What really happened in Yugoslavia

[SeaWolf_48]

The dismemberment of Yugoslavia

Until August 1943 Italy had held the most territory, the western third of Croatia, Montenegro, an enlarged Albania, and two-thirds of Greece. Germany had held northern Slovenia, Serbia, Macedonia around Salonika, a strip of Greek territory on the Turkish border, the Piraeus, the islands in the Agean, and Crete. Bulgaria had occupied western Thrace and Yugoslvia Macedonia. Hungary and Romania had each taken a slice out of Yugoslavia north of the Danube. Croatia, including Bosnia and Hercegovina, was a semiautonomous state under Dr. Ante Pavelic and his Ustasi Movement. After Italy surrendered, Germany had taken over the Italian zone; Bulgarian area had been enlarged somewhat; and puppet governments had been established in Albania and Montenegro to match those in Serbia and Greece.

This is what really happened in Yugoslavia during the war. No game has ever been accurate about this part of the Third Reich, this information is from "Stalingrad to Berlin" by Earl F. Ziemke, Military Heritage Press. Page 365.

It's late and I want to finish describing the make-up of the three guerrilla groups in Yugoslavia tomarrow.

[JerseyJohn]

SeaWolf

Great Topic. Don't want to clog it up but the "forgotten war" in that country is something nobody ever covers adequately, not just games but most history books as well. Thanks for covering this, enjoying it immensely.

[ February 03, 2003, 06:52 AM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[Liam]

One Important aspect of the game not covered. Though Eastern and Western Armies may not be porportioned the same combatant/Military Engineers/Medical/Vehicle support, and SO FORTH!!! There were supposedly a Million Yugoslavs in the Army at the time Hitler invaded. So when I see 3 corps at what military strength? I'm just Blahhhh, even Yugoslavia a small military power would deserve what Switzerland gets 2 full blown fully entrenched armies...

It's a gross misrepresentation. What would be more accurate is giving the Yugoslavians at least 5 armies... Though Poorly Equiped and then perhaps divide the nation along the pro-Allied Coup and Pro-Axis Coup...Hurting supply...also well, they're equipment is a low rating, so we really should have different rating than Anti-Tank. How about Equiped Soldier's level. Like the American GI was the best equiped soldier of the War towards Normandy... Far better than their adversaries, which gave them a huge advantage.

You can't properly deal with the Balkans, the way this game is drawn out. You'd have to have a larger Map for one. For two, you'd have to make seperate nations representing what the Germans would get say, free entrance into Serbia? I'm not sure how the War went. All I heard was Tito was a pain in the but and the Nazis admired the Zeal of the Muslim Soldiers...

We need a larger map... We need more units on the map, regardless of anything

[SeaWolf_48]

Well here is the Readers Digest version of one of the most intresting aspects of WW2. Yugoslavia has about ten different ethnic peoples within her borders. After Germany conquered her in May of 1941 the nation became roughly three different areas. In the Northwest were the Croats, a Catholic area somewhat loyal to Catholic Italy and Nazi Germany. The second area in the Northeast was Serbia, which was made up of bearded Eastern Orthodox Serbs. The third area the rest of Yugoslavia was made up of a mixed bag of ten differnt peoples. This last area is where Tito and his Partisans controled.

In Croatia there lived strangle enough Cossacks who had fought against the Red Army in the Russian revolution, and formed the XV Cossack Cavalry Corps and mostly fought against the Partisans. These Cossacks surrendered to the British at the end of the war, but under pressure from the USSR were handed over to the Soviets Army and all were exicuted or died in Siberia. The Croatian Army loyal to Germany was called the Ustashi (the rebels) and lead by a Fascist named Ante Pavelich. He started enthnic cleansing in Croatia of all Jews, Muslims, Gypsies, and Eastern Orthodox Serbs. His men raped, tortured, raped, killed, and raped (they liked rape) 750,000 people, which sickened the Local German Occupation Authorities. Pavelich's Army was around 100,000 men, of which 50,000 (one corps) fought in Russia, the rest fought against the Partisans.

