Bulgarian empire
The Bulgarian Empire (also called Greater Bulgaria ) was a political concept in Western Europe that foresaw the formation of a state in Bulgaria , which included the Bulgarian settlement areas in Dobruja , Moesia south of the Danube , the greater part of Thrace and Macedonia .
The concept was first conceived by the great powers at the failed Conference of Constantinople in 1876/77 and implemented through the Peace of San Stefano in 1878. The latter also envisaged access to the Aegean (either at Thessaloniki or at Dedeagach in Thrace) for Bulgaria. In the Berlin Treaty of 1878, however, this Greater Bulgaria was nullified. As a result, Bulgarian domestic and foreign policy tried to regain the lost territories.
On March 3, 1878, the Russo-Ottoman War (1877/78) ended with the conclusion of the Peace of San Stefano , the terms of which were determined by the Russian government. As a result, the former provinces of the Ottoman Empire Serbia , Montenegro and Romania became independent. Bulgaria , which had also become independent, was to be extended to the Aegean Sea as a principality including Eastern Rumelia and Macedonia . But just a few months later, these results were revised by the great powers at the Berlin Congress . The Bulgarian national territory was again restricted to the area between the lower Danube and the Balkan Mountains , in addition to the basin from Sofia in the southwest to the Rila Mountains .
In the following period it was the declared aim of the Bulgarian governments to acquire the areas that had been promised to Sofia since the Conference of Constantinople of 1876/77 and the Peace of San Stefano . In 1885 the union with Eastern Rumelia took place, which led to the Serbian-Bulgarian War of 1885/86. The policy of incorporating the territories led to various clashes with neighboring countries, such as the Balkan War of 1913 . Bulgaria also supported several resistance organizations ( IMORO , IMRO , ITRO , IDRO , IWRRO ) of the Bulgarian minorities in the lost territories. Even during the First World War (1914–1918) Bulgaria took the side of the Central Powers, as it was awarded the disputed areas by them. After the war in 1919, the Bulgarian government found itself in isolation from foreign policy because it continued to defend its territorial claims towards almost all neighboring countries. When Bulgaria joined the Tripartite Pact in 1941, the Bulgarian government was able to enforce its territorial claims again in the war against Yugoslavia and Greece , but after the Soviet occupation of the country in 1944 and its political reorganization as a Communist People's Republic in 1946, these extensions were also revised. After the fall of the monarchy, the socialist government abandoned the concept of a Greater Bulgaria in the treaty of February 10, 1947.
literature
- Ralph Melville et al. Hans-Jürgen Schröder (Ed.): The Berlin Congress of 1878. (Publications of the Institute for European History, Mainz. Supplement 7). Wiesbaden 1982
- William Norton Medlicott: The Congress of Berlin and after. A diplomatic history of the Near Eastern settlement 1878-1880. London 1963 (2nd edition)
- Walther Hubatsch : The Berlin Congress 1878. Causes, consequences and judgments a hundred years later. In: Contributions to legal history. Reminder f. Hermann Conrad, ed. v. Gerd Kleinheyer u. a. Paderborn 1979, pp. 307-328.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Bulgaria: Overview , www.auswaertiges-amt.de, accessed on June 28, 2019
Web links
- “Greater Bulgaria” by Hitler's grace, Standard, December 7, 2002
- Magarditsch A. Hatschikjan: Tradition and Reorientation in Bulgarian Foreign Policy, University of Essen, 1987, p. 80
- Peace treaty between Bulgaria and the members of the anti-Hitler coalition of February 10, 1947. The Avalon Project at Yale Law School. Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy.