ABSTRACT
The frontiers between the dwarf states of the Balkan Peninsula were drawn not in accordance with national conditions or national demands, but as a result of wars, diplomatic intrigues, and dynastic interests. The Great Powers – in the first place, Russia and Austria – have always had a direct interest in setting the Balkan peoples and states against each other and then, when they have weakened one another, subjecting them to their economic and political influence. The petty dynasties ruling in these ‘broken pieces’ of the Balkan Peninsula have served and continue to serve as levers for European diplomatic intrigues. And this entire mechanism, founded on violence and perfidy, constitutes a huge burden weighing upon the Balkan peoples, holding back their economic and cultural development . . . This peninsula, richly endowed by nature, is senselessly split up into little bits; people and goods moving about in it constantly come up against the prickly hedges of state frontiers, and this cutting of nations and states into many strips renders impossible the formation of a single Balkan market, which could provide the basis for a great development of Balkan industry and culture. On top of all this is the exhausting militarism that has come into being in order to keep the Balkans divided, and which has given rise to the danger of wars fatal to the peninsula’s economic progress – wars between Greece and Turkey, Turkey and Bulgaria, Romania and Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia . . .
