CHAPTER FOUR - THE FOURTH ILLYRIAN WAR
ITALY VS YUGOSLAVIA
ITALY VS YUGOSLAVIA
While Mussolini was thinking about the Yugoslavian problem, he was informed, on January 1st, 1937, that the first wave of divisions have been trained. All those young people who were willing to do their bit for their Country, have been selected, trained and used to field new divisions. The youngest, whose age was between 20 and 23 years, were sent to Venice and to Pisa, to the Special Training Schools. The result was astonishing: Italy's Army now could field one Marine Division and three Paratroopers Divisions. According to General Alberto Pariani, the Army Chief of Staff, a future war in Yugoslavia would serve as a testing ground for these new troops.
The news arrived in Rome...
... and the divisions were fielded
While Ciano was leaving Rome from Ciampino Military Airfield with Belgrade as a final destination, Mussolini ordered a minor reorganization of the Italian OOB. First, he assigned new leaders to the newly formed divisions and then he assigned them to various Army Corps. While immediate on paper, in reality the process was slow, due of the complicated bureaucratic apparatus. It took more than one month to organize the soldiers, pack them on train with all their equipment and then expand the logistic net, in order to fully supply the newly recruited men. Great attention was paid to the Special Operations Army Corp, led by General Domenico Leone and based in Bari: with a war with Yugoslavia, more imminent every day, the Heavy Transport Division was transferred from Rome to Taranto and the paratroopers of the 184th 'Nembo' Division and the 185th 'Folgore' Division immediately begun a night-time training, aimed to improve the efficiency of airborne invasions mission with the cover of darkness.
Between February 9th and 15th, Mussolini, along with many other generals, drew up the plan for the invasion of Yugoslavia. It was not so much complicated and was affected both by the geography of the Country and by the past experience in Ethiopia. Starting from Zara, General Francesco Grazioli's 6th Army was ordered to push inland, deep into Yugoslavian territory, cross the Sava river between Sanski Most and Bosanska Dubica, and rech the Danube river, close to the Hungarian border, in the vicinity of Slatina. The core of 6th Army was made of the Corpo d'Armata Celere (Fast Corps) and its three cavalry divisions, all equipped with an armoured engineers battalion. Meanwhile, form the longer Italian-Yugoslavian border, a much bigger Army was ordered to smash the enemy line and push inland, capturing the main town of Zagreb, and thereby trapping all the Yugoslavian divisions in that enormous pocket. But this was not enough: to prevent the Yugoslavian from destroying the port of Dubrovnik, Mussolini insisted to use the Special Operations Army Corps. While the three airborne divisions would have landed in the surrounding territories, the 1st Marine Division 'San Marco' would have captured the city of Dubrovnik and the port itself with a seaborne assault.
This concluded the first phase of the invasion. After having secured the rearguard and the supply lines, the second phase would have saw Army Group East's divisions piercing the enemy thin defensive line and marching deep into Yugoslavia, eventually reaching Belgrade and Sarajevo, and rejoining the Special Operations Army Corps' divisions in the area around Dubrovnik. Yes, on paper it looked like an easy and quick plan.
Mussolini and his generals trusted the plan and were confident that the war would have lasted no more than one month. The Regio Esercito (Royal Italian Army) fielded an entire Army Group, with 252.000 soldiers and almost 400 tactical bombers, 180 fighters, 60 long range fighters and 250 transport planes. Three Armies (8th, 2nd and 6th) were deployed on the Yugoslavian border and the entire Corpo d'Armata Alpino (Alpine Corps) with 5 elite Alpine Divisions was relocated in the northern section of the front. With the assolute control of the skies and with the numerical superiority, everyone was confident that victory was behind the corner.
The plan for the invasion of Yugoslavia
But as time was passing and February was turning into March, some alarming reports were coming on Duce's desk. Amongst them, three were particularly disturbing:
1) Grazioli's 6th Army was not receiving the correct amount of supply it needed. Due to the primitive port infrastructure in Zara, the flow of supplies was insufficient to supply all Grazioli's 52.865 soldiers. Nothing could be done, in such a short time, to improve the situation, since all the heavy transport planes were all busy with the paratroopers.
