano, to just 96,000 square kilometers. Serbia’s westwards expansion was also blocked. Thus, they both turned their expansionist ambitions south to Macedonia, claimed also by Greece.

Things became more complicated when in 1885 Bulgaria, violating the provisions of the Treaty of Berlin, annexed Eastern Rumelia, an integral part of the Ottoman Empire and the Powers accepted the outcome of the Bulgarian intervention. The Serbian king Milan Obrenović knew that the annexation gave Bulgaria an important strategic advantage in the impending struggle for Macedonia. He saw the treaty violation as an opportunity to test his new standing army and attacked Bulgaria but was thoroughly defeated. 

With the annexation of Eastern Rumelia, the victory over the Serbs and with Greece bankrupt, distracted by the Cretan Revolt and finally defeated by the Ottomans in 1897, Bulgaria had indeed an important strategic advantage in Macedonia at the eve of the 20th century. Nevertheless, the realization of the Bulgarian threat by the Ottomans and internal divisions among the Bulgarian parastatal organizations which, like in Greece, were coordinating foreign policy led to a significant decrease of the Slavic influence in Macedonia immediately after the suppression of the Ilinden uprising in 1903. (wikipedia, 2021)

Indeed, Greek guerrillas, under the leadership of officers secretly sent by the government in Athens, used the opportunity and swept through western Macedonia restoring the Greek influence in the region. This renewed activity and the retreat of Bulgarian aspirations hastened a change in Serbian policy, too. Serbia would now be fighting for territorial influence not just against the Greeks and Bulgarians, but also against the Ottomans and Albanians. The situation was so complicated that, at various times, the struggle for Macedonia pitted Slav against Slav (Bulgarians against Serbs); Slav against Hellene (Bulgarians against Greeks); Slav against Muslim (Serbs or Bulgarians against Ottomans or Albanians); Hellene against Muslim (Greeks against Turks or Albanians); and Muslim against Muslim (Ottomans against Albanians). The situation calmed after the Young Turks revolution of 1908, which, in its early stages at least, rejected the path of nationalism and created hope for peaceful coexistence among the different ethnicities in Macedonia. (Glenny, 2012)

The successes in Macedonia restored the confidence of the Greek officer’s corps after the debacle in the 1897 war. The army blamed the Crown Prince Constantine for the defeat against the Turks and the politicians for Greece’s chronic lack of preparedness for war. In August 1909 an army conspiracy, the Military League, launched a successful coup d’etat. This did not aim at the overthrow of the monarchy or the establishment of a junta. The officers involved exercised pressure on the new government from behind the scenes to provide for the necessary restructuring of the army and the obliteration of the influence of the palace on it. They also invited Eleftherios Venizelos, a Cretan rebel politician outside the old political establishment to lead the effort. (Glenny, 2012) (Malesis, 2018)

II Eleftherios Venizelos

In Crete

Venizelos was born in Mournies, a part of the city of Chania, in Crete in 1864, the year of the first territorial expansion of modern Greece to the Ionian Islands. His father Kiriakos, a merchant, was involved in the local social and political developments and was often prosecuted by the Turkish authorities during the frequent Cretan revolts. Thus, Venizelos spent part of his early life in exile. 

His father was granted amnesty in 1872 and returned to Chania, where he successfully set up his business and provided for the best preparation of Eleftherios as merchant. The latter complied at first, but later managed to convince his father to study law in Athens, where he developed his interest for politics. He also became involved with chieftains and veterans of the island’s revolutions and exiles because of them, who, together with his compatriot students, constituted the core of the Cretan irredentism in the Greek capital. He develops intense activity and soon becomes a leading figure among them.

By the time that Venizelos returned to Chania to practise law in 1887, apart from the respect of the Cretans in Athens, he had the good fame of his father, who died four years earlier, and the help of Kostas Mitsotakis, a local politician and husband of one of his sisters (he had four as well as a younger brother) to rely on for the advancement of his political carrier. He also proved to be an excellent lawyer, which added to his fame and financial comfort.

Thus, it came to no-one’s surprise, when in 1889, he was elected to the Cretan Assembly, a representation body of the semi-autonomous state granted to the island by the Pact of Chalepa in 1878. (wikipedia, 2020) This first tenure did not last long though. A few days after the elections, the old political establishment, proposed the declaration of unification with Greece. Venizelos, as well as the Greek government, immediately realized the dangers of yet another premature revolt and worked to establish a climate of appeasement and moderation. To no avail. The Turks crushed the new revolt and declared martial law. The Pact of Chalepa was no more and Venizelos found himself in Athens once more, this time as an exile.   

His exile does not last long. In April 1890 he returns to Chania, after general amnesty was granted, and in December 1891 he marries his wife, Maria. His happiness does not last long though. After the birth of his second son, in November 1894, his wife died. At the same time Crete was going through one of the worst periods of its history. The martial law and Turkish terror were casting a dark shadow over the island. The Cretan reaction comes with another revolt in May 1896. Venizelos feared a repetition of the harsh measures of 1889 and was against it. The international condemnation of the Hamidian massacres (wikipedia, 2021) though and the pressure exercised by the Great Powers to the Sultan did not allow for a similar reaction. Thus, the movement was successful in forcing the sultan to commit himself for the restoration of the privileges of the Pact of Chalepa.  

