The M 13/40 performed well in the Invasion of Yugoslavia. Picture courtesy of Warandgames.com
During the initial invasion of Greece in 1940, Italian tanks were out of their element and did not perform well. The roads they had to traverse were narrow and often muddy. As the advance took them into the Greek mountains, they sometimes would literally slide off the treacherous roads and down the side of the mountain. These conditions greatly hampered the tanks ability to maneuver in warfare. The Greek forces had plenty of concealed areas here to set up ambushes and take out the Italian tanks with anti-tank guns. The performance and planning in Greece 1940 for Italian armor had been very disappointing. More was definitely expected, and needed, in the new campaign. The Italians deployed two of its three armored divisions in Albania for use in the Yugoslavian invasion in 1941, the Littorio and Centauro . They were made up of Carro Armato L 6/40 light tanks, and for the first time in significant numbers the Fiat-Ansaldo M 13/40 medium tanks. The terrain in Albania and Yugoslavia was much more conducive for tank operations than western Greece. There was more flat and open space for maneuvering or employing the tanks en masse. The Littorio Division was sent into Yugoslavia on April 11th. They overcame any light resistance they faced, and covered over 300 miles in six days. On the 17th, they victoriously entered the city of Trebenje in central Yugoslavia, truly fulfilling the expectations of a ‘Rapid war’.
The 131st Centauro Armored Division first made its presence felt on the counter attack against the Zetska Division mentioned previously. German operations had halted the Zetska drive, and on the 11th the Centauro Division attacked in force. The Zetska Division was forced to fully retreat, as the Italian armor drove them all the way back to the Pronisat River by the 13th. The Yugoslavian forces had fought hard and with courage, but they could not stand up the firepower now being thrown at them. As other Italian units helped keep them contained for the remainder of the conflict, the 131st Centauro now drove on to Yugoslav fleet base of Kotor to help secure it. On the 17th the Centauro Division joined the Littorio Division for its victorious drive into Trebenje. Yugoslavia would surrender that day.
The Axis powers needed just eleven days to subdue Yugoslavia. The invasion of Greece would be completed by April 30th, with the last of the British troops evacuated off of the mainland on that date. While not completely erasing the memory and stigma of the previous year’s failure in Greece, the accomplishments of the Italian military during the Yugoslavian campaign did help to re-establish some internal pride. The victory did not come without a cost for Italy, as over 3,300 men were killed or wounded. Most of these were during Ninth army’s defense against the Yugoslav offensive. The Italians captured over 30,000 Yugoslavian soldiers during the ordeal. In the aftermath Yugoslavia would be divided up between Germany, Italy, Hungary, and Bulgaria in the weeks after its surrender. The Independent State of Croatia was also created by Italian backed Croatian leaders, further segmenting the country.
Many believe that these operations in the Balkans by the Germans helped inadvertently lead to the “failure” of their Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the USSR, which commenced on the 22nd of June. The failure, measured by the fact that the massive German attack did not lead to the fall of the Soviet Union that year, with most pointing to the inability to capture the capital city of Moscow as the main cause. The invasion was postponed several weeks as German troops were sent south for the Yugo and Greece campaigns. By the time German troops reached the outskirts of Moscow during Barbarossa, winter was fully setting in. The supply roads had become a muddy quagmire, and most German troops did not have winter clothing issued to them. The invasion would be halted by the Russians that December about 25 miles short of Moscow. Although capturing Moscow and the surrounding industrial basin would have been a critical victory for the Germans, and was thought of prime importance by many German Army leaders, Hitler did not consider it at first as part of Barbarossa’s main objectives. By the time the German Army made a final push for the city, the Wehrmacht was worn down by months of bitter fighting, and the Russian winter had taken it’s toll on the advance. The blame in the delay of the start of Barbarossa is often attributed to Hitler “having” to send troops to Greece to save Italian pride. While this did play a part in Hitler’s decision, protection of his rear flank and defense of the all important oil fields in Romania from British air attacks must have played larger in his mind. His anger at the new Yugoslavian government after the coup, which he felt as a personal insult, also was a big factor in his decision to postpone Barbarossa for the Balkans campaign. Central Europe was also experiencing an extremely rainy spring that year, and even if Barbarossa had stayed true to the original invasion schedule and commenced in mid May, the adverse weather conditions would of most likely postponed the attack into the beginning or middle of June anyway. Hitler himself would delay the march on Moscow several weeks longer during Barbarossa, when he diverted Army Group Center to the south to help in the siege and capture of the Ukrainian capital of Keiv. The move would prove highly successful in the capture of both Russian men and equipment, but momentum and time were both lost during this critical stage of the operation by this decision, and the course of the war was altered forever.
The spring of 1941 could be considered a high point for Italy during the war. Although her possessions in East Africa were in their final weeks before their fall to the British, many other fronts were looking promising. Mussolini now had control in the Balkans, something he had dreamt of for decades. His long time nemesis France was thoroughly defeated, and Italian troops were deployed on French soil. Italian troops were now being rebuilt and reequipped in North Africa, and were now joined by the Afrikakorps under Erwin Rommel for their drive into Egypt. The spring of 1941 was as close as Mussolini would ever come to his dream of a ‘New Roman Empire’. In little over two years time however, his Empire would come crashing down around him.
TJ Nicoletti
References:
The Chetnkins: War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 191-1945. Jozo Tomasevich
Empire on the Adriatic: Mussolini’s Conquest of Yugoslavia 1941-1943. H. James Burgwyn
The Italian Army at War Europe 1940-43. Philip Jowett & Dmitriy Zgonnik
Mussolini and his Generals: The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy 1922-1940. John Gooch
Iron Hulls, Iron Hearts, Ian Walker
Wikipedia Articles.
Amazon.com Widgets
Hitler, A Biography: Ian Kershaw
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The IIIrd hungarian army invaded Jugoslavia from the north where lived an important hungarian ethnic population in Bacska area. An airport operation was raised to take bridges over canals. It was the only drop ofhungarian paratroopers. After the drop, they stayed un their position, waiting for the Mobile Corps (gyorhadtest or celere corpo)
ALEX