Venizelos' decision to accept this offer was incontinently vetoed by King Constantine; and Venizelos was forced to resign, though supported by a strong parliamentary majority and an all but unanimous public opinion. In the general election which followed (June 13 1915), despite the desperate efforts of the King and his party, the Venizelist party were returned with a large majority. But, contrary to all constitutional requirements, three full months were allowed to pass before Venizelos was summoned to resume office, the King's illness being made an excuse. When finally Venizelos formed his new Cabinet, the Dardanelles expedi- tion had already failed, and another crisis was at hand. In the preceding spring Serbia had driven back the Austrian armies out of her territory; but now a fresh Austrian invasion was imminent, and Bulgaria was plainly bent on revenging herself for her dis- asters of 1913 by preparing to attack Serbia in the flank. Ac- cording to the terms of the Greco-Serbian Treaty of 1913, Greece would, in that case, be bound to come to Serbia's aid. Bulgaria mobilized her army in Sept. 1915, and on the following day Venizelos obtained the King's signature to the decree mobilizing the Greek army. Two days later, Venizelos made an important statement in the Greek Chamber, declaring that, if Bulgaria attacked Serbia, she would have to face the Greek army as well. This declaration was received by the Chamber with loud cheers. King Constantine thereupon sent for Venizelos, and, after telling him that he would never consent to Greece drawing the sword against the allies of Germany, asked for his resignation. To the Premier's remonstrance that, after the recent verdict of the general election in favour of his policy, the Crown was not entitled to refuse its sanction, Constantine replied that in matters of foreign policy he did not consider himself bound to follow the national will, feeling himself " personally responsible to God alone." In the face of this attitude, Venizelos thought it best to resign once more (Oct. 1915); and after a Zaimis Cabinet had vainly endeavoured to obtain the support of the Venizelist majority in the Chamber, the latter was dissolved (for the second time within six months) and a new election ordered for Dec. 19 1915. This time Venizelos, as a protest against the King's unconstitutional proceedings, called upon his party to abstain from the polls; and as a result, only 230,000 votes were cast, as against 720,000 in the previous election. In consequence of this abstention of the Venizelist electors, no Venizelist was elected, and the new Chamber consisted almost exclusively of the old politicians, whom the military revolt of 1909 had swept out of politics.
Venizelos spent that winter and spring (1915-6) in endeavour- ing, through the press (he founded a newspaper called the Keryx), and by public mass meetings, to force the King to see the folly of his course. But after the surrender of Eastern Macedonia to the Bulgarians (Aug. 1916) he gave up all hope of converting Constantine to his views. On Sept. 25 1916 he took ship with his leading partizans for Crete, whence he sent out his proclama- tion to the Greek people, calling upon all true patriots to disavow Constantine and his fatal policy and to flock to the standard of the Entente. Proceeding on to Salonika, he established there a " Provisional Government of National Defence," which was in Dec. 1916 duly recognized by England, France and Russia, though not by Italy. His call for volunteers was responded to with enthusiasm by all parts of Greece not held by Constantino's troops, and 60,000 men were soon gathered at Salonika.
When at last England and France proceeded to dethrone King Constantine, Venizelos returned to Athens a few days after his removal (June 27 1917) and took over the government of the whole of Greece. His first measure was to convoke the Chamber elected in June 1915, whose dissolution by Constantine in Nov. of the same year was considered as a violation of the spirit, if not of the strict letter, of the Constitution. Venizelos then ordered a general mobilization of the Greek army and for- mally declared war against Germany and her allies. His path was beset by many serious difficulties. The German propaganda had done its work so thoroughly that a large section of the com- munity were now entirely out of sympathy with Venizelos' war policy. Nearly one-half of the officers of the army and navy
were against him and the Entente. These were given their choice between adhesion to the new regime and dismissal from the service. The large majority chose the latter; and thus 1,800 officers were retired on small pensions, and became a dangerous leaven for all subversive activities against the Government. Three distinct mutinies broke out while the newly mobilized reserves were being moved to the front. A large proportion of the public officials and judiciary were also disaffected; their removal from their posts was a matter of elementary prudence for a Government engaged in a war of such magnitude.
After the Armistice of Nov. n 1918, and the assembling of the Peace Conference at Paris, Venizelos took up the diplomatic struggle for the rights of Greece. Between Nov. 1918 and Aug. 1920 he and his colleagues of the Greek delegation were almost continuously absent in Paris or London. He returned a few times for a brief sojourn to attend the meetings of the Greek Chamber; but there could be no rest for him until the Treaties of Neuilly and of Sevres were finally signed. Never before had a Greek statesman achieved such magnificent results for his coun- try. Never before had a representative of a small nation won such admiration or played such a brilliant part in a great inter- national gathering. Yet no sooner was his triumph complete, than an attempt was made upon his life by a couple of young Greek naval officers (Tserepes and Kyriakos) ; and three months later, the Greek elections gave a crushing majority to his political opponents. Greek history is indeed full of such acts of popular ingratitude to public men, from Aristides the Just down to Charilaos Tricoupis.
Many explanations have been given of Venizelos' amazing overthrow in the hour of his greatest triumph. He himself attributed it to the war-weariness of the Greek people, that had i been under arms with almost no intermission since 1912. His I political enemies ascribed it to the determination of the Greek , people to " regain their liberties " and to punish his " tyranny." It is, no doubt, the fact that a large section of the Greek people i had been led to regard the situation in this light. The wildest stories were circulated in the press about the oppressive character of the Venizelist regime of 1917-20. Venizelos was accused of , having cast 80,000 people into prison, shot several thousands of his political enemies, and dismissed 20,000 public servants. As a matter of fact, the aggregate number of persons imprisoned or interned or placed under police surveillance never exceeded 1,600. ; The only executions were those of military ringleaders of mu- 1 tinies or military spies, after due public trial and conviction by \ courts-martial; the total number of these executions was 63. 1 There were also some 9,000 dismissals of public servants for politi- cal reasons; but nearly all of these men were subsequently rein- i stated by the Venizelist Government itself, after they had sworn allegiance to the new order of things. When Venizelos' successors | came into office in Nov. 1920 there were not more than 300 or; 400 of these dismissed public officials still out of service by their i own choice. There were, nevertheless, numerous acts of petty I tyranny and injustice, that could be laid at the door of the! Venizelist administration, during Venizelos' prolonged absence | at the Peace Conference. Some of his lieutenants abused their I power or failed to prevent such abuse by others. Many notorious i bad characters had managed to creep into posts of influence andj used their position to wreak personal vengeance or to enrich; themselves at the expense of the public or the public treasury, i But it may be doubted if, even so, the elections would have gone against Venizelos, had it not been for two other factors. One was the sudden death of the young King Alexander a bare fortnight before the election. This reopened the question of the ! succession to the throne; and although Venizelos, as a desperate makeshift, proposed Prince Paul, Constantino's youngest son, as, King, the utter insignificance of this boy candidate only threw; Constantine's own claim to restoration into stronger relief and I gave a fresh impetus to the efforts of his party. Had Alexander j lived until after the election, Constantine would hardly have succeeded in making his return good. The other factor in Venize- los' defeat was the blind over-confidence of his partizans; manyi Venizelists in Athens and the larger cities neglected to vote.
