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| Territory of the Military Commander in SerbiaGebiet des Militärbefehlshabers in Serbien | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Territory under German military administration | |||||||||
| 1941–1944 | |||||||||
 Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia | |||||||||
| Capital | Belgrade | ||||||||
| Population | |||||||||
| • 1941 | 3,810,000 | ||||||||
| Government | |||||||||
| • Type | Military administration (with puppet government installed) | ||||||||
| Military Commander | |||||||||
| • 1941 | Helmuth Förster | ||||||||
| • 1941 | Ludwig von Schröder | ||||||||
| • 1941 | Heinrich Dankelmann | ||||||||
| • 1941 | Franz Böhme | ||||||||
| • 1941-1943 | Paul Bader | ||||||||
| • 1943-1944 | Hans Felber | ||||||||
| Historical era | World War II | ||||||||
| • Invasion of Yugoslavia | 6 April 1941 | ||||||||
| • Liberation | October 1944 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Today part of |  Serbia | ||||||||
Serbia (Territory of the German Military Commander), officially the Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia (Template:Lang-de), refers to the area of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia that was placed under military administration by Nazi Germany following the invasion, occupation and dismantling of Yugoslavia in April 1941. The territory included central parts of present-day Serbia, the northern part of Kosovo (around Kosovska Mitrovica), and the Banat.
On 22 April 1941, the territory was placed under the supreme authority of the German military commander in Serbia, with the day-to-day administration of the territory under the control of the chief of the Military Administration in Serbia (Template:Lang-de; Template:Lang-sr), initially Harald Turner and later Franz Neuhausen. However, the lines of command and control in the occupied territory were never unified, and were made more complex by the appointment of direct representatives of senior Nazis such as Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler (for SS and police matters) and Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring (for economic matters). Some sources describe the territory as a puppet state, or a 'special administrative province', with other sources describing it as having a puppet government.
The Military Commander in Serbia appointed the Serbian civil puppet governments to 'carry on administrative chores under German direction and supervision'. The first of these was the short-lived Commissioner Administration (Комесарска влада, Komesarska vlada) which was established under Milan Aćimović on 30 May 1941. According to the historian Professor Stevan K. Pavlowitch, 'the German military commander appointed a low-grade Serbian Administration of ten commissioners who were put in charge of the ministries, under the control of Turner and Neuhausen, as a simple instrument of the occupation regime. It was followed by the establishment of the Government of National Salvation (Влада Националног Спаса, Vlada Nacionalnog Spasa) under Milan Nedić, which replaced the Commissioner Administration on 29 August 1941. According to Pavlowitch, the Nedić regime itself 'had no status under international law, and no power beyond that delegated by the Germans'. While the Administration was limited to the use of the former Yugoslav gendarmerie, the Nedić government was authorised to raise an armed force, the Serbian State Guard, to impose order, but they essentially functioned as German auxiliaries until the German withdrawal in October 1944. The Government of National Salvation remained in place until the German withdrawal. Throughout the occupation, the Banat was an autonomous region, formally responsible to the puppet governments in Belgrade, but in practice governed by its German minority.
The puppet governments established by the Germans were little more than subsidiary organs of the German occupation authorities, looking after some of the administration of the territory and sharing the blame for the brutal rule of the Germans. They had no international standing, even within the Axis. Their powers, quite limited from the beginning, were further reduced over time, which was frustrating and difficult for Nedić in particular. Despite the ambitions of the Nedić government to establish an independent state, the area remained subordinated to the German military authorities until the end of its existence.
Names
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Sources use different names for this German-occupied territory.
Official Names
- Territory of the German Military Commander, Serbia
- Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia (Template:Lang-de)
Other Names
- Serbia (Template:Lang-sr; Template:Lang-de)
- Serbia under German occupation (Template:Lang-sr)
- Serbia under German military administration
- German-occupied Serbia
- Nedić's Serbia (Template:Lang-sr
- A rump Serbian state
- a German-controlled territory
- Serbian residual state
- a so-called German protectorate
- Serbia-Banat
History
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1941
See also: Invasion of Yugoslavia, Republic of Užice, and First Enemy Offensive
Occupation and partition of Yugoslavia, 1941-43.
Occupation and partition of Yugoslavia, 1943-44.
In April 1941, Germany and its allies invaded and occupied Yugoslavia. The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was then partitioned. Some Yugoslav territory was annexed by its Axis neighbors, Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria and Italy. The Germans engineered and supported the creation of the new puppet state, the Independent State of Croatia, which roughly comprised most of the pre-war Banovina Croatia, along with rest of present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina and some adjacent territory. The Italians, Hungarians and Bulgarians occupied other parts of Yugoslavian territory. Germany occupied northern parts of present-day Slovenia and northern parts of the Independent State of Croatia. The German-occupied part of present-day Slovenia was annexed by Germany and was divided into two administrative areas that were placed under the administration of Gauleiters in Austria. The remaining territory, consisting of most of present-day Serbia, was placed under German occupation.
This remaining part of Yugoslavia, organised by the Germans as Serbia, 'was occupied outright by German troops and was placed under a military government'. It was administered by the German army of occupation, briefly with the assistance of a group of Serbian administrators led by Milan Aćimović and then for the remainder of the occupation with the assistance of a puppet government led by Milan Nedić. In order to secure the Trepča mines and the Belgrade-Skopje railway, the Germans made an arrangement with Albanian collaborators in the northern tip of present-day Kosovo which resulted in the effective autonomy of the region from the puppet government in Belgrade, which later formalized the German arrangement. Germans used Bulgarian troops to assist in the occupation, but they were at all times under German control.
