Second Balkan War

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Second Balkan War
Part of the Balkan Wars
The Great Powers under the terror of explosion in Balkans. Except for the throne of England, no Great Power's throne will survive after the next Balkan crisis of 1914, which ignited World War I.
Date June 16, 1913 – July 18, 1913 Location Balkan Peninsula Result The defeat of Bulgaria and the Treaty of Bucharest, 1913
Belligerents
Bulgaria	Romania Greece Montenegro Serbia Ottoman Empire
Commanders
Mihail Savov Nikola Ivanov Vasil Kutinchev Radko Dimitriev	Crown Prince Ferdinand Alexandru Averescu Radomir Putnik Constantine I of Greece
Strength
500.221 - 576.878	330.000 [1] 348.000 [1] 148.000 12.802 [1] 255.000 Total: 1.093.802

The Second Balkan War (Romanian: Al doilea război balcanic, Serbian: Други балкански рат, Greek: Δεύτερος Βαλκανικός Πόλεμος, Bulgarian: Междусъюзническата война) was a conflict fought between Bulgaria and all the other Balkan states over the division of the spoils of the First Balkan War, especially Macedonia. Dissatisfied from its share, and engaged in territorial disputes with Serbia and Romania, Bulgaria attacked its former allies, Serbia and Greece, on 16 June 1913. The Bulgarian offensive was stopped, and the Serbian and Greek armies counterattacked, penetrating into Bulgaria. At that point, Romania and the Ottoman Empire also declared war against Bulgaria, making swift gains as the Bulgarian forces were assembled against the Greeks and Serbs. Their intervention sealed Bulgaria's defeat, as Romanian troops approached the Bulgarian capital, Sofia. In the resulting Treaty of Bucharest, Bulgaria had to give up much of its pre-war gains to Serbia, Greece, Romania and the Ottomans.

The outcome turned Bulgaria into a revanchist state, while Serbia's gain in power alarmed Austria-Hungary, leading to the July crisis of 1914 and the outbreak of World War I.

[edit] Background - The First Balkan War

Map of the conflicting Balkan territorial aspirations, that led to the Second Balkan War

During the First Balkan War, the Balkan League, composed of Serbia, Montenegro, Greece and Bulgaria, had succeeded in conquering the European provinces of the Ottoman Empire (Albania, Macedonia, the Sandžak and Thrace), leaving the Ottomans with only the Chataldja and Gallipoli peninsulas. The Treaty of London, signed on 30 May 1913, which ended the war, acknowledged the Balkan states' gains west of the Enos-Medea line on an uti possedetis basis, and created an independent Albania.

The Serbian-Bulgarian pre-war division of Macedonia, including the contested area

However, the relations between the victorious Balkan allies became quickly strained over the division of the spoils, especially Macedonia. During the negotiations that had led to the establishment of the Balkan League, Serbia and Bulgaria signed a secret agreement on 13 March 1912 which determined their future boundaries, in effect sharing Macedonia between them along the Kriva Palanka–Ohrid line (with both cities going to the Bulgarians). This left the bulk of Macedonia in Bulgarian hands. In case of a post-war disagreement, the northern part of Macedonia had been assigned as "disputed zone" under Russian arbitration and the southern part under Bulgarian control. Bulgaria's policy was to use the agreement to limit Serbia's access to Macedonia, while at the same time denying any such agreement with Greece, believing that its army would be able to occupy the larger part of Macedonia and the important port city of Thessalonica before the Greeks. In the event, during the war, the Serbs succeeded in capturing an area far south to the agreed border, down to the Monastir–Gevgelija line (both in Serbian hands). At the same time, the Greeks were able to advance north, occupying Thessalonica shortly before the Bulgarians arrived, and establishing a common border with the Serbs.

When Bulgaria called upon Serbia to honor their prewar agreement over northern Macedonia, the Serbs, displeased at being forced from the Great Powers to evacuate Albania, adamantly refused to give up any more territory. Very soon, minor clashes broke out along the borders of the occupation zones between the Bulgarians, the Serbs and the Greeks. Responding to the perceived Bulgarian threat, Serbia started negotiations with Greece, which also had reasons to be concerned about Bulgarian intentions. Only a few years before, Greeks and Bulgarians had fought a vicious guerrilla war in the area, and a Bulgarian regiment, which had been allowed to enter Thessalonica eight months before, ostensibly for recuperation, had remained there ever since.

