On
October 18, 1912, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia declared war on the Ottoman Empire
and their armies, from the Albanian mountains to the Black Sea, were ordered to
launch an attack. In retrospect, it could easily be concluded that the war began
with the aim of partitioning Macedonia, despite the early claims by the
coalition that they fought for "the liberation of Macedonia!"
The beginning of the First Balkan War marked the end of years of bargaining
between Serbia and Bulgaria over the division of Ottoman territory, Macedonia in
particular. In October 1911, the Bulgarian government stated to Serbia that the
two governments should "reach an agreement as soon as possible concerning
the territory of Macedonia-that is, to determine their share of the cake".
It was not a question of the "disputed" territories; Bulgaria would
agree that
Skopje
belonged to Serbia, retaining Solun (Salonica), Bitola and
Veles
for itself. The outbreak of the Italian-Turkish War in October 1911 favored both
by weakening Ottoman power, and on March 13, 1912, after months of intensive
discussions, an Agreement of Friendship and Alliance was publicly signed,
supplemented by secret clauses. Article two of these clauses provided Serbian
recognize of Bulgaria's rights to those territories east of the Rhodopes and the
Struma river, and Bulgaria in turn recognizing Serbian rights over territory
north and west of Mt. Šar.
"The European part of the Ottoman Empire before the
Balkan Wars.
Macedonia is a Ottoman province
with 3 districts (Skopje, Solun, Bitola)"
These plans were to be put in effect within three months, when "all
territorial gains would be realized by a joint action". The territory
between Mt. Šar, the Rhodopes, the archipelago and Ohrid Lake, if the
establishment of an autonomous state was not possible in view of "the
interests of the Serbian and Bulgarian nationalities" and "other
external and internal reasons", would be divided along a line drawn from
Golem Vrv (to the north of Kriva Palanka) to Ohrid Lake. On that occasion, the
Serbian representatives stated: "We are ready for anything and will take
part in any coalition-with God or with the Devil if need be-to protect our vital
interests." The Bulgarians already considered that "the Macedonian
Bulgarians were lost for our cause, as they set out along their own path".
Soon, the Serbian-Bulgarian coalition was extended by signing a agreement
between Bulgaria and Greece in May, between Greece and Serbia in September, and
between Montenegro and Bulgaria and Serbia-by the beginning of October 1912, the
Anti-Ottoman League was formed. In the meantime, the propaganda machines were
used to constantly and persistently repeat the necessity of helping their
"brother Christians" in their attempts to free themselves from Ottoman
slavery. The peoples of Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia were not the only ones who
believed in this-a considerable number of Macedonians were convinced of the
stated, selfless goals of the League.
Beginning in October 1912, fighting took place throughout Macedonia. Following
several victories over the Ottoman army, coalition forces occupied Macedonia and
forced the Ottoman Empire to seek an armistice, signed on December 4, 1912.
Yet, as in many partitions, one party was not satisfied with their share of the
spoils. Serbia, denied its proposed outlet to the Adriatic Sea, sought
compensation in Macedonia along the Vardar River which the Bulgarians rejected.
Greece asked for control of Salonica and "a certain part" of the
eastern Macedonian territories, which Bulgaria rejected as well.
Correspondingly, on June 1, 1913, Serbia and Greece concluded a secret treaty
for joint action against Bulgaria; joined by Romania, which sought control over
Southern Dobruja. Russia attempted to solve the emerging quarrel in a peaceful
manner; but Austria-Hungary, siding with Bulgaria, encouraged flaring tempers in
the hope of breaking a coalition directed against the Bulgarians. Anticipating
assistance from Vienna, on June 29, 1913, the Bulgarian army attacked its former
allies.
This Second Balkan War was at first waged entirely on Macedonian soil, but on
July 10, Rumania entered the war and four days later the Ottoman Empire joined
the general assault on Bulgaria. Faced with four fronts, Bulgarian armies were
defeated piecemeal and the government at Sofia was forced to seek peace.
The victors of the Second Balkan War did not want to miss the opportunity to
imposing conditions on Bulgaria which "would create a just balance" in
the Balkans. This included settling accounts among themselves at the expense of
Macedonia, taking no account of the ethnic, political and economic unity of the
territory through which drew new frontiers for the second time in less than a
year. At the beginning of August 1913, the Treaty of Bucharest was signed: the
entire "disputed zone" was taken by Serbia, Greece secured its
position in Solun (Salonica) and
southeastern
Macedonia, the Ottomans regained all the territories lost in the First Balkan
War to Bulgaria with the exception of
eastern
(Pirin) Macedonia, and the Romanians seized Southern Dobruja.
"A map after the Balkan wars 1912-1913, Albania & Montenegro
are
independent states, Greece gets southern Epirus and Aegean
Macedonia,
Bulgaria gets Pirin Macedonia and the rest of Thrace,
while Serbia gets
Sandzak, Kosovo and Metohija
and Vardar part of Macedonia"
The events of the two wars and the final partition are the best indications of
the limits to which nationalist and chauvinist passions can corrupt humanity.
