THE INTERWAR YEARS
The period between the first and second world wars was one of political unrest and Macedonian terrorism. The country was in an almost untenable economic situation at the close of the war: prices skyrocketed, people died of starvation, and strikes were almost continuous. Out of this situation two extreme political groups grew up. On the extreme Right was a faction of the IMRO, which at that time demanded the annexation of Greek and Yugoslav Macedonia. On the Left was the Bulgarian Agrarian Union, the only party at the time more popular than the Communists.
When Ferdinand was forced to abdicate, he was succeeded by his son, Boris III. Real political power was, however, in the hands of Alexander Stambolisky, the leader of the Bulgarian Agrarian Union. He led the country as its prime minister from 1919 to 1923. When Stambolisky took power, the peasants formed 80 percent of the population. Stambolisky and the Bulgarian Agrarian Union were dedicated to improving the lot of these people; in his words "to raising the standards both economic and educational, of the desperately poor and depressed peasant class."
Stambolisky, on behalf of the peasant populism movement, made several sweeping reforms. He instituted various social reforms, spread education, and built roads. His strong dislike of the commercial and professional classes in the cities led him toward the objective of a peasant republic. When in power he instituted tax and land reforms and radically altered the legal system. His domestic policies were not popular with all strata of society; his foreign policies were even less popular. He favored reconciliation with Yugoslavia over the Macedonian issue. In 1923 he was overthrown by a group composed of IMRO, military, and other factions and was beheaded.
The murder of Stambolisky was followed by a communist attempt to foment revolution in the country. The leaders were Georgi Dimitrov and Vasil Kalarov, later leading figures in the Bulgarian communist state. The country was in a state of civil war, which was subsequently crushed by the right-wing political factions of the country. Thousands of Bulgarians were killed, and Dimitrov and Kalarov were exiled.In 1925 the Bulgarian Communist Party (BKP—see Glossary) was officially outlawed. Although Boris continued as monarch, the country was ruled by coalition governments and military dictatorships for a decade following Stambolisky's death.
From 1923 until the putsch of 1934 IMRO terrorism dominated the country. Bulgaria's position toward Macedonia was clear and unequivocal: it sought to annex Macedonia completely as it considered the land to be Bulgarian and the people to be Bulgarians. In the Bulgarian sector of Macedonia the Macedonians were given a high degree of latitude, some Macedonians even holding high offices in Bulgaria. In the Yugoslavian sectors of Macedonia, however, most Macedonians felt oppressed and restricted. As a result of this mixed status and treatment, there was a certain ambivalence in Macedonian sentiment, the IMRO terrorists favoring complete independence and self-rule. Among Macedonian patriots, two predominant factions grew up. The federalists favored an autonomous Macedonia—which could, if necessary, be allied with Yugoslavia and Bulgaria—and the Supremists sought to incorporate Macedonia within Bulgaria, with aspirations of dominating the entire Balkan area. The results of these divergent opinions were expressed in acts of violence and terrorism that wreaked havoc in Bulgaria and eventually culminated in federalist collaboration with the Ustashi—a group of Croat separatists—and the murder of King Alexander of Yugoslavia.
Macedonian terrorism was virtually ended by the putsch of 1934. The government, the People's Bloc, which was a coalition of four parties including the Bulgarian Agrarian Union was overthrown by the so-called Zveno—or link—group. The Zveno group was headed by Kimon Georgiev and was aided by the League of Reserve Officers. As soon as it seized power, Zveno suspended the constitution and dissolved parliament. The king was left with only nominal powers. Although the group did succeed for the most part in ridding the country of Macedonian terrorism, its rule was overtly authoritarian. By 1935 the king, with the aid of the military, had regained his power and replaced the Zveno group with a more moderate government.
With the reestablishment of the monarchy, a royal dictatorship took power and ruled over Bulgaria until 1943, when Boris died. There were at this time no forces left to oppose the king, political parties were negligible, and only a shadow parliament existed. Ironically, the military, which had aided the Zveno in the overthrow of the king, now was an instrument of his control.
Foreign relations under Boris III before World War II were leading the country again inevitably into a war that would bring it to total defeat. In 1934, despite the suppression of IMRO by the newly formed government, Romania, Yugoslavia, Greece, and Turkey, as in the Second Balkan War, were once again wary of Bulgaria's irredentist ambitions. In that year the four powers signed the Balkan Pact,from which Bulgaria naturally was excluded, in order to prevent Bulgarian encroachment in the area. Although Bulgaria and Yugoslavia later established a rapprochement in 1937, the potential of a Bulgarian annexation of Macedonia was still considered a threat by its neighbors.
