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THE FUTURE OF TURKEY Whatever the new Turkish cabinet may elect to do that country may now be regarded as out of the war for all potential purposes With the occupation by the Serbians of Nish their old capital and the severance of the railway connecting the central empires with Constantinople Turkey is cut off from all relief from Germany even if that country were in the position to send it which she is far from being Jmis Nemesis is overtaking the Ottoman empire which for centuries has been a menace to the pence progress and prosperity of southern Europe Threatened from the east by the forces of Generals Allcnby and Marshall and from the north by the allied armies under General dEsperey Turkey must either yield or take the consequences of further opposition oppositionThe The world will not readily forgot the grand flour ¬ ish with which the BerlintoConstantinople Ex ¬ press was inaugurated and the imposing ceremonial banquet at which the all highest was present with a glittering galaxy of generals and staff officers and was fulsomely toasted by his brother monarch Ferdinand the Faithless Then vast visions were in ¬ dulged In of the speedy completion of the line to Bagdad and ultimately to the Indian frontier and the establishment of that Mitteleuropa which would make the kaiser not merely Emperor of Germany but the potential ruler of the e rth Wilhelm never swaggered strutted scowled and rattled his shining sword with such aweinspiring effect In his minds eye he saw all the kingdoms and nations of the earth bowing before him including that country from which he was not going to stand any non ¬ sense after the war warScarcely Scarcely two years have elapsed and what a change is to be noted Forsaken by Bulgaria with its late ruler in exile cut off from Turkey with Austria trembling on the verge of revolution and internal dissolution his armies in full retreat from France and Belgium and lie himself desperately scheming for the peace for which he must shortly humbly plead with the sword of surrender out ¬ stretched the kaiser sees the end of ajl his ambi ¬ tions and ruin and disaster facing himself and his country countryAs As for the future fate of Turkey that will be settled at the peace conference but we may be sure there will be no continuance of the Ottoman em ¬ pire in Europe and that its area and activities in the near east will be rigidly limited and prescribed The Turks have in themselve the makings of a free and enlightened people and under proper guidance and control with freedom in their midst not merely for their own religious beliefs but also those of others they may yet become a great nation But they have much to expiate and so long as they hold to the idea that they are fulfilling a religion duty in killing and exterminating infidels and that they are thus securing for themselves a Mo ¬ hammedans paradise they cannot be accepted into free communion with other peoples and they will remain more or less a race apart It is for the really liberal elements in Turkey to assist the entente allies in setting up a stable and liberal administration in the areas which may be allotted to them New York Herald
