Nelson Evening Mail. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1916. THE RIDDLE OF THE BALKANS.

Nelson Evening Mail, 23 September 1916, Page 4

Nelson Evening Mail. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1916. THE RIDDLE OF THE BALKANS.

MR. R. W. Seton-Watson, lecturer in East European history at-the University of London, the author of many important works on the politics and' the history of those nations and small states whose conflicting interests made up the Eastern Question, which eventually .brought, about the Great War, has produced' another deeply erudite and closely argued' book, which is entitled "German, Slav, and Magyar—a stnidyin the Origins of the Great War/' As stated by the re-

viewers, the author covers a vast amount ■of -ground ini his work, dealing chiefly with. Magyar racial .policy, the Serb Renaissance, embodying the idea of Southern Slav unity, and an contradisitFjictioa to -those matters the pan-Ger-man plan of the Central European- Teutonic State and the extension of German power from Berlin to Bagdad. A very impressive map that accompanies this part of the work shows, the. three stages, of tho pan-German'' plan' as formulated in .the public utterances of its leading exponents, and tacitly acquiesced in, though never formally endorsed ' by the German! Government. The first- stage is the formation of "Mittel-EuTopa," comprising the German Empire; AustriaHungary, including Serbo-Croatia and Montenegro and Poland. The secondstage is the Greater German) Customs Union, including, in addition to the foregoing, countries, Switzerland, Belgium', Holland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the "Baltic State" comprising Courland and a large slice of adjoining Russian territory, Lithuania and the Ukoaine, together with Roumania and Albania. The third stage, connoting a German overlordship from Berlin to Bagdad, adds to the 'foregoing tho remaining countries of Italy, Greece, Servia, Bulgaria, and Turkey, (iboth European and Asiatic). This •grandiose conception: has now ;boen shattered .by tho power and; weight of the blows delivered by the Allied armies. Writing 'before these' events the author propounds that Germany can only he defeated if the Allies ar© prepared 1 to hack the Slavs and liberate the Slav democracies of Central Europe. The main task, he says, which confronts the Allies is that of releasing 35,000,000 Slavs and Latins whom.' Germany is ruthlessly exploiting in a quarrel which is not theirs. It is only .by their emancipation that an effectual obstacle to the German extension eastwards can he created, "and Germany restricted to those natural limis within which she would cease to he a danger to the peace of Europe." The essential preliminaries, as stated by this very confident., authority are "the expulsion of the Turks from; Europe and the disruption' of the Hapsburg monarchy into its component parts." The entry oil Roumania into the war seems likely to accelerate the attainment of both these indispensable objects. This author has some very hard things to say about the 'breakdown of the diplomacy and strategy of tho Allies in' the Balkan Peninsula. How far his strictures are-deserved it will be for history to say. Certainly Italian diplomatists have blamed their English, French, and ■Russian colleagues in the Balkans for the miismanagetnient that brought in Bulgaria on the side of the Central European Powers; hut, on the other hand, there is very good reason'for 'believing that"- the action of Bulgaria had- been j determined, by"-King Ferdinand and his j Prime- Minister Raddslavorr for many months before it was carried mi*, and even that' Bulgaria had been l securely 'bound- to tho chariot-wheels of Germany as;a result of the/skilful utilisation by

German wh-e-.p-itHers of her disappoint - iiipnt at the treaty handed ont to her by the Treaty of Bucharest. Mr SotonWatson declares that '"London has no conception' of Servia's role on Europe, especially during a. European, war." Ho rj notes the statement of the British Ambassador ini Potrograd) to M. Sazonoff in July, 1914, that "direct British interests in Servia are mil," and shows that Sir Edward Grey specifically endorsed that .statement. He goes on to declare that to-day it has (become apparent even to tho "man in the street" that the true inner meaning of the attack upon Servia. lay in her position as tho holder of the gate 'which secures to the Central Powers access to Constantinople and to Salonika.