During the 1930s, while Bulgaria was viewed with suspicion by its neighbors, it began to form new friendships with Germany and Italy. Boris had married the daughter of King Victor Emanuel of Italy, a country that had already become fascist, thus strengthening ties with that country. At the same time, Bulgaria began to solidify its ties with Germany, principally by means of trade. A new-founded prosperity was based almost exclusively on German trade, an arrangement that eventually weakened the country. Within a short period German agents were pouring into the country. Thus, Bulgaria was on one side alienated from its neighbors and on the other being drawn into the nazi-fascist camp.
WORLD WAR II
Bulgaria's motives for entering World War II were once again based on irredentism, coupled with almost total economic dependence on Germany. Once more it hoped to regain the lands of Thrace and Macedonia, which were lost after the Treaty of San Stefano was reversed by the Congress of Berlin. The lesson of the two subsequent Balkan wars and World War I had fallen on deaf ears. Bulgaria was still estranged from its Balkan neighbors and once more was being courted by the former ally of World War I, Germany. Germany, again realizing Bulgaria's territorial aspirations, hoped to bribe the Bulgarian leadership with southern Dobrudzha, which was eventually ceded to Bulgaria in 1940.
In December 1941 Bulgaria placed herself squarely on the German side by declaring war on Great Britain and the United States and joining the Rome-Berlin Axis. This alignment, which derived primarily from Bulgaria's irredentist policy, was given further force by dislike of the British, who were held to blame by the Bulgarians for the loss of Macedonia to Yugoslavia and Greece.
Despite the declaration of war against Great Britain and the United States, Bulgaria refused throughout World War II to declare war on the Soviet Union. The Russians, unlike the British and Americans, were popular with the Bulgarian people. They were still remembered for their assistance to the Bulgarians in the past and were viewed by the people as their liberators from Turkish rule. Not only did Bulgaria refuse to declare war on its former liberator, but it also refused to make its army available to Adolf Hitler for his eastern campaign. When Germany declared war on Russia, Bulgaria continued to retain neutrality toward, and to maintain diplomatic relations with, the Soviet Union.
In the early stages of the war, before Bulgaria had declared war on the Allies, it had already begun to regain some of the land lost during the Balkan wars and World War I. Southern Dobrudzha, which had been ceded to Romania in 1913, reverted to Bulgaria by August 1940. In the spring of 1941, supporting Germany against Yugoslavia and Greece, Bulgaria regained Macedonia and part of Greek Thrace. When Bulgaria was rewarded with these lands by the Nazis, Bulgarians perceived their gains as a "historical national unification." By 1941 Yugoslavia was overrun, and some of its territories were taken by Italy, Hungary, and Bulgaria. Italy received Montenegro, Hungary took part of northern Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria gained, in addition to the much-prized Macedonia, the frontiers of southeastern Serbia. The Bulgarians at this point were once again approaching the frontiers that had been established by the Treaty of San Stefano.
Internally, the country was in relatively good condition during the early stages of the war. The economy, based primarily on active trade with the Germans, was booming. The Bulgarian people perceived the fighting as essentially a "paper war" and were generally apathetic regarding their role in the war. There was little suffering within Bulgarian boundaries and little expression of hatred toward Bulgaria's ostensible enemies. Despite Bulgaria's alliance with the Nazis and Fascists, within the country Jews were for the most part protected rather than persecuted.
By 1943, however, the war began to change for the Bulgarians. Slowly the Allies began to turn back German power. At this time Bulgaria was hit frequently by British and United States air raids. Because of Bulgaria's strategic significance and its declaration of war, albeit symbolic, against Great Britain and the United States, Sofia and other major Bulgarian cities became targets for American and British bombers. Sofia was reduced to little more than rubble at one point, and over 30,000 casualties were suffered by the Bulgarians.
In 1943 Boris died and was succeeded by his six-year-old son, Simeon. In fact, however, a three-man regency retained power, with Ivan Bagrianov as premier. The regency was less actively pro-Axis in orientation than was the late king; with its coming to power, thousands of political prisoners were released from jail, and all persecution of Jews was terminated.
By 1944, when Germany and its allies were clearly losing the war, the Bulgarian leaders sought to reverse the earlier decision of the king and to seek peace with the Allies as well as with the Greek and Yugoslav governments-in-exile. Despite sub rosa attempts to release itself from agreements with the Axis, Bulgaria was unable to extricate itself from the alliance. On August 22, 1944, the Bulgarian government publicly announced that it was ready for a peace agreement with the Allies.
