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Born in Barmen in the Kingdom of Prussia, Engels was the son
of a wealthy textile manufacturer. Despite his bourgeois background, he became
a staunch critic of capitalism, influenced by his observations of industrial
working conditions in Manchester, England, as published in his early work The
Condition of the Working Class in England (1845). He met Marx in 1844, after
which they jointly authored works including The Holy Family (1844), The German
Ideology (written 1846), and The Communist Manifesto (1848), and worked as
political activists in the Communist League and First International. Engels
also supported Marx financially for much of his life, enabling him to continue
his writing in London. After Marx's death in 1883, Engels edited from his
manuscripts to complete Volumes II and III of his work Das Kapital (1885 and
1894).
Engels' own works, including Anti-Dühring (1878), Socialism:
Utopian and Scientific (1880), Dialectics of Nature (written 1872–1882), The
Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884), and Ludwig
Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy (1886), are foundational
to Marxist theory.
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David Urquhart (1 July 1805 – 16 May 1877)
Urquhart later publicly accused Palmerston, the head of
British foreign policy, of being bribed by Russia. This view was constantly
promoted in the London magazines he published. Among the regular authors of his
publications was Karl Marx, who fully supported Urquhart's views on Palmerston.
Personally, Karl Marx himself, in correspondence with his friend Engels,
considered Urquhart a "form of maniac" in his accusations of
Palmerston and the worship of the Turks.
In 1835, he was appointed secretary of embassy at
Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire, but an unfortunate attempt to counteract
Russian aggressive designs in Circassia, which threatened to lead to an
international crisis, again led to his recall in 1837.[*]
Urquhart was the chief British case officer of the Young Ottoman movement, having from the 1830s worked for Turkish-Polish collaboration against Russia. Until 1876, when the Young Ottomans succeeded in seizing power in Istanbul for one year, Urquhart served as their adviser. Among other duties, he was paymaster for Young Ottoman leader Ali Suavi, a dominant figure in their Paris-based exile publication.
Urquhart's position was so aggressively anti–Russian and
pro–Turkish that it created difficulties for British politics. In the 1830s,
there was no anti-Russian coalition in Europe; it had yet to be created.
Britain could suddenly find itself in a situation of military conflict with
Russia and, moreover, alone. As a result, Urquhart was recalled from Turkey,
and the conflict with Russia was settled by peace talks.
David Urquhart married Harriet Angelina Fortescue in 1854. She was actively involved in her husband's work, contributing regularly to the Diplomatic Review as "Caritas" and writing to associates of Urquhart such as Le Play, the French sociologist and Major Poore, a Foreign Affairs Committee member. In compiling her biography of Harriet Urquhart M.C.Bishop noticed the problem that this created: "It has been difficult indeed almost impossible, to disengage her share of her husband's labour from his during the years of her married life." Bishop quotes their eldest son who relates how Urquhart's work was composed: "the argumentative work, the collating of extracts from despatches, treaties, and c. was done by her first, and then my father dictated the introduction and conclusion." Their marriage produced two surviving sons and two daughters. David Urquhart died in 1877.
(pictured) The two-volume work takes a favorable view of the Turkish society and culture and of Islam. Comprised of 23 chapters, the first volume mixes travel narratives with accounts of historical and current events, beginning with a five-month journey that Urquhart took from Argos, in the Peloponnese, across European Turkey. The volume details the social life, customs, and laws of administration of the 250 towns and villages that Urquhart visited. The author describes in detail his adventures in a variety of terrains, including watercourses, mountainous regions, and wastelands. Other chapters make military comparisons between Britain and Turkey and observations about the cultural differences between Turks and Europeans, especially the British. The volume concludes with a chapter concerning Urquhart's impressions and reflections on the Westernization sweeping Greek and Turkish societies, a phenomenon he found unfortunate. The first edition of the work was published in 1838.
[*] A lifelong interest in the Turkish Empire began when Urquhart visited Constantinople in 1829 and undertook a mission there for Canning in 1834. Urquhart became First Secretary to Viscount Ponsonby, the British ambassador at Constantinople, in 1836. His familiarity with the Turks and his intense suspicion of Russia did not make for good relations with Palmerston and Ponsonby. This hostility came to a head in the "Vixen" episode when Urquhart supported the efforts of shipowner George Bell to trade with Circassia thereby implying that Circassia should gain independence from the Russian empire. This incident brought about Urquhart's departure from the Diplomatic service.
