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it with profound skepticism. The unwillingness of Greek revolutionaries to compromise with any- thing less than their full independence deprived the Tsar of the last possible support for the success of his initiative.8 The rejection by the Greek side of the Russian Plan constituted a clear indication of the disappointment of the revolutionaries with the stance of Russia. The pre-revo- lution hopes for a decisive Russian intervention to the benefit of the Greek cause proved not to be realistic, and had been dissolved. The Greeks were now perceived as to have fallen victims of a political self-deception. The Plan greatly contributed to the reorientation of the expectations of the Greeks who, under the new conditions that had in the meantime been created, turned their hopes to Great Britain.
In the summer of 1825 the Greeks submitted to the British government the “Act of Submission” by which they asked London to undertake the protection of the Greek nation.9 It was a develop- ment that proved the prevalence of the pro-British group within the Greek government. At the same time, it was also a sign of internal bankruptcy of the Revolution, which having found itself at the brink of the abyss as a result of the civil wars and the military campaign of Ibrahim Pasha in the Peloponnese, desperately sought assistance from abroad. However, the British were not willing to place the Greeks under their direct protection as this development would probably re- sult in a war between Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire.10
Portrait
of George Canning
illustration (frontispiece) in
the edition Speeches of the Right Hon. George Canning, delivered on public occasions in Liverpool, Liverpool 1825 Library of the Hellenic Parliament
8. Foreign Office, British and foreign state papers, 1824-1825,
vol. 12, Ridgway, London 1846, p. 899-900.
9. Ibid, pp. 904-906; Katerina Gardika,
Protection and guarantees. Stages and myths of the Greek national integration, 1821-1920, Vanias, Thessaloniki 1999, pp. 122-125; D. S. Bitsios, “A diplomatic mission by Dim. A. Miaoulis”, Bulletin of the Historical and Ethnological Society of Greece, 20, 1971-1977,
pp. 73-81.
10. Apostolos V. Daskalakis (ed.),
Texts-sources of the history of the Greek Revolution, vol. 2, Athens 1967, pp. 468-470.
The Greek Revolution and European diplomacy 245