Battle for Belgrade (1944 X)

[Qvist]

Hello Mark

Thanks for that. The ten-day reports are as previously mentioned not neccessarily accurate. Generally however they do capture the losses, though sometimes with delays. In earlier instances when they have been compared with German loss figures drawn from published sources (Crimea, Narva), the tendency has rather been for them to suggest higher than lower figures, when this is taken into account. This is a battle that I do not in any way have any specialised knowledge about, but I did not find surprising to find fairly low losses given that the Soviet (and Yugoslav) casualties were also so light. Several other reports also present a fairly similar picture. For example, RH2-1341-55 gives a figure of 17,000 "unwiderbringliche Verluste" for OB SO June-November 1944. The document is from 2 December. It is titled "Aufschlüsselung der unwiderbr. etc", and refers presumably just to dead and missing. RH2-1355-89, which is an overview providing losses by army group on a monthly basis from June 44 to January 45, states 5,657 in September, 9,534 casualties in October, 11,788 in November, 6,127 in December and just a few hundred in January.

That being said, with the divisional figures quoted, there is clearly reason to not put a double line under the figures they quote. There were no additional reported large losses in the period following for OB SO, but perhaps I have not looked long enough ahead. I will have another look, and post something more detailed. I would like to stress that I have done nothing more here than quote some figures from certain documents - I have not done any analysis as such on them. Here we are of course also entering the period when the figures are generally starting to get a bit iffy, and it is not inconceivable that the losses were never fully harmonised.

Just to weed out one possible explanation - we are certain that all of these forces were under command of OB Südost?

cheers

[G. Trifkovic]

NOVJ KIA in Belgrade fighting:2953;
RKKA KIA:cca. 1000;

http://www.vj.yu/publikacije/Informator/inform3.htm

Cheers,

[Mark V.]

Hi Qvist,

Thanks for your post.

Just to weed out one possible explanation - we are certain that all of these forces were under command of OB Südost?

Good point but at least on the field, all German army and W-SS formations on the Balkans were indirectly subordinated to Oberbefehlshaber Südost (von Weichs) through two subordinate army groups - HG E and HG F. However OB SO was at the same time also in charge of HG F - could this be the reason for these quite big disparities? - I found another estimate of around 50,000 casualties for OB SO in October-November 1944 in the above mentioned Hnilicka’s book. So if by coincidence HG E casualties weren’t reported through OBSO than I guess the problem is solved.

As regards to the comparative Soviet/Yugoslav casualties these are only for the Belgrade operation in the contrast to the ones suffered by the OB SO, which was also involved in heavy battles with Bulgarian army forces.

BR

[Qvist]

Hi Mark

The OB SO lossess encompas HG E, HG F and, until 1.12.44, PzAOK 2. After 1.12., the PzAOK 2 losses up until that time (since the transfer of the HQ from the Eastern Front in the fall of 1943) are carried under "sonstige". The way the ten-day reports work, they provide the cumulative total of losses since 21 June 1941 (except in certain cases, such as PzAOK 2). The losses for a given period is found by subtracting the earlier total from the later. Hence, it is not a critical handicap to miss some of the reports (which unfortunately I do).

These are the PzAOK 2 losses (by month and dekade, ie, II Sep= 11.-20. September):

I Sep: 1336
II Sep: 288
III SEp & I Oct: 2383
II & III Oct & I Nov: 1995
II Nov: 2407
III Nov: 3956
I Dec: 2301
II Dec: 85
III Dec:1623

These last three then are not included in the OB SO figures.

The other main formation is HG E, which reported 9,700 casulaties between 20 August and 10 november. Thereafter, its cumulative loss total remains static until 10 December. It reported 11,137 losses during December and January. These might include some delayed figures, but they could also reflect losses during that period.

The remainder of the figures are HG F, but those are very low.

