TURKEY UNDER ITS NEW RULERS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 201, 3 December 1910, Page 10

TURKEY UNDER ITS NEW RULERS.

"Events are giving the lie every day to the. optimists who asserted that the establishment of the Young Turks in power would prove a guarantee ol peace," says the Saturday Review. "It is, (>n the contrary, perfectly clear that they are spoiling for a fight with someone and making every preparation for it. We have no love for the Greeks, and certainly no belief in their capacity as warriors; but their attitude towards Turkey has been anything but provocative of late. Yet the boycott of Greek goods continues without intermission. "At the same moment the Bulgarian Government is remonstrating against the cruelties and injustices practised against their fellow countrymen in Macedonia, where the attempt to make 'good Ottomans' out of diverse nationalities is leading to a' persecution of the Christians'. A Turkish military despotism, so long as" it' purports to act through a puppet Parliament and Cabinet, may perpetrate acts that a Sultan without a Parliament would be vilified for attempting!. "Meanwhile Albania is only pacified on the surface. The recent outbreak -was due in a great measure to Shefket's, the Turkish commander, desire for distinction. He supplied both the provocation for the rising and the means of suppressing it. "In Arabia things are no better than they were under Sultan Abdul Hamid. Probably they are worse, though it is not easy to arrive at the truth. It is equally difficult to ascertain the truth about the trouble in the Hauran which admittedly exist.s. And difficulty there may spread through Armenia to Anatolia, and a rising in that region might mean civil war, in which tie Young Turks would, probably go down. Nazim Pacha, who is Vali at Damascus with very extensive powers, has never joined the new regime with enthusiasm . He was sent to Bagdad to be out of the way, but may easily prove more dangerous there than he was at Stamboul. Therefore in the Asiatic provinces of Turkey there is no stability at present. "The Ministry itself consists of nonentities; some of them amiable and all ineffectual; one of them was recently a telegraph clerk earning £5 a week. The Committee which controls affairs has on it a certain number of officers (the order of the commander-in-chief that they should take no part in politics has been treated with contempt), and the army is, of course, the supreme authority. But affairs are greatly controlled by the Jewish element on the Committee. Nothing, therefore, would be less surprising than a revolt of the Anatolian army and all the devout Mahommedans against the Jews and 'Athiests,' who are credited with directing affairs. "The Committee are well aware of this, and it greatly enhances the danger of war undertaken to distract attention from home affairs. Mahommedan might be easily diverted against the Bulgar or the Greek; but in the caseof a war with Bulgaria Turkey might easily be worsted. _ "The Young Turks, then, have shown little capacity at present for improving the condition of their own country. But, 'if they cannot govern, they can fight, and it is not surprising that they should