The territorial gains of the Balkan states after the Firstst Balkan War and the line of expansion according to the prewar secret agreement between Serbia and Bulgaria

On 19 May/1 June 1913, a day before the Treaty of London was signed and just 16 days before the Bulgarian attack, a secret Serbian-Greek military protocol was signed, confirming the current demarcation line between the two occupation zones as their mutual border and concluding an alliance in case of an attack from Bulgaria or Austria-Hungary. During the negotiations Serbia preferred not to explain the roots of its dispute with Bulgaria, failing to notify the Greeks about their prewar settlements with Bulgaria over Macedonia. With this agreement, Serbia succeeded in making Greece a part of its dispute over northern Macedonia, since Greece had guaranteed Serbia's current (and officially disputed) occupation zone in Macedonia.^[2] Bulgarian diplomacy, under Prime Minister Geshov, in an attempt to halt the Serbo-Greek rapprochement, signed a protocol with Greece on 21 May agreeing on a permanent demarcation line between their respective forces, in effect unofficially accepting Greek's control over southern Macedonia. But his later dismissal ended his Serbia-targeting diplomacy.

Another point of friction was Bulgaria's refusal to cede the fortress of Silistra to Romania as promised before the war in exchange for Romanian neutrality. When Romania demanded its cession, Bulgaria's foreign minister offered instead some minor border changes, which excluded Silistra, and assurances for the rights of the Kutzovlachs in Macedonia. Romania threatened to occupy the promised territory by force, but a Russian proposal for arbitration prevented hostilities. In the resulting Protocol of St. Petersburg of 7 May 1913, Bulgaria agreed to give the area, only to refuse again a little later, making a conflict between the two countries inevitable.

[edit] Going to war - Bulgarian plans

Ferdinand I of Bulgaria

In 1912 Bulgaria's national aspiration, as this had been expressed through the King Ferdinand and the military leadership around him, exceeded the provisions of what was considered in 1878 as maximalistic, Treaty of San Stefano, since it included both Eastern and Western Thrace and all Macedonia with Thessalonica, Adrianople and Constantinople^[3]. An early evidence of the lack of realistic thinking in Bulgarian leadership was that although Russia had sent clear warnings expressed for the first time in 5 November 1912 (well before the first battle of Chataldja) that if Bulgarian Army occupied Constantinople they will attack it, they continued and tried to take the city.

Although Bulgarian Army succeeded in capturing Adrianople (with the help of the Serbian Army), King Ferdinand's ambition in crowning himself an Emperor in Constantinople proved also unrealistic when Bulgarian Army failed to capture the city in the battle of Chataldja. Even worse, the effort in capturing the Thrace and Constantinople ultimately caused the loss of the major part of Macedonia including Thessalonica and that could not be easily accepted, leading the Bulgarian military leadership around King Ferdinand to decide upon a war against its former allies. However, with the Ottomans unwilling to definitely accept the loss of Thrace in the east, and an enraged Romania on the north, the decision to open a war against both Greece (to the south) and Serbia (to the west), was a rather adventurous one, since:

Peter I of Serbia

In May the Turks had urgently requested a German mission to reorganize the Ottoman army. By mid June Bulgaria became aware of the agreement between Serbia and Greece in case of a Bulgarian attack. In 27 June Montenegro announced that it will side with Serbia in the event of a Serbian-Bulgarian war and in 28 June Romania officially warned Bulgaria that it will not remain neutral in a new Balkan war.^[2]

