A New Balkan Nation May Save Europe's Peace.

New York Times 100 years ago today, November 3, 1912:
Prince Lazarovich Hrebelianovich, Well-known Servian Authority, Says the Defeat of Turkey Would Restore Quiet on What Has Been a Battle Ground for Centuries.By Edward Marshall.
    Will the present Balkan war be the last of centuries of fighting and mark the beginning of a new, united and strong Nation in the place of the divided "buffer states" which separate Europe from Asia?
    The other day I talked with Prince and Princess Lazarovich Hrebelianovich of Servia, who had paused here in a homeward flight, having rushed across the continent at news of the outbreak of hostilities. The Prince, the most eminent living author upon the history of his country and the general Balkan situation, as well as a trained soldier with more than one campaign to look back on, is 47 years old. His very beautiful wife, the Princess, great-grandniece of the illustrious American statesman, John C. Calhoun, is the daughter of the late Judge E. E. Calhoun of California and Laura Davis Calhoun, author of well-known biological works.
    Prince Lazarovich looks every inch the soldier, is blonde, rugged-faced and athletic, and ten years younger in appearance than his biography would indicate. His career has been stormy. He entered active political life in 1893, with a campaign against Kings Alexander and Milan of Servia, based on the secret treaty King Milan had made with Austria, a country which Prince Lazarovich regards with much suspicion. He was closely connected with the formation of the Macedonian Committees for the release of Macedonian Christians from Turkish rule, and was founder of the Paris Committee in 1894, and later of the London Committee. In 1903-4 he had charge of the negotiations with the Turkish Government for financial and agrarian reforms on behalf of the Macedonian insurgents. He was active in the efforts which led to the foundation of the Servian Export Bank; he conceived the project and planned for the construction of a continuous waterway, through Servia and Turkey, from the Danube to the Aegean Sea by a canal between two partly navigable rivers. This will complete the great European waterway system and shorten the water route from the Baltic and North Seas to the Eastern Mediterranean by 1,500 miles. The works of preliminary survey were conducted, in 1907-10, at his own expense.
    But in his heart the Prince holds all other work subordinate to that of the unification of the Servian race and the creation of a great Servian state which will be forever free from Turkish rule — Old Servia, Macedonia, and other Servian countries.
    As an author he has produced, in collaboration with his brilliant wife, "The Servian People," in two volumes, English, published both in England and the United Stales and the standard work upon the subject. He has contributed to the periodicals of many countries; He speaks and writes practically every modern European and some Oriental languages, and another important work of his, "The Orient Question," dealing with the problems of "near eastern" Asia, the Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico, is now upon the press.
    He has traveled in all parts of the world, has achieved notability as an African explorer, and is a member of the Academia Nacional de is Historia of Venezuela.
    Both Prince and Princess are like characters from fiction, and their lives are so full of fascinating episodes that they can but seem to ordinary folk almost unreal. The Prince has given his life effort and three fortunes to his country's cause; the devotion of the Princess is as great now as his own.
    "Austria, at least, fears Servian victory in the existing conflicts," said he, "not because she loves Turkey, but because she has no wish to have a strong, coherent country substituted for the present weak, divided Balkan States. Whichever power dominates the Servian plateau dominates the Balkans. When Turkey conquered it, it needed one more battle, the battle of Mollacs, only, to take the Turk before the walls of Vienna. Again the Servian plateau commands the Dardanelles, which again makes it the crux. And so the present war is really of vast importance, and may very greatly change the future history of Europe.
    "Italy's war, which she has just concluded, was to get another naval base as a protection in case of war with Austria. Her suzerainty over Tripoli was a necessity.
