Kitabı oku: «The Turkish Empire, its Growth and Decay», sayfa 28

It is almost incomprehensible [wrote Mr. Crawford Price, who was a witness of this débâcle of the Turkish army] that this warlike nation, the stories of whose valour fill the most thrilling pages of the military history of the world, could have degenerated into a beaten rabble flying before the onslaught of despised Serbians and Greeks, people who, till yesterday, scarce dared to lift their voices when questions affecting their interests were discussed and settled. The Greeks most effectually wiped out the stain of 1897. They showed themselves the superior of the Turk in organization, strategy, and even in personal courage… I do not wish to dwell too strongly on the lack of courage exhibited by the Ottoman soldiers. Words fail me to describe the utter demoralization I found in the ranks of the Turkish troops after their defeat.⁴⁸

Among the chief causes of this demoralization of the Ottoman armies was the complete absence of preparation for feeding them. It was the rule, rather than the exception, for the troops to be left three or four days without food. Another cause was that the Ottoman armies in this campaign in Europe had in their ranks a large proportion of Christian natives of the district who had been conscripted for the first time. Their sympathies were all in favour of the enemy, and they undoubtedly assisted in promoting the stampedes when the Turkish lines were broken. The survivors fled to their homes.

The winter of 1912-13, after the conclusion of the armistice, was spent in futile negotiations for peace at a Conference in London. The main cause of failure was Adrianople. The Bulgarians insisted on its cession to them as a condition of permanent peace. The Porte, in the first instance, was not unwilling to give way on this. But a military émeute occurred at Constantinople. A deputation from the army, headed by Enver Bey, insisted on entering the chamber where the Council of Ministers were deliberating on the question, with the object of protesting against the surrender of the stronghold. Nazim Pasha, the Minister of War, and his aide-de-camp were killed in the endeavour to resist this inroad. The Grand Vizier was thereupon terrorized into resignation. In his place Mahmoud Shefket, who had proved to be so loyal to the Young Turks at the early stage of their movement, was appointed. He refused to surrender Adrianople. The negotiations in London were broken off.

Early in 1913, on January 4th, the Bulgarians gave notice of the termination of the armistice. War was renewed. On February 4th the Bulgarian army commenced an attack on Adrianople, supported on this occasion by fifty thousand Serbians. On the same day they fought a battle near Bulair, defeated the Turks, and captured that important fortress, threatening the command of the Dardanelles. The Greeks also renewed the war. They sent an army into Epirus and, on March 6th, captured Janina, making prisoners thirty-three thousand Turks and seizing immense stores of guns and ammunition. On the 10th of the same month their fleet captured the island of Samos.

On March 28th the Bulgarians captured Adrianople and its garrison of twenty thousand Ottomans, and on April 21st the Montenegrins succeeded in getting possession of Scutari, which they claimed as the capital of their State. After these serious reverses the Porte was desirous of coming to terms, and was willing even to cede Adrianople and almost the whole of Thrace. It invited the mediation of the Great Powers. The allied States agreed to this. A second Conference was held in London on the basis that the Porte was to give up all its possessions in Europe, save the small part of Thrace south of a line drawn from Enos, in the Ægean Sea, to Media, in the Black Sea, a few miles north of the Tchatalja lines. Crete was to be ceded to Greece, and the destination of the islands in the Ægean Sea lately in the possession of Turkey, and some of which were necessary for its defence, was to be left to the decision of the Powers. A treaty was effected between the Porte and the Powers to this effect. But there was far greater difficulty in determining how the ceded districts were to be divided between the victorious Balkan States. The position was aggravated by Roumania coming into the field and claiming compensation in territory, in consideration of the important changes impending in the balance of power in the Balkans.

The four States so lately in alliance against the common enemy, Turkey, were now madly jealous of one another in the division of the spoils. Serbia, which had contributed so largely to the result by the splendid valour of its army against the main body of Turks under Zeki Pasha, was not content with the small slice of Macedonia which it had agreed to in the treaty with Bulgaria in 1912, before the war. The decision of the Powers that Albania was to be an independent State deprived Serbia of the much-hoped-for access to the Adriatic. The acquisition by Bulgaria of Thrace, including Adrianople, would greatly alter the balance of power in the Balkans to the disadvantage of Serbia and justified its claim to a larger share of Macedonia. It was already in occupation of nearly half of that province. Bulgaria was equally ambitious to revive the big Bulgaria of the San Stefano treaty, and could also appeal to long past history in favour of it. It was determined to get possession of Salonika, and was madly jealous of Greece. The Greeks, on their part, were in possession of that city and of the southern half of Macedonia. They had got hold of these districts by force of arms and were determined not to give them up. No agreement could be come to in London. Russia in vain did its utmost to compose these differences. It offered to act as arbitrator and invited the Balkan States to send representatives to Petrograd to settle the questions.

