References - Part 09

What this meant was that Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian terrorist bands, sponsored by their respective churches, were now encouraged to roam Macedonia to murder, rape, pillage and do whatever they felt like without fear of retribution from the Turkish authorities. Greeks and Turks stood side by side as allies while murdering the Macedonian population. The Christian holy man Patriarchate Bishop Karavangelis of Kostur blessed the Muslim owned cannons with Christian words as the Turkish army opened fire on the Christian civilian populated Macedonian villages, killing innocent women and children. The Great Powers, with their military ships docked in the harbours, stood and watched as the mountains were dotted with fires. They watched villages burn and heard cries of suffering and yet did nothing. Such was the fate of the Macedonian people in the aftermath of the Ilinden rebellion.

Expecting no assistance or aid from the Great Powers, remnants of IMRO established temporary centers and distributed urgently needed foodstuffs and medical supplies to the population. While this was taking place, a political struggle for control of IMRO was also beginning to take shape. Bulgaria’s wish for a confrontation between IMRO and the Turkish army was granted. Bulgaria no longer needed IMRO and sought ways to liquidate the rest of its leadership. Bulgarian hopes of fully subordinating IMRO to Vrhovist directives were slim at best, so with that in mind Bulgaria sent a number of assassins to eliminate the rest of the IMRO leaders. For a while Sandanski’s forces succeeded in repealing them, but

their persistence unfortunately paid off as they, in time, succeeded in assassinating all of the important IMRO leaders.

After the rebellion was put down, IMRO still had hopes of better times and perhaps another uprising in the future.

In May 1904 IMRO held a Congress in Prilep and issued “Directives for Future Activity”. Among other things, it was decided to decentralize the Central Committee and give more decision making power to the districts. No future uprising would be allowed without consent from the Revolutionary Districts and from the Cheta chiefs themselves.

Not everyone in the IMRO leadership agreed with this resolution which unfortunately caused the Organization to split into a left and right faction. The right faction insisted on pursuing a policy of renewed confrontation, one no doubt suited to the appetites of its Vrhovist patrons, while the left faction pursued the original policies as outlined by Gotse Delchev. Ironically, both factions operated under the same banner and a showdown was imminent. Fortunately cooler heads prevailed and a negotiated settlement was reached during the Rila Congress in November 1905. The Rila Congress, which took place at the Rila Monastery on the Macedonian-Bulgarian border, was attended by 22 elected delegates and had a single item on its agenda: “What was the appropriate direction for the Organization and how was it to perform its role?” After several recommendations were put to a vote, a resolution was reached and a rule book was issued. Some of the more important recommendations adopted included the following goals;

(a) to create an autonomous and independent Macedonia, (b) to achieve this by a united national front, over a long period of revolutionary activity, (c) to resist all foreign interference.

Items put forward during the Prilep Congress were reaffirmed and certain safeguards were enacted to prevent irresponsible repetition of the Ilinden episode. While IMRO was sorting out its own problems, armed terrorist bands from Greece and Serbia were making their way into

Macedonia. Wreaking their own special brand of terror, the story was the same everywhere; pillaging, murdering and razing entire villages.

The most violent campaign was undoubtedly waged by the Greek terrorists who, aided by the Patriarchate Church and agents provocateur within Macedonia, penetrated far into Macedonia’s south-central regions.

In 1905, sanctioned by the Greek government, one-thousand bandits from the Greek Island of Crete, reinforced by Turkish army deserters, roamed unhindered in Macedonia, razing and slaughtering entire villages, wiping them out completely from the view of the unsuspecting world. The violence wreaked upon innocent Macedonians was staggering.

Relief for IMRO and the Macedonian people came in the form of the Young Turk Uprising, which saw IMRO as an ally in the fight against Ottoman injustices and corruption.

After wrestling power from the Sultan in mid-summer 1908 in Macedonia, the Young Turk regime outlawed armed propaganda and ordered the various terrorist bands to disband. In exchange for their help and for various other reasons, Sandanski and his Cheta helped the Young Turks take Tsari Grad, the Ottoman capital.

With the passing of Gruev and Karev, Sandanski was the natural successor to Delchev and a leading figure in the IMRO leadership. His cooperation with the Young Turk regime earned him the privilege of making recommendations and proposals for reforms.

In July 1908 he proposed the “Nevrokop Programme”, a land re-distribution program in favour of the poor landless peasants. To manage the Programme, an offshoot of IMRO called the National (or Peoples’) Federative Party (NFP) was formed. Unfortunately the Young Turk regime turned out to be another Great Power ploy in their manipulation of the Balkans and soon began its decline until its final collapse on July 13, 1912.

With the return of the Sultan, Macedonia witnessed the resurgence of the armed bands, this time with renewed vigour.

Frustrated by the repressive stand of the Young Turk regime, Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia made a last ditch stand to impose their sovereignty over Macedonian territory and, in the guise of “liberation”, occupied Macedonia. The 1st Balkan war was precipitated by Montenegro’s declaration of war against Turkey on October 18th, 1912. It was almost entirely fought on Macedonian soil, where again innocent Macedonians were forced to suffer in someone else’s war.

The 2nd Balkan war, a vicious war between Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia over the spoils of Macedonia, was also fought on Macedonian soil, delivering even more pain, suffering and death to an even larger Macedonian population.

Worst of all was Macedonia’s partition. August 10th, 1913, the day Macedonia’s partition was signed in Bucharest, became the darkest day in history for the Macedonian people.

With the sanctioning of Macedonia’s partition by the Great Powers in the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, so died IMRO hopes of liberating Macedonia. IMRO, however, did not disappear and subsequently the Serres branch of the Organization, comprising a great number of late Sandanski followers, merged with remnants of the IMRO Provisional Mission of western Macedonia to constitute IMRO (United) under the leadership of Gjortse Petrov and Dimo Hadzi Dimov.

Since IMRO was declared illegal by the occupying states and it was no longer allowed to function on its native soil, from time to time it operated in various countries abroad.

In 1923, under the leadership of Dimitar Vlahov, IMRO (United) was centered in Vienna, Austria.

The legendary IMRO did not liberate Macedonia and the Macedonian people from the clutches of its enemies but it did teach

Macedonians not to lose hope for there would be another, a better day.

References: Dakin,Douglas M.A., Ph.D. The Greek Struggle in Macedonia 1897 – 1913. Salonika: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1966. Nuriani, Giorgio. Macedonia: Yesterday and Today, Rome: Teleuropa, 1967. Radin, A. Michael. IMRO and the Macedonian Question. Skopje: Kultura, 1993.