These articles were published in the collection: Karl Marx, The Eastern Question, London, 1897. The collection gave Marx as the author of the article. However, it was later discovered that this article, as well as "The Turkish Question" and "What Is to Become of Turkey in Europe?", were written by Engels.
The
Eastern Question, as it was termed by the European Powers in the nineteenth
century, was a debate primarily concerned with the issue of 'what to do with
the Turk?'. The Ottoman Empire had become known as the 'sick man of Europe'
following its gradual decline since the eighteenth century, and its demise
would be highly problematic for the crowned heads of Europe. This unique book
focuses on the intellectual and political dynamics of the first Ottoman
political opposition in the modern sense, the so-called 'Young Ottomans'. In
the process it narrates an alternative version of the Eastern Question as
experienced and told by its Eastern observers and critics. Nazan A icek shows
how an important section of the newly-rising semi-autonomous Ottoman Muslim Turkish
intelligentsia in the second half of the nineteenth century, effectively
answered the alternative question of 'what to do with the West?'
The Turkish Question[23]
Frederick Engels
It is only of late that people in the West of Europe and in America have been enabled to form anything like a correct judgment of Turkish affairs. Up to the Greek insurrection[24] Turkey was, to all intents and purposes a terra incognita, and the common notions floating about among the public were based more upon the Arabian Nights' Entertainments than upon any historical facts. Official diplomatic functionaries having been on the spot, boasted a more accurate knowledge, but this, too, amounted to nothing, as none of these officials ever troubled himself to learn Turkish, South Slavonian, or modern Greek, and they were one and all dependent upon the interested accounts of Greek interpreters and Frank[a] merchants. Besides, intrigues of every sort were always on hand to occupy the time of these lounging diplomatists, among whom Joseph von Hammer, the German historian of Turkey[b], forms the only honorable exception. The business of these gentlemen was not with the people, the institutions, the social state of the country; it was exclusively with the Court, and especially with the Fanariote Greeks[25], wily mediators between two parties either of which was equally ignorant of the real condition, power and resources of the other. The traditional notions and opinions, founded upon such paltry information, formed for a long while, and strange to say, form to a great extent even now, the ground-work for all the action of Western diplomacy with regard to Turkey.
But while England, France, and for a long time even Austria, were groping in the dark for a defined Eastern policy, another power outwitted them all. Russia herself semi-Asiatic in her condition, manners, traditions and institutions, found men enough who could comprehend the real state and character of Turkey. Her religion was - the same as that of nine-tenths of the inhabitants of Turkey in Europe; her language almost identical with that of seven millions of Turkish subjects; and the well-known facility with which a Russian learns to converse in, if not fully to appropriate a foreign tongue, made it an easy matter for her agents, well paid for the task, to acquaint themselves completely with Turkish affairs. Thus at a very early period the Russian Government availed itself of its exceedingly favorable position in the South-east of Europe. Hundreds of Russian agents perambulated Turkey, pointing out to the Greek Christians, the Orthodox Emperor as the head, the natural protector, and the ultimate liberator of the oppressed Eastern Church, and to the South Slavonians especially, pointing out that same Emperor as the almighty Czar who was sooner or later to unite all the branches of the great Slavic race under one sceptre, and to make them the ruling race of Europe. The clergy of the Greek Church very soon formed themselves into a vast conspiracy for the spread of these ideas. The Servian insurrection of 1804[26], the Greek rising in 1821 were more or less directly urged on by Russian gold and Russian influence; and wherever among the Turkish pashas the standard of revolt was raised against the Central Government, Russian intrigues and Russian funds were never wanting; and when thus, internal Turkish questions had entirely perplexed the understanding of Western diplomatists who knew no more about the real subject than about the man in the moon, then war was declared, Russian armies marched toward the Balkan, and portion by portion the Ottoman Empire was dismembered.
It is true that during the last thirty years much has been done toward general enlightenment concerning the state of Turkey. German philologists and critics have made us acquainted with the history and literature, English residents and English trade have collected a great deal of information as to the social condition of the Empire. But the diplomatic wiseacres seem to scorn all this, and to cling as obstinately as possible to the traditions engendered by the study of Eastern fairy-tales, improved upon by the no less wonderful accounts given by the most corrupt set of Greek mercenaries that ever existed.