For example, in pursuing the Bulgarian army during the second conflict, Greek
forces systematically burnt to the ground all Macedonian villages they
encountered, mass-murdering their entire populations. Likewise, when the Greek
army entered Kukuš (Kilkis) and occupied surrounding villages, about 400 old
people and children were imprisoned and killed. Several dozen distinguished
Macedonians were victims of the persecution in Kukuš, previously marked for
death as potential hazards for Greek occupation. Specially trained Greek units
destroyed over 40 Macedonian villages.
About 4,000 refugees from Kukuš had gathered in the village of Akandzheli when
on July 6, 1913, a Greek military unit entered the village. Though met with
white flags, the village was burnt down and in the massacre which followed 356
refugees were killed, including children and the elderly. In Serez, Greek police
imprisoned about 200 Macedonians and subsequently executed them. About 1,000 men
were slain in the town of Ingrita alone. On the whole, in the region of southern
Macedonia, the Greeks destroyed 16,000 houses and 100,000 Macedonians were
forced to leave their homes and flee to neighboring countries.
"Map of ethnical-geographical Macedonia, a territory that
was never Greek, Bulgarian, nor Serbian before 1913"
Bulgarian armies and Vrhovist bands were not any more scrupulous in respecting
human life. In the small town of Dokast, inhabited by Greeks and Turks, the
Bulgarians fired 270 out of 570 homes and killed a hundred people. When they
occupied the town of Serez for the second time, they torched 4,000 houses out of
6,000 and massacred many of the inhabitants, mainly Turks and Greeks, on the
pretext of revenging the slain Macedonian population of the town.
Nor did the Serbian "liberators" lag behind in destruction and wanton
slaughter throughout Macedonia. In
Bitola,
Skopje,
Shtip
and
Gevgelija,
the Serbian army, police and chetniks (guerrillas) committed their own
atrocities.
Nor were these events to be the last tragic consequences of the Balkan Wars: an
enormous number of refugees from Macedonia were compelled by threats and force
to leave their homes and flee. About 112,000 refugees sought shelter in
Bulgaria, 50,000 of whom were Macedonians. Greece received 157,000 refugees,
mostly Turks and Greeks, who settled on the properties of Macedonian refugees.
About 1,000 refugees settled on Macedonian territory occupied by Serbia. About
half a million people became refugees, driven across newly-created
borders-driven from one part of Macedonia to another by the rampaging armies.
On March 1, 1913, the Macedonian colony in St. Petersburg sent a memorandum on
the independence of Macedonia to the conference of Great Powers in London, along
with a geographical-ethnic map of Macedonia made by Dimitrija Čupovski.
"Europe is about to make the same mistake as in 1878. Instead of Macedonia
being proclaimed an independent state, its liberators decided to divide it among
themselves... The Macedonians have gained the right to self-determination
through their recent history... A horrible terror now reigns in Macedonia-there
are no limits to the 'freedom' of the allies. Not a single Macedonian has the
right to travel outside Macedonia and go abroad to protest to the European
states. Whoever attempts to do that is either killed or imprisoned. The allied
armies have enclosed Macedonia in an iron grip."
"The Macedonian people needs:
"One: Macedonia
to remain an individual, indivisible, independent Balkan state within its
geographic, ethnographic, historical and economic-political borders;
Two: that, on the basis of a general election, a Macedonian people's assembly
be convened in Salonica as soon as possible, to work out the internal
organization of the state and define its relations with the neighboring
countries."
On April 21, 1913, in the St. Petersburg newspaper Slavjanin (A Slav), Dimitrija Čupovski,
writing under the pseudonym Upravda, published the article "The Macedonian
State" in which he predicted:
"...Despite
vigorous opposition by the Macedonians themselves, the partition of Macedonia
will undoubtedly lead to internecine blood-shedding among the allies... The
Balkan Peninsula is too small for several greater-state ideals to coexist.
Only a federal state constituted of all Balkan peoples, in which Macedonia
will be included on an equal footing as an indivisible state, independent in
its internal affairs-only such a federation that can provide peaceful
coexistence and progress of the Balkan peoples!"
On June 7, 1913, a second memorandum of the Macedonians was sent to the
governments and peoples of the combatants of the Balkan Wars, stating that
"in the name of natural right, in the name of history ... Macedonia is
inhabited by a homogeneous population having its own history, and hence the
right to self-determination. Macedonia is to be an independent state, within its
natural borders. The Macedonian state is to be a separate equal unit of the
Balkan League, with its own church established on the foundations of the ancient
Ohrid archbishopric", requesting that a people's representative body be
convened in Salonica. This memorandum was signed by members of the
Macedonian colony in St. Petersburg.