We now know that the Bulgarian Government had no intention whatever to make concessions to the other Balkan States. The pacific section of its ministers were overborne by the more bellicose members. M. Gueshoff, the able Premier, who had been responsible for the policy which preceded the war, and who was now in favour of a peaceful settlement, was compelled to resign. King Ferdinand, a most unscrupulous and ambitious intriguer, backed up the war party, and was mainly responsible for the treacherous policy pursued, which was fraught with so much misfortune to his State. In spite of the warnings from Russia that, if force were resorted to, Bulgaria would find itself confronted by a Roumanian army, and that the Porte would also join in the war against it, King Ferdinand and his Government decided on war with their late allies. They had unbounded and arrogant confidence in their army, and despised those of Greece and Serbia.

On June 29, 1913, at midnight, the Bulgarian army in Macedonia made a sudden and unprovoked attack on the Greek and Serbian outposts, without any warning or declaration of war. This treacherous action was followed up the next day by an advance of the Bulgarian army of a hundred thousand men on the right flank against the Serbian army, which was nearest to them. For the moment this seemed to promise success, and the Serbians were compelled to fall back. But on July 1st the Serbians, whose forces, supported by the Montenegrins, were almost equal in number to the Bulgarians opposed to them, rallied and decided on a counter offensive. On July 2nd they attacked the Bulgarians on the Bragalbabza River, defeated them, and captured many of their guns. On July 4th another battle took place with much the same result. Istib was captured on the 8th, and the Bulgarians were then compelled to retreat towards their own frontier.

Meanwhile the main army of the Greeks, which was concentrated at Salonika, a day’s march from the Bulgarians on the left flank, advanced to attack them. The two armies were equal in numbers, each of about seventy thousand men. They met at Kiltich, about half-way between the Rivers Vardar and Struma, and a day’s march from Salonika. The Greeks inflicted a very severe defeat on their foes. This was followed up a few days later by victories at Doiran and Strumnitza. In the fortnight which followed the Bulgarians were defeated in a series of engagements as they retreated to their own frontier.

The prediction and warnings of the Russian Government were now verified. The Roumanians, when they found that the Bulgarians were involved in war with the other Balkan States, announced that they were dissatisfied with the small concession of territory made to them at the Conference in London – namely the fortress of Silistria and a belt of land on the Danube. They insisted on a further cession of territory to them in the Dobrudscha. They sent an army across the Danube, on July 10th, to support this demand. It advanced without opposition to within a few miles of Sofia. The Turks also saw the opportunity of retrieving out of the scramble something of their recent great losses of territory. They determined to tear up the treaty of London, signed only a few weeks ago. They sent an army, under Enver Pasha, into Thrace, on July 15th, to attack Adrianople. It had no difficulty in recapturing that most important city, from which the Bulgarians had withdrawn nearly the whole of its garrison in order to strengthen their armies against Greece and Serbia. It also reoccupied Demotika and Kirk Kilisse.

The Bulgarians found themselves in a most perilous position. Their armies had everywhere been defeated and driven back. They were surrounded by invading armies. They were compelled to sue for terms. On July 31st an armistice was agreed to, and a Conference was decided on, to be held at Bucharest, between the representatives of the Balkan States, without the presence of those of the Great Powers. At the Conference the Bulgarians found themselves in the position of being hoist with their own petard. They were compelled by force majeure not only to give up all their ambitious projects, but also to make serious concessions to all their rivals. Had they been willing to come to terms at the Conference at London or, later, to submit to the arbitration of Russia, they would undoubtedly have secured for themselves a large slice of Macedonia. They would have retained possession of a great part of Thrace, with Adrianople and Demotika, and the only concessions they would have made were Silistria and the small belt of land on the Danube. They were now compelled to agree to the division of the whole of Macedonia between Greece and Serbia. They had to surrender a part of the Dobrudscha to Roumania, and the larger part of their conquests in Thrace, including Adrianople, to the Turks. All that remained to them in return for their stupendous efforts in the recent wars was a small portion of Thrace with a narrow frontage to the Ægean Sea, but without a port of any value or importance. Never was there a case in which base treachery and overweening arrogance were followed by more fatal retribution.