    "And so the Balkan problem is now, as it has been of late years, the fight of the allied powers for the strategic position of the Servian plateau. None of them wants a Balkan nation of importance, yet that is what all Christendom should pray for. Up to now England has supported the Turk because his presence in Constantinople on one side and in Salonika on another, in the Servian plateau at the centre, (that is, in Novi-Bazar,) acts as a buffer to protect the Suez Canal against any other European aggression. Russia very badly wants control of all the Balkan States for the sake of the Dardanelles and the Suez water route. Austria's anxiety is born of greed, a hunger for aggrandizement. The Servian plateau would give her Constantinople, Salonika, and the Mediterranean. Control of Novi-Bazar would insure eventual sovereignty over the Balkan States. There has never been a time when more hung on a 'little war.' Complete Servian victory can really advance the cause of progress.
    "The solution of the riddle which is now presented is quite simple. Paraphrase Gladstone and make the cry. 'The Balkans for the Balkans,' and you will have formed a watchword which will stand for everything which ought to happen. None of the big powers should have the Servian plateau. If it should come under any one of the big three contending, it would give that power the dominance over the connecting link between the East and West. Napoleon said: 'Who has Constantinople rules the world.' Who gets the Balkans now will have tremendous power, which is certain not to be used entirely for good.
    "Control of Servia by Austria would be a world disaster, which can scarcely be avoided if Servia is now interfered with and not permitted to go on and whip the Turks. Should Austria thus come down, Russia would begin perpetual warfare, fighting, fighting, fighting till she gained her end — and should she gain it, there would remain nothing to hold her out of Germany, which would be as great a world calamity. Should Austria win, there would remain nothing to keep her from the Persian Gulf and Suez.
    "It is because of these two dangers that England has maintained the status quo, while the blood of at least 30,000 Armenians, slaughtered in religious warfare of Mohammedans against Christianity, has cried in vain for vengeance.
    "The world has never seen a situation like it. Statesmen, with their arguments; diplomacy, and treaties, cannot solve the difficulty; the Balkans, as they are, are a constant threat against world-peace, and nothing can remove this threat except the retention of their plateau by the Servians, and their combination with the Bulgarians and Greeks in the division of the Peninsula. That would make a really formidable buffer state — one strong enough so that neither Austria, Russia, nor England would care to undertake its conquest.
    "No one would be harmed by the creation of this state, no one would be menaced. It would mean a great advance for Europe as a whole. War clouds would disappear as if by magic. We would know Europe as the old lady who had lost her asthma. It would make the vast armaments of to-day unreasonable and silly. It would alter the whole perilous situation.

Four Great Interests.
    "There are, at present, four spheres of influence in the Balkans — Servian, Greek, Bulgar, and a fourth where the lines of delimitation between the peoples are not clear and might bring about a quarrel. This is put aside for common administration, according to a generally accepted programme, and thus it would cease to be a bone of contention.
    "The advantages to Europe of Servian victory would be of many sorts. The confederation of the Balkan States would be for common defense, which would make it too strong to war against; it would mean common customs laws, which would enormously affect trade for good; a common economic development, with the chairmanship in the hands of one or the other of the rulers, would be rapid and to the vast advantage not only of the States themselves but of the world at large, and, especially, contiguous territory in both Europe and Asia,
    "Common administration of the one zone where interests overlap would do away with rivalry in it. The other zones would be administered according to the method logically indicated by their present status."
    "How strong would the united nations be?"
    "Not weak; we would be strong enough to make us safe from the attack of any one. Greece would give us 2,500,000, Bulgaria would give us 4,000,000, Servia would give us 3,000,000, and Turkish territory would contribute 4,500,000, a total, you will see, of 14,000,000, with Montenegro's 200,000 for good measure.
    "How admirable would it be if, through such a plan, this region should be brought to peace and made the peacemaker of Europe. It has been in turmoil, it has been the battlefield of Europe for 500 years, and when not the actual battlefield, a threat."

Valor of the Servians.
    "Are the Servians good fighters?"
    "It was of them," the Prince replied, "that Gladstone said on Oct. 18, 1895: 'In my deliberate opinion their military exploits exceed in glory those of Marathon and Thermopylae, and all the war traditions of the world.'
