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Military history of Bulgaria during World War II
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The military history of Bulgaria during World War II embraces a primary period of neutrality until 1 March 1941, a period of alliance with the Axis Powers until 9 September 1944 and a period of alignment with the Allies until the end of the war.
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The government of the Kingdom of Bulgaria under Bogdan Filov declared a position of neutrality upon the outbreak of World War II, being determined to observe it until the end of the war, but hoping for bloodless territorial gains, especially in the lands with a significant Bulgarian population occupied by neighbouring countries after the Second Balkan War and World War I. However, it was clear that the central geopolitical position of Bulgaria in the Balkans would inevitably lead to strong external pressure by both World War II factions. Turkey had a non-aggression pact with Bulgaria. On 7 September 1940, Bulgaria succeeded in negotiating a recovery of Southern Dobruja in the Axis-sponsored Treaty of Craiova (see Second Vienna Award). Southern Dobruja had been part of Romania since 1913. This recovery of territory reinforced Bulgarian hopes for resolving other territorial problems without direct involvement in the war.
Bulgaria was forced to join the Axis Powers in 1941, when German troops prepared to invade Greece from Romania reached the Bulgarian borders and demanded permission to pass through Bulgarian territory. Tsar Boris III officially joined the fascist bloc on 1 March 1941. With the Soviet Union in a non-aggression pact with Germany, there was little popular opposition to the decision.
On 6 April 1941, despite having officially joined the Axis Powers, the Bulgarian government maintained a course of military passivity during the initial stages of the invasion of Yugoslavia and the Battle of Greece. As German, Italian, and Hungarian troops crushed Yugoslavia and Greece, the Bulgarians remained on the side-lines. The Yugoslav government surrendered on April 17. The Greek government was to hold out until 30 April.
On 20 April, the period of Bulgarian passivity ended. The Bulgarian Army entered the Aegean region. The goal was to gain an Aegean Sea outlet in Thrace and Eastern Macedonia. The Bulgarians occupied territory between the Struma River and a line of demarcation running through Alexandroupoli and Svilengrad west of Maritsa. Included in the area occupied were the cities of Alexandroupoli (Дедеагач, Dedeagach), Komotini (Гюмюрджина, Gyumyurdzhina), Serres (Сяр, Syar), Xanthi (Ксанти), Drama (Драма) and Kavala (Кавала) and the islands of Thasos and Samothrace, as well as almost all of what is today the Republic of Macedonia and much of eastern Serbia. During the spring of 1943, the Bulgarian government, after protests led by the Bulgarian Orthodox Church and the Member of Parliament Dimitar Peshev, succeeded in saving the Jews from its own territory from Nazi concentration camps. However, the Bulgarian troops rounded up all Jews in Greek Macedonia and Vardar Macedonia and forwarded them to Auschwitz.
Bulgaria did not join the German invasion of the Soviet Union that began on 22 June 1941 and did not declare war on the country. However, despite the lack of official declarations of war by both sides, the Bulgarian Navy was involved in a number of skirmishes with the Soviet Black Sea Fleet, which attacked Bulgarian shipping. Besides this, Bulgarian armed forces garrisoned in the Balkans battled various resistance groups. The Bulgarian government was forced by the Germans to declare a token war on the United Kingdom and the United States near the end of 1941. This resulted in the bombing of Sofia and other Bulgarian cities by Allied aircraft.
The German invasion of the Soviet Union caused a significant wave of protests, which led to the activation of a mass guerrilla movement headed by the underground Bulgarian Communist Party. A resistance movement called Fatherland Front was set up in August 1942 by the Communist Party, the Zveno movement and a number of other parties to oppose then-current pro-Nazi government, after a number of Allied victories indicated that the Axis might lose the war. Partisan detachments were particularly active in the mountain areas of western and southern Bulgaria. In August 1943, after a visit to Germany, Bulgarian Tsar Boris III died suddenly. His 6-year-old son Simeon II succeeded him to the throne. But a council of regents was set up because of the heir's age. The new Prime Minister, Dobri Bozhilov, was in most respects a German puppet.
Bulgaria had maintained diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union while being a member of the Axis Powers. In the summer of 1944, after having crushed the Nazi defence around Iaşi and Chişinău, the Soviet Army was approaching the Balkans and Bulgaria. On 23 August 1944, Romania quit the Axis Powers and declared war on Germany. The Romanians allowed armed Soviet forces to cross its territory to reach Bulgaria. On 26 August 1944, the Fatherland Front made the decision to incite an armed rebellion against the government, which led to the appointment of a new government on 2 September. Support of the government was withheld by the Fatherland Front, since it was composed of pro-Nazi circles in a desperate attempt to keep their power. On 5 September 1944, the Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria and invaded the country. Within three days the Soviets occupied the northeastern part of Bulgaria along with the key port cities of Varna and Burgas. The Bulgarian Army was ordered to offer no resistance to the Soviets. On 8 September 1944, the Bulgarians changed sides and joined the Soviet Union in its war against Nazi Germany.[1]
Garrison detachments with Zveno officers at the head overthrew the government on the eve of 9 September, after taking strategic keypoints in Sofia and arresting the ministers. A new government of the Fatherland Front was appointed on 9 September with Kimon Georgiev as prime minister.
War was declared on Germany and its allies a day later and the weak divisions sent by the Axis Powers to invade Bulgaria were easily driven back. In Macedonia, the Bulgarian troops, surrounded by German forces and betrayed by high-ranking military commanders, fought their way back to the old borders of Bulgaria. Three Bulgarian armies (some 455,000 strong in total) entered Yugoslavia in September 1944 and moved from Sofia to Niš and Skopje with the strategic task of blocking the German forces withdrawing from Greece (under the command of Major Georgi Marinov Mandjev from the village of Goliamo Sharkovo, Elhovska Okolia). Southern and eastern Serbia and Macedonia were liberated within a month and the 130,000-strong Bulgarian First Army continued to Hungary, driving off the Germans and entering Austria in April 1945. Contact was established with the British Eighth Army in the town of Klagenfurt on 8 May 1945, the day the Nazi government in Germany capitulated.
As a consequence of World War II, a Communist regime was installed in Bulgaria with Georgi Dimitrov in front. The monarchy was abolished and the tsar was sent into exile.
The Paris Peace Treaties of 1947 confirmed the incorporation of Southern Dobruja into Bulgaria during the war, thus making Bulgaria the only German ally that increased its pre-WWII territory. The occupied parts of the Aegean region and Vardar Macedonia remaining within the borders of Bulgaria were returned, with 150,000 Bulgarians being expelled from Western Thrace.
- Dimitrov, Božidar (1994). "Bulgaria during World War II", Bulgaria: illustrated history. Sofia: Borina. ISBN 9545000449.
- Делев, Петър; et al. (2006). "51. България в годините на Втората световна война", История и цивилизация за 11. клас (in Bulgarian). Труд, Сирма.
- (2005) "Изборът между Сталин и Хитлер. Избор няма", Българите и България (in Bulgarian). Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria, Trud, Sirma.
- Castellan, Georges (1999). История на Балканите XIV–XX век, trans. Лиляна Цанева (in Bulgarian), Пловдив: Хермес, pp. 459-463, 476-477. ISBN 954-459-901-0.
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