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CHAPTER XXIII
russia in decline
On my return to Stockholm I at once took up the
threads of current political questions and of the daily
round again.
At our very first meeting M. Wallenberg asked me
if I considered it an opportune moment for formal
negotiations between the Russian and Swedish
Governments concerning the Aland Islands. " Most decidedly
not," I unhesitatingly replied; " you will arrive at
nothing owing to the confusion reigning at this moment
at the Foreign Office. And then it is hardly worth
while ; in two months, or two months and a half at latest,
M. Sturmer will have ceased to be at the head of our
Foreign Office." M. Wallenberg believed me and took
this for granted. It is probable that the Swedish
Minister to Petrograd had meantime confirmed my
opinion.
My allied colleagues cross-questioned me with the
deepest interest on Rumania’s entry into the war. We
agreed that the whole importance of this entry lay in
the possibility for us of throwing troops into Bulgaria
and of showing the disloyal aud ungrateful people what
it cost to raise their hand against their liberator and
benefactor, Russia. "How many troops have you sent
to the Dobrudja?" asked my colleagues. I did not
know but I supposed that a Russian army would attack
the Bulgarians on that side. Just then the French
General de L. arrived in Stockholm; he had been
attached to our G.H.Q. since the beginning of the
war. He came to see me and I asked him the
same question—that of the number of our contingents
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