Despite the obvious fact that in the partition of Macedonia a nation had been
divided, in the Paris Peace Conferences (June-September, 1919) the Great Powers,
protecting their own interests, confirmed with minor alterations only the
decisions of the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest.
"The participants
of the Bucharest Peace Conference (August 1913), at which the partition of
Macedonia was performed resulting in tearing up the ethnic tissue of the
Macedonian nation so as the geographical and natural entity of Macedonia"
During the conference the Macedonian issue, in one form or another, confronted
any possible settlement of World War One's Balkan front. Three proposals were
placed before the Committee on the Formation of New States. On June 10, 1919,
the Italian delegation proposed that Macedonia be given the status of autonomy
within the framework of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Macedonia
would possess an autonomous assembly and the Macedonian governor would be
responsible to it, although he would be appointed by the Yugoslav government.
Opposed by the French delegation, at the following session of the committee the
Italian representative changed the proposal on political autonomy of Macedonia
and reduced it to a proposal for administrative self-management with a central
council in Bitola.
The French delegation, protecting the interests of the Kingdom of the Serbs,
Croats and Slovenes (viewed as a key ally in the region) categorically opposed
any kind of autonomy for Macedonia and proposed that the Macedonian Question be
discussed in terms of minority issues. The treaties of protection for minorities
would be a sufficient guarantee of freedom and protection for the population of
Macedonia. The British delegation offered in turn a proposal for special control
of Macedonia by the League of Nations, in order to reinforce minority
guarantees. The insistence of France that the Macedonian Question be removed
from the agenda ended culminated in the statement of its delegation that
"the Macedonians do not have a clearly defined nationality and the
population is divided into parties which, in view of the events, change their
character." Supporting the request by Pašič that the new state, the
Kingdom of the SCS (Serbs, Croats and Slovenes) be provided with "a
strategic border", France upheld Yugoslav control of the region, and any
protection for the Macedonians must be limited to the framework of minority
rights in general.
Unfortunately, the Great Powers had no interest in the voice of the
Macedonian-the partition of Macedonia had already been accomplished, and no
power seriously endorsed revision of the partition. Accordingly, Greece
maintained its lion's share of Macedonian territory, some 35,169 square
kilometers; the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats
and Slovenes retained 25,774 square kilometers; and
Bulgaria maintained, after minor revision (giving the Strumica districts to the
Kingdom of SCS), 6,798 square kilometers.
While before the Ilinden Uprising there were an estimated two and a half million
people in Macedonia, after the Paris Peace Conference the totaled populations of
Aegean (Greek); Pirian (Bulgarian) and Vardar (Yugoslav) Macedonia was
2,028,000, hardly past the two million mark. War and economic collapse had
reduced the population of Macedonia by 270,000 people, a negative growth most
visible in Aegean Macedonia. In 1896, there were 681,451 inhabitants of Aegean
Macedonia, 354,406 of them ethnic Macedonians, 68,000 Greek, 195,000 Turks and
about 66,000 of other nationalities. In 1920, on this same territory, the
population had dwindled to 584,294 inhabitants, with a Macedonian population
reduced by 46,763 to a total of 307,643 and a Greek population of 107,437, an
increase of 38,927.
In vain were protests, applications, declarations, memorandums or personal
appeals by representatives of the Macedonian people to the Peace Conference, the
governments of the Great Powers, or to Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece that the
Macedonian people should not be considered "an amorphous mass", that
"the spiritual unity" of the Macedonian should be respected and
Macedonia raised to the rank of "an independent state".
On March 1, 1913, the Macedonian colony in St. Petersburg sent a memorandum on
the independence of Macedonia to the conference of Great Powers in London, along
with a geographical-ethnic map of Macedonia made by Dimitrija Čupovski.
"Europe is about to make the same mistake as in 1878. Instead of Macedonia
being proclaimed an independent state, its liberators decided to divide it among
themselves... The Macedonians have gained the right to self-determination
through their recent history... A horrible terror now reigns in Macedonia-there
are no limits to the 'freedom' of the allies. Not a single Macedonian has the
right to travel outside Macedonia and go abroad to protest to the European
states. Whoever attempts to do that is either killed or imprisoned. The allied
armies have enclosed Macedonia in an iron grip."
While before the Ilinden Uprising there were an estimated two and a half million
people in Macedonia, after the Paris Peace Conference the totaled populations of
Aegean (Greek); Pirian (Bulgarian) and Vardar (Yugoslav) Macedonia was
2,028,000, hardly past the two million mark. War and economic collapse had
reduced the population of Macedonia by 270,000 people, a negative growth most
visible in Aegean Macedonia. In 1896, there were 681,451 inhabitants of Aegean
Macedonia, 354,406 of them ethnic Macedonians, 68,000 Greek, 195,000 Turks and
about 66,000 of other nationalities. In 1920, on this same territory, the
population had dwindled to 584,294 inhabitants, with a Macedonian population
reduced by 46,763 to a total of 307,643 and a Greek population of 107,437, an
increase of 38,927.