Venizelos was not hesitant to get involved in another revolt though, when the sultan did not honour his commitment. Not only as a politician but also as front-line fighter. This is the crisis that culminated to the Greco-Turkish war of 1897. Although Venizelos was in line with Trikoupis’ approach that foreign policy should be dictated by the national centre and supported unification with Greece, he did not hesitate to disagree with the Greek government after the Greek defeat and opt for the more realistic solution of Cretan autonomy under the condition that the Turkish army withdrew from the island. His insistency and the clumsy handling of the situation by the Turks, with irregulars attacking British forces, resulted not only to Crete’s autonomy, but also to the appointment of the Greek king’s second born prince George as high commissioner. 

In December 1898 prince George arrived in Chania. He claimed excessive powers for himself, and Venizelos supported him as a strong executive authority was necessary for the rebuilt of the devastated island. He also served for two years as minister of justice in the cabinet of the prince demonstrating significant legislative work. Cooperation did not last long though. Venizelos believed that the main aim should be full Cretan autonomy and the withdrawal of the Great Powers’ armies from the island, which, in effect, occupied it. Prince George on the other hand was unsuccessfully trying to convince the Powers to accept the unification of the island with the Greek kingdom. When the commissioner used suppressive measures to settle the differences with the politician, Venizelos revolted. 

The centre of the revolt was at Therisos, near Chania, where Venizelos and his supporters declared the unification of Crete with Greece on the 11th of March 1905. This was an attempt to turn the tables as any reaction from the prince would be an act against his own diplomacy that far. In any case, it was the reaction of the foreign armies on the island that would decide the outcome of the revolt. Eventually, Venizelos found himself in a tough spot, but, preferring a realistic approach instead of a fight to the end, he managed to exploit the differences between the Great Powers and by mid-summer managed to achieve: amnesty for himself and his supporters, the establishment of Cretan militia and withdrawal of the Powers’ armies from the island, a loan for the Cretan autonomous state, provisions for the settlement of important pending issues with the Turks, revision of the Cretan constitution. The Greek king would have the right to nominate the high commissioner, but his suggestion was subject to the approval of the Powers. King George decided to withdraw his son and substitute him with former prime minister Alexandros Zaimis. The Powers accepted. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017)

Thus, by 1905 Venizelos had two revolts on his account and a major clash with the royal dynasty and the political establishment supporting it in mainland Greece. No wonder that the officers of the Military League considered him the ideal candidate for the premiership a few years later.

In the Greek political scene

In the elections of the 8th of August 1910 Venizelos was voted member of the Greek parliament for the first time in his career. Contrary to might be expected of him, he did not accept the premiership offered by the Military League. He pointed out that the army officers had committed a serious political mistake: They revolted against the old political establishment and the crown and after gaining control of the situation they trusted the same establishment with the reorganization of the state. Instead, he proposed a compromise: A revision of the constitution of 1864 to introduce the necessary reforms, after which the Military League would dissolve itself. Nevertheless, material provisions of the constitution and especially that concerning the form of government would remain untouched. The crown was safe. Venizelos’ stance served for an improvement of his relations with the palace, especially with king George.

After the king’s invitation to implement the compromise he suggested, Venizelos formed his first government on the 6th of October 1910. But, although the parliament elected in August included 122 independent members, the majority was still with the old parties and Venizelos was not willing to become ‘prisoner’ of this majority. Thus, he convinced the king to dissolve the parliament and call for new elections on the 28th of November. The leaders of the old parties considered this a constitutional coup and decided to abstain from the upcoming elections. As a result, Venizelos’ newly formed Liberal Party won an overwhelming majority of 307 out of 362 seats. 87% of the new MPs were elected for the first time. 

The revision of the constitution introduced important novelties such as a new regime for the expropriation of land, the establishment permanence for the civil servants, compulsory and free elementary education and a ban on the election of army officers as members of parliament. The goal was to address chronic problems of the state like the oppression of the landless, clientism and army interventions in politics. Venizelos actually retained the ministry of the army for himself, and significant compromises were made here. He took as his adjutant the pro-royal captain Ioannis Metaxas, the later dictator during the interwar period in the 1930s, and most importantly restored the crown prince Constantine at the head of the army in June 1911. The reason behind these compromises was the avoidance of an internal front as Venizelos’ concern during this period was the country’s foreign policy. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017) (Mavrogordatos, 2015) Nevertheless, he ensured public support with the elections of March 1912 by winning again with an overwhelming majority against the united opposition this time.

Preparation for war

In February 1912 Bulgaria and Serbia signed a defence agreement and two months later a military pact for common action against the Turks regarding their claims in Macedonia. Venizelos actively pursued Greece’s participation to the alliance but was at first met with reservation from the Bulgarian side. (Malesis, 2018) Nevertheless, the Slavs had no navy and Greece was necessary to restrict the capacity of the Turkish fleet to move freely in the Aegean. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017) As far as the Greek army was concerned though, after Greece’s defeat in 1897 and considering its financial problems, it was estimated that it counted far below those of the other Balkan States. (Glenny, 2012) Knowing this, Venizelos did not insist on any settlement of the division of the potential territorial gains in Macedonia during the negotiations. Thus, finally Bulgaria felt comfortable to accept Greece in the alliance in May 1912. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017)