2) The recruitment of new divisions meant a decrease in the national officer pool, and statistics estimated a fall from 111% to 94%, which meant that there were not enough officers to fulfill all the ranks. Critical situations call for drastic measures: officers were taken from existing divisions and put into the newly formed ones but this generated chaos amongst the men, since all the transferred officers had to get adopted to their new soldiers.
3) All the new divisions lacked modern equipment. The soldiers were wearing old uniforms and were carrying outdated rifles, machineguns and light guns, lacked completely the basic mountain equipment as well as the basic medic service. Italian factories were working all round the clock but the flow of new weapons that were coming out of the plants was still slow and slow was the ritm of their distributions amongst the soldiers.
As a result, one fourth of the divisions deployed on the Yugoslavian border were not ready for combat and one entire Army was lacking sufficient supplies to start the offensive. But Mussolini ignored all these alarms, and on April 2nd he sent to the Yugoslavian ambassador in Rome an unacceptable ultimatum. Ciano failed with the diplomacy to sign a military alliance between Italy and the old region that was called Illyria by the Romans, and now Mussolini lost his patience: war was the only available option to take control of the Illyria once again.
Mussolini's decision
April 2nd, 1937. This day begun as all the other past. At least, this was the thought of the Yugoslavian soldiers who were having a rough breakfast. Then they heard some loud bangs, coming from the Italian territory. At first, they thought a storm was approaching but when the first shells begun to rain onto their position, they realized that war erupted between their Country and Italy. The artillery barrage begun at 06.00 and ended at 08.00. In these two hours, hell was unleashed on the Yugoslavian defences. Small bunkers, strongholds, outposts, and kilometers of barbed wire were simply swept away by the fury of the guns and the surviving Yugoslavian soldiers were too shocked to react the advancing spearhead of the Italian Army. But not all of them: a company of men led by experienced officers held out for four hours the attack mounted by the entire 19th Infantry Division 'Venezia' (Venice). When they were forced to surrender, they were given the honors of war. A company of 53 men and 4 officers paraded in front of an entire division. But these isolate episode of resistance was useless: in less than an hour, the main Yugoslavian defensive line on the border had been broken in many points. By noon, all the remaining pockets were cleared by the rearguards of the advancing troops. Yugoslavian divisions were in full retreat and their only means of resistance were rearguard actions, but those failed to delay the planned schedule. One Corps was advancing with the speed of light: I Fast Truckmobile Corps (General Pietro Maggiani) with three Metropolitan Truckmobile Divisions was racing with the retreating troops with the aim to stop them reaching the Danube. The 10th A. T. M. Division 'Piave' entered the streets of Lubjiana but only one hour later, the 10th Yugoslavian Infantry Division launched a counterattack. A desperate counterattack, which ended with 8 Yugoslavian dead and 1 Italian killed. The advance/pursuit continued and while advancing, Italian troops divided in two groups the retreating formations. In the north, two infantry divisions, one cavalry division and one Army Corps HQ were trapped in Murska Sobota, when troops of the 52nd A. T. M. Division 'Torino' (Turin) occupied Ptuj and prevented the enemy retreating on the northern bank of the Danube. On April 16th, the battle of Murska Sobota was over, with 71 killed amongst the attacking soldiers and 142 amongst the defenders. But it was too early to speak about victory.