And what has been the natural result? That in all essential points Russia has steadily, one after another, gained her ends, thanks to the ignorance, dullness, and consequent inconsistency and cowardice of Western governments. From the battle of Navarino[27] to the present Eastern crisis, the action of the Western powers has either been annihilated by squabbles among them-selves, mostly arising from their common ignorance of Eastern matters, and from petty jealousies which must have been entirely incomprehensible to any Eastern understanding or that action has been in. the direct interest of Russia alone. And not only do the Greeks, both of Greece and Turkey, and the Slavonians, look to Russia as their natural protector; nay, even the Government at Constantinople, despairing, time after time, to make its actual wants and real position understood by these Western ambassadors, who pride themselves upon their own utter incompetency to judge by their own eyes of Turkish matters, the very Turkish Government has in every instance been obliged to throw itself upon the mercy of Russia, and to seek protection from that power which openly avows its firm intention to drive every Turk across the Bosphorus and plant the cross of St. Andrew upon the minarets of the Aya-Sofiyah.
In spite of diplomatic tradition, these constant and successful encroachments of Russia have at last roused in the Western Cabinets in Europe a very dim and distant apprehension of the approaching danger. This apprehension has resulted in the great diplomatic nostrum, that the maintenance of the status quo in Turkey is a necessary condition of the peace of the world. The magniloquent incapacity of certain modern statesmen could not have confessed its ignorance and helplessness more plainly than in this axiom which, from having always remained a dead letter, has, (luring the short period of twenty years, been hallowed by tradition, and become as hoary and indisputable as King John's Magna Charta[28]. Maintain the status quo! Why, it was precisely to maintain the status quo that Russia stirred up Servia to revolt, made Greece independent, appropriated to herself the protectorate of Moldavia and Wallachia, and retained part of Armenia! England and France never stirred an inch when all this was done, and the only time they did move was to protect, in 1849, not Turkey, but the Hungarian refugees[29]. In the eyes of European diplomacy, and even of the European press, the whole Eastern question resolves itself into this dilemma, either the Russians at Constantinople, or the maintenance of the status quo anything beside this alternative never enters their thoughts.
Look at the London press for illustration. We find The Times advocating the dismemberment of Turkey, and proclaiming the unfitness of the Turkish race to govern any longer in that beautiful corner of Europe. Skilful as usual, The Times boldly attacks the old diplomatic tradition of the status quo, and declares its continuance impossible. The whole of the talent at the disposal of that paper is exerted to show this impossibility under different aspects, and to enlist British sympathies for a new crusade against the remnant of the Saracens. The merit of such an unscrupulous attack upon a time-hallowed and unmeaning phrase which, two months ago, was as yet sacred to The Times, is undeniable. But whoever knows that paper, knows also that this unwonted boldness is applied directly in the interest of Russia and Austria. The correct premises put forth in its columns as to the utter impossibility of maintaining Turkey in its present state, serve no other purpose than to prepare the British public and the world for the moment when the principal paragraph of the will of Peter the Great[30], the conquest of the Bosphorus, will have become an accomplished fact.
The opposite opinion is represented by The Daily News, the organ of the Liberals. The Timesat least seizes a new and correct feature of the question, in order afterwards to pervert it to an interested purpose. In the columns of the Liberal journal, on the other hand, reigns the plainest sense, but merely a sort of household sense. Indeed, it does not see farther than the very threshold of its own house. It clearly perceives that a dismemberment of Turkey under present circumstances must bring the Russians to Constantinople, and that this would be a great misfortune for England; that it would threaten the peace of the world, ruin the Black Sea trade, and necessitate new armaments in the British stations and fleets of the Mediterranean. And in consequence, The Daily News exerts itself to arouse the indignation and fear of the British public. Is not the partition of Turkey a crime equal to the partition of Poland"? Have not the Christians more religious liberty in Turkey than in Austria and Russia? Is not the Turkish Government a mild, paternal government, which allows the different nations and creeds and local corporations to regulate their own affairs? Is not Turkey a paradise compared to Austria and Russia? Is not life and property safe there? And is not British trade with Turkey larger than that with Austria and Russia put together, and does it not increase every year? And then goes on in dithyrambic strain, so far as The Daily News can be dithyrambic, an apotheosis of Turkey, the Turks and everything Turkish, which must appear quite incomprehensible to most of its readers.
The key to this strange enthusiasm for the Turks is to be found in the works of David Urquhart[c], Esq., M.P. This gentleman, of Scotch birth, with medieval and patriarchal recollections of home, and with a modern British civilized education, after having fought three years in Greece against the Turks, passed into their country and was the first thus to enamour himself of them. The romantic Highlander found himself at home again in the mountain ravines of the Pindus and Balkan, and his works on Turkey, although full of valuable information, may be summed up in the following three paradoxes, which are laid down almost literally thus: If Mr. Urquhart were not a British subject, he would decidedly prefer being a Turk; if he were not a Presbyterian Calvinist, he would not belong to any other religion than Islamism; and thirdly, Britain and Turkey are the only two countries in the world which en joy self-government and civil and religious liberty. This same Urquhart has since become the great Eastern authority for all English Liberals who object to Palmerston, and it is he who supplies The Daily News with the materials for these panegyrics upon Turkey.
The only argument which deserves a moment's notice, upon this side of the question is this: "It is said that Turkey is decaying; but where is the decay? Is not civilization rapidly spreading in Turkey and trade extending? Where you see nothing but decay, our statistics prove nothing but progress." Now it would be a great fallacy to put down the increasing Black Sea trade to the credit of Turkey alone, and yet this is done here, exactly as if the industrial and commercial capabilities of Holland, the high road to the greater part of Germany, were to be measured by her gross exports and imports, nine-tenths of which represent a mere transit. And yet, what every statistician would immediately, in the case of Holland, treat as a clumsy concoction, the whole of the liberal press of England, including the learned Economist, tries, in the case of Turkey, to impose upon public credulity. And then, who are the traders in Turkey? Certainly not the Turks. Their way of promoting trade, when they were yet in their original nomadic state, consisted in robbing caravans, and now that they are a little more civilized it consists in all sorts of arbitrary and oppressive exactions. The Greeks, the Armenians, the Slavonians and the Franks established in the large seaports, carry on the whole of the trade, and certainly they 'have no reason to thank Turkish Beys and Pashas for being able to do so. Remove all the Turks out of Europe, and trade will have no reason to suffer. And as to progress in general civilization, who are they that carry out that progress in all parts of European Turkey? Not the Turks, for they are few and far between, and can hardly be said to be settled anywhere except in Constantinople and two or three small country districts. It is the Greek and Slavonic middle class in all the towns and trading posts who are the real support of whatever civilization is effectually imported into the country. That part of the population are constantly rising in wealth and influence, and the Turks are more and more driven into the background. Were it not for their monopoly of civil and military power, they would soon disappear. But that monopoly has become impossible for the future, and their power is turned into impotence, except for obstructions in the way of progress. The fact is, they must be got rid of. To say that they cannot be got rid of except by putting Russians and Austrians in their place, means as much as to say, that the present political constitution of Europe will last forever. Who will make such an assertion?
| Written at the end of March 1853 Reproduced from the New-York Daily Tribune First published in the New-York Daily Tribune, No. 3746, April 19, 1853, as a leader; reprinted in the New-York Weekly Tribune, No. 606, April 23, 1853 |
Notes
[a] Franks is the name commonly used in the Middle East for West-Europeans.—Ed.[b] Jos. Hammer, Geschichte des Osmanischen Reiches.—Ed.
[c] This evidently refers to David Urquhart's books published in the 1830s: Turkey and Its Resources and The Spirit of the East.—Ed.
[23] This article was published in The Eastern Question which gave Marx as its author (see Note 17 ↓).
[17] This article was published in the collection: Karl Marx, The Eastern Question, London, 1897. The collection gave Marx as the author of the article. However, it was later discovered that this article, as well as "The Turkish Question" and "What Is to Become of Turkey in Europe?", were written by Engels. This is confirmed by Engels' letter to Marx of March 11, 1853, in which he agreed, in response to Marx's request, to write a series of articles on the subject, and also by his letter to Marx of May 1, 1854, in which he referred to these articles in connection with future plans for writing on the Eastern question for the press (see present edition, Vol. 39).