As skirmishing continued in Macedonia, mainly between Serbian and Bulgarian troops, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia tried to stop the upcoming conflict, since Russia didn't wish to lose either of its Slavic allies in the Balkans. On 8 June, he sent an identical personal message to the Kings of Bulgaria and Serbia, offering to act as arbitrator according to the provisions of the 1912 Serbo-Bulgarian treaty. Serbia was asking for a revision of the original treaty, since it had already lost north Albania due to the Great Powers' decision to establish the state of Albania, an area that had been recognized as a Serbian territory of expansion under the prewar Serbo-Bulgarian treaty, in exchange of the Bulgarian territory of expansion in northern Macedonia. Bulgaria, by making now the acceptance of Russian arbitration possible only if the treaty remained unchanged in effect denied any discussion, caused Russia to angrily repudiate its alliance with Bulgaria. Sazonov's exact words to Danev were "Do not expect anything from us and forget the existence of any of our agreements from 1902 until present"^[1] (see Russo-Bulgarian treaty of alliance of 1902). Tsar Nicholas II of Russia was already angry with Bulgaria because of the later's denial to honor its recently signed agreement with Romania over Silistra succeeded also after Russian arbitration. Then Serbia and Greece proposed that each of the three countries reduce its army by one fourth, as a first step to facilitate a peaceful solution, but Bulgaria rejected it.

Carol I of Romania

Bulgaria was already on the track to the war, since a new cabinet had been formed in Bulgaria where the pacifist M. Geshov was replaced by the hardliner and head of a russophil party Dr. Danev as premier. There is some evidence that to overcome King Ferdinand's reservations over a new war against Serbia and Greece, certain personalities in Sofia threatened to overthrow him. In any case on 16 June, the Bulgarian high command, under the direct control of King Ferdinand and without notifying the government, ordered Bulgarian troops to start a surprising attack simultaneously against both the Serbian and Greek positions, without declaring war and to dismiss any to the contrary orders. On the next day the government put a pressure on the General Staff to order the army to cease hostilities which caused confusion and loss of initiative but this act was otherwise in vain. In response King Ferdinand dismissed General Savov and replaced him with General Dimitriev as the commander-in-chief.

Nicholas I of Montenegro

Bulgaria's intention was to defeat Serbs and Greeks and to occupy as more as possible areas before the Great Powers interfere to stop the hostilities. In order to provide the necessary superiority in arms, the entire Bulgarian army was committed to these operations. No provisions were taken in case of an (officially declared) Romanian intervention or an Ottoman counterattack, strangely assuming that Russia will assure that no attack will come from those directions^[4], although on 9 June, Russia had angrily repudiated its Bulgarian alliance and shifted its diplomacy towards Romania (Russia already had named Romania's King Carol an honorary Russian Field Marshal, as a clear warning in shifting its policy to Sofia on December 1912)^[2]. The plan was for a concentrated attack against the Serbian army across the Vardar plain to neutralize it and to capture north Macedonia, together with a less concentrated one against the Greek Army near Thessalonica, which had approximately half the size of the Serbian in order to capture the city and south Macedonia. Bulgarian high command was not sure whether their forces were enough to defeat the Greek Army, but they thought them enough for defending the south front as a worst case scenario, until the arrival of additional forces after defeating the Serbian Army to the north.

[edit] Opposing forces

Unlike most other armies of Europe, the Bulgarian Army had a very heavy, almost misleading organization, since every division had 3 brigades of 2 regiments, composed of 4 battalions of 6 heavy companies of 250 or more men each, plus an independent battalion, 2 large artillery regiments and one cavalry regiment, giving a grand total of 25 very heavy infantry battalions and 16 cavalry companies per division,^[5] which was more than the equivalent of six nine-battalion divisions, the standard divisional structure in most contemporary armies, as was also the case with the Greek and Serbian armies in 1913. Consequently, although the Bulgarian Army had a total of 600,000 men mobilized in the beginning of the First Balkan War, there were only 9 organizational divisions, giving a divisional strength closer to an Army than to a Division. Tactical necessities during and after the First Balkan War modified this original structure: a new 10th division was formed using two brigades from the 1st and 6th divisions, and an additional three independent brigades were formed from new recruits. Nevertheless, the heavy structure generally remained. By contrast, the Greek Army of Macedonia had also 9 Divisions but the total number of men under arms was only 118,000. Another decisive factor affecting the real strength of the divisions between the opposing armies was the distribution of artillery. The nine division-strong Greek Army had a total of 176 guns and the ten division-strong Serbian Army, 230. The Bulgarians had 1,116, a ratio of 6:1 against the Greeks and 5:1 against the Serbian Army.

