Greece refuses to help Serbia

The British chronology of the war records under 29 January 1915 that the government of Greece refused to intervene on behalf of Serbia. This ended, at least for the time being, the attempt to draw the Greeks into the war that London had made five days earlier by promising them gains in Asia Minor. The Greek documents of those days make no mention of a single formal refusal delivered on 29 January. They suggest rather that the decision matured over several days, and that its shape was settled by Romania’s reply.

The king’s condition

The Prime Minister, Eleftherios Venizelos, was ready to accept the British offer and even to buy Bulgaria’s participation in the war by giving it the port of Kavala. King Constantine I saw the matter differently. Territorial concessions were unacceptable to him. He would allow help for Serbia only if Romania entered the war together with Greece, so that the two armies could hold the Bulgarians in check from two sides. When Bucharest refused joint action, this condition fell away.

The General Staff stood behind the king. One of its leading officers, Ioannis Metaxas, later dictator of Greece, argued that without Romania entering the war at the same time an expedition to help Serbia would end in disaster. The Greek troops would have to march north with a hostile Bulgaria on their flank and facing far more numerous armies of the Central Powers. The staff officers were also sceptical about gains in Asia Minor. They warned that Greece had neither the men nor the money to hold and defend such extensive lands, while in Europe it would still be threatened by a Bulgarian attack.

Venizelos’s last attempt

Venizelos did not give up. On 30 January he presented the king with a second memorandum. In it he wrote that, given Romania’s refusal, the only option left was to win over Bulgaria at the price of painful concessions. He called the surrender of Kavala, Drama and the surrounding area, in all no more than 2,000 square kilometres with about 30,000 Greeks, a “painful sacrifice”. In return, however, Greece could lay claim to the whole western part of Asia Minor, more than 125,000 square kilometres with more than 800,000 Greeks. Such an opportunity, he argued, might never come again. Without taking part in the war, Hellenism in Asia Minor would in his view be lost whoever won.

He did not obtain the king’s consent. Soon, moreover, Bulgaria made clear which way it was leaning by accepting more German money, and Venizelos abandoned the idea of rebuilding the Balkan League. When in February the Entente offered to send a British and a French division to Macedonia as a safeguard against the Bulgarians, Athens judged this too weak a guarantee and refused again.

The beginning of the rift

The dispute over the January offer was the first clear clash between the king and the Prime Minister over the war. It soon recurred with greater force. When in February the Anglo-French fleet attacked the Dardanelles, Venizelos wanted to send Greek troops there, but the king and the staff again objected. On 6 March 1915 Venizelos resigned. The conflict between the Prime Minister’s supporters and the royal camp grew into the National Schism, which divided Greece for two years. The country entered the war on the side of the Entente only in June 1917, when Constantine I had to leave the throne.