The King of Yugoslavia, the teenage Peter II headed the pro-Allied Royal Yugoslav Government-In-Exile which escaped to Cairo and eventually established itself in London.
The administration's first Serbian government leader was Milan Aćimović. In late August Aćimović stepped down and was replaced by Milan Nedić, who hoped that his collaboration would save what was left of Serbia and avoid total destruction by Nazi reprisals, he personally kept in contact with Yugoslavia's exiled King Peter, assuring the King that he was not another Pavelić (the Croatian Ustashe leader), and Nedić's defenders claimed he was like Philippe Pétain of Vichy France (who was claimed to have defended the French people while accepting the occupation), and denied that he was leading a weak Quisling regime. The Serbian collaborationist government failed to win the favour of Serbs, who largely associated with the two key opposition groups, the Serb nationalist Chetniks and the communist Yugoslav Partisans.
The real power rested with the administration's Military Commanders, who controlled both the German armed forces and Serb collaborationist forces. In 1941, the administration's Military Commander, Franz Böhme, responded to guerrilla attacks on German forces by carrying out the German policy towards partisans that 100 people would be killed for each German killed and 50 people killed for each wounded German. The first set of reprisals were the massacres in Kragujevac and in Kraljevo by the Wehrmacht. These proved to be counterproductive to the German forces in the aftermath, as it ruined any possibility of gaining any substantial numbers of Serbs to support the collaborationist regime of Nedić. Additionally, it was discovered that in Kraljevo, a Serbian workforce group which was building airplanes for the Axis forces had been among the victims. The massacres caused Nedić to urge that the arbitrary shooting of Serbs be stopped, Böhme agreed and ordered a halt to the executions until further notice. Approximately 14,500 Serbian Jews - 90 percent of Serbia's Jewish population of 16,000 - were murdered in World War II.
The following months saw the formation of resistance to the administration by Chetnik and Partisan groups, with the Partisans establishing control over the region surrounding Užice.
By late 1941, with each attack by Chetniks and Partisans, brought more reprisal massacres being committed by the German armed forces against Serbs. The largest Chetnik opposition group led by Colonel Dragoljub "Draža" Mihailović decided that it was in the best interests of Serbs to temporarily shut down operations against the Germans until the possibility of decisively beating the German armed forces looked possible. Mihailović justified this by saying "When it is all over and, with God's help, I was preserved to continue the struggle, I resolved that I would never again bring such misery on the country unless it could result in total liberation". Mihailović then reluctantly decided to allow some Chetniks to join Nedić's regime to launch attacks against Tito's Partisans. Mihailović saw as the main threat to Chetniks and, in his view, Serbs, as the Partisans who refused to back down fighting, which would almost certainly result in more German reprisal massacres of Serbs. With arms provided by the Germans, those Chetniks who joined Nedić's collaborationist armed forces, so they could pursue their civil war against the Partisans without fear of attack by the Germans, whom they intended to later turn against. This resulted in an increase of recruits to the regime's armed forces. One of Mihailović's closest personal friends and collaborators, Pavle Đurišić, simultaneously held a command for Nedić, and in 1943 tried to exterminate the Muslims and pro-Partisans of the Sandžak region. The massacres he carried out were compared to the Croatian Ustashe and Muslim massacres of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia in 1941.
1942
1943
Nedić was received by German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and German leader Adolf Hitler at Hitler's Wolf's Lair on September 18, 1943.
1944
By the fall of 1944, the Eastern Front had nearly reached the territory. Most of Serbia was liberated from the Germans over the course of the Belgrade Offensive carried out by the Red Army, Yugoslav Partisans and Bulgarian forces. With the onset of the Belgrade Offensive by the Red Army and the Yugoslav Partisans, the administration was evacuated from Serbia to Vienna in October 1944.
Internal affairs
The internal affairs of Serbia were affected by Nazi racial laws. These were introduced in all occupied territories with immediate effects on Jews and Roma people, as well as causing the imprisonment of those opposed to Nazism. The region of Banat was ruled by its local minority German population. Serbia maintained its own currency, the Serbian dinar which replaced the Yugoslav dinar which existed until 1945, when the Germans and the collaboratists were defeated and replaced by the Yugoslav communist state, which scrapped the Serbian dinar and other currencies of the Independent State of Croatia and Montenegro in 1945.
Administration
Main article: Military Administration in SerbiaGerman military government
The territory of Serbia was the only area of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in which the Germans imposed a military government of occupation, largely due to the key transport routes and important resources located in the territory. Despite prior agreement with the Italians that they would establish an 'independent Serbia', Serbia in fact had a puppet government, Germany accorded it no status in international law except that of a fully occupied country, and it did not enjoy formal diplomatic status with the Axis powers and their satellites as the Independent State of Croatia did. The occupation arrangements underwent a series of changes between April 1941 and 1944, however throughout the German occupation, the military commander in Serbia was the head of the occupation regime. This position underwent a number of title changes during the occupation. The day-to-day administration of the occupation was conducted by the chief of the military administration branch responsible to the military commander in Serbia. The puppet governments established by the Germans were responsible to the chief of military administration, although multiple and often parallel chains of German command and control meant that the puppet government was responsible to different German functionaries for different aspects of the occupation regime, such as the special plenipotentiary for economic affairs and the Higher SS and Police Leader. For example, the plenipotentiary for economic affairs, Franz Neuhausen, who was Göring's personal representative in the occupied territory, was directly responsible to the Reichsmarshall for aspects of the German Four Year Plan, and had complete control over the Serbian economy.
