Vita:Makedóniai front (első világháború)

message: *In May, General Guillaumat's Greek troops attacked and captured the strong Bulgarian position of Skra-di-Legen, marking the first major Greek action on the Allied side in the war. However, with the German offensive threatening France, Guillaumat was recalled to Paris and replaced by General Franchet d’Espèrey.
Although d'Esperey urged an attack on the Bulgarian Army, the French government refused to allow an offensive unless all the countries agreed. General Guillaumat, no longer needed in France, traveled from London to Rome, trying to win approval for an attack. Finally in September, agreement was reached and d'Esperey was allowed to launch his grand offensive.
The Allied forces were now very large, despite the Russians being obliged to cease their participation due to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918. Not only did the Entente have the Greek army fully on their side (9 divisions strong), but they also had some 6,000 men from the Czechoslovak Legion, who had been evacuated from Russia and sailed around the world, ready to fight the hated Austro-Hungarians. However, the Bulgarians had also increased their army during 1917 and in total manpower, the two sides were roughly equal (291 Allied battalions vs. 300 Bulgarian battalions, plus 10 German battalions). But in morale, the two sides were completely different. The Allied were certain of their impending victory while the Bulgarians could see the war was lost - the Ottoman Empire was near collapse, the Austro-Hungarian government was in chaos, and the German Army was beaten on the all-important Western Front. The Bulgarians were not willing to fight and die for a lost cause.
The Battle of Dobro Pole started with the (now traditional) artillery bombardment of enemy positions on September 14. The following day, the French and Serbians attacked and captured their objective. On September 18, the Greeks and the British attacked as well, but were stopped with heavy losses by the Bulgarians in the Battle of Doiran. However the Franco-Serbian army continued advancing vigorously. The next day, some Bulgarian units started surrendering positions without a fight. Bulgarian command ordered a retreat.
The official British government history of the Macedonian Front campaign, Military Operations: Macedonia, the author gives a very detailed analysis of the situation of the Bulgarian forces and the situation of the front. Although a breakthrough was achieved at Dobro Pole, and the allied forces continued their advance, the Bulgarian army was not completely routed and was retreating in order. By September 29 (a day before Bulgaria exited World War I), Skopje was in the hands of the allies, but a strong Bulgarian and German force had been ordered to try and retake it the next day. Also the number of Bulgarian prisoners-of-war in allied hands around that day was only 15,000.[2]
Another major factor contributed to Bulgaria's request for an armistice. A mass of retreating and deserted Bulgarian soldiers had mutinied and converged on the railway centre of Radomir in Bulgaria, just 30 miles from the capital city of Sofia. On September 27 leaders of the Bulgarian Agrarian National Union took control of the mutinous troops and proclaimed the overthrow of the monarchy and a Bulgarian republic. About 4,000–5,000 rebellious troops threatened Sofia the next day. Under those chaotic circumstances a Bulgarian delegation arrived in Thessaloniki to ask for an armistice. On September 29, the Bulgarians were granted the Armistice of Thessaloniki by General d'Esperey, ending their war. The Macedonian front was brought to an end at noon on 30 September 1918 when the ceasefire came into effect. The Soldiers Uprising was finally put down by October 2. Tsar Ferdinand I of Bulgaria abdicated and went into exile on October 3.
At this point, the British Army headed east towards the European side of the Ottoman Empire, while the French and Serbian forces continued north. The British Army neared Constantinople and with no serious Ottoman forces to stop it, the Ottoman government asked for an armistice (the Armistice of Mudros) on October 26 (Enver Pasha and his partners had fled just days earlier to Berlin).
With "Desperate Frankie" (as the British nicknamed d'Esperey) pushing ever forward, the Serbo-French Army re-captured Serbia and overran several weak German divisions that tried to block its advance near Niš. On November 3, Austria-Hungary was forced to sign an armistice on the Italian Front and the war finally came to an end. On November 10, d'Esperey's army crossed the Danube river and was poised to enter the heartland of Hungary. On request of the French general, Count Károlyi, leading the Hungarian government, came to Belgrade and signed another armistice.
*The main reason for the delay was the lack of available Allied forces due to the critical situation in the western front, while the Greek government's insistence for neutrality was used as an excuse although the Albanian coast was also available for a rapid deployment of reinforcements and supplying of equipment during the past 14 months. As Marshal Putnik had suggested, the Albanian coast was adequately covered by the Montenegrin army to the north—being at safe distance from any Bulgarian advancing direction to the south—in case of a Bulgarian intervention. A second reason for the delay was the protracted secret negotiations with the hope to bring Bulgaria to the Allied camp, in which case no Allied help would be needed.
In any case the lack of Allied support sealed the fate of the Serbian Army. Against Serbia were marshalled the Bulgarian Army, a German Army, and an Austro-Hungarian Army, all under the command of Field Marshal Mackensen. The Germans and Austro-Hungarians began their attack on October 7 with a massive artillery barrage, followed by attacks across the rivers. Then, on the 11th, the Bulgarian Army attacked from two directions, one from the north of Bulgaria towards Niš, the other from the south towards Skopje (see map). The Bulgarian Army rapidly broke through the weaker Serbian forces of the Vardar front, that tried to block its advance. With the Bulgarian breakthrough, the Serbian position became hopeless; either their main army in the north would be surrounded and forced to surrender, or it would try to retreat. Many high ranking Serbian officers were killed including Major Jovan Nikolic.
Marshal Putnik ordered a full retreat, south and west through Montenegro and into Albania. The weather was terrible, the roads poor, and the army had to help the tens of thousands of civilians who retreated with them. Only some 125,000 Serbian soldiers reached the coast of the Adriatic Sea and embarked on Italian transport ships that carried the army to various Greek islands (many went to Corfu) before being sent to Thessaloniki. Marshal Putnik had to be carried during the whole retreat and he died a bit more than a year later in a hospital in France.
French soldiers halting in Salonica. 1915
The French and British divisions marched north from Thessaloniki in late November under the command of French General Maurice Sarrail. However, the British divisions were ordered by the War Office in London not to cross the Greek frontier. So the French divisions advanced on their own up the Vardar River. This advance was of some limited help to the retreating Serbian Army as the Bulgarian Army had to concentrate larger forces on their southern flank to deal with the threat (see: Battle of Krivolak). By mid-December, General Sarrail concluded retreat was necessary in the face of massive Bulgarian assaults on his positions. As with the British, the Germans ordered the Bulgarians not to cross the Greek borders reluctant to risk a Greek entrance to the war against a Bulgarian invasion in Macedonia. The Allies for their part took advantage of that, reinforcing and consolidating their positions behind the borders.
This was a clear, albeit incomplete victory for the Central Powers. As a consequence the railway from Berlin to Constantinople was opened and Germany was able to prop up its weak partner, the Ottoman Empire. A flaw in the victory was that the Allies managed to save a part of the Serbian Army, which although battered, seriously reduced and almost unarmed, escaped total destruction and after reorganizing was able to resume operations six months later. But the most damaging event for the Central Powers was that the Allies—using the moral excuse of saving the Serbian Army—managed to replace the impossible Serbian front with a viable one established in Macedonia (albeit by violating the territory of an officially neutral country); a front which would prove key to their final victory three years later. --Frommer    Fórum 2013. február 21., 00:29 (CET)
thread_title:  Fordításra váró részek