Eastern Approaches (35 page)

Mr. Churchill’s reply left me in no doubt as to the answer to my problem. So long, he said, as the whole of Western civilization was threatened by the Nazi menace, we could not afford to let our attention be diverted from the immediate issue by considerations of long-term policy. We were as loyal to our Soviet Allies as we hoped they were to us. My task was simply to find out who was killing the most Germans and suggest means by which we could help them to kill more. Politics must be a secondary consideration.

I was relieved at this. Although, as a Conservative, I had no liking for Communists or Communism, I had not fancied the idea of having to intrigue politically against men with whom I was co-operating militarily. Now, in the light of what the Prime Minister had told me, my position was clear.

Meanwhile the first thing was to refresh my knowledge of the country for which I was bound. While I was in England, I read every book about Jugoslavia that I could lay hands on. Seen from the angle of someone about to plunge headlong into it, the turbulent stream of Balkan history had a new fascination. The details were as confusing as ever, but certain basic characteristics, certain constantly recurring themes, seemed to run right through the bewildering succession of war and rebellion, heroism, treachery and intrigue. In these might lie the key to much that was now happening.

I should be among Slavs once more. Some fifteen centuries ago, the forbears of the principal races which now inhabit Jugoslavia, the Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Montenegrins and others had migrated there from the north to become a southern outpost of the Slav world. They were Jugo-Slavs, South Slavs. Even now their language, Serbo-Croat, which I had set myself to learn, had so much in common with Russian that soon I found that I could understand it and make myself understood in it.

From the first their history had been eventful, a story of bloodshed and violence: of feudal lords contending amongst themselves for supremacy in their own country; of overlords, their supremacy once established, seeking to impose their rule on neighbouring races and countries; striving to weld these into an Empire strong enough to hold its own in the rapidly diminishing power-vacuum between East and West. To overthrow each other, to rid themselves of dangerous rivals and settle their own internal quarrels, these Balkan chieftains would enlist the aid of outside powers, Byzantium, the Turks, the Emperor or the Pope. Then they would unite once more amongst themselves to cast off the foreign allegiance which a short time before they had seemed so ready to accept. They understood above all the art of playing off the Great Powers against each other: East against West, Rome against Byzantium, Pope against Emperor, Teuton against Turk.
But the purpose of these manœuvres remained the same: the preservation of their own national independence. This end they pursued with a violence, a devotion, a turbulence and a resilience all of their own.

But for small national States the struggle for survival was then, as it is now, a hard one. The advance westwards of the Osmanli Turks grew ever harder to check. In 1389, at Kossovo, the famous Field of the Blackbirds, the Serbian Prince Lazar was killed and his people passed under Turkish sway. The neighbouring principalities succumbed one after another. Soon the whole peninsula was under alien domination, the Turks occupying the south and east, while the Austrians and the Hungarians advanced to meet them from the west and north, and the Venetians established themselves along the coast. It was destined to remain so for over three centuries.

In this way the South Slavs were divided up, the southern and eastern area of their territory, now Serbia, falling under Turkish rule and the northern and western, now Croatia and Slovenia, under Austro-Hungarian. The Dalmatian coastal strip passed into the hands of the Doges of Venice, until eventually, with the decline of the latter, it too was absorbed by Austria-Hungary.

Thus, although their language and racial origin were identical, the two groups of Slavs found themselves separated by the national frontiers of the Great Powers and gradually grew apart culturally, politically and traditionally. In the matter of religion also, for by now the division between the Eastern and Western Churches, Orthodox and Catholic, had finally crystallized into a fixed pattern. The results of this cleavage still make themselves felt today.

Under the loose, though often savage rule of the Sultans, the Serbs, while enjoying a certain degree of liberty and even autonomy, inevitably looked towards Constantinople as the political, religious and cultural centre of their world. For them the Church was the Eastern Orthodox Church, with the Patriarch of Constantinople at its head, while some, particularly in Bosnia, even went over to the faith of their conquerors and embraced Islam.

The Croats and Slovenes, on the other hand, looked westwards towards Vienna, the upper classes basking at a respectful distance in the reflected glory of the Imperial Court. In religion they were, like their
Austrian masters, Roman Catholics, Christianity having in general first come to them with the Teutonic invaders from the north. Altogether, they became in their outlook generally, in their standard of civilization and in their attitude towards life, a Western rather than an Eastern people.