Police administration
At the beginning of the occupation, the Military Commander in Serbia was provided with a Security Police Special Employment Squad (Template:Lang-de) consisting of detachments of Gestapo, criminal police and the SD or Security Service (Template:Lang-de). Initially commanded by SS and Police Leader (Template:Lang-de) Standartenführer and Oberst of Police Wilhelm Fuchs, this group was technically under the control of the chief of Military Administration in Serbia, Harald Turner, but in practice reported direct to Berlin. In January 1942, the status of the police organisation was raised by the appointment of a Higher SS and Police Leader (Template:Lang-de) Obergruppenführer and Generalleutnant of SS August Meyszner. Meyszner was replaced in April 1944 by Generalleutnant of SS Hermann Behrends.
Serbian puppet governments
See also: Commissioner Administration and Government of National Salvation (Serbia)Two puppet governments were appointed by the German Military Commander in Serbia. The first, known as the Commissioner Administration, was established on 30 April 1941. Its president was Milan Aćimović. The second, known as the Government of National Salvation, replaced the Commissioner Administration on 29 August 1941. The Government of National Salvation, led by Milan Nedić, operated until it collapsed with the commencement of the German withdrawal from Belgrade in early October 1944.
The Commissioner Administration
Main article: Commissioner AdministrationOn 30 April 1941, a pro-Nazi Serbian administration under Milan Aćimović was appointed by the German Military Commander in Serbia, General Helmuth Förster, consisting of ten commissioners. Aćimović was sworn into office in late May. While the commissioners were quite experienced in their portfolio areas or in politics or public administration generally, the Administration was in an extremely difficult position because it lacked any semblance of power. The three main tasks of the Administration were to secure the acquiescence of the population to the German occupation, help restore services, and 'identify and remove undesirables from public services'. Refugees fleeing persecution in the Independent State of Croatia began to flood into the territory before the Administration had even been established. In early July 1941, the commencement of armed resistance against both the Germans and the Aćimović administration quickly precipitated a crisis. When the new German Military Commander in Serbia, General Heinrich Dankelmann, was unable to obtain more German troops or police to suppress the revolt, he had to consider every option available. As Dankelmann had been told to utilise available forces as ruthlessly as possible, his chief of military administration, Harald Turner, suggested that Dankelmann strengthen the Administration so that it might subdue the rebellion itself.
In response to the revolt in Serbia that commenced in early July 1941, hundreds of prominent and influential Serbs signed an 'Appeal to the Serbian Nation' which was published in major Belgrade newspapers in the second week of August. The appeal called upon the Serbian population to help the authorities in every way in their struggle against the communist rebels, and called for loyalty to the Nazis and condemned the Partisan resistance as unpatriotic.
To strengthen the puppet government, Dankelmann had to find a Serb who was both well-known and highly regarded by the population who could raise some sort of Serbian armed force and who would be willing to use it ruthlessly against the rebels whilst remaining under full German control. These ideas ultimately resulted in the resignation of the entire Administration at the end of August 1941, and its replacement with the Government of National Salvation under Nedić.
The Government of National Salvation
Main article: Government of National Salvation (Serbia)In response to a request by Envoy Felix Benzler, the representative of the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs appointed to assist Dankelmann, the Ministry sent SS-Standartenführer Edmund Veesenmayer to provide assistance in establishing a new puppet government that would meet German requirements. Five months earlier, Veesenmayer had engineered the proclamation of the Independent State of Croatia. Veesenmayer engaged in a series of consultations with German commanders and officials in Belgrade, interviewed a number of possible candidates to lead the new puppet government, then selected General Milan Nedić as the best available. The Germans had to apply significant pressure to Nedić to encourage him to accept the position, including threats to bring Bulgarian and Hungarian troops into the occupied territory and to send him to Germany as a prisoner of war. Unlike most Yugoslavian generals, Nedić had not been interned in Germany after the capitulation, but instead had been placed under house arrest in Belgrade.
On 27 August 1941, about seventy-five prominent Serbs convened a meeting in Belgrade where they resolved that Nedić should form a Government of National Salvation to replace the Commissioner Administration, and on the same day, Nedić wrote to Dankelmann agreeing to become prime minister of the new government on the basis of five conditions and some additional concessions. Two days later, the German authorities installed Nedić and his government in power. Real power resided with the German occupiers rather than under Nedić's government. There is no written record of whether Dankelmann accepted Nedić's conditions, but he did make some of the requested concessions, including allowing the use of Serbian national and state emblems by the Nedić government.
Nedić was worried about the survival of the Serbian people in Hitlers New Order. He aimed to provide refuge for Serbs, who were persecuted in other regions of occupied Yugoslavia, and to save them from Communism. Government of Milan Nedić had a policy to keep Serbia quiet and to prevent Serbian blood from being spilled. Government carried out German demands faithfully, aiming to secure place for Serbia in the New European Order created by the Nazis.
Propaganda of the Nedić's regime labeled Milan Nedić as the "father of Serbia", who started to rebuild Serbia and who accepted his function in order to save the nation. Institutions formed by the Nedić's government were similar to those in Nazi Germany, while documents signed by Milan Nedić used racist terminology that was taken from national-socialist ideology. Propaganda of the regime glorified Serbian "race", accepting its own "aryanhood", and determined Serbian "living space". It asked from the youth to follow Nedić in the building of the New Order in Serbia and Europe.