Bulgaria completely underestimated the capacity of the Greek army. The international financial control after 1897 helped tiding up the country’s finances and the surpluses of 1910 and 1911 together with loan take outs in the same period created an abundance of cash for the Greek state at the eve of the war. (Kostis, The Wealth of Greece, The Greek economy from the Balkan Wars till this day, 2018) Actually, the reorganization effort started in 1904 already with the establishment of the National Defence Fund by the government of George Theotokis. From 1904 till 1912 214 million drachmas were spent on armaments of which 50% during the last two years, when Venizelos came to power. For comparison, the national GDP in 1910-11 was 282.28 drachmas per capita (Kostis, History’s Spoiled Children, The Formation of the Modern Greek State, 2018) , whereas the legendary armoured cruiser Averof (Carr, 2014) cost 24 million drachmas. Venizelos also materialized the decision of Stefanos Dragoumis’ government in 1910 to invite, following a demand of the Military League, French and British officers to undertake the training of the army and navy. The French mission under general Eydoux arrived in January and the English mission under admiral Tufnell in May 1911.

During this preparation period Venizelos faced the opposition’s criticism that once again preferred the old ‘wait and see’ tactic determined by public opinion and possible political cost. The palace and general staff were also not pleased with the invitation of the Anglo-French military missions as the crown prince and his officers were trained in Germany and admired the Prussian military tradition. Nevertheless, Venizelos was determined to pursue an active participation to the upcoming war and did not hesitate, against the public opinion, to refuse the admission of Cretan representatives to the Greek parliament in May 1912 that might have triggered a reaction form the Great Powers (and the Turks) that at this point were split regarding their policies in the region and could not undertake coordinated action to prevent the war. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017) (Mavrogordatos, 2015)

The Balkan Wars

The Balkan Wars commenced on the 8th of October 1912, when tiny Montenegro, the fourth member of the Balkan alliance, declared war on the Ottoman Empire. Five days later an ultimatum issued by Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia was delivered to the Turks, demanding such an extensive number of reforms in favour of the Christian populations of the empire that could not be accepted. Their declaration of war followed on the 17th of October. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017) Military operations lasted only 10 weeks, but the numbers of combatants involved were huge. The Bulgarians mobilized a full 25% of their male population, just under 500,000 men. (Glenny, 2012) The Greeks and Serbs fielded about 200,000 men each and this at a time when their population was less than 3 million. (Malesis, 2018) The Turks were about 350,000. 200,000 combatants, excluding civilians, were killed. The vast massacres of the soon to come First World War relegated the social and economic impact of the Balkan Wars to the penny place. But those who witnessed or participated in them were given a unique insight into what the 20thcentury had in store for the world. (Glenny, 2012)

During the first phase of the war (First Balkan War) the Turks had just come out of a war with Italy and were obliged to fight in four different fronts: against the Bulgarians in Thrace; against the Bulgarians, Serbs and Greeks in Macedonia; against the Serbs and Montenegrins in northern Albania (I refer to modern Albania, as this state did not exist at the time of the Balkan Wars) and Kosovo; and against the Greeks in Epirus. (Glenny, 2012) The Greek army made significant gains in southern Epirus, setting the city of Ioannina under siege, and in western and central Macedonia, taking Thessaloniki, after winning the race to the city over the Bulgarians. The Greek navy was proved predominant in the Aegean by blocking the naval transport of Turkish troops from Asia Minor to the different fronts and freed all occupied islands. At the same time the rest of the Balkan Allies neutralized almost every pocket of resistance in Europe stopping only 40 km from Constantinople. Thus, soon the Turks reached for an armistice which was signed with the Bulgarians, Serbs and Montenegrins in December. The Greeks retained a state of war as Ioannina was still under siege and they also needed to continue controlling the movements of the Turkish fleet in the Aegean. (Klapsis, 2019)   

At the conference of London, in December 1912, the Great Powers tried to regain the initiative in the Balkans with their ambassadors discussing separately from those of the war parts. Nevertheless, Sofia, Athens and Belgrade were no longer prepared to bow to the strategic requirements of the Great Powers. (Glenny, 2012) Furthermore, the Treaty of London, signed in May 1913, although it confirmed the drastic reduction of the Turkish possessions in Europe, contained no specific provisions for the definition of the new borders in the Balkans, especially in Macedonia. The incorporation of a new Albanian state complicated things even more.(Klapsis, 2019) It was time for the Balkan states to settle the differences among themselves. 

Meanwhile, Greece, still in a state of war with the Turks, had taken Ioannina and advanced into northern Epirus, before the Treaty of London was signed. Bulgaria, overemphasizing the contribution of its army during the hostilities, was by no means willing to accept any conventional ratification of the status quo after the First Balkan War. (Klapsis, 2019) Realizing the danger, Venizelos turned to Serbia for the formation of a common front against their former ally. The Serbs accepted but demanded that the Greco - Serbian Defensive Treaty includes also mutual support in the case of an Austrian attack against Serbia now that the latter’s ambition on the Adriatic were restricted by the Italo – Austrian push for an Albanian state in the region. Although the Germanophile crown prince Constantine was against this development, later to play a crucial role for the Greek participation to the First World War, the Treaty was signed on the 1st of June 1913. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017)

