About the book: 2010 / In 1683, the troops of the Turkish Empire besieged Vienna, and in 1914 Turkey faced the First World War, being in Europe territorially pressed to the Bosporus Straits and Dardanelles. In 1684 the vast majority of the Christian population of the Balkans was in a state of raya (cattle in Arabic), and in 1914 they lived in independent states. Liberation took more than two hundred years. And every step on this long and painful path was taken with the support of Russia in its confrontation not only with the Ottoman Empire, but also with Great Britain, Austria and, at times, France. Ten Russian-Turkish wars, one of which, the Crimean, resulted in a European war with the participation of Great Britain, France and Sardinia on the Turkish side, were a kind of milestones on the Balkans’ path to freedom. The great mission of Russia, to which this book is dedicated, was completed.