The war was ended for Bulgaria when, on September 4, 1944, theSoviets, after taking over Romania, entered Bulgaria. The exact sequence of events has been interpreted differently by various historians. There are, however, two major interpretations. One suggests that, once the Soviets had occupied Romania and declared war on Bulgaria, Bulgaria—under a hastily formed anti-Axis coalition government—immediately quit the pact with the Axis and declared war on its former ally, Germany. The other interpretation posits the theory that, on August 26, the Bulgarian government had declared itself neutral, thus withdrawing from the war. At this time it ordered German troops on its soil to disarm. When Soviet troops arrived in Bulgaria, they found this so-called neutrality unacceptable and insisted on a Bulgarian declaration of war against Germany. This declaration was promptly carried out on the eve of the day that it was requested.
When the Soviets occupied the country in September 1944, the government of the so-called Fatherland Front (Otechestven Front) seized power from the existing government within five days of the occupation. On September 9, 1944, the Fatherland Front—under the leadership of Georgiev—officially took control of the country on what was then termed an interim basis. On October 28, 1944, an armistice was signed between Bulgaria and the Soviet Union, which stated that all territories gained by Bulgaria since 1941 would be surrendered. Only southern Dobrudzha, taken from Romania in 1940, was to be retained. The agreement also established the Allied Control Commission in Sofia under direct Soviet control.
The results of the war for Bulgaria were mixed. In terms of financial burdens Bulgaria's position was relatively favorable compared with that of other countries on the losing side. In terms of territorial losses, which resulted in a legacy of bitterness and continued irredentism, its position was poor. As Bulgaria had suffered over 30,000 casualties in the war, the Allies imposed relatively light peace terms. The Soviet Union extracted no reparations from Bulgaria, despite the fact that reparations were demanded from Germany, Hungary, and Romania. Yugoslavia also canceled Bulgaria's debts. Overall war damages to the country itself were generally moderate.
In terms of losses, however, Bulgaria not only lost most of the territories it had regained at the beginning of the war but also ultimately lost its constitutional monarchy and became a Soviet satellite. Although it was allowed to retain southern Dobrudzha, all the territories that were of significance to Bulgaria's sense of nationhood were gone. Macedonia reverted to Yugoslavia, and Thrace to Greece. The Treaty of Paris, signed in February 1947, confirmed Bulgaria's pre-1941 boundaries. Not only had Bulgaria lost these prized territories, but her sovereignty as a nation was severely curtailed by the Soviet military occupation. Both the armistice agreement of September 1944 and the British-Soviet agreement of October of thatyear recognized Soviet dominance in the country. Although this power over the country was not expected by the Western powers to endure indefinitely, this illusion was dispelled as Bulgaria soon succumbed completely to Soviet influence.
THE COMMUNIST STATE
Growth of the Communist Party
In 1891 the Social Democratic Party was founded; the Communist party was eventually an offshoot of this movement. By 1903 the Social Democrats had begun to split into what were known as the "broad" and "narrow" factions. The broad faction retained the ideology of social democracy, but the narrow faction became the Bulgarian counterpart of the Russian Bolsheviks; its leader was Dimiter Blagoev, the so-called father of Bulgarian communism. In 1919 the narrow faction split off from the Second Socialist International and assumed the name Bulgarian Communist Party (BKP). Although the party had great prestige abroad, it failed to enjoy domestic popularity. The most popular party at the time—and that favored by the peasant class, which was predominant in this still-agrarian society—was the Bulgarian Agrarian Union. The BKP, on the other hand, was composed almost exclusively of intellectuals and students and held little appeal for the working and peasant classes.
In 1923 there was an unsuccessful attempt by the Communists to bring the country to revolution. When this uprising was quelled, the Communists turned to terrorism in order to gain their goals, and in 1925 a plot to assassinate King Boris was formulated. Once again the Communists met with failure, as the king not only lived but grew more powerful. In the last half of the 1920s the party faded from the scene, but by the early 1930s it was again revived and grew in popularity.
During the late 1930s the party went underground as the king increased his power. In 1939 the Communists reappeared and merged with the left-wing Workers Party; in the 1939 elections the party doubled its representation and took on an air of greater respectability. In 1941, while the war was under way, the Communists realized that Bulgaria was falling into the German camp. Although they were powerless to stop this alliance, their activity in evoking pro-Soviet sentiment was successful to the extent that—coupled with the basically favorable sentiments of the Bulgarian people toward the Russians—it prevented the monarchy from declaring war against the Soviet Union.
Once the Germans began to invade the Soviet Union itself, the Bulgarian Communists committed themselves to a policy of armed resistance, known as the partisan movement. Historians dispute the extent of partisan activity; some state that it did not become active until the Soviet victory at Stalingrad in 1943, and others claim thatthe movement was active from the onset of the German invasion of the Soviet Union.
In 1942, on the initiative of Dimitrov, the Fatherland Front was established. The organization was essentially a coalition, composed of members of the Workers Party, the Bulgarian Agrarian Union, the Social Democratic Party and the BKP. Its purpose was to overthrow Boris and rid the country of the Germans, simultaneously forming a new government that could more adequately meet the needs of the workers and the peasants.