The Second Balkan War commenced in mid-June with a sudden Bulgarian attack against Greece and Serbia. After few initial successes, the Bulgarian army was thoroughly defeated by the combined armies of Greece and Serbia (supported also by the Montenegrins). Taking advantage of the situation Romania also entered the war occupying Dobruja in northern Bulgaria. The Turks also retook Adrianople from the Bulgarians. The final settlement took place on Balkan ground with the Peace Treaty of Bucharest in August 1913. For Greece the result was astonishing. The gains in Epirus, west and central Macedonia were supplemented by eastern Macedonia till the port city Kavala. In Bucharest, Crete was also finally ceded to Greece that occupied also the islands of north - eastern Aegean, although their fate was to be decided by the Powers at a later point. Within a year the frightened and despised Greece of the past doubled its territory (from 63,211 to 120,308 square kilometres) whereas its population increased by 80% (from 2.6 to 4.7 million people). (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017)

III Conclusion

Greece’s expansion before 1912 was rather coincidental. The Ionian islands came as a ‘dowry’ to the new king George in 1864. The annexation of Thessaly was also the result of serendipitous international relations in 1881. It was actually lost to Turkey after the defeat of 1897 and was luckily granted back to Greece, together with the right to appoint the high commissioner in Crete, because of the power play between the Great Powers that the Greek government could barely influence. 

At the beginning of the 20th century things were different. Greece was actively pursuing international alliances. It did not hesitate to change sides when the national interest and not have public opinion dictating it. It capitalized on the painful cumulative growth it had experienced since its establishment and combining military action with diplomacy achieved its greatest triumph to this day. As it was noted ‘For the first time since the fall of Constantinople in 1453 Greece was fighting and winning without patrons’. (Kostis, History’s Spoiled Children, The Formation of the Modern Greek State, 2018) (Mavrogordatos, 2015) (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017)

Nevertheless, despite Venizelos’ criticism to the Military League that it tried to push reform using the old establishment, he worked with the same establishment. It was probably necessary in view of the imminent developments and the need for internal peace. By restoring the crown prince at the head of the army and pro-royal officers at the general staff though, he revived a power system that the Military League meant to neutralize. Already during the Balkan wars there was significant friction between the politician and the commander in chief regarding the appropriate strategy. The disagreement for the race to Thessaloniki in 1912 (supported by Venizelos) against an advance to Monastir (supported by Constantine) or that on signing the agreement with the Serbs, before the Second Balkan War, are typical examples. King George, who, within a few months, tasted all the joy that was deprived of him during the humiliations of the past, was able to mediate successfully between the two. But in March 1913 he was murdered in Thessaloniki by a paranoid person, according to the official version. It has been commented though that the murder came in handy for the ‘German factor’. (Papadakis (Papadis), 2017) Constantine was now not only at the head of the army but at the head of the state, too.

In short, this was undoubtedly a triumphant period for Greece. But the seeds for another catastrophe to come had also been planted.

What do you think of these years in the Modern Greek State? Let us know below.

References                                                                                                     

Carr, J. (2014). R.H.N.S. Averof, Thunder in the Aegean. Barnsley South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Maritime.

Glenny, M. (2012). The Balkans 1804-2012, Nationalism, War and the Great Powers. New York: Penguin Books.

Klapsis, A. (2019). Politics and Diplomacy of the Greek National Completion 1821-1923. Athens: Pedio (in Greek).

Kostis, K. (2018). History’s Spoiled Children, The Formation of the Modern Greek State. London: Hurst & Company.

Kostis, K. (2018). The Wealth of Greece, The Greek economy from the Balkan Wars till this day. Athens: Patakis (in Greek).

Malesis, D. (2018). '... let the Revolution Begin' Great Idea & the Army in the 19th Century. Athens: Asinis (in Greek).

Mavrogordatos, G. (2015). 1915 The National Schism. Athens: Patakis (in Greek).

Papadakis (Papadis), N. E. (2017). Eleftherios Venizelos. Chania - Athens: National Research Foundation ''Eleftherios Venizelos'' - Estia Bookstore (in Greek).

Papageorgiou, T. P. (2021, September 5). History is Now Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2021/9/5/the-modern-greek-state-18631897-bankruptcy-amp-defeat#.YVH7FX1RVPY

Papageorgiou, T. P. (2021, May 16). History Is Now Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2021/5/16/the-modern-greek-state-1827-1862-a-bad-start#.YLe-yqFRVPY

Wikipedia. (2020). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pact_of_Halepa

Wikipedia. (2021). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilinden%E2%80%93Preobrazhenie_Uprising

Wikipedia. (2021). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamidian_massacres

The 1897 Greco-Turkish War: A Minor War with Major Consequences

The 1897 Greco-Turkish War took place over 32 days from April to May 1897. Greece and the Turkish Ottoman Empire fought, primarily over the question of the status of Crete. However, the war had lasting consequences. Rama Narendra explains.

The Battle of Domeke in the 1897 Greco-Turkish War. Painting by Fausto Zonaro.

The 1897 Greco-Turkish War is a war few remember or even know about outside of the countries involved. The war was relatively short, involved two relatively minor players in the European Concert, and is completely overshadowed by wars and crises happening shortly after it like the Agadir Crisis, the Italo-Turkish War, The Balkan Wars, and World War I. However, the war still had major, but subtle consequences for both countries which, like dominoes, led to the Balkan Wars in the 20thcentury.

