ON THE OBSERVATORY: Regent Alexander on the Thessaloniki front in 1918
During the controversial preparations for the revisionist (?) commemoration of the centenary of the beginning of the First World War (the Great War) in 1914, it was as if the more historically significant ending of that war, in which the Central Powers fell like dominoes, fell into the shadows. The beginning of the end of the Great War was marked by the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki front 95 years ago - in the fall of 1918.
The Serbian army was transferred to the Thessaloniki front, which was several hundred kilometers long, already in the spring of 1916, after recovering in Corfu after the Albanian Golgotha. On one side of the front were French, British and Serbian soldiers, who were later joined by a number of Greeks and Italians (the Russian brigade was withdrawn after the October Revolution), while on the other side, well entrenched in trenches, were Austrian German and Bulgarian divisions.
Already in 1916, the Serbian army conquered Kajmakcalan on Mount Nidza after huge casualties and hand-to-hand combat with the Bulgarians.
The Battle of Kajmakčalan was fought between September 12 and 30, 1916, when the First Serbian Army managed to capture the peak of Sveti Ilija at a height of 2.524 meters, despite heavy losses.
Between September 26 and 30, 1916, the peak was occupied several times until the Serbian army captured it on September 30. The Serbian forces had a total of 4.643 dead, wounded and missing soldiers, of which the Drina Division had 3.320 or 3.804 thrown out of the machine, or three quarters of the total number of soldiers. Among the dead was the commander of the volunteer detachment Vojvoda Vuk.
The capture of Kajmakčalan made it easier for the Serbian 1st Army and the French forces to extend their operations, so in November the belt around Bitolj, including Bitolj itself, was conquered on November 19, 1916, which for the Serbian army had the significance of liberating the first piece of the homeland.
Despite the first success of the Serbian army after the disaster of 1915, the Thessaloniki front remained a secondary battlefield, and from 1916 to September 1918 there was mostly calm.
In the meantime, the French general Franche d'Eperet was appointed as the commander of the Thessaloniki front. In June 1918, he held a consultation with the Serbian generals and regent Alexander, at which the decision was made to finally break through the Front.
It was decided that the offensive would begin in the sector Dobro polje - Veternik - Kozjak, where the Serbian army was located, consisting of six divisions with 140.0000 soldiers, among whom there were about 25.000 volunteers. The Serbian army was divided into two armies - the first, which was commanded by Petar Bojović and the second, headed by Stepa Stepanović, while the commander of the staff was Duke Živojin Mišić (with the regent Alexander).
Duke Živojin Mišić in his Order to the Serbian Army for the Breakthrough of the Thessaloniki Front dated September 13, 1918 says:
"All commanders, commanders and soldiers should be imbued with the idea that the entire success of the offensive depends on the speed of penetration. At the same time, this speed is the best guarantee against surprise, because it achieves the disruption of the enemy and complete freedom in our actions. One should brazenly penetrate, without rest, to the extreme limits of human and horse power. To death, just don't stop! With unshakable faith and hope, the heroes advance to their homeland!»
ROAD CONSTRUCTION FOR SERBIAN ARTILLERY: Gradešnički pass ((k. 1301) 1918. Source: Military encyclopedia
The fighting began on September 14 with all-day artillery fire from all allied guns on Bulgarian, German and Austro-Hungarian positions, and at dawn on September 15 (at 5.30:17 a.m.), after a strong artillery preparation, the division of the first echelon of the Second Army, under the command of Duke Stepa Stepanović on the front: Sušica - Soko (XNUMX km.).
In the first line were the Šumadija Division (right wing), the 17th French Colonial Division (center) and the 122nd French Division (left wing). In the second line was the Timočka Division, behind the 17th French Division, and the Yugoslav Division, behind the 122nd French Division.
Towards the front of this army was the entire 3rd and part of the 2nd Bulgarian division.
The Serbian First Army, whose commander was General Petar Bojović, operated on the Soko-Lešnica front (16,5 km.) In the first line were the Drina Division (right wing), the Danube Division (left wing). In the second line: the Moravian Division, behind the center of the front.
Towards the front of this army was part of the 2nd and the entire 4th Bulgarian division. At the disposal of the Serbian Supreme Command was the Cavalry Division, which stood behind the Moravian Division.
It was a hand-to-hand fight, bayonets on bayonets.