Greece got the larger share of the spoil of Turkey in the two years of war. It obtained rather more than half of Macedonia – namely 17,000 square miles, with a population of 1,697,000. It also secured the final cession to it of the important island of Crete, and of Samos, and other islands in the Ægean Sea. Its territory and population were increased by more than one-half. Serbia obtained 15,000 square miles, with 1,656,000 inhabitants, Bulgaria only 9,600 miles and 125,000 inhabitants. Roumania secured 2,600 square miles, with 286,000 inhabitants, and Montenegro 2,100 square miles and 251,000 population; while the Turks lost 54,000 square miles, inhabited by a population of 4,239,000. But the recovery of Adrianople, Demotika, and Kirk Kilisse was a great coup for them. It redounded to the prestige of the Young Turks and their leader, Enver Pasha, who soon became Minister of War.

The German Emperor telegraphed his congratulations to the Sultan on the recovery of Adrianople, and to the King of Roumania on the success of his intervention. He also conferred on the King of Greece, his brother-in-law, the bâton of a Field Marshal in the German army. The King received this honour in person at Berlin in the presence of a great gathering of German generals. In a speech on the occasion, he attributed his success in the recent war, in the first place, to the bravery of his army, and in the second to the training which he and many of his officers had received in the military schools of Berlin. Thenceforth, till the outbreak of the great war in Europe in 1914, the influence of Germany in the Near East, and especially in Turkey, was continually on the increase. Enver Pasha, who now predominated in the councils of the Porte, was devoted to the interests of Germany, and was probably in its pay. At his instance the Turkish army, which had so conspicuously failed in the recent wars, was put under the control of the German General Von der Goltz, and large numbers of officers were lent by Germany for its better training. Secret drillings of troops took place in many remote parts of the Empire. These measures were well timed to coincide with the outbreak in 1914 of the great war, which, it is now very certain, had been already determined on by the General War Staff at Berlin.

It only remains to add that when, soon after the commencement of the war, the Porte, at the instance of Enver Pasha, declared itself against the Allied Powers, the British Government at once proclaimed the independence of Egypt, under its protectorate, and the annexation of Cyprus. These were the last territorial losses of the Ottoman Empire which can be counted as faits accomplis. It has been shown that, in the past, there were due to the régime of the Young Turks, during the six years of its predominance, from 1908 to 1914, the loss in Europe of Macedonia, Epirus, and Albania, and of a large part of Thrace; of Crete, Cyprus, and many other islands in the Ægean Sea; and the suzerainty of Bulgaria, Bosnia, and Herzegovina; and in Africa of the province of Tripoli and the suzerainty of Egypt. These great losses rivalled in extent of territory and population those incurred either by Mahmoud II or by Abdul Hamid II. It needs no prophet to predict a further shrinkage of territory, or loss of independence, after the conclusion of the existing war in Europe, whatever may be its other results.

XXIII
A RETROSPECT

It has been shown in preceding chapters that the two great historic movements of the growth and decay of the Turkish Empire extended over periods not differing much in length. Reckoning its birth from the accession, in 1288, of Othman, as chief of a small tribe of Turks in Asia Minor, nearly three hundred years elapsed before the Empire reached its zenith. During these years ten eminent Sultans and one Grand Vizier (Sokolli) of a degenerate Sultan were concerned in its extension. It was a period of almost continuous victory and conquest. The Ottoman armies, during these years, met with only a single serious disaster, that at Angora in 1402 at the hands of Timur and a host of Mongolian invaders, which seemed at first to have struck a fatal blow to the Empire. But it soon rallied, and the process of aggrandizement was renewed. With this exception the Ottomans were almost uniformly successful. The number, however, of pitched battles in the field, which decided the fate of States successively invaded, was not great. Thrace was won by the defeat of the Byzantines by Murad I at Eski Baba in 1361. The Bulgarians were conquered at Samakof in 1371, and the Serbians at Kossova in 1389, by the same Sultan. The Hungarians were overthrown at Mohacz in 1529. The Persians were defeated at Calderan, 1514, near Tabriz, and the Egyptians at Aleppo, 1516, and Ridania, near Cairo, under Selim, 1516. The crusaders from Europe were defeated in three great battles – at the Maritza, 1363, Nicopolis, 1396, and Varna, 1444. At most of these battles the Ottomans had great superiority of numbers, and as against the Persians and Egyptians they were provided with a powerful artillery, of which their opponents were wholly deficient. The other very numerous campaigns consisted mainly of successions of sieges by invading armies of Ottomans, where the invaded, with inferior forces, protracted the defence, often over long terms of years.