Nedić aimed to ensure the public that war was over for Serbia in April, 1941. He perceived his time as the time "after the war", i.e. as the time of peace, progress and serenity. Nedić claimed that all deeds of his government were enabled by the occupants, to whom people should be grateful for secured life and "honorable place of associates in the building of the new World".
Nedić hoped that his collaboration would save what was left of Serbia and avoid total destruction by Nazi reprisals, he personally kept in contact with Yugoslavia's exiled King Peter, assuring the King that he was not another Pavelić (the Croatian Ustashe leader), and Nedić's defenders claimed he was like Philippe Pétain of Vichy France (who was claimed to have defended the French people while accepting the occupation), and denied that he was leading a weak Quisling regime. The Serbian collaborationist government failed to win the favour of Serbs, who largely associated with the two key opposition groups, the Serb nationalist Chetniks and the communist Yugoslav Partisans. With the deteriorating situation in the territory, the civil government was allowed to raise its own Serbian State Guard, the fascist ZBOR party formed the Serbian Volunteer Corps, and White Russian émigrés in the region formed the Russian Corps. Some of these forces took part in Operation Užice, a major Axis offensive which saw the Partisans driven out of the territory and largely into the Italian-protectorate of Montenegro.
Key politicians
There were a number of key Serbian politicians that had substantial influence over one or both of the puppet governments or played significant roles in the Nedić government. These included:
- Dimitrije Ljotić
- Lazo M. Kostić
- Mihailo Olćan
- Velibor Jonić
- Dr. Milorad Nedeljković
- Vladimir Velmar-Janković
Administrative divisions
See also: Administrative divisions of Serbia (Territory of the German Military Commander)
Military administration
The Germans created four military area commands (Template:Lang-de) within the occupied territory, with each area command further divided into one or more district commands (Template:Lang-de), and about one hundred towns and localities had town or post commands (Template:Lang-de) that were under the control of the district commands. Each area or district command had its own military, administrative, economic, police and other staff depending on local requirements, which allowed the chief of the Military Administration to implement German decrees and policies throughout the occupied territory.
From December 1941 until the German withdrawal, the German area commands were located in Belgrade, Niš, Šabac and Kraljevo, with district commands as follows:
- Area Command No. 599 Belgrade: District Command No. 378 in Požarevac.
- Area Command No. 809 Niš: District Commands No. 857 in Zaječar and No. 867 in Leskovac.
- Area Command No. 816 Šabac: District Command No. 861 in Valjevo.
- Area Command No. 610 Kraljevo: District Commands No. 832 in Kragujevac, No. 833 in Kruševac, No. 834 in Ćuprija, No. 838 in Kosovska Mitrovica, and No. 847 in Užice.
The German area and district commanders directed and supervised the corresponding representative of the Serbian puppet government.
Civil administration
Serbia's borders initially incorporated parts of the territory of five of the prewar banovinas. The area was, however, reorganized into three banovinas whose administrative centers were Smederevo, Niš and Užice.
In October 1941, the Germans ordered the Nedić government to reorganise the territory, as the existing structure was not suitable and did not meet military requirements. By means of an order issued on 4 December 1941, the German military commander adjusted the military-administrative structure to conform to German requirements. As a result, the district (Template:Lang-sr) subdivision (which had existed in the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes prior to the formation of the banovinas) was restored. The Nedić government issued a decree on 23 December 1941 by which Serbia was divided into 14 districts (Template:Lang-sr) and 101 municipalities (Template:Lang-sr). The District of Veliki Bečkerek (also known as The Banat) was theoretically part of Serbia, but became an autonomous district, run by the members of local ethnic German population. On 27 December 1941, the heads of the districts were appointed and met with Milan Nedić, Milan Aćimović, Tanasije Dinić, and Cvetan Đorđević.
Military
German auxiliary forces
The Germans were short of police and military forces in Serbia, and as a result came to rely on armed Serbian formations to maintain order. There were three officially organised German auxiliary armed groups formed during the German occupation. These were the Serbian Volunteer Corps, the Russian Protective Corps, and the small Auxiliary Police Troop composed of Russian Volksdeutsche. The Germans used two other armed groups as auxiliaries, the Chetnik detachments of Kosta Pećanac which started collaborating with the Germans from the time of the Nedić government's appointment in August 1941, and later the 'legalised' Chetnik detachments of Draža Mihailović
By October, 1941, Serbian forces under German supervision had become increasingly effective against the resistance. They were armed and equipped by the Germans. Serbian collaborationist forces supported by the Serbian government included the Serbian State Guard, the Serbian Volunteer Corps (whose members were largely members of the Yugoslav National Movement "Zbor" (Jugoslovenski narodni pokret "Zbor") or ZBOR party of Dimitrije Ljotić), and the Pećanac Chetniks. Some of these formations wore the uniform of the Royal Yugoslav Army as well as helmets and uniforms purchased from Italy, while others used uniforms and equipment from Germany. These forces were involved, either directly or indirectly, in the mass killings of Jews, Roma and those Serbs who sided with any anti-German resistance or were suspects of being a member of such. According to one single source (Jasminka Udovički, James Ridgeway; Burn This House: The Making and Unmaking of Yugoslavia, 1997), these forces were also responsible for the killings of many Croats and Muslims, but this data is not confirmed by other sources. According to other source, the Croats who took refuge in Nedić's Serbia were not discriminated against. After the war, the Serbian involvement in many of these events and the issue of Serbian collaboration were subject to historical revisionism by Serbian leaders.