Already on the first day, 11 km of the front was breached, on the second day the width was expanded to 40 km, and thus began the collapse of the central forces on the Thessaloniki front, whose line was disintegrating.
After the breakthrough l. and the 2nd Serbian Army continued their vigorous advance to prevent the Bulgarian-German forces from establishing a new line of defense. Despite the difficult terrain, fatigue and irregular supply, the elan of the troops was great. The Bulgarian-German troops tried to put up successive resistances, but they were forced to retreat quickly, leaving behind large amounts of material.
French Marshal Franche d'Eperet in his Report to the French government at the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki front at the end of September 1918 announced. "Operations must be slowed down because there is no communication in order to throw food to the advancing French troops, only the Serbian troops do not need communications, they are moving like a storm - forward.
The French marshal Franche d'Eperet later wrote about the Serbian soldiers: "They are almost all peasants, they are Serbs, hard-working, sober, modest, they are free, indomitable people, proud of themselves and masters of their fields." But the war came. And that's how, for the freedom of the country, those peasants effortlessly turned into soldiers, the bravest, the most persistent, the best of all. These are those great troops, for which I am proud that I led them, side by side with the soldiers of France, to the victorious freedom of their fatherland..."
The break-out of the Serbian army on the Vardar definitely marked the operational-strategic breakthrough of the German-Bulgarian front, whereby the Serbian army had: 681 dead, 132 missing, 3206 wounded.
This resulted in the Bulgarians being 26/27. on September sent a parliamentarian to Thessaloniki with a request to stop the operations for 48 hours. Franche D'Eperre rejected his request and recommended the Bulgarians to send parliamentarians with offers for peace. The Bulgarians accepted this and signed an armistice in Thessaloniki on September 29, by which the Bulgarian army capitulated.
Although the terms of the truce were very difficult, the Bulgarian delegates accepted them with only one demand: that the Serbian army not be allowed into Bulgaria. When on September 30, operations were ordered to stop, 4 German divisions were already captured in the Skopje area, and l. the Serbian army disarmed the 2nd and 4th divisions, during which 46 rifles and 800 cannons were seized.
According to the armistice agreement, the Bulgarian troops west of Skopje were captured, and those east of Skopje were only disarmed, and the personnel were released to Bulgaria. France and Great Britain had to possess certain strategic positions in Bulgaria.
The Germans did not recognize the armistice and their troops got out of contact with the Bulgarians. The remnants of the German army, pursued by the Serbian-French forces, retreated to the north. Their task was to provide continuous resistance as long as possible, in order to gain time for the arrival of reinforcements and the organization of resistance south of Nis, which would preserve the communication between Constantinople—Sofia—Nis—Belgrade for the extraction of forces and resources from Turkey and Bulgaria....
By breaking into the Skopje region, the commander of the allied forces, General Franche D'Eperre, regrouped his forces, and with the aim of occupying the entire Balkan peninsula, formed on October 6: to penetrate the eastern part of the peninsula, towards Constantinople and the straits, the Eastern Section of the Allied Army (British 22, 26 and 28th Division, French 122nd Division, Greek and, 2nd and 3rd Divisions and Italian brigade); for penetrating along the Bulgarian border front towards Pirot, Zaječar and Negotin, the 2nd group of French divisions — the 17th and 76th divisions and the Cavalry Brigade (which was temporarily with the Serbian 2st Army on the right bank of South Morava); to penetrate through Bulgaria, the Danube Army was formed from two French and one British division; a joint French-Greek detachment in the direction of Kosovo (later the 16nd Serbian Army came in that direction); and the Italian 5th Corps through Albania for the occupation of the Adriatic coast. On October 7, the First Serbian Army occupied Vladičin Han and fought its way through the Grdelica gorge, occupied Grdelica, and on October 9 penetrated into the Leskovac valley, into which the Cavalry Division broke out from the Veternica valley and occupied Leskovac on the same day. On October 12, the French Cavalry Brigade was sent from Grdelica via Vlasotinec and Svodo towards Pirot, which occupied Bela Palanka on October 217, drove parts of the German XNUMXth Division towards Knjaževac, and cut the Sofia-Nis railway.