In 1943 the National Committee of the Fatherland Front was formed, and this committee became the vehicle for the communist takeover in 1944. In the same year the so-called National Liberation Army, composed of partisans and certain units of the Bulgarian army who had joined forces with them, was established. In the fall of 1944 there were approximately 18,000 people in the National Liberation Army, augmented by some 200,000 people who sheltered and assisted them.
Before 1944, however, the Communists were still not widely popular. The apathy of a large portion of the population was due primarily to the fact that the country had remained relatively untouched by the war; but, as the country was not actually at war with the Soviet Union, little rationale was provided to the Soviet-backed Communists in their attempts to enlist the support of the partisans. The Bulgarian army and police were active in hunting down the known Communists. All of these factors precluded the possibility of the country becoming totally committed to either the communist cause or armed resistance. By 1944, however, when Soviet troops entered Romania, activity became widespread within Bulgaria. In August 1944 Romania completely capitulated. By early September the Soviet Union declared war on the Bulgarian government, an act more symbolic than real, as Soviet armies met no Bulgarian resistance. On September 9, 1944, the Fatherland Front was installed, and the Communists were firmly entrenched in the country.
Development Since World War II
At the time of the Fatherland Front takeover in Bulgaria the Soviets, with the assistance of the partisans and units of the National Liberation Army, occupied many Bulgarian towns and cities. It is said that they were received by the people with gifts of bread and salt, a traditional Bulgarian gift of welcome (see ch. 7). At the same time, on the political front, the Soviets and their Bulgarian collaborators took over the key ministries in the capital city and arrested members of the government.
The Fatherland Front—a coalition composed at that time of Communists, members of the left wing of the Bulgarian Agrarian Union, members of the left wing of the Social Democratic Party, and theZveno group—was led by Georgiev as the new premier. Dimitrov and Kalarov returned from Moscow, where they had been in exile since 1925, to assist the new government in its takeover. The Communists proceeded to rid the coalition of certain opposing elements within its ranks. Nikolai Petkov of the Peasant Union and Kosta Lulchev of the Social Democratic Party were temporarily retired from the coalition. Large-scale purges were initiated against German collaborators and sympathizers; many thousands were either executed or imprisoned by the Communists.
When plans for elections were made in 1945, both Great Britain and the United States made a strong bid for the holding of popular elections. Their hopes were temporarily defeated when, on November 18, 1945, communist-controlled elections were held. The Fatherland Front won a decided victory, eventually resulting in Georgiev's formal installation as premier. His tenure in office was brief, and he was quickly succeeded by Dimitrov. At this point Great Britain and the United States protested, insisting that the Communists broaden their governmental base. Thus, although the two leading figures of the BKP, Dimitrov and Kalarov, were installed eventually as premier and president, respectively, Petkov and Lulchev were allowed to take over control of the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Justice, two vital organs of the government.
By 1946, however, the Communists had whittled down all opposition. In July 1946 control over the army had been transferred from noncommunist members of the ostensible coalition government to exclusively communist control. At this time 2,000 so-called reactionary army officers were dismissed. A plebiscite held in September abolished the monarchy, declared Bulgaria a republic, and gave all power to Dimitrov as premier. He officially took the title on November 4, 1946, and held it until his death in 1949. When Dimitrov took power, any opposition that remained was quickly eliminated. Once the United States had ratified the Bulgarian Peace Treaty—a moment for which the Communists waited anxiously in order to rid themselves of all Western control over Bulgarian affairs of state—Petkov was summarily arrested and executed. His party, the Peasant Union, had been dissolved one month before his death.
On December 4, 1947, a new constitution was adopted. It was called, after the premier, the Dimitrov Constitution and was modeled on the Soviet Constitution of 1936 (see ch. 8). One historian claims that, at its first drafting, it closely resembled the Turnovo Constitution of the late 1800s but was later amended to parallel more closely the constitution of the Soviet Union. The Dimitrov Constitution created the National Assembly as a legislative body. In fact, however, laws were proposed by the Council of Ministers and passed pro forma by the National Assembly. The constitution was approved by the National Assembly in 1947. It defined collective ownership of production,stated that the regime held the power to nationalize any and all enterprises, and declared that private property was subject to restrictions and expropriation by the state.
By 1948 the small forces that continued to oppose the Communists were finally eliminated. Many opposition Socialists and their leader, Lulchev, were arrested, and the Socialist Party was abolished. The only remaining Socialist party—the Fatherland Front Socialists—was forced to merge with the Communists in August 1948. Thus, absolute communist control was achieved within four years of the seizure of power.