Collaborationist armed forces
Aside from the Wehrmacht, which was the dominant Axis military in the territory, and (from January 1942) the Bulgarian armed forces, there were two Serbian collaborationist military forces, the Serbian State Guard (Srpska Državna Straža) and the Serbian Volunteer Command both formed in 1941. In 1943, the Serbian Volunteer Command was renamed the Serbian Volunteer Corps (Srpski Dobrovoljački Korpus), with Kosta Mušicki as the operational leader.
Initially, the recruits were largely paramilitaries and supporters of the fascist Yugoslav National Movement "Zbor" (Jugoslovenski narodni pokret "Zbor", or ZBOR) party of Dimitrije Ljotić. In late 1941, troops from the Mihailović Chetnik formations dispersed following conflicts with Partisan and German forces, and many of those troops join Nedić's legalized Chetnik. Nedić's forces fought Communist Partisans as well as Royalist Chetniks who were not willing to sign an agreement of cooperation.
Recruits to the collaborationist forces increased in numbers following joining of Chetnik groups loyal to Kosta Pećanac. By their own postwar account, these Chetniks joined with the intention to destroy Tito's Partisans, rather than supporting Nedić and the German occupation forces, whom they later intended to turn against.
On September 12, 1941 Russian white emigres established the Russian Protection Corps which was active in Serbia until 1944.
The Serbian Volunteer Corps were formed in the spring of 1943. At the end of 1944, the Corps and its German liaison staff were transferred to the Waffen-SS as the Serbian SS Corps and comprised a staff from four regiments each with three battalions and a training battalion.
As military conditions in Serbia deteriorated, Nedić increasingly cooperated with Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović. Over the course of 1944 Chetniks assassinated two high-ranking Serbian military officials who had obstructed their work. Brigadier-general Miloš Masalović was murdered in March, while rival Chetnik leader Kosta Pećanac was killed in June.
In addition to Serbian collaborationist forces, members of the Volksdeutsche (ethnic German minority) from Serbia and Banat were serving in the armed forces of the Reich, most of them in the Prinz Eugen Division. This division was responsible for war crimes committed against the peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Resistance
During the summer of 1941, two resistance factions were formed: Serb royalist Chetniks, and communist and unionist Partisans. They began small-scale operations and diversions against local loyalist forces and German military. The uprising became a serious concern for the Germans as most of their forces were deployed to Russia; only three divisions of which were in the country.
Demographics
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The population of the occupied territory was approximately 3,810,000, composed primarily of Serbs (up to 3,000,000) and Germans (around 500,000). Other nationalities of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia have been mostly separated from Serbia and included within their respective ethnic states - f.e. the Croats, Bulgarians, Albanians, Hungarians, etc. Most of the Serbs however ended up outside the Nazi Serbian state, as they were forced to join other states.
By the summer of 1942, is estimated that around 400,000 Serbs had been expelled or had fled from others parts of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and were living in the occupied territory.
The autonomous area of the Banat was a multi-ethnic area with a total population of 640,000, of which 280,000 were Serbs, 130,000 were Germans, 90,000 were Hungarians, 65,000 Romanians, 15,000 Slovaks and 60,000 of other ethnicities.
Of the 16,700 Jewish people in Serbia and the Banat, 15,000 were killed. In total, it is estimated that approximately 80,000 people were killed from 1941 to 1944 in concentration camps in Nedić's Serbia. Harald Turner, the chief of German military occupation forces in Serbia, declared in August 1942, that the "Jewish question" in Serbia had been "liquidated" and that Serbia was the first country in Europe to be Judenfrei; free of Jews.
Economy
Banking and currency
After the collapse of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the National Bank of Yugoslavia was forced into liquidation on 29 May 1941, and two days later a decree was issued by the Military Commander in Serbia creating the Serbian National Bank. The new bank was under the direct control of Franz Neuhausen, the plenipotentiary general for economic affairs, who appointed the governor and board members of the bank, as well as a German commissioner who represented Neuhausen at the bank and had to approve all important transactions. The new bank introduced the Serbian dinar as the only legal currency and called in all Yugoslav dinars for exchange.
The traditional Obrenović coat of arms was found on bills and coins minus the royal crown.
German exploitation of the economy
Immediately after the capitulation of Yugoslavia, the Germans confiscated all the assets of the defeated Yugoslav army, including about 2 billion dinars in the occupied territory of Serbia. It also seized all usable raw materials and used occupation currency to purchase goods available in the territory. It then placed under its control all useful military production assets in the country, and although it operated some armament, ammunition and aircraft production factories in situ for a short period of time, after the July 1941 uprising, it dismantled all of them and relocated them outside the territory.
Next, the occupation authorities assumed control of all transportation and communication systems, including riverine transport on the Danube. And finally, it took control of all significant mining, industrial and financial enterprises in the territory that were not already under Axis control prior to the invasion.
In order to coordinate and ensure maximum exploitation of the Serbian economy, the Germans appointed Franz Neuhausen, who was effectively the economic dictator in the territory. Initially the Plenipotentiary General for Economic Affairs in Serbia, he soon became the Plenipotentiary for the Four Year Plan under Göring, Plenipotentiary for Metal Ores Production in South-East Europe, and Plenipotentiary for Labour in Serbia. From October 1943, he became the Chief of Military Administration in Serbia, responsible for the administration of all aspects of the entire territory. Ultimately, he had full control of the Serbian economy and finances, and fully controlled the Serbian National Bank, in order to use all parts of the Serbian economy to support the German war effort.
