Evening star., 1943-06-27
Balkan Firebrond

By Kostn TodoroD. fAllinnce. J
Although there are probably few
Americans who have heard OF Kosta
Todorov. 1t seems a likely guess that
his autobiography will interest most
Of those who take 1t up. Unless,
that is. the plethora of preceding
autobiographies OF European exiles
has not hopelessly surfeited the
public appetite. BY contrast with
the authors of most of these, Mr..
Todorov, 1t should be said, did not
begin his career as an exile with
the present world trouble. He start
ed as early as 1905, when, at the age
OF 16, he contrived to get price
set on his head, and from then on,
at frequent intervals, he was cast
out Of one or another country and
sternly forbidden to return. He does
not look on his present residence in
America, therefore, as the climax or
catastrophe Of his career, but as
one more episode In a lifelong fight
Tor what, according to his lights, has
been freedom and democracy.
He Is q Bulgarian and is, at pres
ent, head OF the Free Bulgarian
Committee. His career began when,
as a mere boy, he joined a guerrilla
Dand OF Macedonians to fight
against Turkey. A year later he
was sent to Russia to study In the
University of Odessa, but used his
time there to make one with the
revolutionary terrorists. Bombings
and assassinations were the routine
work Of the group to which he be-
longed. and he ended by being cap
tured and sentenced to death, but
got communication to eight years
Imprisonment by reason of his
youth. In jail he continued his ac-
tivities, assisting at prison breaks
and executions" of police spies.
He joined the French Foreign Le-
gion when the First World War
broke out and acted as a highly un-
official emissary to Bulgaria to pro-
pose separate peace when that
country took sides with Germany.
After the armistice he plunged into
Bulgarian politics and, for a number
Of years, was alternately high In
power or banished and sentenced to
death as governmental regimes
came and went with Balkan effer-
vescence. He served his country as
representative to the League of Ma
tions and aS Minister to Yugoslavia.
He was in exile In France when the
Second World War broke out, and
subsequently he came to America.
Like most writers who look back
on the interwar years, he asserts
that he clearly discerned the
course which events were taking in
that muddled period. He writes that
he saw the enemy of Europe's peace
in Fascism even while that move
ment was new, and he lays much of
the blame for the present war on
Italy's Vaccinations in the Balkans.
His own party's policy was to bring
about Balkan unity and it failed
only because, by bribery and terror,
Mussolini kept the rift between Bull
garia and her neighbors open to the
end that he might not meet resist
ance in his own Balkan adventure.
The murder of King Alexander was
an Italian-inspired deed, says Mr.
Todorov. thereby agreeing with a
number of other historians.
The striking thing about the po-
litical picture which the book pre-
sents. apart from the extraordinary
personal narrative, Is its demonstra-
ton of unqualified corruption. No
European statesman with whom Mr.
Todorov had to deal expected honest
procedure-not even in that sense of
political trading which is rec
ognized as etiquette in our own
country. No one had the slightest
sense of serving the public welfare.
No one was animated by patriotism
or restrained by ordinary self-re-
spect. 1t was a murderous free
for-au Of grabbers, vulgarians,
traitors and thugs, as 1t Is shown
here. Statesmen thrown out of Of
flee were casually tortured to death
by their victorious opponents, fam
lilies were used as hostages to insure
treason, eminent gentlemen bearing
ancient titles asked to have their
palms creased for betraying their
countries interests and so on, We