A cumulative total of 46,506 were given on 20 August:
HG E: 18,055
PzAOK 2: 27,048
HG F: 1,403

On 30 November, 69,970:
HG E: 27,755
PzAOK 2: 39,413
Sonstige (HG F): 2,802

And on 10 January, 81,482:
HG E: 37,920
Sonstige (ie, PzAOK 2 until 1 december, HG F): 43,562

Judging from the OOB as of late November, it seems this would work out to no more than about 1,000 casualties per division on average during September, October and November. As mentioned, there is the possibility that the reported figures are not accurate and that they were not fully harmonised later, as this approaches the period when it is known these figures are starting to become unreliable. Unfortunately, I know much too little about this campaign and its command arrangements to be able to do a really useful analysis of the figures. Sorry, I can't be of more help, but these are at least some data points, if of somehat uncertain validity.

One thing we have not touched upon yet however is the basis of the figures given in some of the other works mentioned, such as Hnilicka. Any light on that?

A further thing to bear in mind is that "German losses" is not a clear-cut category. These figures will not, for example, include Luftwaffe or Kriegsmarine personnell (except LW Field Divisions). Perhaps Hnilicka's does. These appear to have been not neccessarily inconsequential. Unfortunately, the monthly OKW summaries lump together OB SW and OB SO for the LW and KM. For September 1944 for example, the report (RW4-482) states 40/15/17=72 casualties for the KM, but 2,042/3,505/2,692= 8,239 for the Luftwaffe. However, the vast majority of these are Fallschirmjäger losses, and these were of course in Italy, not the Balkans.

cheers

[Miha Grcar]

Qvist, great read! I'm pretty struck by the losses in PzAOK 2 you provided, thanks.

best,
Miha / Nibelung

[asiaticus]

If you look at the units with Armeeabteilung Serbien 10/44 and then look for them in 11/44 you see that most where eradicated or badly mauled. The Belgrade campaign looks like it was a catastrophe for the Germans in the Balkans.


10/44 Armeeabteilung Serbien (Armee Group F)
- Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger
- Korpsgruppe Müller
- 1st Serbian Assault Corps
- Russian Defence Corps


11/44 Armeeabteilung Serbien disbanded
- Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger disbanded
- Korpsgruppe Müller disbanded 11/44
- 1st Serbian Assault Corps reduced but survived to end of war with the Chetnik forces.
- Russian Defence Corps reduced but survived to end of war.


10/44 10 Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger (South-East Command )
- 117th Jäger Division
- 118th Jäger Division
- 20th Air Defence Division
- Russian Defence Corps
- 191st Assault Gun Brigade
- Serbian Volunteer Corps SDK
- Municipal State Guard Battalion
- Municipal State Guard Battalion
- Municipal State Guard Battalion
- 440th Fortress Brigade
- "Fortress Belgrade" Regiment
- 18th SS Police Mountain Regiment
- 1st Police Regiment
- 2nd Police Regiment
- 3rd Police Regiment
- 5th Motorized Police Regiment
- 9th Police Regiment
- Gendermaire Replacement Regiment
- 146th Replacement Regiment
- Replacement Battalion, 7th SS Division
- 28th Security Battalion (Landesschützen)
- 12th Tank Battalion
- I/202nd Beutepanzer Rgt


11/44 Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger gone
- 117th Jäger Division with LXVIII Corps
- 118th Jäger Division with Gruppe General Kuebler reduced but survived.
- Russian Defence Corps (Russisches Schutzkorps) reduced but survived to end of war.
- Serbian Volunteer Corps SDK reduced but survived to end of war.
Remainder apparently destoyed or disbanded.


10/44 Korpsgruppe Müller
- Brandenburg Panzergrenadier Division
- 1st Mountain Division
- 92nd Motorized Infantry Brigade
- Sturm-Regmiment "Rhodos"
- 54th Jäger Regiment
- 3rd Police Regiment
- 116th Reconnaissance Battalion
- 44th Anti-tank Battalion
- 738th Turkmenistan Battalion
- 88mm AA Battalion, 4th SS Police Division

11/44 Korpsgruppe Müller
-7th SS Mountain Division "Prinz Eugen"
- 104th Jäger Division

Note none of the old units remain as viable combat units and Korpsgruppe Müller was dissolved the same month.

