Greece rejects the Entente demand

The British chronology of the war records under 11 December 1915, or 28 November by the Julian calendar, that the Greek government rejected the Entente demand to withdraw Greek troops from Salonika. This is true, but only half true. The reply that General Maurice Sarrail received that day through a Greek envoy, Lieutenant-Colonel Pallis, was a compromise negotiated the previous evening in Athens. Greece did not give up the city, but undertook not to hinder the Allies in its defence.

The evening of 10 December

The demands that Sarrail had put to Pallis on 9 December were backed by diplomacy in Athens. On 10 December the French minister, Jean Guillemin, first called on King Constantine I. According to the account that reached Paris that same night, the king told him again: “Do as you see fit. I shall protest for form’s sake, and you will go on doing what you need, paying no attention to my protests.” In the evening the ministers of France, Britain, Italy and Russia came to the prime minister, Stefanos Skouloudis. At the request of the Italian minister, Carlo De Bosdari, the conversation was strictly verbal and no document was left behind, so that the dispute, which had successfully been shifted to the soldiers in Salonika, would not return to the capital.

Skouloudis, with the king’s full consent, agreed five points with the ministers, which he sent out to the Greek legations that same day:

1. Salonika will not be evacuated. The Greek division stationed there will remain in the city.
2. The Greek railway staff may be reinforced to meet the Allies’ needs, but no foreign railwaymen will be accepted.
3. Greece will not oppose by force the building of fortifications or the occupation of strongpoints, but will protest formally and firmly.
4. If the Allied troops, in retreating, carry the war onto Greek territory, the Greek army will step aside and leave both sides a free field.
5. There will be no discussion of Fort Kara Burun at the entrance to the harbour. The king gave his word that neither the fort nor the batteries in front of it would ever be used against the Allies.

The most important thing, however, was a concession that Skouloudis presented as a decision already taken. The Greek V Corps had been ordered to move east so as to leave the Entente troops the whole area between Salonika and the frontier free. The French and British ministers did not hide their satisfaction and regarded this as a great concession. They also asked whether the government might of its own accord stop the repair work on the forts. Skouloudis replied that he promised nothing, but thought it quite likely, if only for lack of money. According to the British official history, the king did indeed order the work to stop and the fort garrisons to be cut by half.

A “moderately satisfactory” reply

On 11 December the reply reached Salonika. The British official history of the Macedonian campaign calls it “moderately satisfactory”. The Allies could at last reconnoitre the ground and dig trenches, and the Greek V Corps was to leave the strip of land they needed for the defence. But the Greeks were not leaving the city itself or handing over the forts, and the railways were to remain in Greek hands. From the start Pallis also made it clear that unless the Allies announced that they would leave Salonika as soon as possible, the Greeks would on no account oppose a Bulgarian advance. Athens therefore did not intend to defend the Allies, only to get out of their way.

The Italian minister judged the agreement optimistically. He wrote to Rome that where the replies were not affirmative, this was made good by Skouloudis’s solemn assurance that Greek troops would never and in no circumstances oppose by force whatever the Allies did. The withdrawal of the Greeks from Salonika, the only matter in which their consent was truly indispensable, he regarded as “practically obtained”. Indeed, over the following days most Greek units left the area of the city, and only a small part of the Greek forces remained in Salonika itself. The French Prime Minister, Aristide Briand, later joked in parliament that the Greek government had reserved the right to protest, and the Allies had reserved the right not to answer the protests.

The price of the agreement

Skouloudis did not give way for nothing. He expressed the hope that the powers, convinced at last of Greece’s good will, would not only lift the measures of coercion to which they had again resorted at the beginning of December, but would also grant the Greek requests for financial and commercial help. The ministers promised that all difficulties would disappear as soon as the soldiers had put the agreement into effect within two or three days.