[24] The Greek insurrection was prepared by secret societies of Greek patriots (Hetaeria). It was sparked off in spring 1821 by a march of a detachment under Alexander Ypsilanti—a Greek officer in the Russian army and leader of a secret society in Odessa—to the Danubian Principalities across the Pruth in order thence to enter Greece. The campaign was a failure, but it marked the beginning of a mass movement in Greece which soon spread throughout the country. In January 1822 the National Assembly in Epidaurus proclaimed the independence of Greece and adopted a Constitution. Initially the powers of the Holy Alliance strongly opposed the insurrection. However, the great sympathy aroused everywhere for the Greek struggle against Turkish domination, and especially the opportunity of using this struggle to strengthen their influence in the south of the Balkans, caused Britain, Russia and France to recognise Greece as a belligerent and render her armed assistance. Russia's victory in the Russo-Turkish war of 1828-29 was of major importance in helping Greece to acquire independence. Turkey was compelled to recognise Greece as an independent state. However, the European powers imposed a monarchical form of government on the Greek people.
[25] Fanariote Greeks—
[26] The Serbian insurrection, which flared up in February 1804 against the arbitrary rule and brutal reprisals of the Turkish janissaries, developed into an armed struggle for the country's independence from Turkey. During the insurrection a national government was set up and Georgi Petrović (Karageorge), the leader of the insurgents, was proclaimed the hereditary supreme ruler of the Serbian people in 1808. The Serbian movement was greatly advanced by the successful operations of the Russian army in the Balkans during the Russo-Turkish war of 1806-12. According to the Bucharest peace treaty of 1812 Turkey was to give Serbia autonomy in domestic affairs. Taking advantage of Napoleon's invasion into Russia, however, the Turkish Sultan organised a punitive expedition to Serbia in 1813 and restored his rule there. As a result of a new insurrection by the Serbs in 1815 and also diplomatic assistance from Russia, Turkish rule was overthrown. After the Russo-Turkish war of 1828-29, which ended with the signing of a peace treaty in Adrianople in 1829, Turkey recognised the autonomy, i.e., the virtual independence, of the Serbian Principality in a special order issued by the Sultan in 1830.
[27] The battle of Navarino took place on October 20, 1827. It was fought by the Turko-Egyptian fleet, on the one side, and the allied British, Ft-cm h and Russian fleet commanded by Vice-Admiral Codrington, on the other. The latter was sent by the European powers to Greek waters for the purpose of armed mediation in the war between Turkey and the Greek insurgents. The battle ended in a crushing defeat for the Turko-Egyptian fleet.
[28] Magna Charta (Magna Carta Libertatum)—a charter signed by King John of England on June 15, 1215, under pressure from the rebellious barons, who were supported by the knights and burghers. It restricted the rights of the King, mainly in the interests of the big feudal magnates, and contained some concessions to the knights and burghers.
[29] In 1849 the Russian and Austrian governments demanded that Turkey should extradite Hungarian and Polish refugees who had taken part in the revolution in Hungary. The Turkish Government, which hoped to make use of the refugees in reorganising the army, refused to comply with this demand. The conflict became especially acute after the intervention of the Western powers, which decided to oppose Russia for fear of her growing influence in the Near East and in Central Europe. The British Government sent a squadron to the Dardanelles. Nicholas I was compelled to give way and be content with the Turkish Government's promise to expel the refugees from Turkey.
[30] The will of Peter the Great—a spurious document circulated by enemies of Russia. The idea of the existence of the "will" was advanced in the West as early as 1797. In 1812 Ch. L. Lesur described the contents of this pseudo-will in his book Des progrès de la puissance russe, depuis son origine jusqu'au commençement du XIX[e] siècle, and in 1836 it was reproduced as a document in T. F. Gaillardet's book Mémoires du Chevalier d'Eon. In Marx's and Engels' lifetime many people in Western Europe regarded this document as authentic.
MarxEngles.public-archive.net #ME0719en.html
WHAT IS TO BECOME OF TURKEY IN EUROPE?
Frederick Engels
We have seen how the obstinate ignorance, the time-hallowed routine, the hereditary mental drowsiness of European statesmen, shrinks from the very attempt to answer this question. Aberdeen and Palmerston, Metternich and Guizot, not to mention their republican and constitutional substitutes of 1848 to 1852 who will ever be nameless all despair of a solution.
And all the while Russia advances step by step, slowly, but irresistibly, towards Constantinople, in spite of all the diplomatic notes, plots and manoeuvres of France and England.
Now this steady advance of Russia, admitted by all parties, in all countries of Europe, has never been explained by official states-men. They see the effect, they see even the ultimate consequence, and yet the cause is hidden from them, although nothing is more simple.