Bulgaria underwent a series of rapid changes in the early years as a communist state. Agricultural collectivization—initiated in 1946—was begun in the form of cooperative farming. By the end of 1947 nationalization of banks, industry, and mines was well under way. Nationalization was not a new phenomenon for the country, as railroads, ports, and mines had been under state control since 1878, but it was greatly extended by the Communists (see ch. 13; ch. 14).
Religion was viewed by the Communists as a means for manipulating and indoctrinating the people, much as it had been during the periods of Byzantine and Turkish rule. Since its founding in the ninth century, the Bulgarian Orthodox Church had claimed most of the population as members. The Communists perceived a dual purpose in their cooptation of this institution. On the one hand, by patronizing the Bulgarian church, they believed that they would receive support from its members. On the other hand, they sought to unify the churches by placing the Bulgarian Orthodox Church under close control of the Russian Orthodox Church. Therefore, the regime reestablished the Bulgarian patriarchate; the patriarch, in turn, required all church members to support governmental policies.
Minority religions were treated as separate entities, although all of them had to register with the Committee for Religious Affairs, a body attached to the Council of Ministers. The leadership of all churches was considered responsible ultimately to the state. The churches became financially dependent upon the government as all church funds were in the hands of the bureaucracy. A certain percentage of Muslims—who constituted the largest minority religion—were expelled from the country. Those Muslims who remained were organized into small communities, and their religious leader, the grand mufti, was allowed to retain his position as long as he remained subservient to the state.
As far as other minority religions were concerned, their churches were, for the most part, closed, and their leaders were either harassed or executed. Roman Catholic churches were closed, the church hierarchy was abolished, and in 1952 forty leading Catholics were tried and sentenced to death. The Protestants were allowed slightly more latitude. Although all Protestant schools were immediately closed,five Protestant denominations were allowed to merge into the United Evangelical Church. In 1949, however, fifteen Protestant pastors were executed. Some Jews were allowed to emigrate to Israel in the early period of communist rule, but in Bulgaria the grand rabbi, like the Moslem grand mufti, was rendered completely subordinate to the state.
In 1949 Dimitrov died and was succeeded by his brother-in-law, Vulko Chervenkov, known as the Stalin of Bulgaria, who controlled the government from 1950 until 1956. His was a one-man rule, patterned completely on the rule of Joseph Stalin in the Soviet Union. He was both the premier and the First Secretary for the six years of his rule. There was an increase in industrial production under Chervenkov. Production plans, however, appeared to be conceived more in the light of Soviet five-year plans than with regard to Bulgaria's economic needs. Agriculture was almost completely collectivized, although production goals were not achieved, and the standard of living declined appreciably under Chervenkov's rule.
In foreign policy Bulgaria under Chervenkov continued to follow the Soviet example. International communism dominated all Bulgaria's foreign policies. In the early 1950s Bulgaria supported the abortive communist uprising in Greece. Chervenkov attempted to rid the country of all Western influence and severed diplomatic relations with the United States in 1950. After Chervenkov's term relations were reestablished in 1960 and promoted from legation to embassy status in 1966. Again, following the example of the Soviet Union, which was then on strained terms with the nationalistic Yugoslavs, Chervenkov purged 100,000 nationalists from the party and executed Traicho Kostov, the deputy premier, on the grounds that he was a Titoist. Because of Bulgaria's antisocial behavior in the world community, the country was excluded from the United Nations until 1955.
Although Stalin died in 1953, Chervenkov retained his office as premier until 1956 but held only nominal powers. He was ultimately purged in 1962. Chervenkov, in the post-Stalin period, was openly charged with supporting the personality cult policies of Stalin. After Stalin's death there was a degree of political relaxation under a policy known as the New Course. Police terrorism abated, and there was greater freedom of movement in the society as a whole. Travel abroad was tolerated to a greater degree, and an increased interest in the welfare of the people was manifested. The government actively courted the peasants in order to win them over to its policy of collectivization. The working classes, office workers, and even artisans were given more latitude by the government. On the foreign front, following the example of Nikita Khrushchev, who sought reconciliation with Tito, and despite Bulgaria's reluctance over the still-fiery Macedonian issue, Bulgaria made some efforts at reconciliation with Yugoslavia. In order to establish better relations both with the Yugoslavs and with theBulgarian nationalists, Kostov was posthumously rehabilitated in 1956.
In 1954 Chervenkov gave up his title as first secretary of the party, thus setting a new precedent for separation of party and state posts and dispelling the concept of one-man rule. Although Chervenkov retained his title as premier temporarily, Todor Zhivkov became the first secretary. Shortly thereafter, Chervenkov was replaced as premier by Anton Yugov. As Zhivkov, despite his backing by Khrushchev, was not firmly in control of the party, his takeover was followed by widespread purges.
