BULGARIA’S PATH

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23865, 20 July 1939, Page 17

BULGARIA’S PATH

REVISIONIST CLAIMS WILL THEY BE SHELVED? ECONOMIC FREEDOM Now that “ the sky grows darker yet, and the sea rises higher,” the importance of Bulgaria in the Balkan diplomatic and strategic tangle becomes more evident, writes Anthony Winn in the Daily Telegraph and Morning Post. Will her policy be determined by irredentist ambitions or a desire to preserve Balkan solidarity and independence in general? King Boris is believed to favour the latter policy, especially as a military breach of it would bring Turkey in at once on the Bulgarian rear. But he may be having to withstand the pressure of his hotheads and his general staff, as well as the lures of the Axis Powers.

By nature and habit the positive aim of Bulgarian foreign policy is the recovery of “lost” territory on three frontiers; nor could any Bulgarian Government publicly disavow this aim by joining the Balkan Entente, wherein the Inviolability clause is the leading point, without gravely prejudicing thier internal security. Irredentist sentiment is directed first towards the southern Dobruja; secondly to Dedeagatch and the outlet and thirdly towards parts of Macedonia now held by Jugoslavia. Except in extremist and Macedonian cliques, the two latter claims had been dormant volcanoes of late years, particularly in view of the pact of perpetual friendship with Jugoslavia. A great Power might be able to stir up an artificial Macedonian revolt, but there is little reason to think that Bulgaria would be a willing blindfold pawn of the Axis in that region.

Relations With Greece

Relations with Greece are more complex, since Bulgaria might well be granted, not territory, but a free Zone debouching on to the Aegean. However. since the war the Black Sea port of Burgas has been developed. • and neither the important Interests of Burgas nor those of Varna wish to see trade diverted southwards. The wedge of Wheatland, with its apex at the Danube and its base on the Black Sea. known as the Southern Dobruja, belonged to the independent Bulgarian principality created at Berlin in 1878, and was lost to Rumania in 1913, after the second Balkan War, as a result of Rumanian opportunism. The population is extremely mixed, and all ethnographical analyses differ widely, but there is a distinct possibility that among the mixture of Bulgars, Rumanians, Turks, Kutzo-Vlachs, etc., no absolute majority of any onfe race exists.

Bulgarians allege not only dispossession, but brutality at the hands of the gendarmes. It is the common tale of grief in frontier changes. Whatever abstract principle may be satisfied, hundreds of peasant families whose life was their land, and whose horizon their village, must either remain to learn what it means to be in a minority, or trudge uncomprehending, with so much as they can carry, to the nearest refugee organisation. The Economic Argument Racial and historical claims are' supplemented by an economic plea for a source of supply to supplement Bulgaria’s lack of exports and need for free foreign exchange. In the Balkans, it is argued, Jugoslavia has wheat, timber and minerals; Rumania, wheat and oil; Greece, tobacco, shlpKand tourists; Bulgaria, only cco, which goes to Germany, and some wheat. Irredentists added their claims together after Munich (although to remote Bulgaria Munich was more of an incident than a landmark), and hoped that Hungarian revisionism might extend its scope, but the Government has reasons for neither actively seeking nor desiring revision at this moment unless sure of overwhelming support from without, secured by some more solid assurance of future independence than Germany is capable of giving. The State is ill armed by Balkan standards, although the Bulgar is as fine a fighter as other races round him, and the King is said to have improved the condition, morale and standard of living of the army thus earning its loyalty. Bulgaria was. of course, rearming secretly before the rescission of certain articles of the Treaty of Neuilly, at Salonika last year, permitted her to do so openly: but she is behindhand and almost utterly dependent on Germany. There are complaints, not easy to authenticate, that the German deliveries are late, and the material, consisting of German discards, inferior. But free exchange to buy elsewhere is scarce. No Sentiment Revealed Nor would sudden recovery of tne Dobruja ease the immediate financial straitjacket. Wheat in Bulgaria is a Government monopoly, for which the peasant receives a guaranteed price. At the moment the State is holding stocks which it has bought above world price, and which it is unable to export except at a loss. More wheat next year (and wheat apart the Dobruja is a poor country) would probably be an embarrassment, not an asset. To these immediate occasions of restraint can be added others, more enduring if less concrete. Bulgaria has backed the wrong horse all through her brief history, losing at conferences what she wins in the field; she has little desire to repeat the errors of the past. Nor does this tough, dour dnd most honest of Balkan peoples desire to support or oppose any great Power for sentimental reasons. Great Britain and France were enemies to them in the last war. 1 but Bulgaria bears them neither good nor ill will on that account. Characteristically, Sofia is the least responsive of Balkan cities to the work of the British Council. A lecturer to explain how to sell more to England would be welcome. The same empirical attitude is shown towards Germany. The economic stranglehold has advantages mixed with its disadvantages, such as the high prices received in barter terms for Bulgarian exports. These are useful, but there can be no sentimental appeal to the past alliance. Differences With Germans I quote from an irredentist Bulgar pamphlet (translated from the French original):— “ Besides, even during the happy period of the war, the Bulgarians had grave differences with the Germans over the Dobruja wheat country, which the Germans, in spite of their promise were unwilling to give to the Bulgarians. The civil population, as well as the army, was in great distress. In spite of her rich agricultural resources, Bulgaria lacked produce, because all foodstuffs were requisitioned by the Central Powers to feed their populations. . . The attitude of the Germans

inside the country, where they acted as masters, hardly improved matters.” In fact, the Central Powers rifled the country, and Bulgaria remembers. The Nazi organisation recently disbanded was not a major movement. The Government estimated its strength at 2000, mostly in Sofia. Nor was Professor Kantargieff, its leader, well known in public life. In reality, the mainspring of foreign policy is King Boris, who bears a reputation for ability and wariness. He has surrounded himself in the Ministry with several of his military contemporaries and friends. The best known of these, for whom even members of the old Opposition find a good word, is M. Bagnanoff. Minister of Agriculture. M. Kiosseivanoff, the Premier, is a diplomat by career, discreet and as chary of speech as President Coolidge. The other men regarded as of importance in the Ministry are M. Mouchanoff, Speaker of the Sobranje, and M. Boziloff, “the Bulgarian Schacht.” Country Remains Poor Meanwhile, the country remains desperately poor. The peasants’ average cash income has been estimated at £ 14 per annum, out of which he must buy chiefly oil and sugar. M. Magrianoff is trying to vary the country’s production, with the dual object of raising the standard of living of the peasantry and of making foreign trade less dependent on Germany as a customer and Balkan tobacco as a staple. In 1828 Germany took 58.8 per cent, of the exports, as against 47.1 in 1937 (including Austria), and contributed 51.9 per cent, of the total imports, thus leaving Bulgaria with a blocked credit of 720.8 million levas. By contrast, the United Kingdom took only 4.8 per cent, of the exports in 1938, and contributed 7 per cent, of the imports, and Bulgaria’s sole source of free currency is her export trade to the countries that possess this invaluable medium of exchange. The economic power of Germany m this little country is therefore apparent, So far there is little outward evidence of this power being used as a political lever. But until recent events the need for abuse of such power had not arisen: If it arose, and if there were to be a difference of opinion, Germany could dispense with Bulgaria tobacco, but Bulgaria, an embryonic and unpromising mining industry apart, has no other irons in the fire of International trade. •