Word: bulgaria
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...Hellenes were Hellish too. They had carefully mined the roads and primed the bridges with TNT-and, unlike the Dutch and French, apparently did not forget to touch off the charges. Greece's Metaxas Line-pillboxes, barbed wire, trenches-was ironically strongest opposite neutral Bulgaria; nevertheless it offered barriers. The first line ran from Fiorina to the sea. The Greeks furthermore diverted streams on to roads, used every hillock and rock for sniping. Italian Alpinists are among the best mountain troops in Europe; but the Greek evzones-picturesque, wiry men in white jackets and kilts, slippers with turned...
...Cover) Since World War II began 14 months ago the Balkan Peninsula has run a temperature. Periodic scares have sent it to fever pitch, then dropped it as, one way or another, neighboring powers got their way without bloodshed. Rumania is partitioned and overrun by the German Army. Bulgaria takes orders from the Axis. Even Yugoslavia, which has a relatively large, well-trained Army, has taken the path of appeasement. This week war came at last to the Balkans, to the weakest country, but to the one country determined enough to stand up to Axis threats - to Greece...
Minor Problems. Last week's Greek squeeze was in the best tradition of courtship, firm but unhurried. The Axis even denied for the benefit of jittery Greeks that it had made demands. First there were the two minor problems of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia to be dealt with. Bulgaria's Coburg King Boris was primarily pro-neutrality and then, oddly enough, pro-British, but most Bulgarians were ready to shout for the side that could produce the Dobruja and promise Thrace...
Strong man of Bulgaria is Minister of Agriculture Ivan Bagrianoff, onetime palace companion of Boris, whom he is privileged to address with the familiar "thou." He was an officer in World War I, then turned his attention to large-scale farming on his estates near Razgrad. Grooming him to succeed scholarly Premier Professor Bogdan Filoff, the Axis called him to Berlin last week to learn the knack of dictating under orders, then on to Rome for further instructions...
Little trouble was anticipated in Bulgaria aside from a lack of highways, and Axis "experts" had Bulgarian peasants busy last week widening and repairing the dirt roads...