[C 939] 6 FEB 1928

No. 43

(26/7/28)

Belgrade.

31st January 1928.

Sir,

I have read with interest Mr. Dodd's despatch no 19 of the 26th January, of which he has kindly sent me a copy, and, as I notice that he refers to the part which the S.C.S. Government can play in putting a stop to the activities of the Macedonian Revolutionary Organisation, I would venture to offer the following observations on the subject.

• 2. As regards the physical measures adopted by the S.C.S. Government I presume that under the normal conditions of the pre-war Balkans it would not have seemed illogical that, in the event of the Bulgarian government being unwilling or finding it impossible to suppress a private organisation within its territory, which was deliberately executing a campaign of wholesale murders of the most brutal kind on innocent officials in South Serbia, the S.C.S. Government should have declared that under these circumstances they must undertake the task themselves and send a military expedition into Bulgaria with a view to the destruction of the Macedonian Revolutionary Organisation's bases at Kustendil, Petrich and elsewhere, and the arrest and punishment of the persons responsible for these outrages. This would of course have been an act of war and would under existing conditions be impossible. At the present day the obvious course of this government, in the event of their receiving no satisfaction, would be to appeal to the League of Nations. This they would no doubt be loath to do, as they do not desire a re-opening of the whole Macedonian question, which must be attended by the necessary investigations into conditions in South Serbia, and further they still hope that a rapprochement with Bulgaria may be possible and that the principle of the “Balkans for the Balkan peoples” may in course of time find expression by an understanding between Sofia and Belgrade. M. Marinković has, therefore, confined his action to drawing the attention of the Bulgarian government to every outrage which takes place and to supplying them with the necessary material for them to identify the perpetrators.