The second group were called the Chetniks (they took their name from the Cheta, the 19th Century Group who fought against the Turkish Occupation forces), and were mostly Eastern Orthodox Serbs. They were lead by Army Colonel Drazha Mihailovich, a royalist who wanted to perserve the Monarchy. The Chetniks started off fighting the Germans, but after the brutal repercussions of 100 to 1 killings of innocent men, women, and children, for each German soldier killed they became neutral and even started to fight against the Partisans instead of the Germans. In 1941 they numbered around 15,000, in 1942 around 40,000, and in 1943 and 44 around 90,000. Britian started sending supplies to the Chetniks, but after a year stopped and only sent supplies to the Communist Partisans.

The last group the Partisans (the spanish name partidas which was a group of Spainish Guerrillas that harassed Napolean) was first used here in Yugoslavia. The Partisans were lead by a man called Tito, a Communist, his real name was Josip Broz a Croatian-Slovene peasant. He served in WW1 with the Austro-Hungarian Army and was captured by the Russians. While working on the Trans-Siberian railway as a prisoner of war during the Russian Revolution he became a Communist. Tito became the Partisan leader after the Germans and Italians took over Yugoslavia and raised about 12,000 partisans in 1941. In 1942 his army was around 45,000 men, in 1943 140,000, and in 1944 around 300,000.

The Russians and the Partisans liberated Yugoslavia in late 1944 thru early 1945. A pro-soviet government was established, and all other guerrilla groups were extinguished. Of course reprisals took place for things done during the war.

The Italians had 19 divisions serving in Yugoslavia until their capulation in May of 1943. Germany had 60,000 second line troops there until mid 1942, Hilter wanted to make an example out of the Guerrillas (Operation White) and sent two first rate Mountain divisions from Russia. Later when Italy fell, Germany had 120,000 men in Yugoslavia, troops needed in Russia. During Operation Black in 1943 when Italy surrendered, Germany had about 150,000 men there.

The Germans could never control all of Yugoslavia at one time, but thru collaberation with Croats, Serbs, Italians, Bulgarians, Hungarians, and their own forces they did a thoroughly terrible job of managing this area of the Third Reich.

Since our map is divided when Poland falls and becomes the General Government(part of Germany) and annexed to the Soviet Union. When France is conquered and is divided into Vichy France and German Occupied France, how about Yugoslavia divided according to her historic distibutions describe above. One Pro-Nazi Government (Croatia), one semi-neutral area (Serbia), and one Partisan area.

[ February 03, 2003, 12:01 PM: Message edited by: SeaWolf_48 ]

[JerseyJohn]

SeaWolf

Great stuff, and not the Reader's Digest account by any means. One of the controversies of the BBC documentary series, The World as War, was the decision to leave all of this out. They decided they couldn't do justice to it without leaving out some other area, such as Burma. That's how involved it was! A shame it doesn't get better ducumentary coverage.

Very glad you posted this information and did such a fine job. I learned a lot from it and am sure others will also. Thanks for helping to clarify such an important and little discussed topic.

[ February 03, 2003, 11:59 AM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[Shaka of Carthage]

Always interested in the details. Do you have maps? It would be nice to visualize the areas you are describing.

Thanks,

Barry

[Shaka of Carthage]

Liam

You are correct that SC does not represent the different nationalities and the differences in equipment, training, etc. It is an extremely difficult subject, made even worse by the fact that identical units; same men, same equipment, same experience, can have an effectivness difference of almost 2:1. Even the experts cannot agree on how to accuratly reflect this.

So in SC you have a system that has decided to keep it simple by making a "generic" unit. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that manpower equals the combat power of this unit. If a man with a rifle has a combat power of one (1), a machine gun is around seven (7), but an artillery piece is around eight hundred (800) to twelve hundred (1200).