Background

Just like other Empires at the time, the Ottoman Empire was troubled with nationalist revolts in the 19th century. One particular hotbed for nationalist fervor was Crete, with its Greek-speaking majority demanding autonomy or even self-rule. To escalate the situation, King George of Greece was of one mind with Greek nationalists in wishing to annex the island, and frequently sent arms and men to support Cretan nationalists. 1897, however, would prove to be a fateful year as the over-confident Greek leadership saw the chance to annex Crete or even expanding on the mainland further north. This overconfidence was fueled by the humiliation of the Ottoman armed forces back in the 1877 Russo-Turkish War, and an exaggerated view of the internal problems of the Ottomans, especially regarding the Armenian rebellions.

The Ottoman military, though, was far from what the Greek leadership had imagined. Sultan Abdülhamid II has been working closely with German advisors to reform and improve the Ottoman army. The mission led by Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz in 1886 had particularly lasting effects on Ottoman leadership and planning. He not only drastically improved the Ottoman education and training system, but also changed the overall status of the general staff officer corps within the army. Close cooperation with German firms also ensured that the Ottomans were armed with modern bolt-action rifles.

Escalating Tensions

On February 15, 1897 two regular Greek battalions, joined by local rebels landed on the shores of Crete. Within two weeks, Greek semi-official gangs, called the Ethnike Hetairia, reinforced with regular officers and soldiers, began to launch raids into Ottoman Thessaly. On April 9 Greek raiders, with some Italian volunteers, attacked Ottoman border towers and defeated a border company in Kranya. They were repulsed by Ottoman border guards the next day, and even though the Ottoman government were reluctant to enter a full-blown war, intense public pressure eventually pushed the Ottomans to declare war on Greece on April 17.

The war was fought in two separate theaters: Alasonya-Thessaly and Yanya-Epirus. However, most of the fighting was done in the Thessaly Front. During the war, the Ottomans used plans devised by none other than Von der Goltz himself. The plan was to force the Greeks to overstretch their defensive lines, which were very near to the border. The main body of the Ottoman Army at Alasonya would then try to encircle the Greeks before they were able to retreat back to the Yenisehir line. Von der Goltz expected that the Great Powers would not let the Greeks be beaten and would intervene in the conflict in less than 15 days. So the Greek army had to be crushed in less than two weeks.

The War

The first stage of the war (April 16–22) was marked by border clashes and the occupation of mountain passes. This stage also shows that despite the reforms the Ottoman army still had glaring shortcomings. Officers and soldiers sometimes ran towards the enemy as if in a race without paying attention to combat tactics and techniques, and as a result officers suffered abnormally high casualty levels. Instead of conducting the encirclement maneuver as planned, most units simply tried to push the Greek defenders back by frontal assaults. Confusion, delay, and lack of coordination and communication were the norms until the Ottoman forward units reached weakly defended Yenisehir two days after the Greeks withdrew from the town.

The second stage (April 23–May 4) was marked by the battle of Mati-Deliler and the occupation of Tırnova and Yenisehir. The second stage proceeded almost the same way as the first stage, with Ottoman units pushing the Greek defenders back without attempting encirclement maneuvers, and the Greeks safely evacuated their defenses and retreated to their last defensive line.

The third and last stage (May 5–17) was marked by the decisive battles of Velestin, Catalca, and Domeke, in front of the last Greek defensive line. The first battle of Velestin was a disaster for the Ottomans. In this encounter, a forced reconnaissance turned into a futile and bloody assault, and the Greek lines held firm against Ottoman cavalry and infantry charges. However, the Ottomans eventually pushed through Greek lines in the second battle. The Ottoman army finally decisively beat the Greeks at the battles of Catalca and Domeke. The Greek defenders were thoroughly beaten and the road to Athens was opened.

Conclusion and Consequences

However, as Von der Goltz had predicted, the Great Powers intervened and Greece was saved from further humiliation. Even though the Ottomans militarily won the war, they did not gain much from the victory. The Great Powers forced the Ottomans to give Crete autonomy and refused an Ottoman plea to obtain the region of Thessaly, previously lost in the aftermath of the 1877 Russo-Turkish War. Greece, however, was required to pay a heavy war indemnity to compensate the Ottomans for the territory won by them in Thessaly and returned under the terms of the peace. The victorious Ottoman troops retreated as if defeated, and Abdülhamid spent several tense months trying to explain to the public why the war had been won in the battlefield but lost at the diplomatic table.

So what were the consequences of this short war? As it turned out, they were big. In the Ottoman Empire, despite the disappointing result, the victory gave the Ottomans a public morale boost and confidence after being humiliated by the European powers for decades. This confidence is what eventually drove an overwhelmingly pro-war public opinion on the eve of the 1912-13 Balkan Wars. If their armed forces had beaten Greece in 1897, what prevented them from doing it again? Yaşasın harb! (Long live War!), cried the pro-war demonstrators in 1912.

In Greece, the defeat was seen as disgraceful and humiliating, mostly due to the rapid and unexpected advance of the Ottoman army. This defeat though, fueled the country’s irredentist policy of the Megali Idea (Greater Greece) and led Greece to reform its politics and economy, redefine its international alliances, and prepare the military and naval forces that helped Greece double its territory over the next 20 years.

If you enjoyed this article, you can read about the Megali Idea and how it shaped the modern Greek state here.

References

Ginio, E. (2016). The Ottoman Culture of Defeat: The Balkan Wars and Their Aftermath. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Katsikas, S., & Krinaki, A. (2020). Reflections on an" Ignominious Defeat": Reappraising the Effects of the Greco-Ottoman War of 1897 on Greek Politics. Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 38(1), 109-130.

