MODERN GREECE: A History since 1821 - Amazon Web Services

THE VENIZELIST DECADE (1910–20) 73
captured 20,000 prisoners in Bizani and Ioannina. Another 15,000
Turkish soldiers retreated to Albania pursued by Greek forces. On
March 3 Greek units seized Argyrokastro and Delvino. Next day a cavalry
regiment entered Tepeleni. Venizelos, in a telegram he sent
Constantine, defined the northern line beyond which the army should
not move, thus forbidding the seizure of Avlona – a port of great interest
to Italy.
When the First Balkan War broke out, the powers of the Triple Entente
temporarily lost control over the Balkan belligerents. They planned to
resume their regulatory role with the London Conference. In December
1912 an armistice was signed in London without the participation of
Greece which continued the siege of Ioannina. The armistice, however,
was violated by a coup that the Young Turks staged in Constantinople.
The resumption of hostilities gave the Balkan countries, especially
Bulgaria, the opportunity to seize new territories (Scoutari, Adrianople).
A new armistice allowed the belligerents to settle outstanding issues.
Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria fixed through bilateral agreements the
limits of the lands they had occupied, while the Ottoman Empire –
according to the Treaty of London of May 1913 – surrendered all territories
west of the Aimos mountain range as well as Crete.
The Second Balkan War was a settling of scores between the victors
of the First Balkan War. Since there was no clear demarcation between
the territorial targets of the four allies and since Bulgaria’s horizontal
aspirations cut across the vertical lines of attack by the Greeks and the
Serbs, from Thrace to western Macedonia, a settling of scores was only
a matter of time. The occupation of Thessaloniki by the Greeks certainly
constituted a major grievance for Bulgaria. Furthermore the Austro-
Hungarian Empire did everything in its power to sow discord among
the allies on various fronts. It promoted the independence of Albania,
the internationalization of Thessaloniki, and encouraged Romania’s
claims on Bulgarian Dobrudja. Although the Serbs assisted the Bulgarian
siege and the taking of Edirne, they also attempted to revise the Serb–
Bulgarian treaty of 1912 to consolidate their territorial gains in western
and northern Macedonia.
Pressured by an intransigent King Ferdinand and a fanatical IMRO
(Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization), Bulgarian leaders
plunged into a war on five fronts. Besides Greece and Serbia, they had
to fight against Romania who took Dobrudja and the Ottomans who
recaptured Edirne. Bulgaria was compelled to sue for peace and