Zhivkov's rule, like that of his predecessor, emulated the Soviet model. Unlike Chervenkov, however, Zhivkov based his government on the principle of collective leadership. In the early years of his rule he based his foreign policy on allegiance to the Soviet Union. He strongly supported the Soviets in their border conflicts with the People's Republic of China (PRC). Bulgaria, despite basic sentiments concerning Macedonia, still attempted to renew its friendship with Yugoslavia, again following the Khrushchev example.
In 1962 Zhivkov purged the party of both Chervenkov and Yugov and made himself premier as well as first secretary, thus reestablishing the principle of unity of rule (see ch. 9). At the same time, this move increased Zhivkov's control over the party. Internal problems continued to plague the Zhivkov government. There were, in the 1960s, severe shortages of food, housing, and consumer goods.
Bulgaria's foreign policy under Zhivkov, however, continued on an even, strongly Soviet, keel. Bulgaria's foreign policy has been assessed by some observers as "a carbon copy of Moscow's." Bulgaria was, and is, considered to be the most reliable partner of the Soviet Union in the Balkans. In contrast, Albania has supported the PRC, Romania has pressed its case for independence, and Yugoslavia has essentially followed a nationalistic policy.
Bulgaria's relations with Greece, which had been basically negative for twenty years, became more positive in 1964 when trade, air traffic, communications, and tourist agreements were signed. Because of the issue of Macedonia, relations with Yugoslavia were, for the most part, cool, although Zhivkov attempted to improve them from time to time. Relations with the United States remained cool but correct.
In 1965, shortly after Khrushchev's ouster in the Soviet Union, there was an attempted coup against Zhivkov. The government tried in vain to silence the story but, when pressed, stated that the conspirators in the plot were Maoists, alienated by Bulgaria's anti-PRC policies. As the coup was attempted only five months after Khrushchev's removal from office, Zhivkov—whose power had been based to a large extent on Khrushchev's support—was in a highly vulnerable position. For this reason many attributed the conspiracy to those opposed to Zhivkov's government itself and particularly those opposed to its subservience to the Soviet Union. The conspiratorsincluded Bulgarian Communists, army officers, and World War II partisans. The discovery of this plot resulted in purges, the suicide of one of the leading conspirators, and the reorganization of the Ministry of the Interior and the transfer of its security functions to the new Committee of State Security, which fell directly under Zhivkov's personal control.
Bulgaria occupies 42,800 square miles of the Balkan Peninsula, and its 1973 population was estimated at 8.7 million (see fig. 1). It is a member of the Warsaw Treaty Organization (Warsaw Pact), together with five other Eastern European countries to its north and northwest and the Soviet Union. Bulgaria's location is such that its natural features are combinations of those found in the western Soviet Union and in southern Europe. Its climate is transitional between that of the Mediterranean countries and that of north-central Europe. The blend of the various geographic influences is unique, however, and gives the country a degree of individuality that is not anticipated until it is explored in some detail.
It is a land of unusual scenic beauty, having picturesque mountains, wooded hills, beautiful valleys, grain-producing plains, and a seacoast that has both rocky cliffs and long sandy beaches. Soil and climate are adequate to permit production of a variety of crops. Although only a few mineral resources are present in quantity or in good quality ores, the country has a number of them. Large quantities of brown coal and lignite are available, but resources of the better fuels are limited.
The people of the country have been influenced by its location, which is close to the point of contact between Europe and the Orient. The area had been overrun by so many conquerors and occupied for so long that only since liberation in 1878 have a majority of the peasants dared come out of the hills to farm the better land of the plains and valleys.
The country fared poorly in the distribution of the spoils after the First Balkan War in 1912. It was then on the losing side of the Second Balkan War in 1913 and of the two great wars since. In spite of this, its boundaries contain most of the Bulgarian people in the area, and only some 10 to 15 percent of the population within its borders is not ethnically Bulgarian. It has until recently been predominantly agricultural. Industrialization was undertaken late, and it was not until 1969 that the urban population equaled that of the rural areas (see ch. 2).
NATURAL FEATURES
Topography
Alternating bands of high and low terrain extend generally east to west across the country. The four most prominent of these fromnorth to south are the Danubian plateau, the Stara Planina (Old Mountain), or Balkan Mountains, the central Thracian Plain, and the Rodopi (or Rhodope Mountains). The western part of the country, however, consists almost entirely of higher land, and the individual mountain ranges in the east tend to taper into hills and gentle uplands as they approach the Black Sea (see fig. 2).