Number of men is not a good way of trying to determine how many units a nation should have. Better way is the number of artillery pieces and armored fighting vehicles. Posting those numbers would give a more meaningful comparison of the potential military units (divisions, corps, armies) a nation can raise.

[CalifVol]

Thank you for the history.

There are a number of areas in WW II that could be called forgotten or appear forgotten. If you would like more about Yugoslavia the Time-Life history of World War II book series covers it at length.

In the West history of the Partisan/resistance efforts tends to be a focused discussion about Norway and France. The Yugoslavia experience is a history that is out there, but lack of interest tends to make it forgotten.

For partisans the War in Russia becomes one of a lot of missing history. Many Partisan leaders were shot or sent to Gulag's after the war. A small number of partisan groups (in the Ukrain) kept fighting the Russian Army after it showed up and replaced the occuping German Army. Stalin was such a great guy that it seemed some people didn't see a big difference between fighting him or Hitler. A lot of the Russian partisan history has been deliberately forgotten by the old USSR.

One of the other areas that falls into the realm of forgotten is Italy. On September 8, 1943, Italy unconditionally surrended to the Allies. Well, duh, that's not forgotten. On October 13, 1943 Italy declared WAR on Germany! That is forgotten. Its forgotten that the Italians provided troops and equipment to fight the Germans. Its forgotten how Italy was treated after declaring war. Italy was in a weird status of "co-belligernt", she wasn't part of the Allies.

Going quickly to the Pacific, the Guerreillas (sp) in the Phillpines are also a forgotten element of WW II, which is sad as they have a direct US connection and were one of the very few pro-west guerreilla effort in the region.

I shall stop before I digress into pure babbling.

[JerseyJohn]

CalifVol

You may call it babbling, I call it Great Stuff! Between you and SeaWolf I've learned a lot today.

Nobody will ever get the 1943 Italian situation sorted out to more than a mild muddle. First Mussolini needed to be ousted but with Germany believing Italy would remain in the Axis. Then arrangements had to be made so the Allies wouldn't regard the place as a defeated enemy. Then . . . etc. & etc..

The Italians, especially the communist guerillas, did some good fighting against the Germans. Kesselring, nicknamed Smiling Albert, who liked both Italy and the Italians and was one of Germany's most mellow fieldmarshals, wound up hanging partisans from railroad bridges.

Occupied Poland also had people hiding in forests, but they weren't as much partisans as Jews and others trying their best to survive the war. War Deaths in both Poland and Yugoslavia were totally out of proportion to their populations. I think it was something like 30% of the 1939 population in Poland and probably similar in Yugoslavia.

The unfortunate Russian partisans executed by either the Red Army or commisars sent to help them were, in many cases documented on film or in still photos.

[ February 03, 2003, 02:34 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

[CalifVol]

If you seen the movie "The Battle of San Pietro" (A documentary made during WW II, by John Huston) it shows the Italian Army attacking Mt. Loungo (sp) in support of the US assualt on the city of San Pietro.

This is a fascinating movie in that not only does it show the Italian regular army fighting along side the US (very brief scene), it also shows failure to undersatnd the concept of Key Terrain. The critical part of the battle was the assualt on Mt. Lungo (The Italians got waxed and didn't seize it). The failure of the Italians resulted in the US also getting waxed, but the US commander failed to understand Lungo was the key to the battle and ordered assualt after fruitless assualt to take the town. A really great picture to show how combat operations can be mucked up! It even shows a pure tank assualt into a city. That was very scary with predictable results when the narrator says out of 17 tanks only 4 returned.