The great motive power which speeds Russia on towards Constantinople, is nothing but the very device, designed to keep her away from it; the hollow, the never-enforced theory of the status quo.
What is this status quo? For the Christian subjects of the Porte, it means simply the maintenance for ever' and a day, of Turkish oppression over them. As long as they are oppressed by Turkish rule, the head of the Greek Church, the ruler of sixty millions of Greek Christians, be he in other respects what he may, is their natural liberator and protector. Thus it is, that ten millions of Greek Christians in European Turkey, are forced to appeal to Russian aid, by that very diplomatic scheme, invented in order to prevent Russian encroachments.
Look at the facts as history records them. Even before the reign of Catherine II Russia never omitted an opportunity of obtaining favorable conditions for Moldavia and Wallachia. These stipulations, at last, were carried to such a length in the Treaty of Adrianople (1829)[35] that the above-named principalities are now more subject to Russia than to Turkey. When, in 1804, the Servian revolution broke out, Russia took the rebel Rayahs at once under her protection, and in two treaties, after having supported them in two wars, guaranteed the internal independence of their country[36]. When the Greeks revolted, who decided the contest? Not the plots and rebellions of Ali Pasha of Janina, not the battle of Navarino, not the French army in the Morea[37], not the conferences and protocols of London, but the march of Diebitsch's Russians across the Balkan into the valley of the Maritza[38]. And while Russia thus fearlessly set about the dismemberment of Turkey, western diplomatists continued to guarantee and to hold up as sacred the status quo and the inviolability of the Ottoman territory!
So long as the tradition of the upholding, at any price, of the status quo and the independence of Turkey in her present state is the ruling maxim of Western diplomacy, so long will Russia be considered, by nine-tenths of the population of Turkey in Europe, their only support, their liberator, their Messiah.
Now, suppose for a moment that Turkish rule in the Graeco-Slavonian peninsula were got rid of; that a government more suitable to the wants of the people existed; what then would be the position of Russia? The fact is notorious, that in every one of the States which have sprung up upon Turkish soil and acquired either total or partial independence, a powerful anti-Russian party has formed itself. If that be the case at a time when Russian support is their only safeguard against Turkish oppression, what, then, are we to expect, as soon as the fear of Turkish oppression shall have vanished?
But to remove Turkish authority beyond the Bosphorus; to emancipate the various creeds and nationalities which populate the peninsula; to open the door to the schemes and machinations, the conflicting desires and interests of all the great powers of Europe;—why is not this provoking universal war? Thus asks diplomatic cowardice and routine.
Of course, it is not expected that the Palmerstons, the Aberdeens, the Clarendons, the Continental Foreign Secretaries, will do such a thing. They cannot look at it without shuddering. But whosoever has, in the study of history, learned to admire the eternal mutations of human affairs in which nothing is stable but instability, nothing constant but change; whosoever has followed up that stern march of history whose wheels pass relentlessly over the remains of empires, crushing entire generations, without holding them worthy even of a look of pity; whosoever, ) in short, has had his eyes open to the fact that there was never a demagogic appeal or insurgent proclamation, as revolutionary as the plain and simple records of the history of mankind; whoever knows how to appreciate the eminently revolutionary character of the present age, when steam and wind, electricity and the printing press, artillery and gold discoveries cooperate to produce more changes and revolutions in a year than were ever before brought about in a century, will certainly not shrink from facing a historical question, because of the consideration that its proper settlement may bring about a European war.
No, diplomacy, Government according to the old fashion will never solve the difficulty. The solution of the Turkish problem is reserved, with that of other great problems, to the European Revolution. And there is no presumption in assigning this apparently remote question to the lawful domain of that great movement. The revolutionary landmarks have been steadily advancing ever since 1789. The last revolutionary outposts were Warsaw, Debreczin, Bucharest; the advanced posts of the next revolution must be Petersburg and Constantinople. They are the two vulnerable points where the Russian anti-revolutionary colossus must be attacked.
It would be a mere effort of fancy to give a detailed scheme as to how the Turkish territory in Europe might be partitioned out. Twenty such schemes could be invented, every one as plausible as the other. What we have to do is, not to draw up fanciful programmes, but to seek general conclusions from indisputable facts. And from this point of view the question presents a double aspect.