The Danubian plateau, also called a plain or a tableland, extends from the Yugoslav border to the Black Sea. It encompasses the area between the Danube River, which forms most of the country's northern border, and the Stara Planina to the south. The plateau rises from cliffs along the river, which are typically 300 to 600 feet high, and abuts against the mountains at elevations on the order of 1,200 to 1,500 feet. The region slopes gently but perceptibly from the river southward to the mountains. The western portion is lower and more dissected; in the east it becomes regular but somewhat higher, better resembling a plateau. Bulgarians name local areas within it, but they do not name the region as a whole. It is a fertile area with undulating hills and is the granary of the country.
The southern edge of the Danubian plateau blends into the foothills of the Stara Planina, the Bulgarian extension of the Carpathian Mountains. The Carpathians resemble a reversed S as they run eastward from Czechoslovakia across the northern portion of Romania, swinging southward to the middle of that country, where they run westward and cross Romania as the Transylvanian Alps. At a famous gorge of the Danube River known as the Iron Gate, which forms part of the Romania-Yugoslavia border, the Carpathians again sweep eastward, becoming Bulgaria's Stara Planina range.
Considered in its local context, the Stara Planina originates at the Timok Valley in Yugoslavia, continues southeastward as it becomes the northern boundary of the Sofia Basin, and then turns more directly eastward to terminate at Cape Emine on the Black Sea. It is some 370 miles in length, and some twelve to thirty miles in width. It retains its height well into the central part of the country, where Botev Peak, its highest point, rises to about 7,800 feet. The range is still apparent until its rocky cliffs fall into the Black Sea. Over most of its length, its ridge is the divide between drainage to the Danube River and to the Aegean Sea. In the east small areas drain directly to the Black Sea.
Sometimes considered a part of the foothills of the Stara Planina, but separated from the main range by a long geological trench that contains the Valley of Roses, is the Sredna Gora (Middle Forest). The Sredna Gora is a ridge running almost precisely east to west, about 100 miles long. Its elevations run to only a little more than 5,000 feet, but it is narrow and achieves an impression of greater height.
The southern slopes of the Stara Planina and the Sredna Gora give way to the Thracian Plain. The plain is roughly triangular in shape, originating at a point east of the mountains that ring the Sofia Basin and broadening as it proceeds eastward to the Black Sea. It encompasses the Maritsa River basin and the lowlands that extend from it to the Black Sea. As is the case with the Danubian plateau, a great deal of this area is not a plain in strict terms. Most of its terrain is moderate enough to allow cultivation, but there are variations greater than those of a typical plain.
Figure 2. Topography of BulgariaFigure 2. Topography of Bulgaria
Figure 2. Topography of Bulgaria
The Rodopi occupies the area between the Thracian Plain and the Greek border. This range is commonly described as including the Rila mountain range south of Sophia and the Pirin range in the southwestern corner of the country. As such, the Rodopi is the most outstanding topographic feature, not only of the country, but also of the entire Balkan Peninsula. The Rila contains Mount Musala—called Mount Stalin for a few years—whose 9,500-foot peak is the highest in the Balkans. About a dozen other peaks in the Rila are over 9,000 feet. They feature a few bare rocks and remote lakes above the tree line, but the lower peaks are covered with Alpine meadows, and the general aspect of the range is one of green beauty.
The Vitosha range is an outlier of the Rila. A symmetrical, 7,500-foot high, isolated peak in the range is a landmark on the outskirts of Sofia. Snow covers its conical summit most of the year, and its steep sides are forested.
The Pirin is characterized by rocky peaks and stony slopes. An impression of the landscape is provided by a local legend, which says that when the earth was being created God was flying over the peninsula with a bag of huge boulders. The rocks were too heavy for the bag, and it broke over southwestern Bulgaria.
Some Bulgarian geographers refer to the western Rodopi and the Pirin as the Thracian-Macedonian massif. In this context, the Rodopi includes only the mountains south of the Maritsa River basin. There is some basis for such a division. The Rila is largely volcanic in origin. The Pirin was formed at a different time by fracturing of the earth's crust. The uplands east of the Maritsa River are not of the same stature as the major ranges.
Sizable areas in the western and central Stara Planina and smaller areas in the Pirin and in Dobrudzha have extensive layers of limestone. There are some 2,000 caves in these deposits. The public has become more interested in the caves during the past three or four decades, but only about 400 of them have been completely explored and charted.
To the east of the higher Rodopi and east of the Maritsa River are the Sakar and Strandzha mountains. They extend the length of the Rodopi along the Turkish border to the Black Sea but are themselves comparatively insignificant. At one point they have a spot elevation of about 2,800 feet, but they rarely exceed 1,500 feet elsewhere.