[ February 03, 2003, 07:30 PM: Message edited by: CalifVol ]

[Liam]

thanxs for the Comments on my posting Shaka...

armies in the field are a big difference, communication<modern>, transportation, proffessional Western Leadership... At least Even Modern 20th century equipment...Though did every Yugoslav have a Rifle? It's grossly respresented, a million men if determined would be a very healthy force for the 3rd Reich to Crush in weeks... Without a "grunt" of manpower and equipment. This game is about taking real history into consideration. You can replace Tanks, with Sappers, you can replace Artillery with Guerrilia tactics and suicide squads. Depends on the flexability of the countries armed forces and mountain Warefare is a Pain in the butt which is bigtime in Yugoslavia. So you waltz in in what is roughly equivelant to 150k of Western Troops and stamp em out. The poles were fairly organized. They were a Fair military, only beaten due to lack of understand BlitzKrieg and likely leadership. Nomatter how ill a weapon is, it is still effective if used, and practiced again and again. If the Russians didn't have so much space to make mistakes, their weapondry would've succumbed to the much more modern Western German Power. Also if they weren't fighting during a Winter/with a long front from the Baltic in Leningrad to the Black Sea Rostov in the South '41... They learned from their mistakes and with far inferior equipment and it was not equal IMHO until around midish '43

That made the huge change between the Soviet fighting man, but still they used the tactic of #s vs Quality. They could've gone quality but the very nature of a Communist state is #s and loss of life being of little consideration...

All these minors are misrepresented in that sometimes you wipe them out in 2 seconds. Other times you get a lucky Corp here or there. There needs to be a smaller organization of disorganized Fighting men in this War. That is Truely the backbone of most Eastern European Armies. The Romanians/Bulgarians/Hungarians I bet carried WW1 equipment at best. No mechanized ability, without their Axis friends. So they are no good really either. They had little or 0 Morale to fight against a determined Ally they were more worried about Obtaining more lands in the baltics as represented. Although the baltics were a poor area, aside from Ploesti...semi-strategic<not very> It was just a problem to be overlooked... So should the Russians with a lot of their beginning inf modeled after weak and badly equiped lead troops be somehow modeled say a Base Infantry Unit...

With a strength of 3 that cannot be improved place all over the map for these countries. For true representation of their fighting capabilties. The Russians were torn a new rear end in WW2 until 1942 at Stalingrad. They had no idea what Modern warefare was, in this game they can play hit and run tactics that historically Russia was incapable of doing. She was in shambles for losing all that she did, and most of her backbone would come from LATER reorganization not early...After her troops escaped and her leadership woke up and properly equiped and fought an effective style warefare with inferior equipment.

To sum it up, the BEF and the French were better military units than the Germans. I think that their air was significantly weaker and their tactics were old style... There should be a better bonus than just HQs for Germans in that situation and their should be proper penalties as the Allies later improved their technology by Worldwide Cooperation and a HUGE ULTRA wealthy Modern<comparable to Chinese military of today> USA

[JerseyJohn]

Liam

A lot of interesting views but I can't agree that the French in 1940 and B. E. F. were better fighting units than their German counterparts.

The British were more motorized than the Germans, but didn't have the tactical doctrine; their tanks were not comparable those the Germans were using and they had no tactical doctrine to utilize them with.

French Tanks tended to be either heavier and slower or lighter and faster than those the Germans were using. In the campaign the Pz IIIs and IVs were unduly handicapped by the incorrect use of the IIIs having the high velocity gun with armor piercing shells and the IVs having the short, low velocity gun with high explosive shells. It was one of the few mistakes Hitler admitted to. After France both models were fitted with long high velocity weapons. Even with that handicap they fared well against the equally numerous French armor which was almost never employed effectively.

Aside from these things, German soldiers of 1940 were very well trained and well led. There's no doubt the British and French fought bravely, but the Germans always seemed to have an edge even beyond the Luftwaffe's 'flying artillery' advantage.

Definitely true that the Luftwaffe ruled the skies till the Battle of Britain.

British firstline fighters and German firstline fighters were closely matched, but the RAF operated primarily out of Britain and in that early campaign rarely met the Germans in sufficient numbers to attain parity.

Months after the Battle of Britain, it was the UKs turn to attempt escorted bombing runs over enemy territory and the Brits suffered just as badly on the German side of the Channel as the Germans had on the English side.

Even if Poland's equipment, training and airforce had been the equal of Germany's, I think they'd have still been doomed by sheer geography and the fact Germany is simply a much more powerful nation with more of everything.