    "It is because we Serbs were given by God the dominant strategic position in the Balkan Peninsula, because He made us guardians and keepers of this great gateway, that we have been denominated as barbarians and irresponsibles. The Turks have ever been at work in an endeavor to destroy us. Moslemism has wrecked its own country and is striving to wreck ours. The Moslem statutes have degraded every state over which they have achieved control. Constitutionalism and parliaments cannot exist in a Moslem country. The massacre is a tenet of Moslem government.
    "When Abdul Hamid became Sultan he owed his life to a relative of mine, who was the intimate friend and adviser of his father. This father hated Abdul Hamid and wished to have him killed because of a persistent rumor that he was not his son. It seems to me, as I look back at recent history, that by the preservation of Abdul Hamid's life my relative lost a tremendous opportunity for service to the human race."
    "But the Young Turks have now given Turkey a constitution?"
    "Constitutionalism in a Moslem country is impossible," said the Prince, "A Moslem State is a theocracy, and in a theocracy a Christian could not possibly have rights. Even by Mohammedans, in a country like Persia, which is wholly Mohammedan, a progressive act cannot be made into a real law by a simple parliamentary decision. After Parliament has expressed its will, the Sheik-ul-Islam, who is the head expounder of the law, must pass on it, deciding whether or not that law is in accordance with the sacred law or chery, written 1,200 years ago.
    "If he does not like the act, it is easy for him to discover some detail of that ancient law which he can use as an excuse for disapproving it.
    "Much can be done with those old Moslem laws. Their logic is far different from ours. Mohammed forbids pork and fermented drinks, therefore to eat the one and drink the other is a sin. Being sin, how can these two acts be made evidences of the highest devotion to religion — when the Moslem thirsts for wine and hungers for roast pig? Very simply. In Islam there are acts called sins and acts called virtues. Ranking these are acts called greater sins and greater virtues. Among the greatest of all virtues is the preservation of one's own life. Abstinence from pork and wine is minor virtue. Therefore, if a Turk can place himself so that he can twist up a necessity for drinking wine and eating pork, in order to preserve his life, he can at once satisfy his carnal appetites and achieve the highest virtue.
    "This gives the key to the whole conduct of affairs among the Turks. Their laws leave everything in the hands of the religious leader. He can find Justification for any act which he desires to justify; he can find a prohibition of anything he wishes to prohibit. It gives the religious leaders absolute control of the fanatical and ignorant populace, making a constitution really impossible. By the fact that it becomes an article of faith, all law in Turkey is religious, therefore, to run counter to any law means to go into a fierce perdition far more terrible than Christian prophets ever managed to predict for sinners.
    "These things being true, how can a constitutional regime be possible in a Mohammedan country? The expounder has studied the Koran constantly from early youth. He knows its possibilities of interpretation. He has a horror of all change. Such has been the story of Persia; such will be the story of Turkey to the end of Moslemism. Mohammedanism is not, in the sense in which we use the word 'religion,' a religion at all. It is not wholly, or even principally, made up of sentiment. It has, indeed, been so overgrown with interpretations that it is a hindrance rather than a help to rightful living.
    "When, in 1876, Abdul Hamid came to the throne, the Sultan, because of his progressive thought, was more or less excommunicated by the orthodox Mohammedans; but the weakness of the Turkish Empire had become dangerous, and it became necessary in some way to weld Islamism together. The British, finding in Islam a sword with which to fight Russia, brought the Mohammedans of India nearer to the Sultan. Abdul Hamid found much resistance to his pretensions of being the khalifa, especially from the Shiek El Senoussi, whose stronghold is at Djerbouh, an oasis at the Egyptian-Tripolitan border. The influence of the holy brotherhood of Senoussis is great throughout all Islam, and the Shiek called Abdul Hamid a 'Sultan gjour' — one who sympathises with Christians. "It was, therefore, necessary for Abdul Hamid to do something by means of which he might restore the waning confidence of Islam, and — the Armenian massacres were his pledge that, in truth, he was the real khalifa and not under Western influence. Massacres in Mohammedan eyes, are merely a means of discipline, by which the fact is demonstrated that the Moslem is the master and the Christian is his slave.
