Paris 1919 - Margaret Macmillan [94]
The southern Dobrudja caused even greater bitterness. The Americans insisted that the Peace Conference deal with its ownership. On ethnic grounds, Bulgaria’s claim was much stronger than Rumania’s. The population was mixed: largely Tatars, Turks, Bulgarian-speaking Muslims and Christian Bulgarians, who were probably in a slight majority. There were fewer than 10,000 Rumanians out of a population of almost 300,000. Rumania nevertheless managed to hang on to it at the Peace Conference, partly because the issue was small and unimportant in the context of its other demands. And, as so often happened, facts had been created on the ground: by the time the Peace Conference opened, the French military authorities in the occupation forces had allowed Rumanian troops and civilian officials to take control of the area.11
The Bulgarian delegation, including Stamboliski, was summoned to Paris in July 1919 although their treaty was not ready. For two and half dreary months they sat in their hotel, an old castle in the suburb of Neuilly, under police guard. They were forbidden to go into Paris, their mail was censored and they were not allowed visitors. In a plaintive letter to Clemenceau they complained that the French press was attacking Bulgarians “as a barbarous people, unworthy of the confidence and friendship of civilized nations.”12 Sadly for Bulgaria, the United States, the only power to support its claim to the Dobrudja, was disengaging itself from Europe and European affairs by the time the issue came up for negotiation. The American delegates who stayed on in Paris after the signing of the Versailles treaty doggedly argued their case through the summer of 1919, but they no longer had much leverage over the European powers, who held, as Balfour put it in his usual detached fashion, that although Rumania should properly give up a piece of territory “which was clearly not Rumanian,” it was not the time to make such a request.13
When the draft treaty was finally delivered in September, the delegation had much more to complain about. Bulgaria lost about 10 percent of its land, including the southern Dobrudja and what it still had of western Thrace, along with its access to the Aegean. (The Allies took over Thrace temporarily, but Greece, which had come to Paris with a long shopping list, had every hope of getting hold of it.) Bulgaria was to pay reparations of £90 million. (Since the annual payments taken together with the country’s foreign debts were more than the annual budget, Bulgaria eventually defaulted on both.) Finally the armed forces were severely slashed; the army was to be a mere police force of 20,000. When the details of the treaty were published, there was a national day of mourning in Bulgaria.
The Bulgarian delegation begged for modifications, arguing that since the overthrow of Ferdinand it had become a new, democratic country, just like France after its revolution. The Allies paid little attention; almost their only concession was to allow Bulgaria to maintain a small flotilla of lightly armed boats on the Danube. There was talk in Bulgaria of resistance but Stamboliski, a realist, said that he would sign “even a bad peace.” On November 27, 1919, a simple ceremony took place in the old town hall in Neuilly. Guards with fixed bayonets lined the stairway and a curious crowd waited for the Bulgarians to appear. Stamboliski, pale and apprehensive, entered alone. It looked, said a sympathetic American, “as if the office boy had been called in for a conference with the board of directors.” Among the observers was the Greek prime minister, Venizelos, “endeavouring not to look too pleased.” Clemenceau presided from a table covered in green baize, and the signing was over quickly. In Athens there was a public holiday. In Sofia there was glum resignation.14
Earlier that month, Stamboliski had made a desperate appeal to Venizelos for their two countries to cooperate: “Of all the statesmen in the Balkans, your excellency is the best able to appreciate the great efficacy of an understanding among the