The Conference of Paris, which met early in 1869 to settle the dispute between Turkey and Greece over the Cretan question, appears in retrospect as one of many abortive attempts to resolve an insoluble situation. The Cretan rebellion, stemming from religious and ethnic conflicts endemic in those parts of the Turkish empire which embraced Christian communities, invites modern parallels; while the attitudes of the spectators were governed not only by the immediate needs of their external policies, but by principles often based on ideological considerations. Panhellenism and panslavism came into conflict with the traditional desire to support Turkey. Liberal sympathy with the insurgents precipitated legal problems identical with those created by the American Civil War. Yet, apart from the intrinsic interest of any aspect of the Eastern question, and the importance of any issue which influenced the development of international law, the conference has a significance of its own as an attempt to apply the process of mediation. This requires explanation, since at first sight there is little to distinguish the conference from previous workings of the concert of Europe. During the peace conference at the close of the Crimean War the plenipotentiaries made an informal recommendation that ‘states between which any serious misunderstanding may arise should, before appealing to arms, have recourse as far as circumstances might allow to the good offices of a friendly power’. The conference of 1869 put into practice1 for the first time this Protocol no. 23 of the Treaty of Paris of 1856.
