RUSSIA AND GERMANY, AT CONSTANTINOPLE.
MHANOTAUX may well express, as we take it • from his speech he intended to express, a serious doubt as to the maintenance of peace. There is no certainty that it will be maintained even between Turkey and Greece, and there is a dangerous rift becoming perceptible in the understanding between the three Imperial Powers. The military party, which is for the moment dominant at Constantinople, is evidently highly excited by its easy victory over Greece, and is pressing the Sultan to insist on being allowed to claim the "just reward" of his many victories. His Majesty vacillates after his fashion between two fears, fear of his Generals, and fear of Russia; but intermediately he yields to the military party, and is filling European Turkey with troops. He is said to have already one hundred and ten thousand men in Thessaly, and every correspondent notices that the despatch of reinforcements to Macedonia, drawn from every part of Asiatic and African Turkey, never ceases. It is asserted, and seems true, that the Sultan will shortly have three hundred thousand men in Europe, independent of the scattered garrisons in Asia, and of the very good, though smaller, army which watches the Armenian frontier, while of munitions and rough food there appears to be no lack. The traditional system of supply reorganised by German advisers appears to be working as well as it worked in the days when the Ottoman Army could. be mobilised as swiftly as a brigade. It is perfectly possible that when the armistice expires on June 5th, Edbem Pasha may receive orders to advance on Athens, and possible also that the Sultan, declaring himself " unjustly " treated by Europe, or treated with un- becoming hauteur, may state his minimum demands, and his intention until they are granted of retaining Thessaly and Crete as " material guarantees." This, as we understand the situation, is the counsel of the military party, who desire, above all things, to shake off the " European fetter," and who, though they have not the power to change the dynasty, which is protected by an Ottoman superstition, have the power, if driven to extremities, to change the immediate occupant of the throne. If the ultimate decision at Yildiz Kiosk should. be to adopt an attitude of complete independence—and even Abd-ul- Hamid has bursts of military pride—the situation would become very serious indeed.
The Russian Emperor has evidently made up his mind to protect Greece if he can. This is clear from the telegram to the Sultan, which we now suspect was made flattering in order to weigh with Abd-ul-Hamid personally as against his military counsellors, and from the really adroit offer to pay a heavy indemnity for Greece out of the money still owing by Turkey to Russia for the indemnity promised in 1878. Turkey cannot say that this is a bad asset, for it is her own bond, while Greece would be relieved, the Czar not expecting to get the whole of the sum which nominally will be owing to him. He will not press Greece any more than he has pressed Constantinople, except at moments when it is convenient to himself. He will thus retain a right of menacing Turkey, for twenty millions or so will still remain owing, and of controlling Athens, where financial considerations are apt to overpower all others. The Sultan, however, who wants cash, is sure to reject this proposal, and when he has rejected it the Russian statesmen will be aware of two disagreeable facts, —that they cannot protect Greece peacefully, and that their vassal is slipping out of their hands. They have reckoned on ruling Turkey through its Sultan, and the Sultan will be bidding them, doubtless under flattering formulas, something like open defiance. That is very disagreeable not only to the Russian statesmen, but to their people, who are not anxious, if Greece is submissive, to crush co- religionists, and who regard the ascendency of the Czar over the Sultan as the most necessary factor in their per- manent position. How, if the Sultan is defiant, is Russia ever to reach open water? It will be almost imperative on the Russian Emperor to recover his ascendency at Yildiz Kiosk, if only for the sake of his amour propre, and it is hard to see how he could recover it except by war, by urging on Bulgaria, which is the same thing, or by menaces before which even the military party at Constan- tinople would retreat. His Majesty may be devoted to peace, and reluctant beyond measure to disturb it, but he cannot sit there a patient recipient of snubs from the Turkish Sultan. He is the head, remember, of a great mili- tary Monarchy, es-officio protector of the Greek Christians, and heir in reversion, as his subjects believe, of the whole Turkish Empire. So long as the Sultan takes his orders all is well, but if the Sultan or his successor revolts it is unreasonable to expect the house of Romanoff to act on a meek policy at variance with its whole history.
In the event of any real quarrel between Russia and Turkey—and any assertion of independence by the Porte would involve a real quarrel — the point of interest for Europe would be the attitude of the German Em- peror. Guided by ideas to which we do not profess to have the key—for we regard the notion that he is seeking profitable concessions for his subjects as unbecoming to the Emperor's dignity—he is clearly protecting Turkey in a way for which A.bd-ul-Hamid feels much gratitude. He is always the last to assent to any coercive " representation " to the Sultan ; he always contends in the Concert for " justice " to Turkey ; and he has offered " advice" which Abd-ul-Hamid finds so acceptable that he has telegraphed his warmest thanks and asked for more, which may en- able him to assert his right of reaping the reward of his victories. Now how far will William II. go in that direction ? Most reasonable men in this country would reply, " No distance at all," and would expect his Majesty, once aware that war was likely to arise from the quarrel between Turkey and Russia, to advise the Sultan to give way. His object, he says, is peace. He seeks a good understanding with Russia, and it is exceedingly difficult to see what Turkey could do for Germany which would be worth broken bones to a single Pomeranian grenadier. Industrial concessions in Anatolia will not make Germany rich or exorcise the demon which resides in the Socialist party. Nevertheless it is quite clear that William II. is favouring the Turk, that the German Ambassador markedly separates himself from the other five, and that the Sultan trusts Berlin as he does not trust either St. Petersburg or Vienna. Is it quite impossible that the Ger- man Staff, who know the high value of Ottoman troops, and who weigh policy by brigades, and not by" sentimental" considerations, may think that war with Russia is almost inevitable, and that the safest occasion for it would be one when the help of the Ottoman Army would paralyse two or three hundred thousand Russian soldiers ? Austria must obey the signal from Berlin or stand dangerously isolated, and the three Powers together, with some support from Italy, would be terrible antagonists even for Russia and France. We seem to remember offers of definite guarantees for Turkey if only Turkey would join the Triple Alliance, and Turkey had not then been revived as it is now. There is no proof, of course, that the German Emperor contemplates any plan so dangerous and so far-reaching ; but there is a chance, if he does not, that Austria and Russia might come to an understanding which would isolate Germany, and there is the fact, revealed in every telegram, that the German Emperor is pursuing in Turkey some object which is not that of the Concert, and which can hardly be a small one. It is asserted, no doubt, that his delays, and his demands for detail, and his apparent desire that Greece should be crushed, are all produced by the great wish to be important in the world, which is a permanent note of his. character ; but the explanation is, we think, a little unjust to a man who dreams truly, but dreams of great adventures. At all events there is the broad fact that, at a moment when the Russian Emperor is most awkwardly situated• as regards Turkey, when, in truth, he has considerable reason to expect resistance from Turkey, the German Emperor carefully, and even ostentatiously, poses as the- Sultan's friend. That is a situation which has not arisen in Europe before, and to suppose that it has no meaning and will have no consequences is a little incon- siderately optimist. A Power like Turkey, which relies avowedly upon the sabre's edge, is never quite the same before and after victory, and the Sultan's advisers, if really elated. enough to disregard " advice " from St. Petersburg, can place the Russian Court in a rather humiliating, if not a quite unendurable, position. Nations have national interests which are not changeable ; and the Russians, who have been struggling with the Ottoman tribe, at all events since the days of Peter the Great, or for two clear centuries—his first Turkish War ended 1696—are not in the least likely to regard a genuine revival of Turkey with equanimity, or even tolerance.
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