Strategically the construction of the Bagdad Railway was a real menace to Russian ambitions in the Near East. The completion of the line would enable the Ottoman Government to effect a prompt mobilization along the Armenian front. For example, the Fifth Turkish Army Corps, from Damascus, and the Sixth Corps, from Bagdad—which in the War of 1877 arrived on the field after a series of forced marches, minus a large number of its effectives, too late to save Kars or to raise the siege of Erzerum—could be brought quickly by rail from Syria and Mesopotamia to Angora for the defence of northern Anatolia. In the event of a Russo-Turkish war such a maneuver would render extremely precarious a Russian invasion of Armenia or a Russian advance on Constantinople along the south shore of the Black Sea. In a general European war in which both Russia and Turkey might be involved the existence of this railway line would make possible a Turkish stroke at the southern frontier of Russia, thus diverting troops from the European front. That the German General Staff was not ignorant of these possibilities is certain because of the presence in Turkey, during this time, of General von der Goltz.[9] The Russian Government and the Russian press were fully aware of the menace of the Bagdad Railway to Russian imperial interests. That the Tsar did not offer serious resistance to the construction of the line was due to the rise of serious complications in the Far East, the crushing defeats of his army and navy in the War with Japan, friction with Great Britain in Persia and in Central Asia, and the outbreak of a revolutionary movement at home. But the Russian press called upon French citizens to show their loyalty to the Alliance by refusing to participate in the financing of the Railway.[10] The plaintive call of the Russians, however, did not fall on altogether sympathetic ears in the Republic; a conflict of interests led some French citizens to invest in the Railway even though it was denounced by their Government. THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT HESITATES