The Poles had to defend too long a line made all the more impossible by it's 'C' shape. How do you successfully defend something when you start off not only outnembered but doubly out flanked? To have pulled everything back and only defended the central part of the country with it's capital, Warsaw, would have been unthinkable and equally doomed, though it might have taken a little longer though at the expense of abandoning much of their nation.

[Liam]

Yes, you are right about the short ranged P.4 and the Lack of firepower in the P.3 the German's had to outthink their oponent, get around their flanks and hit them in their weaker points. The British a13 was comparable armor to most frontline German tanks, and that was the weakest British Tank. Although never around in great #s... Also the Matilda series<the right ones> were unstoppable armor, though very heavy. Also not enough in #s... You're absolutely right about German Air superiority, i guess the allies didn't realize the importance early enough. As it would have been a great factor in delaying German advancing.

The Char1bis and the Somua, had the same turret. That was more or less like a Panther vs a slightly stronger Sherman. You could fire endless rounds of AP from a P3 into a Char1s turret and it would just bounce off.. In fact the Germans pioneered faster, more maneuverable and more numerous tanks... Much like their American counterparts a few years later :)The only comparable Armor to the Axis was the Renault that was a lt piece of chunk. Though the Somua in 1940 was the finest Medium tank in the entire world. I have heard that the Allies had more tanks and more aircraft and of course deployed wrong. In support of infantry rather than as line pounchers and fast routers. The Blensheim Hawk75, is roughly equal to many of the Luftwaffe fighters... The JU87, 109 and HE-111<corrected formely shnell bomber> were already obsolete by 1940ish...

A lot of these I base of a Simulator I have played and books I've read about their equipment. Although even on a defensive role, the Allies should've bought a tad bit more time than they did. The Poles I hear weren't as bold as the Czech's or as brave. They were ready to fight in '38 with their awesome T38 which I find almost as nice as the P3...far superior to any other German tank available. Besides a worthy Airforce a combined Pole-Czeck front whilst the allies built a true # of Supply and equipment to match their German counterparts may have caused the War to be a lot shorter. Plus would've pushed other Balkan nations in perhaps and made the Russians very very Stressed!

[JerseyJohn]

Interesting about the evolution of armored warfare. Guderian's 1930's book, Achtung Panzer! envisions tanks as evolved cavalry; originally Guderian began his study as an examination of German cavalry tactics in the opening phases of WW I, then drew the connection to tanks. As the war progressed tactics moved away from that concept of disruption and speed toward the original idea of impregnable behemeths moving ponderously through any object they came across.

The French had a lot of tanks in 1940. Like the Russians in '41 they despersed them throughout the corps often using them in groups of two or three and sometimes having lone tanks assigned to defending specific positions. The Germans found such tactics easy to deal with. Whatever the anti-tank gunners couldn't take care of was allotted to the dive bombers. Strangely, in the late twenties and through the 30s there was considerable talk within the French army of emphasizing the cavalry!

The British Matildas were very good for directly supporting infantry attacks, but not for the cut and slash tactics of Blitzkrieg. Though comparably heavy to later tanks, they were much slower and not as heavily armed.

[Shaka of Carthage]

We have now officially went off-topic. We are now discussing equipment, manpower, etc... Not what the topic was orginally about. Though I am not a moderator, I am going to take the liberty of creating new topic(s) to address those items. Then I will add my $.03.

[JerseyJohn]

Shaka

Excellent idea. I hope you also start a forum connecting the new economic/diplomatic and minor country allignments into a unified concept. As I stated in the other forum. I believe either you or Kurt would set it up more effectively than myself.

[Hubert Cater]

Originally posted by Liam:

There were supposedly a Million Yugoslavs in the Army at the time Hitler invaded. So when I see 3 corps at what military strength? I'm just Blahhhh, even Yugoslavia a small military power would deserve what Switzerland gets 2 full blown fully entrenched armies...

