Balkan campaign, fought firstly by Greek troops and RAF units against Italian forces which invaded Greece in October 1940; then by Greek, British, and Commonwealth forces which resisted the German invasion of Greece the following April; and finally by the Yugoslavs when their country was invaded by Axis forces at the same time as the Germans entered Greece (see Maps 11 and 12).
After Italy invaded Albania in April 1939 Mussolini gave a formal assurance that he had no designs on Greece. Nevertheless, the British and French governments immediately pledged themselves to maintain the independence of Greece and Romania, and Germany and Italy reacted by signing the
Pact of Steel.
When Italy declared war on 10 June 1940 Mussolini still maintained that he had no interest in Greece, but on 28 October 1940, after accusing Greece of allowing the UK to violate its neutrality, he sent troops across the border from Albania. Though its forces were dangerously stretched at home, and by the
battle for the Mediterranean, the UK immediately dispatched five RAF squadrons to Greece and established an inter-service mission there.
The Italian offensive, which was grossly under strength, collapsed when it met determined Greek resistance, and by 14 November the Greeks had begun a counter-offensive to drive the Italians back into Albania. The Greek C-in-C, General Alexandros Papagos (1883–1955), determined to strike before the Italians could be reinforced, pushed boldly forward. In December he captured Santa Quaranta and by 10 January 1941 had taken Klissoura, while British bombers, despite adverse weather, struck at Italian port facilities and lines of communication and supported the Greek advance on Valona.
In November 1940 the Germans began their own preparations for the invasion of Greece through Romania and Bulgaria, not so much to help the Italians as to protect the Romanian oilfields and secure their southern flank for their planned invasion of the USSR (see
BARBAROSSA). The Luftwaffe made its appearance in the area for the first time and in January 1941 a build-up of German troops started in Romania, which after the
fall of France had repudiated the Anglo-French pledge and aligned itself with the Nazis. The presence of Luftwaffe units in Bulgaria, and other indicators of German intentions, were revealed by
ULTRA intelligence, and by other sources, and by the second week in February—diplomatic efforts by the Germans to halt the fighting having so far proved fruitless—it was clear that Greece was to be attacked a second time.
During January 1941, in an atmosphere of mutual suspicion—the Greeks thought the British wanted to commit them to a long conflict against the Germans, while the British suspected the Greeks wanted to make a separate peace with the Italians—a British offer of ground forces and a Greek request for
matériel were both refused. To ensure the continued commitment of the Greeks Churchill sent a mission under
Anthony Eden. Aiming to get Yugoslavia and Turkey to resist any German invasion of Greece, Eden told the Greeks on 22 February that the British would send troops to help defend their country on condition that the Greeks agreed to abandon Thrace to the Axis forces by withdrawing south to a new defensive position, the Aliakmon Line, which ran from the mouth of the River Aliakmon, through Veroia and Edessa, to the Yugoslav frontier. The British understood the Greeks to have agreed to this plan. But when Eden returned to Athens on 2 March, having failed to embroil Turkey and with Yugoslavia still equivocal, he found that Papagos (whose understanding had been that forming the Aliakmon Line had been conditional on Yugoslavia's reply to Eden's request for support) had done nothing to organize the withdrawal of his troops to it.
On 9 March the Italians launched a second offensive against the Greeks on the Albanian front, but despite now having 28 divisions at their disposal they were unable to break through. During this month Yugoslavia was under constant pressure from Germany to join the
Tripartite Pact and eventually did so on 25 March. This precipitated an anti-Nazi
coup d'état and, having reluctantly agreed to the withdrawal of his troops from Thrace, Papagos now reversed his decision. This left three and a half Greek divisions manning the Metaxas Line to protect Salonika while another three formed the Aliakmon Line with a British and Commonwealth force commanded by
Lt-General Maitland Wilson. Rushed from the Middle East, this force comprised the New Zealand Division and 6th and 7th Australian Divisions of the 1st Australian Corps under
Lt-General Blamey with supporting tanks and artillery. The total of RAF squadrons was now seven, and though aided by two squadrons of
Western Desert Air Force bombers for night operations, two of these were operating with the Greeks on the Albanian front, and what remained were no match for the 800 or more operational aircraft the Germans had at their command.
