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The greco-turkish war of 1897, which lasted a little more than a month, is one that has all but disappeared from history books: Dupuy and Dupuy’s The Encyclopedia of Military History affords just fifty-six words and numbers to this conflict, and this would seem to be par for the course. There is indeed no disputing the simple fact that this was a war that was of little importance and consequence, and it is a war that has been pushed to the side by the greater conflicts that came over the next twenty-five years. But it was a war that was the one exception in the process of Turkish contraction on the Haemus : it was the only war in the nineteenth-century Balkans in which Turkey was not obliged to cede territory. What was to become known as the Thirty Days’ War began on 17 April 1897 as the by-product of the situation that had arisen on Crete, where the collapse of Turkish authority and the activities of Greek militias produced a situation that tethered on the brink of civil war and foreign intervention, the great powers not wishing to see any conflict that might lead to a wider war on the mainland .1 The great powers were able to prevent Turkey from sending to Crete army formations that might have restored order if not law but could prevent neither a landing on Crete by a Greek force of some two thousand troops on 15 February 1897 nor a Greek declaration of annexation (16 February). What the great powers were able to do, however, was to demand—under threat of naval blockade of all Greek ports for non-compliance—the Greek withdrawal of its military and naval forces from Crete (2 March), but with one unforeseen chapter two The Greco-Turkish War of 1897 32 definitions and terms of reference consequence: frustrated on Crete, the Greeks sought compensation in Macedonia via the encouragement of rebellion among the Greek population in the area and a dual offensive, to the west in the Epirus from the Arta area and in the east from the Larissa area.2 Confounding this intention, however, were two simple facts of life: the unfolding of events on Crete had given the Turks two months in which to ready themselves for a campaign, and the Turkish Army possessed clear numerical advantage on both sectors but more specifically in the east. In the west the Greeks were able to drive Turkish forces beyond artillery range from Arta and, with Turkish forces withdrawing to positions in front of Philippiada, Greek formations were able to advance some 20 miles/32 km northward, roughly half the distance to Janina, by 25 April.3 By the time they did so, however, the situation in the east had unravelled. The intended Greek offensive in the direction of Elassona had come to nothing with the Greek forces gathered around Mati,4 having been outflanked without ever having managed to get over the border, being obliged to conduct a general withdrawal that ultimately resulted in the whole of the area north of Pharsala, including Larissa, Trikkala, and Karditza,5 being abandoned. This, however, proved only the first part of what was to be comprehensive defeat. With the Greek formations in front of Janina simultaneously forced into a disastrous retreat, the Greek defeats of 15–17 May in front of Domoko and then in the Phurka Pass laid bare the whole of the area to the north of Lamia and the river Sperchcheios.6 With the Turks also securing first Volo and then virtually the whole of the coastal area between Volo and Lamia,7 there was little to prevent a Turkish advance to Athens. It was at this point that great power intervention, and a ceasefire in place from 20 May,8 ensured Greece against the consequences of her own impetuosity and bad judgment. Under Russian brokerage, and after international consultations involving both Greece and Turkey and then those two countries being obliged to negotiate directly with one another, a peace was agreed and a treaty signed on 4 December at Constantinople . The latter provided for a very minor border adjustment in Turkey ’s favor, and receipt of a very small—indeed derisory—indemnity. Turkey was not able to register gains that its position of military advantage suggests would have been within its grasp but for the great powers. What is especially interesting about this brief affair is the fact that the...

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