Turks' Army A Mob Says Von Der Goltz.

New York Times 100 years ago today, November 24, 1912:
German Strategist, Who Organized Ottoman Force, Tells of Fatal Defects.
NO OFFICERS TO TEACH MEN
Staff, Taken Unawares, Had No Time to Pick Troops to Fight a Foe, Ready and More Numerous.
Special Cable to The New York Times.
    BERLIN, Nov. 23.—Field Marshal Gen. von der Goltz, the noted German strategist, who organized the Ottoman Army several years ago, broke his silence last night concerning Turkey's military collapse. Addressing a meeting of the German Asiatic Society, the General declared that the troops which had met defeat at the hands of the Allies were "nothing but an army of recruits."
    Any other power would have suffered the same fate, he asserted, at the hands of the enemy which had been preparing for war for twenty-seven years. No Generals could have taken the offensive against forces that were both numerically superior and better trained.
    Turkey never had an army, worthy of the name, until 1908. She had possessed an organized mass of troops, but only since then had there been any serious or systematic effort to create an army in the modern sense with a peace footing and a regular chain of reserves of the first, second, and third grades, and a service liability of thirty years. Lethargy, however, had preceded this renaissance.
    Another fatal factor, he continued, was the absence of adequate talent for instruction. Turkey had gone to work seriously to make up for wasted decades, but a corps of officers and an army could not be created overnight. When the crisis came six weeks ago the Turkish staff had no time to pause to consider who were fit to be soldiers and who were not. The inevitable result was a hodge-podge assemblage of an indiscriminate horde of recruits.
    Gen. von der Goltz concluded his impressive remarks with this expression of his belief:
    "Turkey is by no means at the end of her powers. Her internal strength has undergone stupendous strain to hold the European provinces and check the spirit of revolution, unceasingly fanned from without.
    "The loss of Macedonia would rather leave the empire stronger than weaker. Everybody who knows Anatolia and the Asiatic hinterland is. convinced that Turkey is far from being annihilated."

SAYS ALLIES ARE CAT'S-PAWS.
C.W. Furlong Declares Russia Is Aiming to Get Southern Outlet to Sea.
    That the Balkan allies are merely cats-paws in a game of diplomacy and special interests of certain nations, is the opinion of Charles W. Furlong, educator and explorer, who is well informed on the Balkan equation. Since his graduation from Cornell and Harvard, he has spent much of his time in travel and has studied the Tripolitan and Turkish situations closely.
    "I want to ask for fair play in the treatment of the Turks," he said in an interview here yesterday. "With the leading powers combined against them they will ultimately be the losers, but they are far from being defeated.
    "I believe that Russia, more than any other nation, is back of the Balkan crisis. Russia has practically agreed to the terms of a loan of $10,000,000 to Bulgaria after France had refused it. Russia did not do this for an investment merely, but for influence and other advantages.
    "I believe that Russia is going to get a southern outlet to the sea. England will finally withdraw her opposition. England, it is true, would prefer not to see Russia get an outlet on the Red Sea, where she would be in a position to block the route to India.
    This cable message of approval from the Queen of Bulgaria was received by Mrs. N. Karastoyanoff, President of the Balkan War Relief Fund Committee, 1,109 Amsterdam Avenue, from Sofia yesterday:
    Her Majesty sanctions your efforts and thanks you for your patriotic initiative.
            DRANDER, Private Secretary.
    This relief fund has been organized to aid the widows, orphans and other dependent relatives of soldiers killed in battle.
    A lecture will be given to-morrow at 3 P.M. in the assembly hall, 1 Madison Avenue, under the auspices of the clerical conference of the New York Federation of Churches, by Prof. Michael I. Pupin, of Columbia University. His subject will be "The Balkan Revolution and the Opportunities It Offers to the Churches of America."