    "When the Young Turks did the same in European Turkey after 1908 — under the régime of the Turkish Constitution — it was because they wished to show to the Christian subjects of Turkey that the Turkish Constitution was a mere device to bunco Europe and was not to be taken seriously by their Christian subjects. That Constitution guaranteed their right to vote, but did not protect them from the death which certainly would follow their exercise of suffrage.

True Story of Turkish Revolution.
    "The true story of the Turkish Revolution, according to what was told to me by men who are to be believed and who ought to know, does not seem even to have been dreamed of in the European and American press. It was the greatest confidence game with which the statesmen of all Europe ever have been victimized. It was supposed and believed to have been directed against Abdul Hamid — as a matter of fact, it was his creation. During the second revolution the Young Turks got a little out of hand, almost beyond his control, but all the tales of his imprisonment and that sort of thing were fakes, pure and simple.
    "There is a theory, which I have reason to believe is accurate, that during the time while Abdul Hamid was supposed to be in durance at the Villa Allatini, at Salonika, the real government of Turkey, the so-called Committee of Union and Progress, held meetings in a house near by. The movements of that mysterious real government were a puzzle to the world. I think the truth of this has not been told before.
    "There is a theory which I cannot advance as truth, but which has some supporters of importance and good knowledge, that Abdul Hamid was actually the head of the 'Committee of Progress and Union' — the committee which was supposed to be most potent in devising means toward his downfall. Many evidences are undoubtedly in existence pointing to the truth of this, but I can advance it only as a theory." After these amazing statements with reserve concerning the great Turkish "revolution," the Prince and Princess bore me off to a late luncheon, and on our return to their apartment we talked again of Servia.

Princess Talks of Servia.
    "Unprogressive?" said the Princess. "The Servians have worked out the problem of co-operation, as it has not been worked out in the United States or in any European country. They have no beggars. There is no utterly neglected suffering in Servia. Every man has his home. It may be a small house, but it is home. The hospitals are free to the rich as well as to the poor." She laughed. Then, very seriously: "It is a communism tempered by individualism. The Servians bind themselves in groups. So far from being barbarous territories, the Balkan States have solved many problems which are still puzzling the balance of the world.
    "The plan may properly be called communistic on one side and individualistic on the other. Each individual owes the community a certain amount of work, and in the results of that labor the community shares. Young and old — all have their tasks. But the moment an individual has finished his community task, which never is too onerous, he has the right to work as hard and long and cleverly as possible for his own individual interests.
    "He can raise his level, he can lower it, his identity is not swallowed up. Some of the industrial groups are wonderful. There is the carpet-weaving community at Perot. The groups live simply and make so many carpets that it is necessary to employ a community appraiser, who values them. When one of the workers has accomplished the manufacture of his alloted value, he is quite free to occupy himself with any other trade, producing, thus, a surplus income, for his alloted carpet making is sufficient to supply all his wants. Because of these and other details of Servia's industrial life, there is no poverty in Servia. Nicola Tesla, your great electrical inventor, is a child of a community of this sort.
    "The Serbs are an ancient and a cultured people. Elena, Queen of Italy, was of unmixed Servian blood, and was celebrated as 'stately, beautiful, and just.' She was no exception, but a type of Servian womanhood. From the most ancient times the Serbs organized in communities of blood relationship. Their landed property was the hereditary possession of the community and was worked in common. The right recognized was to plant where one had cleared and to reap where one had sown. The great migration of the Serb people into the Balkan provinces occurred as long ago as 600 A.D., which surely now gives them the right of ownership, after 1,800 years.