There is a dispute over the strength of the Bulgarian Army during the Second Balkan War. At the outbreak of the First Balkan War, Bulgaria mobilized a total of 599,878 men. The non-recoverable casualties during the First Balkan War were 33,000 men (14,000 killed and 19,000 died of disease). To replace these casualties Bulgaria conscripted 60,000 men between the two wars, mainly from the newly occupied areas, using 21,000 of them to form the Seres, Drama and Odrin independent brigades. It is known that there were no demobilized units. According to the Bulgarian command the Army had 7,693 officers and 492,528 soldiers in its ranks on the 16th of June (including the above mentioned three brigades).^[6] This gives a difference of 99,657 men in strength between the two wars. In comparison, subtracting the actual number of casualties including wounded and adding the newly conscripted men produces a total of no less than 576,878 men. The army was experiencing shortages of war materials and had only 378,998 rifles at its disposal. The 1st and 5th armies (under Generals Vasil Kutinchev and Stefan Toshev respectively) were deployed along the old Serbian-Bulgarian borders, with the 3rd Army under General Radko Dimitriev around Kyustendil, and the 4th Army under Stilian Kovachev in the Kočani-Radoviš area. The 2nd Army under General Nikola Ivanov was detailed against the Greek army.

The army of the Kingdom of Serbia accounted for 348,000 men (out of which 252,000 were combatants)^[1] divided into three armies with 10 divisions. Its main force was deployed on the Macedonian front along the Vardar river and near Skopje. Its nominal commander-in-chief was King Peter I, with Radomir Putnik as his chief of staff and effective field commander.

By early June, the army of the Kingdom of Greece had a grand total of some 142,000 armed men with nine infantry divisions and one cavalry brigade. The bulk of the army with 8 divisions (117,861 men) was gathered in Macedonia, positioned in an arc north, northeastern of Thessalonica while one division and independent units (24,416 men) were left in Epirus. With the outbreak of hostilities, the 8th division (stationed in Epirus) was transferred to the front, and with the arrival of new recruits, the army's strength in the Macedonian theater increased eventually to some 145,000 men with 176 guns. King Constantine I assumed command of the Greek forces, with Lt. General Viktor Dousmanis as his chief of staff but as in the First Balkan War the organizational and strategic mind behind the scene was Major (later Lieutenant General) Ioannis Metaxas.

The Kingdom of Montenegro sent one division of 12,000 men under General Janko Vukotić to the Serbian-Macedonian front.

The Kingdom of Romania mobilized over 330,000 men, allocated in five corps. 80,000 of them were assembled to occupy the Southern Dobrudja, while an army of 250,000 was assembled to carry the main offensive into Bulgaria.^[1]

The Ottoman Empire entered the war with an army of 255,000 men.

[edit] Outbreak of the war

The main Bulgarian attack was planned against the Serbs with their 1st, 3rd, 4th and 5th Armies, while the 2nd Army was tasked with an attack towards Greek positions around Salonika. The Bulgarians were outnumbered on the Greek front and the low-level fighting soon turned into Greek attack all along the line on 19 June. The Bulgarian forces forced to withdrew from their positions north of Salonika (except the isolated regiment stationed in the city itself which was quickly overrun) to defensive positions between Kilkis and Struma river. The plan to quickly destroy the Serbian army in central Macedonia by concentrated attack turned out to be unrealistic and the Bulgarian Army started to retreat even before Romanian intervention and the Greek advance necessitated disengagement of forces in order to defend Sofia.

[edit] Battle of Kilkis-Lahanas

Constantine I of Greece and Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos at the Greek GHQ during the Second Balkan War