The Serbs, for their part, made, under Turkish rule, but little progress towards civilization as it existed in Western Europe. As administrators, the Turks were not greatly concerned with culture. In the outlying provinces of their Empire their main preoccupations were financial and military in nature: the levying of tribute and the defence of their frontiers. While Zagreb came to resemble a European town, Belgrade remained an oriental fortress.

But if the Serbs in some ways lagged behind their Slav brothers beyond the frontier, in one important respect they did not. They never lost their love of freedom, their sense of nationhood. All through the centuries of Turkish rule the spirit of independence was kept alive in the hill-country of Serbia by little bands of guerrilla fighters who harried the Turks, partly for the fun of it, and partly to keep in existence a nucleus, however small, of national independence. Most successful of all in this were the Montenegrins, who, in their mountains, held out unsubdued against all-comers for century after century. This tradition of resistance was to endure both in Serbia and in Montenegro.

At the start of the nineteenth century there came a change in the situation. The Ottoman Empire began to crumble. The new spirit of liberty and national independence which was sweeping through Europe like wildfire made itself felt in the Balkans with redoubled force. For the first time progressive elements in Europe, following the fashionable example of Lord Byron, began to interest themselves in the fate of the Balkan Christians. With the Russians the ties of race, language and religion carried particular weight; Panslavism, the all-Slav movement, was born. All of a sudden the patriots of the Balkans found that they had powerful friends.

In Serbia they also had effective leaders. The revolt which flared up in 1804 was led by Kara Djordje, or Black George, peasant, turned mercenary, turned brigand, turned guerrilla. Kara Djordje, who was
to be the founder of the Karadjordjević dynasty, was a black-a-vised man, owing his name equally to his swarthy appearance and savage, morose nature. With his own hands he is said to have killed over a hundred men, including his own father and brother. A man of great determination and an effective commander in the field, he showed himself a forceful rather than a skilful statesman. By 1807 he had driven the Turks from Serbia. In 1809 they returned. With Russian help he drove them out again. In 1813 they returned again, this time in overwhelming force, and Kara Djordje was driven out and obliged to take refuge, first in Austria, then in Russia. The Turks appointed Miloš Obrenović, a former herdsman, to rule the conquered province for them.

But in 1815 there was a fresh rising against the Turks. This time it was led by Miloš Obrenović, the man the Turks had made their Viceroy. He, too, showed himself a man of determination. In a single campaign he expelled the Turks and proclaimed himself Prince of Serbia. After this he obtained Turkish recognition and in return accepted Turkish suzerainty. When Kara Djordje came back in 1817 he was assassinated and his head sent to the Turks. Miloš Obrenović, it was thought, had not been entirely unconnected with his assassination.

For the next hundred years Serbia presents an extraordinary picture of intrigue and unrest. Rival dynasties, founded by the two peasant-liberators, Kara Djordje and Miloš Obrenović, served as rallying points for opposing factions. Princes and Kings, Prime Ministers and Commanders-in-Chief followed one another in a bewildering succession, regulated by mob-violence, political assassination and the intrigues of the Great Powers. In her external relations, Serbia sided first with one Great Power and then with another, as her interests or the personal inclinations of her rulers demanded, while the Great Powers, for their part, lent their support first to one Serbian faction and then to another.

Seen from close by, these proceedings are far from edifying; but, regarded in the light of later events, they fall into their proper place as incidents in the struggle of a proud and naturally turbulent people for unity and nationhood. For that was the ultimate aim: the reunion with Serbia of the Croat, Slovene, Dalmatian, Bosnian and other provinces,
still under Austro-Hungarian or Turkish rule, and the maintenance, by judicious manœuvring, of Serbia’s independence in relation to the Great Powers.

With Kara Djordje out of the way and Russia supporting him, Miloš Obrenović reigned as Prince of a semi-autonomous Serbia under Turkish suzerainty until 1839. The ferocity of his despotism equalled that of the Turks. In 1839 he was ousted by his own son, Milan. But Milan died the same year and was succeeded by his brother, Michael, and Michael was in turn dethroned two years later by Alexander Karadjordjević, the son of Kara Djordje, who enjoyed the support of Austria-Hungary and Turkey. The Obrenovićs went into exile.

