Negotiations were conducted between Greece and Turkey from these respective points of view without leading to any result, and the two standpoints were in fact irreconcilable, since either power required the other to leave vital national interests at the mercy of an ancient enemy, without undertaking to make corresponding sacrifices itself.  The problem probably would never have been solved by compromise; but meanwhile the situation has been entirely transformed by the participation of Turkey in the European War, and the issue between Greece and Turkey, like the issue between Greece and Bulgaria, has been merged in the general problem of the European settlement.

The Balkan War of 1912 doomed the Ottoman power in Europe, but left its Asiatic future unimpaired.  By making war against the Quadruple Entente, Turkey has staked her existence on both continents, and is threatened with political extinction if the Central Powers succumb in the struggle.  In this event Greece will no longer have to accommodate her regime in the liberated islands to the susceptibilities of a Turkey consolidated on the opposite mainland, but will be able to stretch out her hand over the Anatolian coast and its hinterland, and compensate herself richly in this quarter for the territorial sacrifices which may still be necessary to a lasting understanding with her Bulgarian neighbour.

The shores that dominate the Dardanelles will naturally remain beyond her grasp, but she may expect to establish herself on the western littoral from a point as far north as Mount Ida and the plain of Edremid.  The Greek coast-town of Aivali will be hers, and the still more important focus of Greek commerce and civilization at Smyrna; while she will push her dominion along the railways that radiate from Smyrna towards the interior.  South-eastward, Aidin will be hers in the valley of the Mendere (Maiandros).  Due eastward she will re-baptize the glistening city of Ala Shehr with its ancient name of Philadelphia, under which it held out heroically for Hellenism many years after Aidin had become the capital of a Moslem principality and the Turkish avalanche had rolled past it to the sea.  Maybe she will follow the railway still further inland, and plant her flag on the Black Castle of Afiun, the natural railway-centre of Anatolia high up on the innermost plateau.  All this and more was once Hellenic ground, and the Turkish incomer, for all his vitality, has never been able here to obliterate the older culture or assimilate the earlier population.  In this western region Turkish villages are still interspersed with Greek, and under the government of compatriots the unconquerable minority would inevitably reassert itself by the peaceful weapons of its superior energy and intelligence.

4.  If Greece realizes these aspirations through Venezelos’ statesmanship, she will have settled in conjunction her outstanding accounts with both Bulgaria and Turkey; but a fourth group of islands still remains for consideration, and these, though formerly the property of Turkey, are now in the hands of other European powers.