[Qvist]

Well, I would be very careful about drawing from this any conclusions about units being destroyed or disbanded.

- There's a difference between commands and units. That commands (and especially ad-hoc commands, such as most of these) are dissolved says little about the units under their commands
- Units can have been transferred to other commands. This pertains, for example, to the 4th SS and 1.GbD, if I remember correctly
- I notice that while the October overviews contain a wide array of units down to batallion level, the November ones name only divisions and larger commands. This hardly suggests that all the batallions and regiments have been disbanded or destroyed.


In short, it would be neccesssary to track the fate of each of these units in order to draw or infer such a conclusion.

cheers

[Michate]

It may be added many of the units mentioned for October were of a less regular nature or did not belong to the army.

However I have read (do not remember where, may have been Hnilicka) that 1. Geb. Div. really did suffer heavy losses when passing the Belgrad bottleneck and was rebuilt as "1. Volks-Gebirgs-Division".

[Qvist]

In fact, none of the divisions that disappear from these commands were disbanded or destroyed:

20.Flak-Division: Hungary and Germany from October 44 onwards
Brandenburg Division: Eastern Front after October and until end of the war
1.GbD: Hungary and Austria for the remainder of the war
4.SS: Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Germany until end of war


cheers

[G. Trifkovic]

Way off topic Mr. Quist,but I'll ask anyway:

Would you have casaulty figures for Befehlshaber der Deutsches Truppen in Kroatien for the last two weeks of May and two first week of June 1943?

Thanks very much,

Gaius

[asiaticus]

I missed mentioning the continued existance of the Brandenburg Division. Too quick with the enter key. Knew about that.

Did not know about 20th Luftwaffe Div. continuing. Wonder if they were in the battle at all.

From what I could find out most of the Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger minor units disappeared. It would be interesting to see what happened to all of these if any
record exists.

AFAIK most of Korpsgruppe Müller's units (except for Brandenburg Div.) were destroyed or decimated SE of the city as part of KG Wittman that was attempting to break out of encirclment to the west.

[Qvist]

Did not know about 20th Luftwaffe Div. continuing. Wonder if they were in the battle at all.

I thought that was 20.Flak-Division?

From what I could find out most of the Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger minor units disappeared. It would be interesting to see what happened to all of these if any
record exists.

AFAIK most of Korpsgruppe Müller's units (except for Brandenburg Div.) were destroyed or decimated SE of the city as part of KG Wittman that was attempting to break out of encirclment to the west.

Well, you'll need something better than these OOBs to settle that. Many of these units are difficult to find information about. I'll look some more, pots what I come up with.

cheers

[Qvist]

10/44 Armeeabteilung Serbien (Armee Group F)
- Korpsgruppe Schneckenburger
- Korpsgruppe Müller
- 1st Serbian Assault Corps
- Russian Defence Corps

First of all, this seems a strange way to group the German forces. I have no OOB for October, but I do have ones for September and November. In both cases, the structure goes like this:

Heeresgruppe F:
Heeresgruppe E
PzAOK 2

The German casualty reporting follow the same structure. Obviously the two Korpsgruppen are some sort of ad-hoc temporary commands but do they represent the whole of HG F? It would appear strange if they did. Nor is there any mention of any AA Serbien. Where do these OOBs come from?

440th Fortress brigade: I can't find any mention of tihs unit. Not in Nafziger, not on any OOB, not on Feldgrau or AFB, not in Müller-Hillebrand. Typo? Ditto Festungsrgt "Beograd". SS-Polizei-Rgt 18 is still on the OOB of LXVIII AK as of 26 November. The rest are either minor units, police formations, parts of other units or training formations, or allied forces. I have no resources with which to track their fate.