In the south, when hostilities begun, Grazioli's 6th Army was facing supply troubles. Despite the local depot with 42 tons of supplies as a reserve, his staff calculated that only 44% of the needed supplies were flowing to the troops. Since there were no way to get supplies, Grazioli rationalized the existing supplies, giving high priority to General's Riccardo Moizo Fast Corps and its three cavalry divisions, becouse, according to the plan, these would have acted as the spearhead of javelin that would have pierced across Yougoslavia and cut the Country in two. Here, the war begun without artillery. Not becouse there were no guns there, but becouse Grazioli hoped in the surprise effect. And instead of the artillery, Grazioli relied in a massive air raid, conducted by bombers of the 3rd, 5th and 6th Bombing Divisions. While a rain of medium and small bombs was falling from the skies, Italian cavalry divisions charged at the Yugoslavian troops stationed at Udbina. Within one hour, the area was occupied by the Italians and after five days of forced marches, on April 7th, the 2nd and the 3rd Cavalry Divisions reached the Sava River near Sanski Most. But there was no time to rest. So, once the engineers completed the bridges over the river, each squadron, one after the other, crossed the Sava. The bulk of the motorized artillery was still marching across the river when reports of a recon plane indicated that there was a Mountain Infantry Division marching through Bosanska Dubica, with every probability directed to the north, to face the main Italian thrust. General Costantino Salvi listened very carefully to a famous Oratio's quote: 'Carpe Diem!'. He immediately ordered his 3rd and 5th Cavalry Regiment to charge at the enemy columns. Surprise was everything: the Yugoslavian were terrified, believing they were being attacked by two cavalry divisions, and quickly surrendered or escaped. In half an hour, the battle was won with 0 losses for the Italians and with 27 buried amongst the Yugoslavian. The rest of the division was forced to retreat to Sisak. Five days later, on April 12th, Yugoslavia was cut in two and one Army HQ, one Army Corps HQ, one Mountain Infantry and two Infantry divisions were being trapped between the thin line held by 6th Army and the core of Army Group East. Despite being cut off from supplies and reinforcements, Yugoslavian did not give up. The same day, troops of the 27th Yugoslavian Infantry Division attacked the Italians of the 32nd Infantry Division 'Marche', well dug in and aroun Udbina. For almost three days the encircled soldiers tried to break the line but their attacks were not successfull. Meanwhile, the other retreating infantry division, instead of crushing the line, rushed north and liberated Delnice, threatening the entire supply line of the attacking divisions. The 10th A. T. M. Division 'Piave', located around Ptuj, was immediately ordered to rush south, and prevent the Yugoslavian from reaching the Sava river at Karlovac, while Alpine and Infantry Divisions of the 8th Army were marching north and east of Karlovac, to stop and maybe encircle the advancing enemy troops.
While Italian bombers were flying over Delnice to prevent Yugoslavian troops advancing deeper into the Italian rearguard, a special news arrived from Hungary. Having seen how the Italians managed to pierce and smash the Yugoslavian defences at the border, the Hungarian Government feared the Country might have shared the same fate, sooner or later. To prevent this, Hungarian Kálmán Kánya arrived in Rome, offering Mussolini and his troops transit rights. Il Duce immediately recognized this and accepted the offer.
Hungary offering transit rights
While is true to say that Yugoslavian High Command was shocked when he heard the news of the Italian breakthrough, it is also true that he performed well against the elite of the invader's Army. For the soldiers of the Special Operations Army Corps, things went wrong from the beginning. On the eastern Adriatic Sea, weather conditions were really bad, and if the heavy cargo planes managed to fly through the storms, the landing ships with onboard the men of the 1st Marine Division had no way out. With low visibility and rough sea, many boats lost their route but thanks to the radio contact, they managed to rejoin the main convoy. Not all of them, however: the ship carrying the entire staff and HQ of the division struck a mine, an Italian mine, which have been previously laid, to prevent Yougoslavian convoys to escape somewhere else. Without knowing it, the only Marine division of the Italian Army has lost its commander, without an enemy shot. The amphibious landing was even far worse: strong tidal winds and currents, begun pushing the landing ships toward north-west. Despite only a few officers recognized the mistake, it was already too late to correct the route. Some adrifted ships landed two companies on the islands in front of Metkovic, while all the rest of the division landed and occupied Metkovic itself. Thus, the planned surprise attack at Dubrovnik has failed and now the port and the city had to be taken by land.
