Great Britain, in its dual capacity of guardian of the sea-routes of the world and the greatest Mohammedan Power, has seldom been in a more critical position. Germany and Turkey acting in combination could approach the Suez Canal through Asia Minor, the Red Sea through Arabia and the Persian Gulf through Mesopotamia. Enemy successes in these three directions could hardly fail to have an adverse influence on Mohammedan opinion and, under such conditions, India itself would not be safe. The foundations of the British Empire were endangered, threatened by forces both open and insidious; a British policy, framed by men who understood their business, was the only Allied policy which could properly meet the case. The British statesmen then in office faced this grave situation with steady eyes, and reached a conclusion which, at the time, was widely criticized, but, to their credit, they persisted in it.

The fiat went forth from Downing Street, and on the experts of Whitehall devolved the task of evolving a strategy in harmony with policy.

Experts, of any kind, are good servants but bad masters; they are prone to pessimism when called to work outside their special spheres, and are, as a rule, indifferent prophets; like the Spaniards, they often seem wiser than they are. Expert and official opinion on both sides of Whitehall was opposed to the expedition to the Dardanelles. The North Sea drew the Navy like a magnet, there it was felt the decisive battle would be fought, and the desire of islanders was natural to make security doubly sure. Mr. Winston Churchill devoted all the resources of his forceful and energetic personality to Eastern Naval preparations, he had both courage and imagination, and brushed aside the protests of officials within his jurisdiction, but these were not the only obstacles—sometimes he must have wondered whether a chasm had not replaced the thoroughfare which separates the Admiralty from the War Office. In the latter building, an old machine, under new and inexperienced direction, was creaking uneasily, barely able to stand the strain caused by the war in France. To the War Office staff, it seemed as if Pelion had been piled on Ossa, when they were asked to co-operate with the Navy in a distant expedition, whose scope and nature brought into strong relief their mental and material unpreparedness. Refuge was sought in procrastination, difficulties were exaggerated, the many human cogs of a complex machine groaned in the throes of a new and unwelcome effort.

In enterprises of this nature, risks must be taken, a circumspect and timid strategy misses the mark. In this particular instance, time was the essence of the problem; a single Division, at the psychological moment, was worth nine arriving late; a military force of 20,000 men, acting in close support of the Allied Navies, could have achieved success where a host a few weeks later, even if ably led, might fail. The stakes were enormous, the obstacles, both naval and military, formidable but not insuperable. A calm appreciation of the situation should have convinced the most doubting spirits that Constantinople could be taken by a well-timed and vigorous stroke. At this period Turkey was isolated, her forces were disorganized and short of ammunition, the Germans were unable to send either reinforcements or war material to this theatre, except in driblets. The position of Enver Pasha was precarious, his enemies were numerous and active, they had viewed with profound misgivings the rapid growth of German influence, and were ready for a change. Constantinople was ripe for revolution; the wheel had turned full circle, the Allies, by the irony of fate, could count on assistance from reactionary elements, converted by mistrust of Germany into potential supporters of our cause. The neutral Balkan States were waiting and, in their hearts, longing for Allied intervention, it meant the solution of many complicated problems, and they preferred even unpleasant certitude to doubt.

A turning point in history had been reached; statesmen had ordained the expedition and left its execution to amphibious experts; prompt, energetic action based on careful plans was needed, action combining force on land and sea. A watching world was wracked with expectation, something portentous was about to happen, the Small States held their breath. In Whitehall, an official mountain trembled slightly, and forth there crept a tardy, unready mouse.

While troops were being crowded pell-mell into transports and hurried to Gallipoli, the Foreign Office in London and Paris took up the question of the neutral Balkan States. A suggestion that reinforcements should be sent to Servia had gained support in certain Allied quarters and, since the only available port of disembarkation was Salonika, for this, if for no other reason, friendly relations with the Greeks were sought. Under the cloak of the commercial convention with Servia, ammunition was already passing freely up the Vardar Valley, and it was hoped that the precedent thus established might be extended so as to cover a still more benevolent neutrality, and allow of the passage of French and British troops. Greece was the only Balkan State which depended for its existence on sea communications, she was completely at the mercy of the Allies, and no amount of German intrigue, in court and military circles, could twist the logic of hard facts. Neither King Constantine nor his advisers were prepared to accept formally a technical violation of Greek neutrality, they would have been helpless, however, if the Allies had insisted. To a layman, the diplomatic situation seemed to be typical of those described in a certain class of novel, in which suave but firm diplomacy, supported by overwhelming force, meets every protest with a soothing phrase and lends an air of elegance to the most sordid bargain. When people or States are weak, the path of consent descends by hesitating stages from “No” through “Perhaps” to “Yes.”