It's a gross misrepresentation. What would be more accurate is giving the Yugoslavians at least 5 armies...

Yugoslavia had about 6 armies made up of 16 divisions plus one division of Royal Guards. The divisions were named for the territories in which they were based and these were some of the names used for the Corps in the game. So that's a division for 16 different territories and as far as I could tell from my research this was part of the problem for the Yugoslav army, especially if it was to be of any great effect in countering a blitzkreiged invasion. Most of the forces were spread out to protect much of the border instead of being concentrated in a sort of hedgehog or stronghold defence.

Although still unclear officially, according to General Simovic, the Prime Minister "only about 5 infantry divisions and some cavalry regiments managed to engage the enemy", and this will probably explain why Yugoslavia surrendered in only 11 days.

Hubert

[DalmatiaPartisan]

great topic!

interesting for me (Croat) because my grandpa was partisan commander.

although Yugoslavia fell down so early when attacked - southern yugoslav forces kicked Italian asses and came to the starting positions in attacking Drac(Albanian city).

the main reason of such a short defeat is defetism - and also other nations didnt want to be in so called "nations prison" royalistic Yugoslavia under Serbs monarchy.

anyway in your replies are few errors - but I ll write about them more next time.

[DalmatiaPartisan]

also there s one thing i forgot

sea wolf suggestion about dividing yugoslavia is good but needs bigger map-and that automatically brings more problems.

anyway-partisans were mainly stationed in bosnia and dalmatia-beacause of mountains and woods.they were high mobile army often changing their territory control-thats the way they survived.

serbia wasnt neutral teritory-it was under direct control of axis with chetnicks helping them against partisans. there wasnt any serious partisans movement in serbia till the late years of war.serbian peasants were royalistic(mainly) and simpatized chetnics and ortodox church.

communists movement was very weak but people who wanted to fight nazi-s didnt have any other choice than to join partisans

[JerseyJohn]

Hubert

Thanks for the info, it also answers my own questions on the matter.

DalmatiaPartisan

Glad you came in, some good info already and looking forward to hearing the further info you're preparing. I suspect some of that in error material may be my own, if so I look forward to being corrected. It's always better to learn from others than go through life wrong on your own authority.

[Hubert Cater]

great topic!

interesting for me (Croat) because my grandpa was partisan commander.

It's interesting for me as well since although I am Canadian, my background is Slovenian (both parents). It always fascinated me to hear the many accounts from relatives at that time in the war and what a difficult time it really was just to survive.

Just to put some of the events into perspective and just how long they reach in time, my father just received a few years ago a notice from the Slovenian government that they finally updated their official files to reflect the proper spelling of his name in Slovenian from the official birth record which was done in German in '43 during the occupation.

Hubert

[Balkanac]

OK,I am also a Croat and I'll try to explain you what hapened in Yugoslavia during WWII. I'll do it in parts starting whith what hapened BEFORE WWII started.

Question of the Balkans is very compleks one where most of the time one consequence has more than one casue.I agre that there are neglected areas in history of WWII,but when is a word about Yugoslavia we have to start from the fact that during WWII there was more wars stacked one on another.First you have etnic war,then religius war,civil war and on the end world war.When Germany ocupied Yugoslavia,Balkan was already barrel of gunpowder(AGAIN!).

Europe is a cultural boil over saucepan,Balkan is microcosmos of Europe.On small area you have diferent tipes of people:Sclavs,Romanians,

Albanians,Greeks,Turks.Sclavs who live on the Balkans are South Sclavs(Yugoslavia means South-

Slavenia).Before WWII officially you have four

southslavenian people:Slovenians,Croats,Serbs and

Bulgarians.Others are Montenegros,Macedonians

and Bosnians(Muslems).Also before WWII on the teritory of Yugoslavia there are minoretis like

Austrians,Germans,Hungaryans,Gipsys and Jews.