The Ottomans were almost equally successful at sea, with one notable exception, at Lepanto, at the very end of the period we are referring to, when they met with a terrible disaster from the combined navies of Europe, much inferior in numbers of ships and men. But before this their naval supremacy had enabled them to extend the Empire over Algiers and Tunis. Nothing resulted from the great battle of Lepanto except loss of prestige to the Ottomans. The combination against them was dissolved, and for many years they maintained supremacy in the Eastern Mediterranean.

At the close of this period of growth the Ottoman Empire reached its zenith and extended over the vast countries described in the chapter on the Grand Vizier Sokolli. The whole of its immense area, however, was not in full ownership of the Ottomans. Parts of it, such as North Hungary, were autonomous States with native rulers paying tribute to the Porte. Other parts, such as the Crimea, Wallachia, and Moldavia, were vassal States, whose princes were appointed by the Sultan, and which were bound to send contingents in support of the Ottoman armies when at war. The really integral parts of the Empire in Europe were Thrace, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Bosnia, and Albania; in Asia, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and a great part of Arabia; and in Africa, Tripoli. Egypt, Tunis, and Algiers very early acquired a practical autonomy under the suzerainty of the Porte, though they were still nominally integral parts of the Empire. The Empire thus constituted was one of the greatest in the then world. It may be worth while briefly to review the causes which led to its aggregation.

It was the common belief in Europe, confirmed by many historians, up to recent times, that the Ottoman armies which invaded Europe from Asia Minor were composed of pure Turks, and that the motive which impelled them in their conquest was the fanatical desire to extend Islam. But these views have been modified of late years. It has been shown that the armies which Sultans Orchan and Murad led across the Straits into Europe were not pure Turks, but were very largely composed of subjects of the East Roman Empire from the northern parts of Asia Minor, who, after the defeat there of the Byzantine armies, had embraced Islam. They were welded with the Turks by religion into something approaching to a nation. They called themselves Osmanlis, or Ottomans, from the founder of the Othman dynasty. It may be doubted whether the Turks alone were capable of effecting the conquests in Europe. It is certain that they could not have maintained the Empire when formed.

The Turks of Anatolia had many valuable qualities as soldiers. They were, and are to this day, brave, hardy, sober, frugal, and cleanly in their habits, as inculcated by their religion, a strong point in their favour in days when sanitary arrangements were completely ignored by armies. They bore the hardships of long campaigns without complaint. But they were deficient in intelligence and education, which count for much in war as in civil life. In this respect they were very inferior to subjects of the East Roman Empire and to many of the Christians with whom they came in conflict. But the Ottomans who first invaded Europe were not simply Turks. Later, the most effective corps in the Ottoman army was formed exclusively of the sons of Christian parents in the Balkans, conscripted at an early age and forcibly converted to Islam. It was with forces thus constituted that the Ottomans extended their Empire up to and beyond the Danube. The conquests of the larger part of Asia Minor, of Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt, were also effected, by composite forces, to which Serbia and Wallachia sent contingents by virtue of treaties with the Porte. The greater number of Ottoman generals who distinguished themselves in these early days of conquest were not of Turkish race, but were Greeks, Albanians, Slavs, and Italians, who had embraced Islam or whose forbears had done so. It was the same with almost all the naval commanders. They were of foreign origin, who had gained experience as pirates and had embraced Islam. The crews who manned the Ottoman navy were mainly Greeks from the islands in the Ægean Sea.