    "Class distinctions, due to organization for their wars of defense, never brought about in Servia the domination of one class over another. The democratic principle of equality between man and man, regardless of place and caste, has never been deserted, but has always been preserved by means of representative governing bodies. The Serbs were the first people to put 'judgment by a man's peers,' in other words, the jury system, into effect. Three articles of the code give to the meanest subject the right to sue the sovereign or any other executive agent in the courts of justice and make it a duty of the Judge to see to the execution of the judgment rendered. The claimant must be protected by the Judge against revengeful acts of a defendant, be he the sovereign or commoner.
    "It was in 1413 that the southern provinces yielded to the Turks, Servia in 1439, Bosnia in 1463, and Herzegovina in 1481. Since then they have been ruled by the sword in an organized theocracy. But Mohammedanism is not a religion in the true sense of the word, devoted mostly to moral and spiritual growth and the quest for immortality. It is a state of society, founded on laws governing every act of human life, individual and public. So whether Islam is recognized or not, no other civil status is tolerated, save in subordination.
    "This has meant a sort of slavery, and has aroused my keenest sympathies and indignation, as it should those of every true American man and woman.
    "The conquered nations were disarmed and deprived of all property. Their people were made serfs under Turkish masters and known as 'Rayah' — the herd. The only means of escaping serfdom lay in renouncing Christianity and embracing Moslemism. They mostly refused. History offers no finer example of devotion to a faith.

Rigor of Turkish Rule.
    "Christians were refused the use of horses or camels, being permitted to use only mules and asses, which they were not allowed to ride in the presence of a Turk. That their houses should be of an inferior appearance was an order. Their Christian clergy were kept in a miserable condition; they were not permitted to rebuild destroyed churches or read the Holy Scripture; the pronunciation of the name of Jesus Christ was made excuse for severe punishment; Christians could not openly bury their dead, but were forced to do it secretly at night; mourning for Christian dead by costume, by symbol, or in any other way, was prohibited. It was not lawful to show a cross or make the sign of the cross, or to eat pork in the sight of a Turk.
    "The chastity of Serb women was, of course, as little respected by the conquerors as the rights of the Serb people or the ideals of the Serb religion. Is it a wonder that the Serbs fled when they could? Those who took refuge in the mountains became the most expert mountain fighters which the world has ever known.
    "Austria served the Serbs but little better than the Turks did. In 1689 she promised fine things to those who helped her fight, but the promises were lies and the Serbs were left to Turkish fury, or, fleeing to Austria, there found worse misery than they bad known before.
    "Bosnia-Herzegovina became an Austrian province in 1878 and gained little by the change. From 1880 to the present time Montenegro, which consists largely of inaccessible heights harboring fine fighting men, has been at peace with Turkey — a peace proclaimed only after its civilization had deteriorated through constant war.
    "To review other details of Servian history would be but to repeat a tale of struggle often defeated but never acknowledging defeat; a struggle in which men, women, and children joined and in which the enemy was not always Turkish. To come down to recent years, influenced by Austria, King Milan of Servia declared war on Bulgaria in 1885. It ended in a drawn battle. Then the domestic quarrels of Queen Natalie and King Milan took precedence over politics until the humiliating spectacle of their divorce. Milan abdicated in 1889, and a regency rule for his minor son, Alexander, full of disorder ensued until in 1893 Alexander achieved a coup-d'état by declaring himself of age and ended the regency.
    "In the final years of the nineteenth century Servia reopened schools which had been closed since the Turkish war of 1876-78, and real progress began. A revival of national feeling was evidenced by a remarkable organization known as the 'Servian Brothers,' and followed by the closing of Austrian borders to Servian produce.
    "King Milan returned from Paris to support Alexander and helped form a Cabinet which lasted from 1897 to July, 1900, and then came more scandals and the betrothal of King Alexander to Mme. Draga Lounyevitza, who, in reduced circumstances, had become lady-in-waiting to Queen Natalie and was thrown much in the King's company. There was much opposition to the marriage, but it restored good feeling with the Russians, while the Western European press began a campaign of calumny against the new Queen who had been drawn into a net of intrigue.