The Allies did not negotiate upon these lines. They invited the Greeks to send practically the whole of their army to reinforce the Serbs; in return, they undertook to protect Greek communications with Salonika, by occupying the “non-contested” zone in Macedonia with Allied troops. In all my travels in the Balkan peninsula, I had never come across a region to which the description “non-contested” could be applied with any accuracy; in London and Paris it was visualized by a miracle of self-deception, and acted like a charm. Here was the solution of the Balkan question, an Allied force, immobilized in this mysterious zone, would hold the Bulgarians in check, encourage the Serbs and reassure the Greeks; Rumania would see what efforts we were making and hurry to our aid; the Turks, trembling for Adrianople, would make a separate peace.

For the moment the Greek Government was unable to entertain the proposed arrangement; King Constantine and the Greek General Staff rejected the suggested plan of operations and put forward another of their own, which envisaged a second campaign against Turkey and opened up alluring prospects further East. Temporarily, the negotiations failed to secure either the co-operation of the Greek Army or a more benevolent neutrality on the part of Greece. The political situation in Athens became more and more confused. Allied diplomacy paid assiduous court to M. Venizelos and, thereby, excited the jealousy and mistrust of the King. Telegrams from an Imperial War Lord addressed to “Tino” flattered the monarch’s vanity as a strategist, he laughed, with some reason, at our tactics, and grew convinced we could not win the war.

Sofia presented a very different aspect from Athens. In the Bulgarian capital there was little bustle in the streets, political excitement was not apparent, the inhabitants went about their business quietly and, in the case of most of them, that business was military in its nature. Bulgaria, though unwilling to commit herself permanently, still nursed her wrongs; to obtain redress for these was the object of the entire people, and no neutral State was better prepared for war.

The alliance of Bulgaria was on the market, obtainable by either set of belligerents at a price; that price was the territory in Thrace and Macedonia, of which Bulgaria considered she had been wrongfully deprived by the Treaty of Bucharest. If the Allies could have satisfied the Bulgarian Government on this point, the Bulgarian Army would have been employed with the same soulless ferocity against the Turks as, in the end, it displayed against the Serbs.

The situation was clearly defined, and the rôle of diplomacy limited to the manipulation of cross-currents of popular feeling and personal sympathies, which, in Bulgaria as in every other State, divided opinion among several political camps. Unfortunately for the Allies, neither the British nor the French representative in Sofia had the requisite qualifications for making verbiage about a “non-contested” zone pass for a definite policy in the Balkans. The British Minister was—rightly or wrongly—credited with Servian sympathies, the French Minister was not a “persona grata” with King Ferdinand, whose favour was all-important in a diplomatic sense. There does not appear to have been any reason for the retention of either of these officials in their posts, except the habitual unwillingness of government departments to disturb routine. The difficulty of finding substitutes did not arise in either case. Our Foreign Office had at its disposal a brilliant young diplomatist, with a unique experience of Balkan capitals, who could have rendered more useful services as Minister in Sofia than as Counsellor of Embassy in Washington; a well-selected French aristocrat would have received a cordial welcome from a Prince of the Orleans family, who himself controlled Bulgaria’s foreign policy, and whose “spiritual home” was France. The foregoing were some of the imponderable factors in Bulgaria; in 1914 they could have been turned to good account, in 1915 it was perhaps too late.

In time of war, a diplomatic duel is like a game of cards in which victories are trumps; no amount of diplomatic skill can convert defeat into success. During the spring and summer of 1915, our Diplomats in the Balkans fought an unequal fight. The conviction that a stalemate existed on the front in France and Flanders was daily gaining ground, public attention was concentrated on the Dardanelles, and here the operations were followed with an interest as critical as it was intelligent. During the war against Turkey, the topographical features in this theatre had been closely studied by the Bulgarian General Staff, when a portion of the Bulgarian Army had penetrated into Turkish Thrace as far as the lines of Bulair. To these men our tactics became daily more incomprehensible. At first, the assaults on the Western extremity of the Gallipoli Peninsula were taken to be feints, intended to cover a landing in the neighbourhood of Enos, but, when it was realized that these were the major operations, when thousands of lives were sacrificed for the capture of a few bare and waterless cliffs, their bewilderment became intensified, and into all their minds there crept a doubt. General Fitcheff, the Chief of Staff and a man whose English sympathies were widely known, ran considerable risks by giving his expert advice in regard to a landing on the coast near Enos; he was no arm-chair critic but a practical soldier with recent and personal experience of battlefields in Thrace. His views were identical with those of the King of Greece and, indeed, of the vast majority of soldiers in the Balkans. They were rejected or ignored; a pseudo-omniscient optimism pervaded Allied counsels and acted like a blight.