Formation of the Balkan landmasses involved a number of earth crust foldings and volcanic actions that either dammed rivers or forced them into new courses. The flat basins that occur throughout thecountry were created when river waters receded from the temporary lakes that existed while the rivers were cutting their new channels. The largest of these is the Sofia Basin, which includes the city and the area about fifteen miles wide and sixty miles long to its northwest and southeast. Other valleys between the Stara Planina and the Sredna Gora ranges contain a series of smaller basins, and similar ones occur at intervals in the valleys of a number of the larger rivers.
Drainage
From a drainage standpoint, the country is divided into two nearly equal parts. The slightly larger one drains to the Black Sea, the other to the Aegean. The northern watershed of the Stara Planina, all of the Danubian plateau, and the thirty to fifty miles inland from the coastline drain to the Black Sea. The Thracian Plain and most of the higher lands of the south and southwest drain to the Aegean Sea. Although only the Danube is navigable, many of the other rivers and streams have a high potential for the production of hydroelectric power and are sources of irrigation water. Many are already being exploited.
Insignificant when compared with the watersheds that drain to the seas, about 125 square miles of the country drain into a few small salt lakes that have no outflowing water. The largest such lake has a surface area of 2.5 square miles.
By far the greater part of the country that drains to the Black Sea does so through the Danube. Most of its major tributaries in the country (from west to east, the Ogosta, Iskur, Vit, Osum, Yantra, and Lom) carry more water than do the combination of the Provadiyska, Kamchiya, Fakiyska, and Veleka rivers, all of which flow directly into the Black Sea. Of the Danube's Bulgarian tributaries, all but the Iskur rise in the Stara Planina. The Iskur rises in the Rila and flows northward through a narrow basin. Territory not far from the river on both sides of it drains in the opposite direction, to the south. The Iskur passes through Sofia's eastern suburbs and cuts a valley through the Stara Planina on its way to join the Danube.
The Iskur and the other of the Danube's north-flowing tributaries have cut deep valleys through the Danubian plateau. The eastern banks tend to rise sharply from the rivers; the western parts of the valleys may have broad fields with alluvial soils. The peculiar, though consistent, pattern is caused by forces resulting from the earth's rotation; these forces give the water a motion that tends to undercut the right banks of the streams. Some of these rivers are sizable streams, but the Danube gets only a little more than 4 percent of its total volume from its Bulgarian tributaries. As it flows along the northern border, the Danube averages one to 1.5 miles in width. Its highest water levels are usually reached during June floods, and in normal seasons it is frozen over for about forty days.
Several major rivers flow directly to the Aegean Sea, although theMaritsa with its tributaries is by far the largest. The Maritsa drains all of the western Thracian Plain, all of the Sredna Gora, the southern slopes of the Stara Planina, and the northern slopes of the eastern Rodopi. Other than the Maritsa, the Struma in the west and the Mesta (which separates the Pirin from the main Rodopi ranges) are the two largest of the rivers that rise in Bulgaria and flow to the Aegean. Most of these streams fall swiftly from the mountains and have cut deep, scenic gorges. The Struma and Mesta reach the sea through Greece. The Maritsa forms most of the Greek-Turkish border after it leaves Bulgaria.
About 3,750 square miles of agricultural land have access to irrigation waters. Dams provide the water for about one-half of the acreage; diversions from rivers and streams serve about one-third; and water pumped from the ground and from streams accounts for the remainder.
Of the dams, ninety-two are termed large state dams. Their combined capacity is three times that of some 2,000 smaller dams. The sources of four large rivers—the Maritsa, Iskur, Mesta, and Rilska (a major tributary of the Struma)—are within a few miles of each other in the high Rila. Water from the upper courses of these and several other streams supplies the Sofia area with both water and electricity, and they have a potential for further development. There are major dams on the Tundzha, Iskur, Rositsa, and Struma rivers. The Danube is too massive a stream to harness, and damming the Maritsa along most of its course would flood too much valuable land. The rivers flowing north across the Danubian plateau also tend to be overly difficult to use in the areas where they are most needed.
The Vucha River, flowing from the Rodopi into the Maritsa River, is often used to illustrate how rivers have been effectively harnessed to provide a variety of benefits. Its cascade system of hydroelectric development employs six dams having the capacity to generate over 600,000 kilowatts of electricity. The water they back up serves the municipal water systems in Plovdiv and a number of other towns in its vicinity, and the dams provide irrigation water for nearly 250,000 acres of cropland. The reservoirs themselves are being developed as recreational areas and mountain resorts.
Where a stream is difficult to dam or to divert, water is pumped from it. This has been feasible only since about 1950, when low-cost diesel engines and sufficient hydroelectric power became available from newly constructed dams on other streams. About eighty-five huge pumping stations have been set up along the Danube River, which furnishes about three-quarters of the water acquired by this method; and in 1970 there were about 1,200 lesser stations operating on smaller streams, most of them on the Thracian Plain.