Firstly, then, it is an undeniable reality that the peninsula, commonly called Turkey in Europe, forms the natural inheritance of the South-Slavonian race. That race furnishes seven millions out of twelve of its inhabitants. It has been in possession of the soil for twelve hundred years. Its competitors if we except a sparse population which has adopted the Greek language, although in reality of Slavonic descent are Turkish or Arnaut barbarians, who have long since been convicted of the most inveterate opposition to all progress. The South-Slavonians, on the contrary, are, in the inland districts of the country, the exclusive representatives of civilization. They do not yet form a nation, but they have a powerful and comparatively enlightened nucleus of nationality in Servia. The Servians have a history, a literature of their own. They owe their present internal independence to an eleven years' struggle, carried on valiantly against superior numbers. They have, for the last twenty years, grown rapidly in culture and the means of civilization. They are looked upon by the Christians of Bulgaria, Thrace, Macedonia and Bosnia as the center, around which, in their future efforts for independence and nationality, all of them must rally. In fact, it may be said that, the more Servia and Servian nationality has consolidated itself, the more has the direct influence of Russia on the Turkish Slavonians been thrown into the background; for Servia, in order to maintain its distinct position as a Christian State, has been obliged to borrow from the West of Europe its political institutions, its schools, its scientific knowledge, its industrial appliances; and thus is explained the anomaly, that, in spite of Russian protection, Servia, ever since her emancipation, has formed a constitutional monarchy.
Whatever may be the bonds which consanguinity and common religious belief may draw between the Russian and the Turkish Slavonians, their interests will be decidedly opposite from the day the latter are emancipated. The commercial necessities arising from the geographical position of the two countries explain this. Russia, a compact inland country, is essentially a country of predominant agricultural, and perhaps, one day, manufacturing production. The Graeco-Slavonian peninsula, small in extent, comparatively, with an enormous extent of shore on three seas, one of which it commands, is now essentially a country of commercial transit, though with the best capacities for independent production. Russia is monopolizing, South Slavonia is expansive. They are, besides, competitors in Central Asia; but while Russia has every interest to exclude all but her own produce, South Slavonia has, even now, every interest to introduce into the Eastern markets the produce of Western Europe. How, then, is it possible for the two nations to agree? In fact, the Turkish South Slavonians and Greeks have, even now, far more interests in common with Western Europe than with Russia. And as soon as the line of railway, which now extends from Ostende, Havre and Hamburg to Pesth, shall have been continued to Belgrade and Constantinople (which is now under consideration), the influence of Western civilization and Western trade will become permanent in the South-east of Europe.
Again: The Turkish Slavonians especially suffer by their subjection to a Mussulman class of military occupants whom they have to support. These military occupants unite in themselves all public functions, military, civil and judicial. Now what is the Russian system of government, wherever it is not mixed up with feudal institutions, but a military occupation, in which the civil and judicial hierarchy are organized in a military manner, and where the people have to pay for the whole? Whoever thinks that such a system can have a charm for the South Slavonians, may study the history of Servia since 1804. Kara-George, the founder of Servian independence, was abandoned by the people, and Miloš Obrenović, the restorer of that independence, was ignominiously turned out of the country, because they attempted to introduce the Russian autocratic system, accompanied with its concomitant corruption, half-military bureaucracy and pasha-like extortion.
Here then is the simple and final solution of the question. History and the facts of the present day alike point to the erection of a free and independent Christian State on the ruins of the Moslem Empire in Europe. The next effort of the Revolution can hardly fail to render such an event necessary, for it can hardly fail to inaugurate the long-maturing conflict between Russian Absolutism and European Democracy. In that conflict England must bear a part, in whatever hands her Government may for the moment happen to be placed. She can never allow Russia to obtain possession of Constantinople. She must then, take sides with the enemies of the Czar and favor the construction of an independent Slavonian Government in the place of the effete and overthrown Sublime Porte[39].