As part of this, the Germans imposed huge occupation costs on the Serbian territory from the outset, including amounts required to run the military administration of the territory as determined by the Wehrmacht, and an additional annual contribution to the Reich set by the Military Economic and Armaments Office. The occupation costs were paid by the Serbian Ministry of Finance on a monthly basis into a special account with the Serbian National Bank.
Over the entire period of the occupation, the Serbian puppet governments paid the Germans about 33,248 million dinars in occupation costs. Occupation costs amounted to about 40% of the current national income of the territory by mid-1944.
Culture
Media
With the dissolution of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, many newspapers went out of print while new papers were formed. Soon after the occupation began, the German occupation authorities issued orders requiring the registration of all printing equipment and restrictions on what could be published. Only those that had been registered and approved by the German authorities could edit such publications. On 16 May 1941 the first new daily, Novo vreme (New Times), was formed. The weekly Naša borba (Our Struggle) was formed by the fascist ZBOR party in 1941, its title echoing Hitler's Mein Kampf (My Struggle). The regime itself released the Službene novine (Official Gazette) which attempted to continue the tradition of the official paper of the same name which was released in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
Film
The state of film in Serbia was somewhat improved compared to the situation in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. During that time, the number of cinemas in Belgrade was increased to 21, with a daily attendance of between 12,000 and 15,000 people. The two most popular films were 1943's Nevinost bez zaštite and Golden City which were watched by 62,000 and 108,000 respectively.
Sport
With the dissolution of the Yugoslav First League in the spring of 1940, Serbia had its own national football competition. Competing teams included BSK Belgrade, SK 1913 (SK Jugoslavija) and FK Obilić.
Theatre
The German occupation authorities issued special orders regulating the opening of theatres and other places of entertainment which excluded Jews. The Serbian National Theatre in Belgrade remained open during this time. Works performed during this period included La bohème, The Marriage of Figaro, Der Freischütz, Tosca, Dva cvancika and Nesuđeni zetovi.
Transportation
The Serbian State Railways (Srpske državne železnice, SDŽ) was the national railway company of the occupied territory.
War crimes
Persecution of the Jews
Several concentration camps were formed in Serbia and at the 1942 Anti-Freemason Exhibition in Belgrade the city was pronounced to be free of Jews (Judenfrei). On 1 April 1942, a Serbian Gestapo was formed. It is estimated that approximately 80,000 people were killed from 1941 to 1944 in the German-run concentration camps in Nedić's Serbia. Serbia was proclaimed one of the Judenfrei (free of Jews) countries in Europe.
Harald Turner (1941–1942), Walter Uppenkamp (1942), Egon Bönner (1942–1943), and Franz Neuhausen (1943–1944) were the German chiefs of the military administration. Böhme was given emergency powers to govern the territory from July 1941 and served as a defacto governor of the region even before the administration was solidified in August. Böhme was relieved of the position later in 1941. Staatsrat (privy councillor) Harald Turner and SS Untersturmfuhrer Fritz Stracke handled most of the affairs of the administration while Nedić served as a nominal local leader and as a symbol of legitimization of the German presence there. The regime was unsuccessful in detracting Serbs from rebelling against the occupiers and had little support amongst Serbs. This was due to acts of extreme violence and ethnic persecution of Serbs by the German occupiers and Ustashe extreme nationalists in the Independent State of Croatia, most Serbs associated with opposition forces who fought against both the German occupation forces and the Ustashe regime of the Independent State of Croatia. The regime attempted to reduce the large Serbian resistance against the German military occupation, but continued atrocities by German occupation authorities.
Concentration camps
- Sajmište concentration camp (Belgrade)
- Banjica concentration camp (near Belgrade)
- Crveni krst concentration camp (Niš)
- Topovske Šupe (Belgrade)
- Dulag 183 (Šabac)
Symbols
Symbols used by the Serbian puppet government were the flag, the coat of arms, and the anthem Oj Srbijo, mila mati (Oh Serbia, dear mother).
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the flag
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the coat of arms
.svg)
Post-war trials
German officials
General Franz Böhme committed suicide before being tried at the Hostages Trial for crimes committed in Serbia. Harald Turner was executed in Belgrade on 9 March 1947. Heinrich Dankelmann and Franz Neuhausen were tried together in October 1947. Dankelmann was subsequently executed while Neuhausen was sentenced to twenty years imprisonment.
Serbian collaborators
The most prominent Serbian collaborators died before they could be tried. Dimitrije Ljotić died in a car accident in Slovenia in April 1945, while Milan Aćimović was killed by Yugoslav Partisans during the Battle of Zelengora. Milan Nedić was extradited to Yugoslavia in early 1946 but died in prison before facing trial. After their entrance into Belgrade the Partisans executed Radoslav Veselinović, Dušan Đorđević, Momčilo Janković, Čedomir Marjanović and Jovan Mijušković all on November 27, 1944. A group of ministers in the Nedić government were tried together as part of the same process led against Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović. Kosta Mušicki, Tanasije Dinić, Velibor Jonić, Dragomir Jovanović, and Đura Dokić were subsequently executed on July 17, 1946.
Some of the members of government fled abroad and were never brought to trial. These included Lazo M. Kostić who moved to the United States of America, Borivoje Jonić who went to France, and Miodrag Damjanović who moved to Germany.
Legacy
In 2008, the non-parliamentary Serbian Liberal Party launched a proposal to the County Court in Belgrade to rehabilitate the Serbian leader Milan Nedić. This has met no support from any political party and also met opposition from the Jewish community of Serbia.
See also
- Banat (1941–1944)
- Republic of Užice
- Kingdom of Montenegro (1941-1944)
- Independent State of Croatia
- Ustaše
- Military history of Hungary during World War II
- Military history of Bulgaria during World War II
- Military history of Albania during World War II
- World War II
- Anti-Freemason Exhibition
- Balkans Campaign
- People's Liberation War
- Quisling
Notes
- ^ Tomasevich (2001), p. 177
- ^ Hehn (1971), pp. 344-373
- ^ Pavlowitch (2002), p. 141
- Kroener (2000), p. 95
- Vucinich & Tomasevich (1969), p. 79
- Klajn (2007), p. 49
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 78
- Lemkin (2008), p. 248
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 51
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 179
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 58
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 186-191
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 58
- ^ Wolff (1974), p. 204
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 182
- Wolff (1974), pp. 203-204
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 182-186
- - Quotation: "Таква Србија под немачком окупацијом обухватала је површину од 61.000 км2 од приближно четири и по милиона становника."
- Cohen (1996), p. 83
- http://www.knjizara.com/knjige/knjiga/126922_Ko+je+ko+u+Nedićevoj+Srbiji+1941-1944_ISBN:978-86-7274-388-3
- Lemkin (2008), p. 248
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 49
- Lauterpacht (1999), p. 32
- Lumans (1993), p. 232
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 83
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 61-63
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 63
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 80
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 63
- ^ Dobrich (2000), p. 21
- ^ Browning (2004), p. 344
- Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Macmillan Publishing Company New York 1990.
- Bailey (1980), p. 80
- ^ Bailey (1980), p. 81
- ^ Wolff (1974), p. 213
- ^ Kroener (2000), pp. 40-41
- Wolff (1974), p. 324
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 78
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 64-82
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 50
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 77-78
- Cohen (1996), pp. 30-31
- Pavlowitch (2008), p. 51
- ^ Tomasevich (2001), pp. 178-179
- Cohen (1996), p. 32
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 68 & 179
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 52-55
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 180
- ^ Cohen (1996), p. 33
- "Nedic thus headed a government whose powers were strictly limited, one that had no international standing even with the Axis powers. Like its predecessor, it was no more than a subsidiary organ of the German occupation authorities, doing part of the work of administering the country and helping to keep it pacified so that the Germans could exploit it with a minimum of effort, and bearing some of the blame for the harshness of the rule. - Tomasevich 2001 p. 182"
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 181-182
- Pavlowitch (2002), p. 142
- Olivera Milosavljević, Potisnuta istina - Kolaboracija u Srbiji 1941-1944, Beograd, 2006, page 17.
- Olivera Milosavljević, Potisnuta istina - Kolaboracija u Srbiji 1941-1944, Beograd, 2006, page 18.
- Olivera Milosavljević, Potisnuta istina - Kolaboracija u Srbiji 1941-1944, Beograd, 2006, pages 18-19.
- ^ Tomasevich (2001), p. 74
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 75
- ^ Tomasevich (2001), pp. 74-75
- ^ Brborić (2010), p. 170
- Cohen (1996), p. 34
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 186
- Cohen (1996), p. 35
- Cohen (1996), p. 38
- Cohen (1996), pp. 76-81
- Udovički, Jasminka; Ridgeway, James (1997). Burn This House: The Making and Unmaking of Yugoslavia. Duke University Press. p. 133. ISBN 0-8223-1997-7.
- Deroc (1988), p. 157
- Cohen (1996), p. 113
- The apparatus of the German occupying forces in Serbia was supposed to maintain order and peace in this region and to exploit its industrial and other riches, necessary for the Germany war economy. But, however well organized, it could have not realized its plans successfully if the old apparatus of state power, the organs of state administration, the gendarmes, and the Police had not been at its service. - Cohen (1996), p. 61
- Tomasevich (1975), p. 200
- Tomasevich (1975), p. 260
- Lumans (1993), p. 235
- Howard Margolian, Unauthorized entry: the truth about Nazi war criminals in Canada, 1946-1956, page 313.
- Tomasevich (1975), p. 97
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 219
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 219
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 205
- ^ Serbien und Montenegro: Raum und Bevölkerung, Geschichte, Sprache und Kultur by Walter Lukan, Ljubinka Trgovcevic, Dragan Vukcevic
- ^ Cohen (1996), p. 83
- Lemkin (2008), pp. 53-54
- ^ http://www.atsnotes.com/catalog/banknotes-pictures/serbia/serbia-22.JPG
- Worldcoingallery.com
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 617-618
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 624
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 618
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 619
- Tomasevich (2001), pp. 665-667
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 668
- Tomasevich (2001, p. 177
- ^ Olivera Milosavljević - POTISNUTA ISTINA
- Miroslav Savković, Kinematografija u Srbiji tokom Drugog svetskog rata 1941-1945. Ibis, Belgrade 1994 (p. 59).
- Miroslav Savković, Kinematografija u Srbiji tokom Drugog svetskog rata 1941-1945. Ibis, Belgrade 1994 (p. 46).
- History of FC Obilić
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 177
- Serbian National Theatre, Belgrade
- Srpske Drzavne Zeleznice, 1941-1945
- Tasovac, Ivo (1999). American foreign policy and Yugoslavia, 1939-1941. Texas A&M University Press. p. 161. ISBN 0-89096-897-7, 9780890968970. Retrieved 28 February 2011.