Uyar, M., & Erickson, E. J. (2009). A Military History of the Ottomans: From Osman to Ataturk: From Osman to Ataturk. ABC-CLIO.

Could the US and the West have done more? The Balkan Wars and the West

In this article, Nick Shepley considers the background to and views on Western intervention in the Balkans in the 1990s.

Before his death in 2010, historian Tony Judt discussed the Balkan Wars and their causes at length in his book Postwar. In the London Review of Books, in March 2010, he also discussed the historic roots of the lack of concern over the fate of the Balkans amongst her nearest European neighbors with the journalist Kristina Božič. Judt argued that in the 18th and 19th centuries, Europe fought predominantly colonial wars against non-European peoples, and treated even their most implacable European foes far better during conflict than their own colonized subjects. This process changed with the two world wars of the 20th Century. With the advent of Nazism and Soviet Communism, Europeans were colonized and exterminated by other Europeans, a process Judt describes as 'internal colonization'.

Ruins of Sarajevo, Bosnia. 1997. Following the siege of the city.

The aftermath of this age of conflict has had profound and negative implications for the way in which Europe has dealt with conflicts on its doorstep, and far from meddling, Judt argues that there has been an indifference to the Balkans conflict. In the article he says:

"I don’t think the consequence is that Europeans have once again exported their conflicts of interest out of Europe. It is more passive than that and in a way worse. What we see is an utter lack of concern. Before the Yugoslav wars broke out in 1991 I was in Europe a lot, especially in Germany and Austria. I would talk to people and say: ‘This is going to be bad. This is serious. If you listen to what Milosevic is saying and watch what is happening in Serbia and Kosovo, there is going to be trouble.’ People would say one of two things. Either: ‘No, no, of course not, it won’t happen.’ Or: ‘So what? This isn’t our problem. We have no moral responsibility, they aren’t part of Europe.’ That is an ethically catastrophic position but not the same as active participation. It’s an expression of indifference."(1)

Judt's stance on the Balkans, as a self-confessed social democrat and liberal interventionist (his faith in liberal interventionism was tested to breaking point over the Iraq War), was that the West had a duty to intervene and was woefully inadequate prior to, and during the 1990s NATO intervention. His argument is not that international meddling caused the wars, but that international inaction and indifference actually allowed them to happen.

Western inaction?

In Postwar, he places responsibility for the Balkan Wars largely at the feet of Franjo Tudjman and Slobodan Milosevic, claiming of the latter that the wars that wracked the region for seven years were of his design. Judt applauds Tony Blair's eventual intervention in the conflict as necessary and morally courageous, and is excoriating in his criticism of French, Dutch and Danish peacekeepers for their alleged complicity in the Srebrenica Massacre.

Judt writes: "Outsiders did indeed contribute crucially to the country's tragedy, though mostly through irresponsible acquiescence in local crimes."(2)

In the opening chapter of his book The Age of Extremes, Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm makes a similar point when he recounts the visit by the elderly Francois Mitterrand to Sarajevo on June 28 1992. Hobsbawm points out that the world's media gave Mitterand plaudits for his visit, drawing attention to a conflict that was being largely ignored, whilst at the same time missing the significance of the date of his visit, the anniversary of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand - the event that triggered World War I. Mitterand's visit was an ominous warning to the world to intervene in the conflict, a message, according to Hobsbawm, that was delivered slightly too subtly. (3)

Both historians, approaching the conflict from subtly different ideological and historiographical perspectives seem to concur that inaction, as opposed to interference, was key.

Judt, in Postwar, questions why the path out of Communism to liberal democracy and free markets was so much more problematic for Yugoslavia than for other eastern bloc states like Czechoslovakia or Poland. (4)

He concludes that in Czechoslovakia and other former Communist states, few alternatives to free market economics and democratization existed, and there was an absence of ethnic division (or in Czechoslovakia's case it was a clear and easily resolvable one) to exploit. In the Balkans, the failure of Communism was followed by a retreat into ethnic nationalist politics, and given the intermingled nature of communities this was bound to result in conflict.

The US view

Judt argues that western indifference was fuelled by a media portrayal of the Balkans as a mystifying and impenetrable conflict, the kind that western states dislike engaging in, where a clear binary division between 'good' and 'bad' is impossible to establish. He quotes US Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, who said: "Until the Bosnians, Serbs and Croats decide to stop killing each other, there is nothing the outside world can do about it." (5)

America had recently washed clean the slate of national humiliation over Vietnam by successfully expelling Saddam Hussein from Kuwait in 1991. She had been determined not to become drawn into complicated and morally ambiguous ethnic conflicts within the multi-ethnic state of Iraq, and so did not advance into Iraqi territory.

The Clinton administration that would come to power in November 1992 inherited a strong foreign policy legacy from George Bush Senior and was not keen to be seen, as Democrat Presidents sometimes are, as committing US troops to unnecessary wars.

Judt claims that critics of the role of outside nations focus on the two centuries of imperial interventions in the Balkans, from nearly every major power in Europe and the Ottoman Empire. The role of Hans Dietrich Genscher, the German foreign minister in 1991, prematurely recognizing the independence of Slovenia and Croatia, was, according to the same audience, evidence of culpability. It was this action that encouraged Bosnia to do the same and risk intervention from Belgrade, thus commencing the bloodiest phase of the Balkan wars. (6)

Judt doesn't offer much in defense or condemnation of this perspective, though he does state that it fails to take into consideration the role of Yugoslavians themselves in the crisis, something he argues is far more important.