Our friends in Bulgaria contemplated the useless slaughter at Gallipoli with horror and dismay, waverers turned to German agents, who took full advantage of every change of mood. An influx of German officers and officials began about this time; they had access to all Government departments, and assumed control of part of the Bulgarian railway system; as one result of their activities Constantinople received supplies of ammunition, whose Bulgarian origin was suspected if not known.

The journey from Sofia to Bucharest lasts less than twenty-four hours, its one noteworthy feature is the abrupt transition from a Slavonic to a Latin race. The Bulgars are reserved and taciturn, strangers are treated coldly, they are not wanted unless they come on business whose utility can be proved. I left Sofia impressed by the efficiency and self-confidence of the people, but chilled by their morose and almost sullen ways. On crossing the Danube a new world was entered, where hearts were warm and life was gay and easy, where every one talked cleverly and much, and where, perhaps, words counted more than deeds.

In the spring of 1915 Bucharest was a diplomatic arena, in which all the Great Powers were making prodigious efforts. Russia had ceased to treat her southern neighbour as a revolted colony; the Central Empires had developed a sudden sympathy for Rumania’s national aspirations, more especially in the direction of Bessarabia; Great Britain had made a loan of £5,000,000, on little or no security, and, as a further proof of disinterested friendship, was buying a large proportion of the output of the oilfields, regardless of the impossibility of either using or exporting this more than ever precious product. A golden age had dawned, business men were doing a roaring trade, cereals were being bought at fancy prices and, looming ahead, were brighter prospects still.

I looked for the warlike preparations of which the War Office in London had so confidently spoken. Of officers there appeared to be no dearth, the streets and cafés were crowded with brilliant uniforms, whose wearers sauntered slowly to and fro, bestowing glances on the softer sex which were returned in kind. To seek the favour of the fair has at all times been a martial occupation. A wise man once remarked: “I know not how, but martial men are given to love,” and added some comments on perils, wine and pleasures which seemed to fit this case. But war is not made with officers alone, men are required, men of the people, who have no decorative functions in the piping times of peace. These were lacking, they were neither on the streets nor in the barracks, they were in their homes, producing wealth and not yet bearing arms.

Rumania was not prepared for war; no reservists had been mobilized, training depots were at normal strength, there was a shortage of horses for the Cavalry and Field Artillery, the Heavy Artillery was deficient both in quality and quantity, the aviation equipment was out of date, last but not least, the reserve stocks of ammunition had been depleted, and the Rumanian arsenals lacked the plant needed for their replenishment and the maintenance of an army in the field.

A policy which co-ordinated diplomacy and strategy would have carefully weighed the “pros” and “cons” of an alliance with Rumania. The mere presence of an army in a certain geographical position means little, unless that army is an organization ready to act, containing within itself the means whereby its action can be sustained. Rumania was a granary of corn, a reservoir of oil, both valuable commodities, though more so to our enemies than ourselves, but, from a military point of view, the co-operation of this land of plenty involved a heavy charge. To meet this charge, not only had guns and ammunition to be sent, the Rumanian Army was short of everything, including boots and clothes. Supply alone, though at this period difficult enough, did not completely solve the problem, delivery required communications capable of transporting at least 300 tons a day. No such communications existed between Rumania and the Western Powers. Imports could reach Bucharest or Jassy only through Servia or Russia, the railways in both countries were inefficient and congested, to send ammunition by these routes, in time of war, was to pass it through a sieve. The prophecy, made in May, 1915, that the then existing communications could not deliver more than a seventh of Rumania’s requirements was well within the mark.

In short, in the spring and summer of 1915, the alliance of Rumania would have been for the Western Powers a doubtful advantage and a heavy responsibility. The first of these considerations might, at least, have restrained the French Minister at Bucharest from demanding Rumanian intervention with a vehemence which too frequently degenerated into insult; it was fully appreciated by the Grand Duke Nicholas who, in his quality of Russian Generalissimo, described as “une folie furieuse” what the French Diplomat thought would turn the scale in favour of the Allied cause. The second consideration should have appealed to the British Government, the representatives of a people who look before they leap. British statesmanship had inspired the Near Eastern policy of the Allies, and had chosen as first objectives Constantinople and the Dardanelles. Impartial historians will justify this choice; here lay the key of the whole Balkan situation, here were the lever and the fulcrum with which to actuate the Neutral States. Once masters of Constantinople and its waterways, the Allies would have found Rumania willing, when ready with their help, to co-operate in a concerted plan. Her army, based on the Black Sea and the Danube, would have become dynamic, a source of strength, instead of weakness, to an inert and passive Russian front; Bulgaria, reduced to impotence, would either have kept a strict neutrality or, breaking unnatural bonds, have returned to the Russian fold; the Greeks, with their eyes on Smyrna, could not have held aloof.

