As a last resource, Greece appealed to neutral countries, describing the condition in which she had long found herself, because she was not strong enough to impose respect for her neutrality, and protesting against this latest demand as most injurious to her honour and {158} subversive of all her rights.[15] The solicitation remained fruitless. The great American Republic was too intimately connected with France and England to intervene on behalf of Greece. The small states knew too well from their own experience how frail are the foundations upon which rest the honour and the rights of weak neutrals in a world war. Nevertheless, firm in the knowledge that he had the vast majority of the nation behind him, M. Lambros, on 30 November, by a final letter, declared to the French Admiral that his claim was utterly unacceptable. "I do not wish to believe," he concluded, "that, after examining in a spirit of goodwill and equity the reasons which render it impossible for the Greek people and its Government to give you satisfaction, you will proceed to measures which would be incompatible with the traditional friendship between France and Greece, and which the people would justly regard as hostile acts." [16] In face of Greece's unequivocal determination not to yield, the Admiral would have been well advised to insist with his Government on an amicable accommodation. He had not the means of carrying out his threats. It is true, his ships dominated the sea and their guns the capital; but, since the Greeks were determined to stand another blockade and to risk the bombardment of their capital rather than surrender their arms, how could he take them without an army? The problem had not escaped the worthy sailor. So grave a claim, he tells us, could not be enforced without war; and the Entente Powers were not thinking of going to war with Greece. Therefore, he had hit on the expedient of giving to his action the name and, so far as the nature of the thing permitted, the character of a "pacific demonstration." Not one shot would be fired except in self-defence: the troops would not seek to seize the material by violence: they would simply occupy certain points of vantage until they received satisfaction. He admits that his confidence in the success of these tactics, since his last interview with the King, had suffered some diminution. But he still {159} nourished a hope--based on the fact "that the Athens Government had always hitherto ended by bowing to our will." [17] He overlooked the inflamed minds of the people.