THE Otautau Standard AND WALLACE COUNTY CHRONICLE Tuesday, December 3rd 1912. THE EASTERN QUESTION:

Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 395, 3 December 1912, Page 4

THE Otautau Standard AND WALLACE COUNTY CHRONICLE Tuesday, Dec ember 3rd 1912. THE EASTERN QUESTION:

\ The phenomenal and altogether unexj pected success of the Allies in their ' attack upon Turkey, whilst placing the near Eastern Question upon an entirely new footing, tends to rather . increase than diminish the dangers of a disagreement between the Great Powers. For close on a century, the continued oppression by the Porte of her subject race has been a fruitful cause of international discord, and it has always been a difficult question to decide whether sympathy for the Christian race or their own self- inter est has been the motive force in the action of the Porte's powerful neighbours. In the past* it was always Russia that was looked upon as the disturbing force, and although Britain and France joined with her in 1828, to ensure the independence of Greece, she has usually been regarded by the statesmen of the other Powers with deep suspicion. It has always been thought, whenever Russia made a move towards the Turkish dominions that the possession of Constantinople rather than the amelioration of the conditions of the Christian subject of the Porte, was the aim in view. It was pursuant to this policy that led Britain, together with France and Sardinia, to embark in 1854 in the Crimean War, and which led her to the verge of hostilities in 1878. On every occasion Turkey has promised at the conclusion of hostilities the greatest penitence, and has made voluminous promises of the most liberal reforms, but it has always beea a case of When the Devil was ill, the Devil a saint would be, When the Devil was well, the devil a saint was he,

It was hoped that when tbe revolution of 1908 deprived the Sultan of all real power, and a constitutional government was established, the long promised reforms would at last materialise, but your Irue Mussulman is irreclaimable, and whether a Sultan or a President, justice to Christians and good government aro quite beyond him. If it comes to a question of armed intervention, it looks at the present time like resulting in a duel between Russia and Austria, a country that has evinced great activity in that quarter of late years, and whose seizure of Bosnia and llerzgovinia in defiance of the Berlin Treaty, to which she was a party, is one of the greatest acts of national perfidy of modern times. Uf course, Germany has always to be considered, and she is suspiciouslv quiet and pacific in tone at the present time, but cne thing can be taken for granted, much as the people of Bri tain may dislike the idea of Constantinople passing into other hands, she will keep clear of the business, for apart from ihe feoling that no more blood or treasure should bo expended bolsteiiog up Turkey, she has enough to engage l.er full attention in the North Sea ! The day when Britain thought it her duty to take part in every European squabble has gone by for tLe present, perhaps never to return.