War Portents in the East.
Is the torch of war soon to be lighted in Eastern Europe? This is the question which is agitating the minds of European diplomatists and statesmen in a marked degree at the present time; and the outlook is not calculated to allay their anxiety. An able review of the situation in the Springfield (Mass.) weekly Republican of March 17, brings out many strikingly suggestive facts on this subject. “The danger of a European war,” so the article begins, “is greater now than at any time since the Berlin congress.” The designs of Russia are foreshadowed in the following statement: “Russia sees Austria oppressing the Bosnians, drafting their young men for her army, and invading their religion with a propaganda of Jesuits disguised as Greek popes; and Russia proposes to interfere, unless Europe insists on the observation, in letter and spirit, of the treaty of Berlin.” Skobeloff is reported as saying to a number of officers in the army in reference to Bismarck, that he “with blood and iron had founded an empire which must be destroyed by Russian blood and iron.” This, while it is as bad as anything that Skobeloff said in his Paris speech, is considered less excusable and more ominous. Austria evidently is not expecting the rigid enforcement of the Berlin treaty; for she has promptly “recognized the kingdom of Servia, and is preparing to send a new ambassador to St. Petersburg, while the Herzegovinian insurrection is almost quelled; but if Austria should, in retaliation for the aid Montenegro has given to the revolting Slavs, venture to attack that outpost of pan-Slavism, the fire would be kindled that would rage again throughout the Balkans, and down the Danube.” There is to be noticed also a remarkable co-incidence going to strengthen the existing apprehensions of Russia’s aggressive policy; namely, that while Gen. Skobeloff was making his threatening speech in Paris, Persia was quietly ceding to Russia the northern border of Iran, long called the garden of Khorassan. The belt of ceded territory extends from Ashkabad to Sarakhs at the junction of the northern boundaries of Persia and Afghanistan, a little southwest of Merv, whose possession has been deemed an object of Russian covetousness. It is of peculiar value to Russia, both on account of its agricultural importance, and because it will enable Russia to appropriate Merv, whenever the favorable moment shall come. Thus the English possessions in the East are threatened by Russia through Afghanistan. Under these circumstances, Prof. Arminius Vambéry in the Augsburg Allgemeine Zeitung derides the apathy of England, to whom he raises a solemn note of warning. He sees in every move of Russia an advance step toward that supremacy forecast by Napoleon in his famous saying that “in a century Europe would be either all republican or all Cossack.” Thus the nations of Europe seem to be caught by an irresistible current, and to be drawing rapidly toward the inevitable vortex of war. In this whirlpool the one nation which is first destined to disappear is Turkey. The very next convulsion in the Eastern political world may bring this result. But whether it does or not, affairs have assumed such a shape that whatever move is made the result is that Turkey comes still nearer her manifest doom without power to recede. As the pawl on the ratchet-wheel can move forward but not back, and as a man in the quicksands finds that to stand still or to struggle is alike to sink deeper toward his destruction, so Turkey, whatever the event, is sinking to her doom. And with the fall of Turkey comes the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy that “Michael, the great prince,” who can be none other than the Son of God, the King of kings and Lord of lords, shall ascend his throne, and establish his people in a kingdom that shall have no end.