The Bulgarian 2nd Army in southern Macedonia commanded by General Ivanov held a line from Lake Doiran south east to Kilkis, Lachanas, Serres and then across the mountain Pangeo to the Aegean. The army had been in place since May, and was considered a veteran having fought at the siege of Adrianople in the First Balkan War. General Ivanov possibly to avoid any responsibility for his crashing defeat, claimed after the war that his Army consisting of only 36,000 men and that many of his units were understrength but a detailed analysis of his units contradict him. Ivanov's 2nd Army was consisting of the III Division minus one brigade with 4 regiments of 4 battalions (total 16 battalions plus the divisional artillery), the I/X brigade with the 16th and 25th regiments (total 8 battalions plus artillery), the Drama Brigade with the 69th, 75th and 7th regiments (total 12 battalions), the Serres Brigade with 67th and 68th regiments (total 8 battalions), the XI Division with the 55th, 56th and 57th regiments (total 12 battalions plus the divisional artillery), the 5th border battalion, the 10th independent battalion and the 10th Cavalry Regiment of 7 mounted and 7 infantry companies. A total of 232 companies in 58 infantry battalions, a cavalry regiment (14 companies) with 175 artillery guns. That gives a number between 80,000 (official Bulgarian source) to 108,000 (official Greek source according to the official Bulgarian history of the war before 1932)^[7]. All modern historians agreed that Ivanov underestimated the number of his soldiers but the Greek army still had a numerical superiority.^[1] The Greek Headquarter also estimated the numbers of their opponents between 80,000 to 105,000 men.^[8]

The Greek army, commanded by King Constantine I, had 8 divisions and a cavalry brigade (117,861 men) with 176 artillery guns ^[9] in a line extended from the Gulf of Orphano to the Djevjeli area, since it was not possible for the Greek headquarter to know where the Bulgarian attack will take place, giving by necessity the Bulgarian Army the possibility to enjoy temporary local superiority to the chosen for the attack area.

On 26 June the Bulgarian Army took orders to destroy the opposing Greek forces and to advance towards Thessaloniki. The Greeks stoped them and by June 29 an order for general counterattack was issued. At Kilkis the Bulgarians had constructed strong defenses, including captured Ottoman guns which dominated the plain below. The Greek 4th, 2nd and 5th divisions attacked across the plain in rushes supported by artillery. Greeks suffered heavy casualties but by the following day had carried the trenches. On the Bulgarian left, the Greek 7th Division had captured Serres and the 1st and 6th divisions Lachanas. The defeat of the 2nd Army by the Greeks was the most serious military disaster suffered by the Bulgarians in the 2nd Balkan war^[10]. Bulgarian sources are giving a total of 6,971 casualties^[10]. To these Greeks captured more than 6,000 prisoners and more than 130 artillery pieces, suffering 8,700 casualties^[10]. On June 28 the retreating Bulgarian army burned down the major city of Serres (although previously had claimed that the city had mainly Bulgarian population and had named an army brigade with its name), ostensibly in a repeat of what the Greek army had done to the town of Kukush(Kilkis) which took place after the named battle. On the Bulgarian right Evzones captured Gevgelija and the heights of Matsikovo. As a consequence the Bulgarian line of retreat through Doiran was threatened and Ivanov's army began a desperate retreat which at times threatened to become a rout. Reinforcements in the form of the 14th Division came too late and joined the retreat towards Strumica and the Bulgarian border. The Greeks captured Doiran on 5 July but were unable to cut off the Bulgarian retreat through Struma pass. On 11 July the Greeks came in contact with the Serbs and then pushed on up the Struma River until they reached Kresna Gorge on 24 July. At this point the exhausted Greeks had overstretched their supply lines, and were forced to halt.

[edit] Battles of Bregalnica and Kalimantsi

Serbian soldiers during the Second Balkan War

During the night of 17 June, 1913 Bulgarians attacked the Serbian army at Bregalnica river (battle of Bregalnica 30 June - 9 July). Thanks to the suddenness of their offensive the Bulgarians were temporarily successful but Serbian army amazingly resisted the sudden night attack, while most of the soldiers did not even know who they fought, as Bulgarian camps were located next to Serbians and were considered allies. Montenegro forces were few kilometers away and ran to the battlefield in pijamas. The violent battle lasted for several days, but gradually the Serbs regained the upper hand. By 1 July the Bulgarians were beaten. The losses were very heavy on both sides, and in the end the Bulgarians made a strategic retreat to the east towards the mountains.

On the north the Bulgarians started to advance towards Serbian town of Pirot (near the Serbian - Bulgarian border) and forced Serbian Command to send reinforcements to the 2nd Army defending Pirot and Nis. This enabled Bulgarians to stop the Serbian offensive in Macedonia at Kalimantsi on 18 July.

