LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE ATTITUDE OF GREECE.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'SPECTATOR.']
agree so heartily with most of your views on the Eastern Question, that I am sorry to see what I think an unfair estimate of Greek neutrality in your article of last Saturday on Mr.
Forster's speech. You speak of "the deliberate neglect of their duty shown by the Greeks of the Kingdom and the people of Thessaly and Epirus "in not declaring war on Turkey three
months ago." Now, as an old Philhellene, I should have been glad to see the Greeks taking a glorious part in this struggle against Turkish despotism. But it seemed that their geographical position made it almost madness to move, until Servia should have achieved some decided success. Leaving aside the danger of English interference, there was a powerful Turkish fleet, under Hobart Pasha, ready to destroy Greek commerce and to burn the Greek seaports, should the little kingdom venture itself openly against the Porte. Greece had no army sufficiently strong to cut its way to the rear of the Turkish forces operating against Servia, and so to effect a serious diversion in favour of General Tcher- nayeff, whilst the Greek seaboard is terribly exposed to naval war- fare. I doubt whether the intervention of Greece last July would have been of much use by land, and it certainly would have en- tailed on the Greeks heavy losses by water. The days of clumsy Turkish liners flying from fire-ships, or afraid to put to sea be- cause of bad weather, are gone for ever. We have a skilful Eng- lishman in command of splendid, English built ironclads, to de- fend the Sultan's authority in the Levant, and unless Greece had five times her present navy, she could make no head against Hobart Pasha.
As to Hellenic jealousy of the Sclavs, there is some truth in what you say. Greece would be sorry to see Constantinople in the hands of a Power from whom she could never hope to win it back, and many Greeks remember with bitterness that when Crete was struggling desperately against Turkey in 1867, the Servians obtained an evacuation of their fortresses by the Turks as a reward for keeping quiet. Nevertheless, there is a strong feeling in Greece at this moment in favour of Servia, and if King George possessed as large an army as Prince Milan, his subjects would clamour for immediate war. The fact is, that whilst Servia has imitated the Prussian system to the extent of arming and training a great portion of her fighting-men, the Greeks have, like ourselves, been averse to bear such heavy sacri- fices in time of peace, and are, of course, unable to extemporise a complete military organisation. I say nothing about Russian volunteers, in comparing Greece with Servia, but merely take the two countries as they stood at the beginning of July ; the one could, and did, tax the whole strength of Turkey to resist her, whilst the other would hardly have been ready to take the field with 30,000 men by the end of September, and would meanwhile have suffered three months of ruinous blockade and bombard- ment, which would have effectually crippled her resources.—I am,
Previous page