On October 9, the First Serbian Army broke out in front of Nis. Attacking the positions of the German army near Nis, the 1st Serbian Army broke out about 200 km ahead of the main Allied forces and the 2nd Army, exposing itself to risk, which is why the Commander-in-Chief Franche D'Eperre ordered to halt its further advance until the rest of the forces arrived. However, despite this, the Serbian High Command, at the suggestion of the army commander and regardless of the technical superiority of the enemy, approved the 1st Serbian Army to attack the German army near Nis. In the battles from October 10 to 12, it defeated parts of that German army and entered Nis on October 12.
Belgrade was liberated on November 1, 1918.
With the defeat of Bulgaria, the German-Austro-Hungarian forces in the Balkans found themselves in a difficult position, and then the collapse of the empires followed. The Ottoman Empire capitulated on October 30, 1918. Austria-Hungary capitulated on October 31, 1918, and Germany on December 11, 1918.
The real end of the First World War was on June 28, 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles was signed.
After the military defeat in the First World War, in 1918, Austria-Hungary was disbanded, and several successor states were formed on its territory: Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and Poland, and parts were annexed to Italy and Romania.
"Burn from grain, from hunger from thirst,
crucified on the cross of Calvary,
but firm faith in ultimate victory
they never lost for a moment..."
The sign at the entrance to the crypt at Zeytinlik, Thessaloniki
At the Serbian military cemetery in Zejtinlik, in the ossuary where 5.580 Serbian soldiers who died on the Thessaloniki front are buried, and around the mausoleum (chapel with ossuary) there are ten plots where 1440 Serbian soldiers are buried. In addition, there are two common graves. The meme was brought from Serbia from the Momin Kamen mine. The cypress trees were brought from Hilandar. The conceptual design of the complex was created by the architect Nikolay Krasnov, a representative of academic historicism and the architect of the Russian court, who came to Serbia during the wave of Russian emigration after the Bolshevik revolution in 1917. The final construction works began in 1933 under the direction of the architect Budimir Hristodul, one of the 1300 corporals.
On September 95, the 28th anniversary of the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki Front was marked at the Serbian military cemetery in Zejtinlik near Thessaloniki. On September XNUMX, wreaths were laid by delegations from the Ministry of Defense and the Serbian Army, the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Labour, Greek officials and diplomats from the then allied powers: France, Great Britain, Russia and Italy.
The Minister of Culture of Serbia, Ivan Tasovac, said during the laying of a wreath on Zejtinlik, that this feat of the most famous generation in our history provides guidance for today's generation as well.
"Standing in this place, with due reverence and gratitude, we have an obligation to ask ourselves what messages and directions we can draw from this feat of the most glorious generation in our history."
He recalled that a French officer described the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki front as an "unprecedented marathon of French cavalry and Serbian infantry, in which the Serbian infantry won."
"That orientation towards the goal, that triumph of potential over problem, was enough for the Serbian soldier, returning to his homeland, to be faster than the French horseman." Today, such a feat is not required of us, but we are required to focus on the goal, which will allow us to no longer be crowded at the exit from Serbia, but, like then, at the entrance to it, and with the speed that we can achieve then, I am sure that we ourselves will be amazed."
Tasovac reminded of the respect that the world gave to Serbia at that time, and above all America, which in those years entered the stage as a world power, whose president Woodrow Wilson on July 28, 1918 pointed out the Serbian flag alongside the American one on the White House and all state buildings and said that "Serbia fought chivalrously and suffered for the same principles that the United States stands for", and in his later representation of Serbia in the negotiations, our country gained its powerful protector.
We do not forget, Tasovac added, the sacrifice of the Russian Emperor Nicholas II, who, entering the war to protect Serbia, ended up losing both his life and his empire.
"We have no words to express our gratitude to Greece, which in those years replaced the homeland for the Serbs and which, to the offer of the central powers to attack Serbia from the south and gain territorial benefits for itself, responded that it is too small a country for such a great impiety," Tasovac said.
Updated on September 28th
THE BREAKTHROUGH OF THE THESSALONIKI FRONT: The Salonika Front includes the battles of the armies of the Entente powers (French, British, Serbian, Greek, Italian and Russian) against the armies of the Central Powers (German, Austro-Hungarian and Bulgarian) in the period October 1915-October 1918 in the area of the established front from the Orphan Bay through Greek and Albanian territory, to the Ionian Sea. Source Military encyclopedia, Belgrade 1974.