During the early months of 1915, diplomatic activity in Athens and Sofia might have achieved results, it might, conceivably, have secured the co-operation of the Greeks and Bulgars in our operations at the Dardanelles; at Bucharest the position was wholly different. To urge Rumanian intervention at this period was foolish and immoral, it demanded an immense sacrifice from the Rumanian people which could not help the Allies and might do their cause incalculable harm.

Owing to geographical conditions, the Central Empires were able to offer Rumania more than merely contingent support in return for her co-operation and alliance. Numerous railways cross the Carpathians and by means of these the Rumanian army could have been promptly equipped and efficiently maintained during a forward movement into Bessarabia, a province described by German Diplomats as Rumania’s “promised land.”

Rumania lay between the upper and the nether millstones of belligerent diplomacy, the mill was working at high pressure, but was not grinding small. M. Bratiano, the Rumanian Prime Minister, was equally uninfluenced by the promises of Germany, the blandishments of Russia, the taunts of France, and the loans of Great Britain. He refused to deviate from a policy of more or less impartial neutrality, and awaited what he himself described as “le moment opportun.”23

Disgruntled allied diplomats and many of his countrymen reproached M. Bratiano with lethargy and cowardice, in reality they owed him a debt of gratitude; better than they he knew the unreadiness of the army and the country for an adventurous policy, and, fortunately for Rumania in 1915, he possessed sufficient sense and courage to reject their amateurish plans. On the other hand, he had too sound a judgment to be dazzled by proposals, however spacious, which held out prospects of territorial conquest at the expense of Russia, although, as his father’s son,24 he suspected all Russians of treachery and guile.

Since the death of King Charles in November, 1914, M. Bratiano had been the guiding force in Rumanian political life; he stood between the extremists, who clamoured for intervention on the Allied side without regard for consequences, and the Pro-germans, whose hatred and mistrust of Russia had overcome the instincts of men of a Latin race; his influence with King Ferdinand was undisputed, he used it to impose a neutral attitude, both in the Council and at Court. This man had many qualities of high statesmanship, he loved his country and had at least one deep conviction—he was convinced that in the end the Allies would win the war.

“Le moment opportun” of M. Bratiano was the moment when Rumania could take up arms to fight on the Allies’ side, under conditions which would confer a reasonable prospect of success; in his more expansive moods he confessed to cherishing the hope, and even the belief, that the Rumanian Army would deal the decisive blow. A proud thought this, coming from a citizen of a little Neutral State during so great a war; but Ion Bratiano was nothing if not proud.

Events were to put a heavy strain on the Prime Minister’s faith and hope, times of trial and temptation lay ahead, when more garrulous champions of the Entente were to give way to doubt. The withdrawal from the Dardanelles, Bulgaria’s alliance with the Central Powers and Servia’s subsequent rout were incidents charged with grave import to Rumania, and destined to postpone indefinitely “le moment opportun.” M. Bratiano never wavered, he waited patiently, by thus resisting the impulses of interest and sentiment, he faithfully interpreted the Rumanian people’s will.

1915 was a black year for the Allies, a period of diplomatic defeats and military disasters. The officials and experts had had their way; the policy, which had frightened them and of which they had disapproved, had been reversed; Servia, the victim of predigested plans, had been overrun, the succour so long demanded had been sent three months too late; the Near East, save for some ragged remnants, immobilized in Macedonia, had been denuded of troops and abandoned to the enemy; the legend of British tenacity and perseverance had been tried in a fiery furnace and had not survived the test.

Confusion, both mental and material, prevailed throughout the British Empire; a vague uneasiness had entered every mind; a race of hero-worshippers had vainly sought a hero and the market place was strewn with broken idols. The war had introduced a new dimension, an all pervading influence, a nightmare which haunted waking moments, a great winding-sheet, a deluge submerging human thought.

During these days of evil omen, one reassurance was vouchsafed, one thought consoled, lightening an atmosphere of gloom like a rainbow in a lowering sky. The British people, though disillusioned and humiliated, still kept the virtues of their race; in their hour of trial, they rose above misfortune, and proved themselves worthy descendants of the inspired adventurers whose heritage they held. Men to whom war was odious developed into seasoned warriors, and women, who had never worked before, gave up their lives to toil.

On battlefields, heroic valour was regarded as a commonplace, in countless homes, self-sacrifice became a daily rite. In British hearts, despair had found no place, theirs was a confidence born of consciousness of strength, the strength which in Kinglake’s glowing words is: “Other than that of mere riches, other than that of gross numbers, strength carried by proud descent from one generation to another, strength awaiting the trials that are to come.”