But Serbia had not seen the last of the Obrenović dynasty, or indeed of its founder, Miloš. Alexander’s policy of friendship with Austria was not popular, least of all with the Tsar, who was inclined to regard himself as the Protector of Serbia. In 1859 Alexander was driven out and, after twenty years of not entirely misspent exile, that aged but persistent herdsman, Miloš Obrenović, returned to the throne from which he had been driven by his son twenty years earlier. He, for one, knew the value of friendship with Russia.

In less than two years Miloš Obrenović was dead, succeeded by his son Michael, who had also returned from exile, and who now reigned wisely and well until 1868, when he was assassinated. The Karadjordje faction were, it was thought, not entirely unconnected with his demise.

This time, however, there was no change of dynasty. The Karadjordje plot misfired and Michael Obrenović was succeeded as Prince by his cousin Milan. Under Milan Obrenović, Serbia embarked on a more adventurous policy, undertaking or joining in no less than three wars. In 1876, having attacked the Turks, she was defeated by them and her autonomy seemed in danger. But she was rescued by the Russians, whom she then joined in their war of 1877-78 against Turkey. As a reward she was granted complete independence from Turkey and Milan was proclaimed King. But even so he felt that the Russians had not done enough for him and, abandoning the traditional pro-Russian policy of his dynasty, turned towards Austria. When in 1885 the Serbs were defeated by their neighbours the Bulgars, who now, in their turn, enjoyed the favour of the Russians, it was the Austrians who
came to their rescue. Leaning heavily towards Austria, Milan continued to reign until 1889, when, following his divorce from his Russian wife, Natalie, he abdicated unexpectedly in favour of his young son Alexander. With his departure, Serbia swung back once more towards Russia.

But the young Alexander, finding himself in difficulties, soon recalled his father, the ex-King, from exile to advise him, making him Commander-in-Chief of the Serbian Army. With Milan’s return, Serbia inclined once more towards Austria-Hungary. Inclined, that is, until Alexander fell in love with and married Draga, one of his Russian mother’s ladies-in-waiting. Then he exiled his father once more and threw Serbia back into the arms of Russia.

But by now Alexander Obrenović was popular neither with the Great Powers nor with his own subjects. Plots, disturbances and conspiracies became the order of the day. He played with the idea of changing his foreign policy or, alternatively, divorcing his wife. But he was not quick enough. On June 15th, 1903, he and Queen Draga were assassinated and their horribly mutilated bodies thrown from the window of their ornate little palace. It was generally supposed that the supporters of the rival dynasty had not been unconnected with the assassination.

At any rate it was Peter Karadjordjević, the grandson of Kara Djordje, who now ascended the throne, while the Ministry of Public Works (a lucrative appointment) went to a certain Colonel Mašin, who was known to have played an important part in the assassination. He was also, as it happened, the brother-in-law of the murdered Queen, but had clearly not allowed family ties to interfere with his political convictions. The first act of the new Parliament was to pass a vote of thanks to the regicides and the Russian Ambassador was among the first to congratulate King Peter on his accession to the throne. Russian influence was on the increase.

From now onwards Serbia’s relations with Austria-Hungary became increasingly strained. For she was clearly destined to be the rallying point for South Slav irredentism, and most of the South Slavs outside Serbia dwelt in Croatia, Slovenia and Dalmatia, and were subjects of the Austrian Emperor. Thus Vienna viewed the rise of
Serb nationalism with ever-growing concern. In 1908 the Austrians, who believed in leaving nothing to chance, formally annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slav provinces which were nominally still part of Turkey, although since 1878 they had, to the disgust of the Serbs, been administered by Austria-Hungary.

The Serbs were indignant, but powerless to intervene. They too started to reinsure. In 1912, in company with the Greeks, Bulgars and Montenegrins, they fought a victorious war against the Turks, forcing them to cede most of what remained of Turkey in Europe. Then in 1913 they fought the Bulgars, their allies of the year before, for the fruits of their common victory, the Turks joining in on their side. Serbia emerged from these struggles with her territories enlarged and her national consciousness now thoroughly awakened.