In the dominant anti-war narratives in the West, Yugoslavians are effectively edited out of the picture; whereas, according to Judt, their involvement in the tragedy of Yugoslavia was key. (7)

Eric Hobsbawm, in interviews with Antonio Polito in The New Century, discussed the eventual intervention in Bosnia by NATO, pointing out that part of the reason for the delay in acting and for the confusion over the nature of the mission was the uncharted political and diplomatic waters that the West was entering.

Hobsbawm cites the 'fusion of domestic and international politics' in the post-Cold War era, that made the mission's brief and its rules ambiguous and confused, thus adding to the reluctance of western nations to act. (8)

Western hesitation

It is possibly this reluctance, along with the disinterest cited by Judt that actually facilitated Milosevic's crimes, allowing him the luxury of knowing that any intervention would be a long time in coming.

Hobsbawm suggests that actual outside interference was relatively trivial in the breakup of Yugoslavia, stating that there were minor 'irredentist pressures' from Italy and Romania, seeking to claim territories lost throughout the course of the 20th Century. (9)

It seems highly doubtful that even these irredentist claims were serious or state led, perhaps more the demands of fringe nationalist parties and newspapers. Their overall effect was trivial compared to the forces within Yugoslavia that eventually tore the nation apart.

Hobsbawm disagrees that there was a real sense, prior to the 1990s, that Yugoslavia would break up. In his interviews with Polito, he claims there was no good reason to think the multiple ethnic state housing multiple nationalities would 'splinter as a result of the political pressure of its nations'. As with Judt, the explanation of internal nationalist tension is as inadequate for Hobsbawm as the explanation of external meddling. Both historians seem to agree that it was a toxic and violent part of the process of the end of Communism, a blood-letting that the USSR had largely been spared.

In The New Century, Hobsbawm states that Communism in Yugoslavia had not successfully penetrated people's lives in the way that religion might have; it simply prevented them from being motivated by other political ideas.

He said: "Where forms of nationalism had previously existed, they were obliged by history to fulfill a new, more powerful and more prominent role." (10)

One factor cited by both Judt and Hobsbawm in their writings that made intervention slow to materialize is a strange millennial historical amnesia that seems to have gripped the western world.

Judt, in his anthology of essays published in 2010, Reappraisals, wrote: "Not only did we fail to learn very much from the past...But we have become stridently insistent in our economic calculations, our political practices, our international strategies, even our educational priorities - that the past has nothing of interest to teach us. Ours, we insist, is a new world: its risks and opportunities are without precedent." (11)

New age. Forgotten past?

Judt's analysis of this particular aspect of western culture - the decline in our ability to think about the past - touches on a number of key areas of public discourse, one of which is foreign policy. Judt was making clear reference to the debacle of Anglo American policy that was Iraq, but also his perception of a sense of western amnesia that derives from the myopia exhibited by European and American powers over the Balkans.

Just as Mitterrand tried to ignite public memory in his visit to Sarajevo in 1995, Judt seems to lament our ability to see the historic dangers that emanate from the South Eastern corner of Europe.

Hobsbawm also makes similar statements about the phenomenon of forgetting in The Age of Extremes, stating that: "Most young men and women at the century's end grow up in a sort of permanent present, lacking any kind of organic relation to the public past of the times they live in... In 1989 all governments, and especially all Foreign Ministries, in the world would have benefitted from a seminar on the peace settlements, after the two world wars, which most of them had apparently forgotten." (12)

Hobsbawm clearly makes reference here to the missed opportunities for global security at the end of the Cold War and the making of a stable and comprehensive world order after Communism. Much of this obviously relates to the failure to help Soviet Russia to adapt from a command economy and a one party state, but also part of the West's failings after 1989 were to deal with the crises afflicting the states created during and after 1919. A clearer understanding of the consequences of Versailles, Lausanne, Sevres and Triannon might, in Hobsbawm's opinion, have motivated the West to act differently when the Balkan Wars began.

Slobodan Milosevic – his role

For Judt, the real culprit is Milosevic, and he explicitly blames him in Postwar not just for the destruction of Bosnia Herzegovina in 1992, but for the other Balkan Wars as well. However, Judt does not follow a narrow 'great man' version of history.

The circumstances in which Milosevic was able to create a series of wars in the Balkans result from the end of the Communist state and the failure of liberal democratic institutions to take root in Belgrade or in the other capitals of the region. Whilst countries like Poland assumed that the de facto alternative to membership of the Warsaw Pact was not necessarily embracing free market American capitalism, but acceptance into the EU, the Yugoslavs were not presented with anything like as compelling an opportunity. Whilst Poland's accession to the EU might have been credible, it seemed utterly inconceivable in 1992 that Bosnia, Serbia, Slovenia or any of the other former Yugoslav states would be invited to join. This played neatly into the hands of Balkan nationalist’s intent on territorial acquisition, as it made aggressive nationalism the only viable replacement as an alternative to Communism.

Hobsbawm's argument that the lessons of other failed and partially successful attempts to win the peace after winning the wars should be observed by world leaders is particularly relevant here.