{{cite book}}: Check|isbn=value: invalid character (help) - Final Solution (New York, 1985), p. 77; Walter Manoschek, "Serbien ist judenfrei".
- Cox (2002), p. 93
- Benz (1999), p. 86
- Tomasevich (2001), p. 76
- http://chgs.umn.edu/histories/otherness/otherness2.html
- ^ Milan Nedić and Prince Paul again dividing Serbia
References
- Bailey, Ronald H. (1980). Partisans and guerrillas (World War II; v. 12). Time-Life Books. ISBN 978-0-7835-5719-9.
- Benz, Wolfgang (1999). The Holocaust: A German Historian Examines the Genocide. Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-11215-4.
- Bond, Brian; Roy, Ian (1977). War and society: a yearbook of military history, Volume 2. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-0-85664-404-7.
- Template:Cite article
- Browning, Christopher H. (1978). The final solution and the German Foreign Office: a study of Referat D III of Abteilung Deutschland, 1940-43. Holmes & Meier. ISBN 978-0-8419-0403-3.
- Browning, Christopher H. (2004). The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939-March 1942 (Comprehensive History of the Holocaust). Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority. ISBN 978-0-8032-5979-9.
- Cohen, Philip J. (1996). Serbia's Secret War: Propaganda and the Deceit of History. Texas A&M University Press. ISBN 0-89096-760-1.
- Cox, John (2002). The history of Serbia: The Greenwood histories of the modern nations. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-313-31290-8.
- Deroc, Milan (1988). British Special Operations explored: Yugoslavia in turmoil, 1941-1943, and the British response Volume 242 of East European monographs. East European Monographs, University of Michigan. ISBN 978-0-88033-139-5.
- Dobrich, Momcilo (2000). Belgrade's Best: The Serbian Volunteer Corps, 1941-1945. Axis Europa Books. ISBN 978-1-891227-38-7.
- Friedman, Jonathan C. (2011). The Routledge history of the Holocaust. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-0-415-77956-2.
- Hehn, Paul N. (1977). "Serbia, Croatia and Germany 1941-1945: Civil War and Revolution in the Balkans". Canadian Slavonic Papers. 13 (4). University of Alberta: 344–373. Retrieved 8 April 2012.
{{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters:|month=and|editorlink=(help) - Klajn, Lajčo (2007). The Past in Present Times: The Yugoslav Saga. New York: University Press of America. ISBN 978-0-7618-3647-6.
- Lauterpacht (ed.), Elihu (1999). International Law Reports, Volume 112. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-64242-2.
{{cite book}}:|last=has generic name (help) - Kroener, Bernhard (2000). Germany and the Second World War: Volume V: Organization and Mobilization of the German Sphere of Power (Part 1: Wartime Administration, Economy, and Manpower Resources, 1939-1941). New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-822887-5.
- Lemkin, Raphael (2008). Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.
- Lumans, Valdis O. (1993). Himmler's Auxiliaries: The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle and the German National Minorities of Europe, 1933-1945. University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-0-8078-2066-7.
- Manoschek, Walter (2007). Holokaust u Srbiji: voijna okupaciona politika i uništavanje Jevreja, 1941-1942. Službeni list SRJ, Indiana University.
- Pavlowitch, Stevan K. (2002). Serbia: the History behind the Name. London: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. ISBN 978-1-85065-476-6.
- Pavlowitch, Stevan K. (2008). Hitler's New Disorder: The Second World War in Yugoslavia. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 1-85065-895-1.
- Tomasevich, Jozo (1975). War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: The Chetniks. Vol. 1. San Francisco: Stanford University Press. ISBN 0-8047-0857-6.
- Tomasevich, Jozo (2001). War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration. Vol. 2. San Francisco: Stanford University Press. ISBN 0-8047-3615-4.
- United Kingdom Naval Intelligence Division (1944). Jugoslavia: History, peoples, and administration. Michigan: University of Michigan.
- Vucinich, Wayne S.; Tomasevich, Jozo (1969). Contemporary Yugoslavia: Twenty Years of Socialist Experiment. University of California Press.
- Weinberg, Gerhard L. (2005). A World At Arms: A Global History Of World War II, 2nd Edition. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-61826-7.
- Wolff, Robert (1974). The Balkans in our time (American Foreign Policy Library, Volume 23 of Russian Research Center studies, Harvard English Studies). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-393-09010-9.
Further reading
- Venceslav Glišić, Užička republika, Beograd, 1986.
- Dr Rajko Đurić - mr Antun Miletić, Istorija holokausta Roma, Beograd, 2008.
- Miloslav Samardžić, Krvavi vaskrs 1944 - Saveznička bombardovanja srpskih gradova, Beograd, 2011.
- Bojan Đorđević, Srpska kultura pod okupacijom, Beograd, 2008.
- Simo C. Ćirković, Ko je ko u Nedićevoj Srbiji: 1941-1944, Beograd, 2009.
- Olivera Milosavljević, Potisnuta istina - Kolaboracija u Srbiji 1941-1944, Beograd, 2006.
External links
- War in the Balkans - 5
- Politička propaganda u okupiranoj Srbiji (in Serbian)
- Map
- Map
- Map
- History of Serbian Volunteer Corps
- Serbia at WorldStatesmen.org
- German Occupation of Serbia 1941-1944
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