On 6 April the Germans bombed Belgrade, inflicting heavy casualties. The same day
List's Twelfth Army began the simultaneous invasion of southern Yugoslavia and Greece from Bulgaria, and on 8 and 10 April German, Italian, and Hungarian armies attacked from surrounding countries into northern and central Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav Army amounted to a million men, but it was antiquated and riven by dissent,
mutinies, and inefficiency. Only 151 Germans were killed; Belgrade fell on 12 April; and the government capitulated on 17 April.
Lack of Yugoslav resistance allowed List's 40th Corps to move from southern Yugoslavia into Greece, outflanking the Aliakmon Line and isolating the Greek troops that Papagos had refused to withdraw from the Albanian front. At the same time List's 18th Corps broke through the Metaxas Line and captured Salonika on 9 April. Wilson was immediately obliged to adjust his defensive line to meet the threat by 40th Corps, and by 10 April was already beginning to withdraw to another line further back. On 14 April, with the Germans in Belgrade, he was forced to withdraw yet again, this time to Thermopylae. Though under constant pressure, Wilson's moves were well timed, and were in part due to the ULTRA intelligence he received. He was also told its source, the first time a commander in the field had been made privy to the secret. But overall ‘it is unlikely that Ultra assisted much in the defence of Greece, and certain that it could not have prevented defeat’. ( R. Bennett,
Ultra and Mediterranean Strategy, London, 1989, p. 50.)
Though it suffered a rebuff at Ptolemais the advance of the 40th Corps into Greece also threatened the Greek Army on the Albanian front which until 9 April had continued to attack the Italians. Papagos, knowing the effect on morale that an unforced withdrawal would cause, hesitated, and did not order his army back to a new defensive line until 12 April, which was too late. On the east coast New Zealand units, while withdrawing through the Olympus Pass on 14 April, mauled forward units of the advancing 18th Corps, but the plight of the Greek Army, now split from the British forces, became increasingly hopeless, and on 21 April the British decided to evacuate Greece. The same day the Greek Army opposing the Italians surrendered to the Germans after officers had deposed its commander.
The evacuation posed immense problems for the C-in-C Mediterranean,
Admiral Cunningham, but he eventually mustered an evacuation force which included 7 cruisers, 20 destroyers, 2 infantry assault ships, and 19 medium-sized troopships. Units of New Zealand Division and 6th Australian Division defended the Thermopylae Line as the withdrawal to the beaches began, with 25th New Zealand Battalion fighting a notable defensive action at Molos on 24 April. Embarkation from the Peloponnese beaches, and from those around Athens, began on the night of 24/25 April and lasted seven nights. The acute shortage of shipping meant that most troops were off-loaded at Crete though some went direct to Alexandria. The few remaining RAF aircraft had been flown to Crete to avoid certain destruction. Thus the Luftwaffe could attack unhindered, and two destroyers and four transports were sunk with heavy loss of life. Early on 26 April German parachutists captured the bridge across the Corinth Canal. This cut off many units from their beaches, including the rearguard 4th New Zealand Brigade at Erithrae, but they were eventually picked up from Port Raphti.
The evacuation was completed on the night of 30 April/1 May, though for months afterwards small groups of stragglers and individuals continued to escape as best they could. In total 50,732 men of several nationalities were saved from the beaches, while more were rescued by
flying boats operating between the Greek mainland and Crete. German ground forces had little opportunity to attack the evacuation beaches, though at Kalamata on 29 April some 7,000 Allied troops waiting to embark had to be abandoned and were subsequently forced to surrender.
The decision to send British troops to Greece was considered by
General Brooke ‘a definite strategic blunder’ and in September 1941 Churchill remarked that it was the only error his government had so far made. Certainly, by stripping
Wavell of his reserves, it handed the initiative to the Axis in the
Western Desert campaigns. See also
land power.