[edit] Battle of Kresna and armistice

Greek troops advancing in the Kresna Gorge

Meanwhile after the Serbian front became static, King Constantine seeing that the Bulgarian Army in his front had been already defeated ordered the Greek Army to march further into Bulgarian territory and take the capital city of Sofia. King Constantine wanted a decisive victory on this war despite the objections of Eleftherios Venizelos who realized that Serbs having won their territorial objectives, were now trying to move the weight of the rest of the war to the Greeks by staying passive. In the pass of Kresna the Greeks were ambushed by the Bulgarian 2nd and 1st Army newly arrived from the Serbian front that had already taken defensive positions there. By 30 July the Greek army outnumbering by the now counterattaking Bulgarian Armies was facing a defeat in a Cannae-type battle.^[10] The battle was continued for eleven days, between 29 July and 9 August over 20 km of a maze of forests and mountains with no conclusion. The Greek King, realizing that the units he fought were from the Serbian front, tried to convince the Serbs to renew their attack, as the front ahead them was now thinner, but the Serbs, already under Russian pressure rejected it having nothing more to gain. After that, King Constantine listened to Venizelos' proposal and accepted the Bulgarian request for armistice. The Bulgarians, with the Romanians having declared war over Silistra (10 July) and approaching Sofia from the north and no army to stop them, accepted the Russian arbitration and the resulted general armistice signed on 18/31 July, 1913. The Turks who invaded Eastern Thrace (12 July) without meeting Bulgarian resistance were already in Adrianople. In helping Bulgaria facing the rapid Ottoman advance in Thrace, Russia threatened to enter the war against the Turks by attacking through the Caucasus, and sending the Black Sea Fleet to Constantinople which resulted in a British intervention.

[edit] Peace treaty and aftermath

Map showing the final territorial gains of the Balkan countries after the Balkan Wars.

The territorial spoils were divided in the Treaty of Bucharest and the Treaty of Constantinople. Bulgaria lost most of the territories gained in the First Balkan War including the southern Dobrudja (to Romania), most of Macedonia, and Eastern Thrace (to the Ottomans). With the strong diplomatic support of Russia it succeeded in retaining Western Thrace, its Aegean outlet, with the port of Dedeagach and part of Macedonia, having enlarged its territory by 29 percent to that before the First Balkan War and increased its population by 445,000 people, compared to Greece and Serbia which doubled both in population and territory. The above treaties forced Greek Army to evacuate the above areas, which it had occupied during operations. The retreat from the Western Thrace and the Macedonia of Pirin, areas that had to be ceded to Bulgaria, together with the abandonment of Northern Epirus to Albania, was not well received in Greece, although through the diplomatic support of Germany, Greece succeeded in retaining the occupied territories of Serres and Kavala. Serbia made additional gains in northern Macedonia and having fulfilled its aspirations to the south, turned its attention to the north where its rivalry with Austro-Hungary over Bosnia-Herzegovina led the two countries to war a year later igniting the First World War.

In the terms of the Treaty of London, the Albanian state acquired officially its independence. With the delineation of the exact boundaries of the new state under the Protocol of Florence (17 December 1913), the Serbs lost their outlet to the Adriatic and the Greeks the region of Northern Epirus (Southern Albania). This was highly unpopular to the local Greek population, who after their revolt managed to acquire local autonomy under the terms of the Protocol of Corfu.^[11]

After the defeat, Bulgaria turned into a revanchist local power looking for a second opportunity to fulfill its national aspirations, which ensured its voluntarily interference to the First World War on the side of the Central Powers, since its Balkan enemies (Serbia, Greece and Romania) were pro-Entente (see articles on the Serbian Campaign and the Macedonian Front of World War I). The resulting enormous sacrifices during World War I and the new defeat caused Bulgaria a national trauma and new territorial losses.

[edit] References

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[edit] Further reading

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Second Balkan War

• Erickson, Edward J.; Bush, Brighton C. (2003). Defeat in Detail: The Ottoman Army in the Balkans, 1912–1913. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0-275-97888-5. 
• Hall, Richard C. (2000). The Balkan Wars, 1912–1913: Prelude to the First World War. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-22946-4. 
• Schurman, Jacob Gould (2004). The Balkan Wars 1912 To 1913. Kessinger Publishing. ISBN 1-4191-5345-5.