Lastly, the German Government agreed to
use its good offices with its ally, Turkey, to obtain for Bulgaria a
Turkish cession of the Demotika district of Thrace west of the Maritza
River, thereby giving Bulgaria direct railroad communication with
Dedeagatch, her one practicable outlet on the AEgean Sea. All these
things presently came to pass. Serbia lay crushed, and Serbian Macedonia
was under Bulgarian control before the close of 1915. Turkey soon
yielded Demotika. In the spring of 1916 the quarrel between the Greek
King Constantine and the Entente powers permitted Bulgaria to occupy the
coveted Drama-Serres-Kavala districts of Greek Macedonia, while that
same autumn Rumania's intervention on the Allied side resulted in her
speedy defeat, with Bulgarian troops overrunning the whole Dobrudja as
far as the Danube mouth, and Bulgarian regiments triumphantly parading
through the streets of Bukharest. Small wonder that up to the close of
1916 Bulgaria remained a loyal member of Mitteleuropa, thoroughly
contented with her bargain.
[Sidenote: Effects of defeats on Russia.]
[Sidenote: The Russian Revolution.]
[Sidenote: Bulgaria only a link in Mitteleuropa.]
The year 1917, however, saw the beginning of that estrangement from
Germany which has finally caused Bulgaria's abandonment of the Teutonic
cause. The first rift in the lute was the Russian Revolution. This event
was a great shock to Ferdinand and the Sofia politicians. When Bulgaria
had joined Germany in the autumn of 1915 her political leaders had
divined the fact that Russia's war spirit was broken by the crushing
defeats inflicted upon her by the Germans and that she would ultimately
retire from the war.
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