| Written at the beginning of April 1853 Reproduced from the New-York Daily Tribune First published in the New-York Daily Tribune, No. 3748, April 21, 1853, as a leader; reprinted in the New-York Weekly Tribune, No. 607, April 30, 1853 |
Notes
[35] The Treaty of Adrianople—a peace treaty signed between Turkey and Russia in September 1829 to end the Russo-Turkish war of 1828-29. By the treaty Russia obtained the Danube Delta with its islands and a considerable portion of the eastern Black Sea coast south of the Kuban estuary. Turkey was to recognise the autonomy of Moldavia and Wallachia, granting them the right to elect their Hospodars independently; their autonomy was to be guaranteed by Russia. The Turkish Government also pledged to recognise Greece as an independent state, whose only obligation to Turkey was to pay an annual tribute to the Sultan, and to observe the previous treaties with regard to Serbian autonomy, issuing a special order in official recognition of it.Marx's notebook with excerpts for 1853 contains, on page 18, a passage in French from the Adrianople treaty. The text of the treaty was published in many collections of documents, in works by various authors quoted by Marx, and in periodicals.
[36] The Serbian insurrection, which flared up in February 1804 against the arbitrary rule and brutal reprisals of the Turkish janissaries, developed into an armed struggle for the country's independence from Turkey. During the insurrection a national government was set up and Georgi Petrović (Karageorge), the leader of the insurgents, was proclaimed the hereditary supreme ruler of the Serbian people in 1808. The Serbian movement was greatly advanced by the successful operations of the Russian army in the Balkans during the Russo-Turkish war of 1806-12. According to the Bucharest peace treaty of 1812 Turkey was to give Serbia autonomy in domestic affairs. Taking advantage of Napoleon's invasion into Russia, however, the Turkish Sultan organised a punitive expedition to Serbia in 1813 and restored his rule there. As a result of a new insurrection by the Serbs in 1815 and also diplomatic assistance from Russia, Turkish rule was overthrown. After the Russo-Turkish war of 1828-29, which ended with the signing of a peace treaty in Adrianople in 1829, Turkey recognised the autonomy, i.e., the virtual independence, of the Serbian Principality in a special order issued by the Sultan in 1830.
[37] Ali Pasha of Janina, who ruled over a vast territory in the south-west of the Balkans (Epirus, Albania, South Macedonia and other lands, with Janina as the centre), had been at war with the Turkish Sultan since 1820, a fact which contributed to the success of the Greek uprising. However, unlike the national liberation movement of the Greeks, this struggle was of a feudal-separatist nature and ended in his defeat in 1822. For the battle of Navarino see Note 27↓.
[27] The battle of Navarino took place on October 20, 1827. It was fought by the Turko-Egyptian fleet, on the one side, and the allied British, Ft-cm h and Russian fleet commanded by Vice-Admiral Codrington, on the other. The latter was sent by the European powers to Greek waters for the purpose of armed mediation in the war between Turkey and the Greek insurgents. The battle ended in a crushing defeat for the Turko-Egyptian fleet.
When war broke out between Turkey and Russia in the spring of 1828, French troops under the command of General Maison landed in Morea (the Peloponnesus) in Southern Greece in August and occupied the peninsula. The aim of the expedition, which was organised on the pretext of rendering assistance to the Greeks, was to counteract growing Russian influence in the Balkans and consolidate the position of France in the region.
[38] The London conferences of the representatives of Britain, Russia and France were held in 1827-29 and discussed the Greek question. On July 6, 1827, the three powers signed a Convention which confirmed the Protocol on Greek autonomy signed by Britain and Russia in St. Petersburg on April 4, 1826. Both the Protocol and the Convention contained clauses on the diplomatic recognition of Greece as an independent state and armed mediation in the Turko-Greek conflict. On the basis of this Convention the allied fleet was sent into Greek waters and took part in the battle of Navarino. A number of other documents concerning Greece were also signed, including a Protocol of March 22, 1829, which established the borders of the Greek state and provided for a monarchical form of government in Greece. However, these agreements and the steps taken by Britain and France, who hoped to settle the conflict through diplomacy, without a defeat for Turkey in the Russo-Turkish war, could not make Turkey change her attitude on the Greek question. It was only after the victory of the Russian army under General Diebich in the 1829 campaign that Turkey agreed to make some concessions.
[39] The editors of the New-York Daily Tribune inserted the following passage at the end of the article (which was also reproduced in the New-York Weekly Tribune): "For the present, the duty of those who would forward the popular cause in Europe is to lend all possible aid to the development of industry, education, obedience to law, and the instinct of freedom and independence in the Christian dependencies of Turkey. The future peace and progress of the world are concerned in it. If there is to be a harvest, too much care cannot be given to the preparation of the soil and the sowing of the seed."
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