While soldiers and sailors were crossing an hell of water, waves and confusion, things were a bit different for the airborne troops. Men of the 184th Paratrooper Division had already been dropped in the surrounding area of Metkovic and they had all the time to prepeare an all round defense and secure the city. In fact, they were surprised when an exploring patrol of the 1st Marine Division met with the paratroopers just south of Metkovic. After a short chinwag between the commanding generals, the situation was cleared: the 1st Marine landed on the wrong beach, due to bad weather. But the men of the 184th has not been alone during their landing experience from 2.300 meters. Heavy clouds in the sky and a confusion with communications, meant the arrival of another enormous mistake: the 185th Airborne Division was dropped on Metkovic too, instead of Herceg Novi. The conclusion was simple: not only the Marines landed on the wrong zone, but also one airborne division was dropped on the wrong target and the entire right flank was left open. But the worst was yet to come. The assigned objective for the 80th Airborne Division was the town of Gacko and its surrounding area. Despite heavy clouds and a severe storm in their path, the pilots of the planes carrying the paratroopers managed to stay in formation. However, due to a miscalculation, they confused the lights of Ljubljana for those of Gacko. So, once they were over the town, order was given to the men: it was time to jump. Behind this mistake, laid one of the most tragic consequences of the entire conflict. Ljubljana was not a city like all the others. It was in the middle of the railroad connecting Zagreb, Sarajevo, Belgrade, it had many industries producing consumer goods as well as small arms ammunitions, and was well defended by air with a mix of anti aircraft guns. Around the town, there were British, Czeck, German and even Italian guns, of all calibers, from automatic 20mm heavy machineguns to powerful 90mm. When the sirens begun to shout in Ljubljana, everyone believed it was an air raid exercise. Nobody took the situation seriously. But when the aero-engine noise begun to fill the air, the people realized they were in the middle of an airborne invasion. The first echelon of paratroopers touched ground without a loss, but the same could not be said about the second and the third. Every AA gun that had enough ammunitions, was put into action by local militia and police forces, while all those who possessed a gun, started practicing skeet shooting... or better, para-shooting. Despite a loss of almost 150 men, the remaining paratroopers attacked Ljubljana and wiped out any form of resistance.
As hours, days and weeks passed, April 20th arrived. While in the north, things were running smoothly, in the area north and west of Dubrovnik, things were not. Having failed the the landings operations, Mussolini ordered General Leone's troops to dig in and wait for reinforcements to come from the north, during the second phase of the offensive. Easier said than done, becouse the lacking of a port through which sending supplies, meant that the Airborne and Marine troops had to rely on their own supplies. Although there were enough of them to sit and wait, there were not enough of them to fight. And the battle of Ljubljana begun on April 20th, when two Yugoslavian Infantry Divisions attacked from the north and from the east, the 80th Airborne division. Four infantry regiments versus three airborne regiments and one airborne artillery regiment. Although the battle seemed quite balanced, it immediately turned in favour of the attackers. After only two hours of heavy fighting, Italian artillery ended its ammunition and after two more hours, the situation went from bad to worse. Fearing an encirclement and running out of supplies, the 80th Airborne Division was forced to fall back from Ljubljana.
The first Italian defeat
When the report reached Mussolini's ears, he immediately ordered the Heavy Transport Division to resupply from the air the troops around Metkovic. By noon of the same day, the first airbridge of the history of mankind was launched. In big wooden boxes hooked to a white paratrooper, supplies were coming down from the skies, like manna from heaven, and ended their drop amongst the arms of hungry Italian soldiers. Yes, since there were no airfields available in the area, supplies had to be dropped from medium altitude and thanks to the parachutes produced by the textile industries, the efficiency of the airbridge increased significantly. After barely one day of waiting, the 184th Airborne Division was ordered to capture Dubrovnik. By April 27th, the Yugoslavian recaptured Ljubljana but Dubrovnik was in Italian hands. With a small port under control, it was now possible to ship supplies by sea, despite the weather conditions over the Adriatic were not so good.