Versailles and the Balkans

In his 1920 Economic Consequences Of The Peace, John Maynard Keynes led a withering attack on the failure at Versailles to address any of the most pressing concerns of post war Europe, but it might well have been written for Eastern Europe in 1989. He said: "The Treaty includes no provision for the economic rehabilitation of Europe - nothing to make the defeated Central Powers into good neighbors, nothing to stabilize the new States of Europe...It is an extraordinary fact that the fundamental economic problem of a Europe starving and disintegrating before their eyes...and they settled it from every point of view except that of the economic future of the States whose destiny they were handling." (13)

Keynes attacked the myopic folly of Britain and France, knowing that the excluded, marginalized and ignored states of Europe, and the vanquished Germans, would not allow the Allies their triumphalism for long.

Keynes fear, along with a minority of the British establishment, had been of a resentful, resurgent Germany, able to profit from an unstable Europe where acute national questions had gone unresolved.

Unlike the case of Germany, there was no fear in the minds of post-Cold War planners that rogue states like Serbia would have grand continental wide ambitions and succeed in implementing them as Germany did. Milosevic did not have his equivalent of Weltpolitik; instead he was content to re-establish medieval Serbian borders and become a regional, rather than a continental, hegemon. At the same time, however, Yugoslavia was wedged between a liberal democratic western and now central Europe, allied under NATO, and with an EU membership rapidly expanding eastwards, and a post-Soviet Russian Federation, struggling to re-assert itself as a world power. Therefore the great danger was not that, left to their own devices the Serbs might build a vast arsenal and attack the West, but that interfering in their affairs could bring the confrontation that both sides in the Cold War had worked hard to avoid for fifty years. The other possibility was that of being dragged into a multi-ethnic conflict where all sides were guilty of war crimes, and whoever the West backed would be morally tainted in some way. There was the (later realized) fear that the war would often be fought by irregular troops, while America and Britain were particularly hesitant about being drawn into conflicts that were difficult to extricate themselves from owing to the lack of a clear exit strategy.

A map of the states of the former Yugoslavia in 2008.

In conclusion….

Seen in this context, some of the criticism leveled by Judt and Hobsbawm at the western allies might be judged as unfair. Did they really suffer from a lack of historical insight, or had the lessons of countless internecine conflicts across the globe in the 20th century been learned? Was Eagleburger actually correct when he stated that NATO was powerless?

Could the West have seized the post-Cold War initiative, and offered a new European settlement likely to lead to peace and security, as was created in Vienna in 1815, Berlin in 1876, Versailles in 1918, and at Yalta and Potsdam in 1945? The sudden collapse of Communism, and the lack of the experience of warfare amongst the populations of Europe probably made this impossible, especially if one considers the still fiercely insular and nationalistic Russian Federation.

There was little on offer to the Serbs in 1992 other than Milosevic and his brand of violent irredentist nationalism, and western military planners distanced themselves from the conflict, looking upon it as Communism's tragic 'fall out'.

Both Judt and Hobsbawm are right to suggest that many Serb crimes were facilitated or exacerbated by NATO forces who stood by as killings took place. Srebrenica is the clearest example of this, but again, this is due to an inability of western powers to find a clear and cohesive strategy to deal with the complexities of the Balkan Wars. NATO-led and then UN-led troops allowed massacres to happen (and this phenomenon is not just limited to the Balkans), because of a fear that the nations that had committed them would become fully involved in a conflict they had little, if anything, really invested in.

Both Judt and Hobsbawm make clear points that dismiss the more conspiratorial arguments that the West planned to destroy Yugoslavia and worked to undermine it, but the argument that NATO was slow to act often fails to accommodate the scale of the problem Europe and America were presented with.

The fact that intervention took place at all, that it was as successful as it was, and that there was a clear exit strategy, is perhaps the most surprising aspect to the Balkan Wars.

International action, in the final analysis, did little to cause the Balkan Wars. Those actions which can be seen as contributory are, as both historians argue, acts of omission, not commission. The acts of commission by the West are those, ultimately, that brought the Balkan Wars to a close.

Do you agree with the conclusion about the West’s impact in the 1990s conflicts in the Balkans?

By Nick Shepley

The author runs the site www.explaininghistory.com, a site that has a wide selection of interesting 20th century history ebooks.

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References

Footnotes

1) Judt, 11-14

2) Judt, 665

3) Hobsbawm, 2-3

4) Judt, 672

5) Judt, 666

7) Judt, 665

8) Hobsbawm,19

9) Hobsbawm, 24

10) Hobsbawm, 24

11) Judt, 2

12) Hobsbawm, 3

13) Keynes, 43

Bibliography

Judt, Tony. "The Way Things Are and How They Might Be." London Review of Books. 23 Mar 2010: Ex: 11-14. Web. 14 Oct. 2012. http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n06/contents.

Judt , Tony. Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945. 2nd. London: Vintage, 2010. 665. Print.

Judt, Tony. Reappraisals: Reflections on the forgotten 20th Century. 2nd. London, Vintage 2010: 2. Print

Hobsbawm, Eric. The Age of Extremes. 3rd. London: TSP, 1996. 6. Print.

Hobsbawm, Eric. The New Century. 1st. London: Little Brown, 2000. 19. Print.

Keynes, John Maynard. The Economic Consequences of the Peace. 12th. London: Bloomsbury, 1971. 43. Print.