Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 29, 2025
I saw them on their arrival in Athens in October 1912, where they received a most enthusiastic welcome from the Greeks, while everybody stopped to admire their picturesque dress, their superb physique, and their dignified demeanor. If Mr. Venizelos excluded these delegates from the chamber he would defy the sentiments of the Greek people. If he admitted them, Turkey would proclaim war.
The other was when, under the guidance of the two great statesmen of the Balkans, Venizelos of Greece and Pashitch of Serbia, the Balkan League was formed, and the power of Turkey in Europe broken. If the League had held together, the great German project would have been ruined, or at any rate gravely imperilled.
On this occasion Venizelos appeared in public for the first time since his retirement from political life, after he had been obliged to resign by the king. When he left the cathedral in Athens, where services were held, thousands of persons followed his motor car, cheering enthusiastically.
How confident was Venizelos in the belief that the Government had come around to his policy is obvious from the following statement, which he made on that same date: "The addition of one more nation to the long list of those fighting against Prussian militarism for the liberty of Europe and the independence of the smaller states cannot but give more strength to the common confidence in a complete victory of the Allies.
And he was good enough to enumerate the reasons why it should be realized, and the way in which it must be worked. I was greatly impressed by what he said." "Just fancy!" exclaimed a colleague, "wasting all that time in talking about a scheme which will never come to anything!" But M. Venizelos knew that the time was not misspent.
The good order, the low cost of living, the high value of the drachma, the excellent condition of the army, the enhanced prestige of the Greek nation after the war, all testify to the ability of Venizelos. Venizelos won for Hellas territory which extends from Salonica all the way to the Black Sea, and brought her almost to the gates of Constantinople.
The king submitted to part of the Allied demands, the others were waived, and the forces landed were withdrawn, after a day of fighting in which the Greek reservists engaged in many clashes with the armed followers of Venizelos.
They had landed under the terms of a "benevolent neutrality," even at the request of the Greek Government, while Venizelos was at its head. With the change in premiers had come a complete change in attitude. The Greeks had begun hampering the Allies at every turn. Prices were raised; they were called upon to pay in advance, and in gold, for the use of the railroads in transporting the troops.
At the same time she worried the Greek government about the future of Saloniki, and that at a time when the Greek people were criticizing Mr. Venizelos for having allowed the Bulgarians to occupy regions in Macedonia and Thrace inhabited by Greeks, notably Seres, Drama, and Kavala, and the adjacent country between the Struma and the Mesta.
So far his doubts seemed to have more justification than the faith of Venizelos; and Greece had in return for her security put up with an unconstitutional government and the shame of her broken Serbian treaty. But the strain which Constantine put upon the patience of his people reached the breaking-point in 1916.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking