Evening star., 1945-07-10
Greek -YugosIov Crisis

SISSk- uyOStuf SIiSiS
A speech made last Sunday by
Marshal Tito. ruler of Yugoslavia,
high lights a most disturbing situa-
ton which has been developing for
some time between that country and
Greece. The apple of discord is the
region of Northern Greece, generally
termed Greek Macedonia, centering
around the port city of Salonika.
Salonika is the commercial outlet
for the entire watershed of the Var
dar River which runs northward into
the heart of YugoSlavia. Rivalry for
this Mediterranean gateway to the
Balkans caused the Second Balkan
War of 1918. when the Christian
Balkan States quarreled over the
spoils they had acquired from beaten
Turkey in the First Balkan War the
year before. In that second struggle
Bulgaria, which claimed Salonika,
was beaten by Greece and Serbia,
the predecessor of the larger Yugo-
Slavia which came into being after
World War I. The victors divided
Macedonia, Greece getting the coast
al zone with Salonika, but granting
Serbia railway transit rights and a
free port in the city, thus satisfying
Serbian commercial needs. This ar
rangement still legally exists.
Under Turkish rule, all Macedonia
had highly mixed population. After
the 1918 partition, Greece and Serbia
both strove to eliminate the Bull
garian element and also to attract
their respective nationals to their
sides of the border. A decade later
vast numbers of Greek refugees from
Turkey were settled in Greek Mace
donia. which thus became over
whelmingly Greek in character.
After the Axis conquest of Greece in
1941 most of Greek Macedonia was
occupied by Bulgarian puppet troops
and many Bulgarian civilians re-
turned, but by the armistice terms
at the close of the recent war those
civilians were t6 leave Greek terri
tory.
1t is not unlikely that some of
these were the "Slavs" whom Tito, in
his Sunday address, charged as
having been driven across the Yugo-
Slav border by Greeks, there being
very few persons of Yugoslav blood
in Greek Macedonia. Indeed, it Is
significant that Tito refers to these
alleged refugees as "Slavs"-a gen.
eral term which could include per-
sons of Bulgarian stock. Tito likewise
charged other provocative acts on
the part of the Greeks, such as firing
across the frontier and terroristic
acts by Greek bands" against both
"Slavs" and Greeks opposed to the
present government at Athens, which
Tito describes as "reactionary" and
Fascist" This is the government
headed by Admiral Voulgaris, estab-
lished after the civil war last winter,
when the British intervened to sup
press the coup attempted by the
Communicated ELIAS party. Many
ELIAS fled into Yugoslavia. where
they were well received by Marshal
Tito and his Communicated regime,
which is now in close relations with
the Communist regime established
in Bulgaria after it's occupation by
Soviet Russian armies.
Tito makes no secret of his hope to
establish federation of Balkan
States with Communistic regimes,
intimately connected with Soviet
Russia. One member of this fedora
ton would be an autonomous Mace
donia," thereby healing the historic
feud between YugoslavS and Bulgars.
Such Macedonia would logically
include the Greek portion with Salo-
nika. The Greek Communists show
no aversion to such a development,
provided Communized Greece were
included in the projected Balkan
federation.
OF course, such scheme is loaded
with dynamite, since Britain would
bitterly oppose it. Is Tito acting en-
tirely on his own, or has he at least
the sympathy of Moscow? In any
event there are plenty of British
troops still in Greece, some of them
presumably in Salonika. If Tito's
speech is more than verbal gesture,
a new crisis tenser than that of
Trieste may be in the off1ng.