After Austro-Hungarian breake apart Croats have started initiative to create Southslavenian state

because South Sclavs are the same blod and have

similar language,and diference is in historical,

political and cultural developement.Todays teritorys of Slovenia,Croatia,Bosnia and Herzegovina were under Austro-Hungaria and they

wanted a federativ alliance whith Kingdom of

Serbia and Kingdom of Montenegro.

Big part of the Serbs lived on that teritory

so they wanted that too.But Serbs in Kingdom of

Serbia wanted something else.They wanted to

expand Serbia.When all that parts have united 1918

Serbs have created a centralized state where all

other people wharen't satisfaced because of the Serbian hegemony.

Political conflicts and coruption brought to the

social diferences.This is one reason why Tito on

the head of komunist party get the support of the

people(for now very litle support).

Serbs killed croatian politic leader stjepan Radic

in the parlament.Then King proclames dictatur and

on the next day Ante Pavelic establishes his organization Ustasa.His camp is in Italy so he is

turning to fasishm and they whant Croatian state.

King Aleksander ones said:"If Italy atack us,

Croates won't fight for Yugoslavia."

(Ustasis killed him in Marseille.)

King Petar is inheretig the thrown but he is to

young to rule so some powerful men are actualy on the head of the country.Between WWI and WWII

Yugoslavia was several times on the edge of the

civil war.

Yugoslavia is roten inside,she is surrounded whith

kvislin-nazi states.Britain is makeing pressure

that she makes some resistance(to slow down the

Germany),and in the same time she doesn't ofer

some help.

"Pro-allied cup" appeared when Yugoslavia whanted

to sighn pact with Germany.People where against that so King do not see the way out and he is

runing to London and he leaves army widouth orders!

On the 6th April 1941 Germans are entering Yugoslavia.

[JerseyJohn]

Balkanac

Great info. I think the last line is especially significant about the King running to London and leaving both his army and his people to fend for themselves. That's pretty much the way I feel about those noble Governments in exile; it would have been far nobler to stay in their country, with their citizens, and make some attempt to help them. There would always have been escaped troops to fight against the conquerers, the established government's place is always to remain with it's population.

[Balkanac]

Part 2

In geopolitical sense it is very important that

Balkan territory whitch was comprised by

Yugoslavia be united so Hitler wanted kvislin-YU

more than disintegrated one.

That was a plan "B".First he offeres that to

Vlatko Machek croatian oposition political leader

but he was a democrat so he refuse.

I am not sure what status had Serbia but Croatia

was a political fenomenus.

I'll start whith

CHETNIKS

Drazha Mihailovich was a monarhist,anglofil and

expert on gerill waefare.He was in Bosnia when

Germans atacked YU.He establishead his HQ in

western Serbia.

Like a high rang officier he represented a

remains of royal command.Like a Serbian patriot

he enjoys loyality of meny serbian citizens.

His man was known by the name chetniks which

lead to many misunderstanding because there was

already an official "chetnik" organization based

on veteran movement from WWI who becomed right

hand of serbian kvisling regime(august '41) lead

by general Nedic.

DalmatiaPartisan clames they are kvislings and

SeaWolf that they are monarhist-this is that

misunderstanding.

Word CHETA actualy means SQUAD.Gerilla movement

is a tradition in Balkans for meny centuries,and

they moved in little groups(squads) so elsver

local serbian groups call them selvs "chetniks"

but they didn't have any conection whith

Mihailovich man.(Nor Nedic aidher)

Big disadvantage of Mihailovich organization was

that his local commanders worked independently

in long periods or they didn't even bother about

the orders.Mihailovich chetniks begun with active

resistance in May but in Yuly and September his

government in exile demanded that he stay aside,

to built strong organization, to infiltrate in

armed forces of Nedic kvisling regime and to

prepare him selfe for a rebalion when the Allies

gaine predominance over Germany.

Mihailovich tempted to preserve population and

avoid Germans revenge and destroying all territorys.

Source:Noel Malcom;Bosnia a short history

There will be more...

[JerseyJohn]

Great stuff. Looking forward to your further installments.