By April 29th, fighting in northern Yugoslavia ceased. The invaders managed to wipe out all the opposition in a series of battles, which culminated in the battle of Ogulin, the one that saw the complete annihilation of Yugoslavian divisions still active in the pocket. Yes, a great portion of the old Roman Illyria was under Italian control but too much time has been wasted due to the remaining enemy divisions, which refused to surrender. Mussolini hit the ceiling when he read that, finally, the last Yugoslavian soldier, trapped between the 2nd and the 6th Armies, has given up. 'Do you realise which day is today? Bunch of incompetents. That's all what you are!' shouted to his Chief of Staff in Rome. He immediately ordered the redeployment of Army Group East's troops along the new frontier but the entire process was completed only on May 15th. Not only soldiers, but even the supply network had to be revised and extended, in order to meet the requests.
All is ready for the second phase
Even before the beginning of the second phase, bad news rained on Mussolini's desk: a Yugoslavian Infantry Division, the same which had the honor of having liberated Ljubljana, attacked the 184th Airborne located in Dubrovnik. Italian paratroopers were taken by surprise and were even more surprised when they saw enemy bombers flying over their heads and unleash tons of death and destruction. But the Italian reaction was swift: the VIII Fighter Brigade was transferred from Rome to Taranto and from there, launched a series of intercepting missions against hostile planes. Within three days, the skies were liberated. But the situation was still grim and to avoid the worst, the 185th Airborne Division was sent to Dubrovnik to relieve the 184th. After its arrival, the tide turned in favour of the Italians and the Yugoslavian were repulsed and pushed back from where they came from.
Finally, on May 15th, the second phase of the offensive begun. With four infantry, one cavalry and one motorized divisions, the Yugoslavian faced an impressive Army of 252.000 men. Even without air support, enemy resistance was crushed during the first hours of fighting. Everywhere the Yugoslavian were retreating in an atmosphere of chaos and disorder, while the Italian steamroller was advancing unstopped toward Belgrade, Sarajevo, Split and Dubrovnik. Everywhere, Italian troops were victorious. On May 28th, the first contact between the 10th A. T. M. Division and the Belgrade Garrison was made and 24 hours later, the battle for the capital was won. By June 1st, Italian troops encircled into two pockets the four infantry divisions met during the initial battles and were threatening to trap the garrison troops located south-east of Dubrovnik. They never closed the trap nor eliminated those troops. Exactly three ours after the first Italian soldiers set foot on Belgrade, the Government decided that this was enough and surrendered to the invaders.
Yugoslavia surrendered
Outright, the fighting around Cevo ceased and all the Yugoslavian soldiers were taken prisoners and elsewhere, many tired and exhausted soldiers laid down their weapons and were being transported in Italy with forced marches. There, they would have been given the opportunity to join the victorious Italian Army or work into war factories. Not all of them however were taken prisoners. When the news of the surrender spread across the Country, many soldiers, determined not to surrender in any case, fled from the battlefields and hid themselves into forests or scattered on the mountains, ready to recruit nationalists and convert them into partisans. Mussolini knew he would have now faced hard times into the newly acquired territories and, for this reason, he decided not to retreat the victorious troops. While most of Army Group East' men were deployed along the Bulgarian, Greek and Albanian border, the entire 6th Army was ordered to patrol the main cities and supply routes of the old Yugoslavia.
Partisans activity in the Balkans is high...
Now that the Yugoslavian question has been solved, Mussolini turned his attention to his norhtern partner. In fact, while Italian soldiers were storming Yugoslavia, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop flew many times to Rome, to meet Ciano and Mussolini, to propose them to bring Italy into a solid military alliance with Germany. Now that the war in the Balkans was over, Mussolini was faced with an even more drastic decision to make. Was it really necessary to join the Axis? Which gains Italy would have enjoyed by signing the pact? And which disatvantages? Was it warthwile?
Mussolini begun to buy time, with the excuse that the administration of the Balkan territory needed the highest priority, but time was already running out...
