The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1895-11-21
THE CASTERS QUESTION:.

THE EASTERN QUESTION.
The unspeakable Turk" who has
been boil on the body of Europe for
two centuries, has broken out again in
malignant form, and for the hundredth
time the whole civilized world is angrily
demanding that something be done to
end him. Long ago it was decided that
nothing could be done to mend him.
But how to end him? There is the
puzzling question, which it may take a
million lives to answer.
The Sultan of Turkey ruled $50 years
ago territory in Asia, Africa, and Eu-
rope about as large as the United States.
This included Greeks, Rumanians, Bull
garians and other Slavs, in Europe ;
Armenians, Jews, and Syrians in Asia,
and Egyptians, Tripolitans, Algerians,
Arabs, and Moroccans in Africa.
In 1869 the Russians took away from
Turkey the Crimea, and all the country
north Of the Black Sea, and in 1906
another large slice of territory. In
1923 the Allied Powers compelled Tur-
key to give Greece her independence,
and in 1858 England and France Gre
ated out of Moldavia and Wallachia
the Kingdom of Rumania, to act as a
buffer" between Russia and Turkey.
Russia's war against Turkey in 1876
resulted in Russia getting large slice
of Armenia, in Austria's getting Bosnia
and Herzegovina, Greece being given
Thessaly and Epirus, and Bulgaria, Ser
via, and Montenegro being declared
independent States. Morocco had long
been independent, the French had taken
Algiers, and assumed protectorate over
Tunis; and in more recent years Eng
land has seized Egypt.
There still remains to Turkey in Eu-
rope the City of Constantinople, and
territory about the size of Illinois. This
has a population of about 100000,
composed of high mixture of races
Of the $4,000 people in Constantine
pie 384,910 are Mussulmans, 1874
Greeks, 1850 Armenians, and the
remainder Jews, Catholics, etc.
In Asia Minor, Turkey has terri
tory about as large as the late so-called
Southern Confederacy, and inhabited by
100000 Armenians, Jews, Arabs,
Greeks, Syrians, and a hodge-podge of
tribes and peoples who have dwelt there
from time immemorial. From the be-
ginning of history these have been under
the dominion of some foreign power |;
first the Babylonians, then the Persians,
next the Greeks, then the Romans, and
finally the Turks.
The aggravating problem of centuries
has been to whom these territories and
people should go if the Turk were
driven out. They cannot be built up
into little Independent Kingdoms, as
Greece, Rumania, Servia, Bulgaria, and
Montenegro have been, because the popu-
lation is too heterogeneous, disunited,
and destitute of publicspirit. The Jews
could not take care of Palestine if it
were given them. The Armenians
might possibly make something out of
their country, but it Is felt to be hopeless
with regard to the others. Gladstone,
ON sentimental and historical grounds,
has favored giving Constantinople to
Greece, but this IS mob generally re-
garded as a practical proposition. The
powers are bitterly opposed to giving the
country to Russia, and equally hostile to
England's assuming control. So there
they are, just where they were a century
ago, except that several of the powers
have made large grabs of Turkish terri
tory.
The only hope of peace is an AMIGA
bic division of Turkey among England,
France, Germany, Italy, Austria, and
Russia, but the difficulties in having each
satisfied with his share seem almost in
surmountable.