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i4] MY ADVICE ABOUT BULGARIA
Bulgaria’s entry into the arena, the decided superiority
of Germany over her adversaries became apparent. In
September, 1916, Rumania’s entry into the war was
wasted and neutralised because we could not realise that
the first advantage to be derived from the Rumanian
alliance should have been to attack the Bulgarians with
large Russian forces and to beat them, on which the
entire Bulgarian Army would have come over to us with
the cry that Holy Russia was invincible, that traitors
alone had induced the Bulgarian people to take part in
a sacrilegious war and that these traitors deserved
death. In 1918 when the Bulgarian troops, exhausted
by the interminable struggle, were duly beaten and
overthrown, the defection of Bulgaria that ensued caused
the defection of Austria and that of Turkey, and finally
hastened the capitulation of Germany. If the entry of
Bulgaria into the war on the side of Germany could have
been prevented—and for that there was all the time
between August, 1914, and October, 1915—the war would
not have lasted so long, that is to say, it would not have
assumed the proportions of a world-wide calamity,
unparalleled in history, and above all would not have
brought about the awful shipwreck of Russia!
I have heard that the diplomatic mistakes committed
from the beginning of the war with regard to Turkey
and to Bulgaria were due, amongst other causes, to the
false direction of English diplomacy, which would not
perceive the danger and thought it possible to make use
of evasions and mildness there where, on the contrary, a
display of strength and decision were imperative. As
regards Constantinople I have no grounds for believing
or disbelieving these assertions ; with regard to Bulgaria
I personally should be inclined to doubt if the British
Government was well and fully informed at this period
of the political situation of Bulgaria and of the true
disposition of King Ferdinand and his people.
On Sunday, the 2nd August, I was awakened at seven
o’clock in the morning to read the telegrams which had
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