ABSTRACT
Salisbury felt strong sympathy for the Christian nationalities of the Balkans under Ottoman sovereignty. His antipathy to alien rule was in this case intensified by Turkish misgovernment, which led him to deny any justification for Moslem rule in Europe. Despite his strong dislike of the Turks, Salisbury recognized that they, too, had a legitimate nationality; and he showed sufficient respect for their government on the level of international politics. Salisbury was not optimistic about preserving even Asia Minor from the Turkish Empire’s enemies; he did, however, try to reshape the Sultan’s rule there and further into Asia on lines familiar from British experience in India. This chapter seeks to show that Salisbury’s personal solution to the Eastern Question envisaged first, a controlled partition of the Ottoman Empire; second, the retention, if possible, of Turkey in Asia, or much of it, under the Sultan; and third, the reform and reinforcement of Ottoman authority in its heartland of Asia Minor. But by the mid-1890s he had despaired of the Sultan, only to be surprised by the demonstration of Turkish revival in the war of 1897 with Greece. To him the solution to the Eastern Question would now be effected more by transition than by design.