Gren.Brig. 92 is still on the OOB on 26 November, though it is classified as "Reste". Sturm-Rgt "Rhodos" I have not been able to find any real info on. 54. Jäger-Rgt was apparently part of 100.Jäger-Division, which was sent tothe EF already in April. Possibly it left behind one its regiments. However, 54.JgRgt does not turn up on the OKH Kriegsgliederung either in September or November. Another typo?

In short - as far as my sources go, I am not able to confirm that any of the units mentioned were either dissolved or annihilated.

This impression seems to be strengthened by BA-MA RH2-1098-33-38, which is actually a systematic overview of all dissolved units as of 15 November - 11 pages listing even minor units dissolved, on all fronts. It contains no mention of any units dissolved in HG F/OB SO.

cheers

[Andreas]

It may be added many of the units mentioned for October were of a less regular nature or did not belong to the army.

However I have read (do not remember where, may have been Hnilicka) that 1. Geb. Div. really did suffer heavy losses when passing the Belgrad bottleneck and was rebuilt as "1. Volks-Gebirgs-Division".

Ziemke confirms that, as does Lexikon der Wehrmacht. The division was encircled in the Morava valley during the Belgrade campaign. On 18 Oct 1944 it attempted to break out. This succeeded under destruction of all heavy weapons and with heavy losses, including the divisional commander (not sure what happened to him, but on the 19th the division seems to have received a new commander). At the time the division command was in charge of a Kampfgruppe in the Morava valley (the division itself and the forces sent out to relieve it which had then become encircled in turn). The number of those managing to get out across the Sava river at Sabac is given as 12,000 in Army Group F KTB, but a later supplement to the KTB (25 Oct) states that 'the actual number "was substantially smaller."' Ziemke Stalingrad to Berlin pp.375-77

My guess from this is that the division can be rated as effectively destroyed in the battle. Regimental histories on Lexikon der Wehrmacht mention they were somewhat (notduerftig) brought up to strength again.

MH Vol III has the following disbandments to the end of 1944 for SE:

264. ID (bo) - into 264.VGD
133. Festungsdivision - disbanded
Sturmdivision Rhodos - into PzGrDiv Brandenburg, divisional staff as staff IV. Pzkp

All the best

Andreas

[Mark V.]

Thanks for the info, Qvist. Very informative.

I’m afraid I don’t have much more to offer. Hnilicka got the figure of 50,000 from his correspondence with General Geitner, former chief of staff by Militärbefehlshaber SO.

Yugoslav books, including the combined research written by both Yugoslav and Soviet historians, are also scarce with this sort of information, all of them use the official number for German casualties - 15,000 KIA and another 9,000 POW.

The only other referenced figure I could find is from Klaus Schmider: Partisanenkrieg in Jugoslawien, who quotes a document from Heeresartz im OKH for the number of casualties in the Southeastern theathre at 20,276 KIA and 21,800 MIA for the period 22.6.1941-31.3.1945. I’m not sure how useful it might proved to be if any at all. Perhaps subtracting them with the numbers in both categories prior to September 1944?

I can only agree what you have written regarding the fate of the units directly engaged in the battle for Belgrade (Gr. Schneckenburger and Gr.Müller). Some smaller formations were effectively destroyed and survivors distributed among other formations, other units returned to their parent divisions, while larger formations gradually received reinforcements and were rebuilt. Also there were only two complete divisions present at the start of Belgrade operation - 1.Geb.Div. and 7.SS-Geb.Div. plus the better part of Div. Brandenburg (prior to September 1944 this division’s units never fought under a unified command this was also the case in battle for Belgrade) and none of them fought in the city itself. Other units mentioned as divisions were just their battle groups airlifted from Greece, while their parent divisions caught up later.

Probably the worst hit (in October-November) were the Brandenburg regiments and Gren.Brig.(mot.)92, which were used after their breakout to fill the defensive positions on the Danube front N of Belgrade. In late November the Red Army opened up their offensive in this sector and overwhelmed the 2.Pz.Armee's positions. Allready weakened units again suffered very heavy losses.

BR