Assassination of King and Queen.
    "In 1901 Alexander promulgated a new constitution, framed by the representatives of all political parties, but elections were corrupt and the people lost patience. There was a general desire to end the reign which for twenty years had humiliated Servia, and on the night of June 11, 1903, a committee of conspirators shot King Alexander and Queen Draga, the Prime Minister, the Minister of War, an aid de camp of the King, and two brothers of the Queen.
    "Prince Peter Karageorgevich was proclaimed and shortly afterward elected King Peter I. of Servia. Then came general improvement until in 1904 Austria-Hungary again closed her borders against Servian products. Since then there have been continual tariff wars, but the newly energetic Servian Government has established new outlets for Servian products in Egypt, Italy, France, England, and elsewhere, and there has been a general betterment in the Servian condition.
    "A determined national movement for the accomplishment of racial ideals and liberty has risen throughout all Serb lands. In Croatia, Southern Hungary, and Bosnia-Herzegovina this impulse has met with severe repressive measures, by prosecutions and persecutions in Croatia and by terrorism in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The year 1908 began with the statement that Austria-Hungary would construct a railroad through Novi-Bazar, that strip which separates the two Servian States. That railroad, to connect existing lines going to Salonika, was recognized as purely strategic and a menace to both Servia and Turkey.
    "In the Spring of the same year occurred the European visits of King Edward VII. to France, Austria, and Russia, made in the interests of the Delcassé policy of isolating Germany and to further plans for the division of Turkey. But Abdul Hamid again outwitted Europe with the Young Turks and the supposed revolution against him, which he himself operated, and on July 24, 1908, and in July, in supposed answer to demands of the Young Turks, gave the Ottoman Empire a constitution.
    "With the violation of the Berlin Treaty by the seizure of Servian lands of Bosnia-Herzegovina began Austria's violent campaign against Servia and Montenegro, aimed at securing pretext for invasion and occupation. This was not only a blow to Serb sentiment, but a menace to Servian liberty. Every man was ready for war. Then the Servians formed a coalition Cabinet of the best men of all parties under the old statesman and historian, Stoyan Novakovich. A military convention was concluded with Montenegro, and both parties began war preparations along modern lines with feverish haste. Thus and through skillful avoidance of traps by Minister Milanovich the Servian State was saved from Austrian invasion, and, although possibly she did not know it, prepared for the existing war. A new, a strong, and infinitely useful Balkan nation may now be held assured, no matter what trend affairs may take.
    "Since 1909 Servia has progressed along all lines, and to-day her victorious armies will soon be before Salonika. A Greater Servia, therefore, already has been born. Last Sunday, the 27th, the Servian King entered Skopje, or Uskub, the old imperial city, and a 'Te Deum' was sung in the church where 566 years ago (in 1346) the first Servian Emperor, Justinian, was crowned as 'Imperator Sarborum et Romandrum' — as Emperor of the Servians and Romans.
    "A unified, greater Servia, (Montenegro,) a greater Bulgaria, and a greater Greece mean peace for the world in that quarter.
    "I consider it to be the duty of every friend of peace, of every one who wishes progress and world peace, to support the Balkan States, to support Servia, (Servia-Montenegro;) Bulgaria, and Greece by doing what is possible to prevent the interference of Europe in the crisis. We should and must be let to settle, once for all, this question of the Balkans. They are, to-day, policemen of humanity, arresting and expelling an assassin.
    "There is some American capital invested in Turkey, but the defeat of the Ottoman Empire would not have a serious effect upon the value of Turkish tobacco monopoly, Turkish public debt, or Turkish railway bonds, as these are under the national guarantee and would be taken over by the new governments coming into control, and the country in proportion to the territory taken over, indeed, a Turkish defeat and the wiping out of European Turkey, would probably enhance the value of all Turkish as well as all Balkan securities."