With respect to the objects and motives of the Ottoman conquests, a careful review of the history of the early Sultans has shown that there was very little, if any, of missionary enterprise on behalf of Islam. It will be admitted that there is no pretence for concluding that the vast conquests in Asia and Africa had any such motive. The populations there were already Moslems. The motives for conquest were the ambition to extend the Empire at the expense of neighbouring States and the hope of plunder on the part of the soldiers. Religious zeal had nothing to do with it. What reason is there to suppose that conquests in Europe had any different object than those in Asia? As a matter of fact, there was no very large extension of Islam in Europe as a result of Ottoman conquest. When cities were captured and their inhabitants were massacred, or when districts were conquered and the people were carried away as captives to be sold as slaves, they do not appear to have had the alternative offered to them of embracing Islam.

In some few districts, as in Bosnia and parts of Albania and the Morea, the landowners, or some of them, were allowed to avoid the confiscation of their property by becoming Mussulmans. But these were exceptions. The general rule was that the land of the conquered districts was confiscated without the option to the owners of changing their religion and saving their property. As regards the labouring people, the rayas, there does not appear to have been any desire that they should adopt the religion of their conquerors. They were wanted for the cultivation of the land as serfs or slaves. It seems to have been a matter of indifference what their religion was.

There is also nothing to show that the Ottoman soldiers were animated by any religious zeal in their campaigns in Europe. The main cause of their military efficiency was the organization of the army effected by Orchan and perfected by Murad I. It offered immense rewards to the soldiers for victories in battle and for personal valour, in the share of booty and plunder levied in the conquered districts, of captives to be sold as slaves, of women for wives or concubines or to be sold for harems, and of lands to be distributed as fiefs. These rewards appealed to the predatory instincts of the Moslem soldiers, whether Turks or others of alien origin. In the rare intervals of peace the soldiers soon wearied of life in barracks, and yearned for active campaigns. At such times the Janissaries and other soldiers were a danger to the State from their turbulence and disorder. It was necessary to find employment for them at a distance. This acted as a constant incitement to war and to fresh conquests. It was one of the causes of the continuous growth of the Empire.

A second main cause of success to the Ottoman armies in Europe was the want of union for resistance on the part of the people of the Balkan States. There can be little doubt that if the Greeks, Bulgarians, and Serbians had combined to resist the invading Moslems their efforts would have been successful. But Greeks and Bulgarians, Greeks and Serbians hated one another more than they feared and hated the Ottomans. In the six centuries dealt with in this volume there was only a single occasion when Greeks, Bulgarians, and Serbians formed a combination against the Ottomans. This was not till 1912. The combination was successful and drove the Turks out of Macedonia, Epirus, Albania, and the greater part of Thrace. But we have shown that it broke down on the division of the spoil, with the result that the Turks recovered a small part of their lost territory. The case illustrates our contention that want of union of the Christian States was a main cause of the servitude of all of them for nearly five hundred years under Turkish rule.

Lastly, in appreciating the causes of the wonderful growth of the Ottoman Empire, we must not lose sight of the personal element, of the fact that, for ten generations, the Othman family produced men capable of leading their armies in the field to victory, and almost equally remarkable as administrators and statesmen. This succession of a single family, father and son, for ten generations without a break, culminating in the greatest of them, Solyman the Magnificent, is quite without precedent or example in history. The Othman family were pure Turks in their origin. But the Turkish blood was very soon diluted. The mothers of future Sultans were either captives taken by corsairs or slaves bought on account of their beauty. They were of every race – Greeks, Slavs, Italians, or Russians. But in spite of this mixed blood the type of Sultans remained much the same for ten generations. The prestige acquired by the family in these three hundred years, as founders and maintainers of the Empire and as generals who led their armies to victory, was such that it has impressed itself on the imagination of all Ottomans, and has survived to this day, in spite of the long subsequent degeneration of the family. Unquestionably, the foundation and growth of the Empire were largely due to the personal qualities of the Othman dynasty.

After the death in 1578 of Grand Vizier Sokolli, who carried on the traditions of the first ten Sultans for a few years under the worthless Selim II, the pendulum of Empire swung in the opposite direction. Thenceforth, down to the present time, there were successions of defeats and disasters to the Turkish Empire, with but few intermissions. Provinces were torn from it periodically, like leaves from an artichoke, till all but a small fraction of it in Europe, the whole of its possessions in Africa, and a large part in Asia have been lost to the Empire. What remains to it is the core of Turkish and Arabic provinces in Asia, and in Europe only its capital, Constantinople, and a small portion of Thrace to the north of it.

