On its accession to power, the new Government issued a _communique_, announcing that it would pursue the policy adopted at the beginning of the War: a policy of neutrality qualified by a recognition of the obligations imposed by the Servian Alliance, and a determination to serve the interests of Greece without endangering her territorial integrity.[1] And as the Entente representatives at Athens expressed a certain disappointment at not finding in the _communique_ any allusion to the Entente Powers,[2] M. Zographos, Minister for Foreign Affairs, in order to remove all uneasiness on that score, instructed the Greek representatives in London, Paris, and Petrograd to assure the respective Governments categorically that the new Ministry did not intend to depart in any way from the pro-Entente attitude dictated by hereditary sentiments and interests alike. The only {34} difference between the Venizelos and the Gounaris Cabinets--the difference which brought about the recent crisis and the change of Government--was one regarding the danger of immediate action, but did not affect the basis of Greek policy.[3] That, by all the evidence available, was the truth. M. Gounaris thought as M. Venizelos thought, as King Constantine thought, as, indeed, every Greek capable of forming an opinion on international affairs thought--namely that, if Greece were to fight at all, interest and sentiment alike impelled her to fight on the side of the Entente.[4] The only question was whether she should enter the field then, and if so, on what conditions. M. Venizelos persisted in declaring that the Dardanelles expedition presented "a great, a unique opportunity," which he prayed, "God grant that Greece may not miss." [5] His successors had no wish to miss the opportunity--if such it was. But neither had they any wish to leap in the dark. M. Gounaris and his colleagues lacked the Cretan's infinite capacity for taking chances. Even in war, where chance plays so great a part, little is gained except by calculation: the enterprise which is not carefully meditated upon in all its details is rarely crowned with success.