Five of the Great Powers of Europe have had their share of the spoils, and six independent States have been resuscitated out of the remaining débris of it. It is hard to say which of the Great Powers gained most. Austria recovered by force of arms Hungary, Transylvania, Dalmatia, Croatia, and Slavonia, and by artful policy Bosnia and Herzegovina. Russia obtained by conquest the Crimea, Bessarabia, Podolia, and a part of the Ukraine in Europe, and the Caucasus, and a great part of Armenia, in Asia. France has possessed itself of Algiers and Tunis. England has secured the suzerainty and practical possession of Egypt and complete possession of Cyprus and Aden. Italy has seized Tripoli. Of the six smaller independent States, Bulgaria and Roumania owe their revival solely to Russia, Greece mainly to Great Britain and France, Albania to the concert of the Balkan States in 1912, and Serbia and Montenegro alone owe their freedom mainly to their own valour. It need not be said that gratitude forms no part of the ethics of modern statecraft, and a few only of the above States have recognized that they owe anything to the Powers who rescued them from Turkish rule.

During the last three hundred years, when these vast changes were being effected, the Ottoman army lost all the prestige it had acquired during the previous three hundred years. With the single exception of the battle of Cerestes, fought against the Hungarians in 1646, when a débâcle of the Turkish army was averted by the splendid cavalry charge of Cicala Pasha, which saved to the Ottoman Empire the larger part of Hungary for another term of seventy-two years, its armies were defeated in almost every battle of any importance. In nearly all of them the Ottomans had the advantage of very superior numbers, but this did not save them from disaster. The armies opposed to them were led by a succession of generals who were masters of the art of war, such as Sobieski, King of Poland, Prince Eugène of Savoy, Prince Charles of Lorraine, Generals Munnich, Loudon, Kutusoff, Suvorov, Diebitsch, Paskievitch, Skobeleff, and Gourko. Compared with these, the Turks had not a single general of eminence and only a few valiant leaders in battle.

To what causes, then, are we to attribute the decay and dismemberment of the vast Empire, and the complete failure of its armies to maintain prestige for victory and valour? It is more easy perhaps to suggest causes for downfall than for the birth and growth of the Empire. First and foremost of the causes has unquestionably been the degeneracy of the Othman dynasty. It could not have been by a mere chance coincidence that the growth of Empire was synchronous with the reign of the first ten Sultans, and that its decay and dismemberment were extended through the reign of twenty-five successors, of whom all but two, or possibly three, were degenerates and wholly incompetent to rule. The Ottoman State was an autocracy in which all military, civil, and religious faculties were centred in its head. It needed autocrats competent for the task, and in the absence of such it was certain that the State would take the road to ruin. Whether the degeneracy of the dynasty was due, as has been hinted, to a break in the true succession, and the introduction of alien blood after Solyman the Magnificent, or not, the fact remains that we can discern no trace of the eminent qualities of the family in those who succeeded him.

The deterioration of the race, which began with Selim ‘the Sot,’ was confirmed and accentuated by what occurred after three more Sultans had succeeded father to son – all of them equally unfit to fill the throne. The original law of succession, which had been set aside by the cruel practice of fratricide, was then reverted to, and the eldest male of the family, and not the eldest son of a defunct Sultan, was recognized as his successor. Thenceforth, by way of precaution against conspiracy and rebellion, the reigning Sultans, in lieu of putting their brothers to death, immured them as virtual prisoners in the building of the Seraglio known as the Cage, where they were allowed little or no communication with the world. They were permitted to maintain their harems, but by some abominable process the women were sterilized so as to prevent their giving birth to possible claimants to the throne. Of twenty successors to Mahomet IV, seventeen were subjected to this degrading treatment, and only left prison on succeeding to the throne. Three Sultans escaped this treatment, two of them by succeeding their fathers, in default of other male heirs of an older age. Only one of these three was better equipped to fill the throne than the average of the other seventeen. It is evident, therefore, that the dynasty was worn out. It would have been well for the Empire if the Othman race had long ago come to an end, and had been replaced by some more virile and competent stock.