A History of the Great War

The Flames of War: Part 1

The Eastern European Front: July 1st to December 31st

Where the war had started, Serbia was on her last legs. Besieged from virtually all sides her armies had been spent in her aggressive efforts to defend her country. Supply wise she was stretched to the limit and her troops were exhausted. Meanwhile her enemies continued to be able to supply fresh armies and munitions while the Serbs struggled to hold on to what they had. Her greatest centers of industry were mostly bombed out or occupied by the enemy. They had called nearly 400,000 men to war and the pool from which to call upon was shrinking every day.

With enemies virtually on every side the Serbians faced a difficult choice. The next offensive was likely to be overwhelming, and their nation was sure to be occupied if they could not (and few in the Serbian High Command thought they could) beat back the offensives. Thus it was a choice of treating with the enemy, or fighting on.

The Serbians chose to fight on.

Though they managed to beat back spoiling and probing attacks from July 2nd to July 12th they knew it was only a matter of time until a fully coordinated attack fell upon them. They would have an unexpectedly long reprieve to wait and plan.

The Entente commanders were all uncoordinated and unused to having to work together, having launched unrelated assaults and offensives independent of each other up till now. Matters were made worse by having to attempt to coordinate in four different languages. More importantly each side was more worried about the post-victory spoils and the carving up of territory than they were with an immediate offensive. Military action was stalled as empire builders argued testily over who would grab which pieces of Serbia. The Austrians had wanted to annex the whole nation at first, but the Bulgarians balked at that idea and the Turks were outraged, even some of Austria’s own ministers were wary of adding millions more uppity Slavs to the empire.
Bulgaria wished to annex pieces of Eastern Serbia while the Ottomans wished all of southern Serbia to be annexed into their province of Rumelia. The Austrians merely wanted control of both banks of the Drina River.

Finally on July 18th an acceptable compromise was reached by the Entente powers with Bulgaria getting its portions and Turkey getting most of southern Serbia and Austria to head up the immediate occupation government in Belgrade. Military plans were then set and it was agreed upon a coordinated general offensive by each side by August 5th. The Serbs meanwhile, were not planning to stick around to be occupied.

The King and his ministers, the highest members of the military, and all forces which could be successfully moved were placed upon the border of Albania and holding actions were implemented along the border. The plan was to break out towards the Greek front line and continue the fight from there. This government exodus of some 235,000 individuals would be followed by nearly 300,000 civilians wishing to flee.

So when the combined Entente offensive began, they found themselves facing fanatical resistance of holding units, but were surprised by the apparent lack of depth in the Serbian lines. The Ottomans however, were completely blindsided by what was in essence the entire Serbian army suddenly appearing on their flank and crashing through their offensive maneuvers with reckless abandon. Having technically invaded Albania the Serbs wheeled around the Turkish advance and cut straight through the surprised Turks towards the Greek lines around Bitola. The surprised (and somewhat dismayed) Turks suddenly found themselves outnumbered and outgunned and for a brief moment a corridor between the two lines was open cutting the Turkish forces in half.

This somewhat confusing state of affairs would last for two days which allowed the combined Greek and Serbian forces to seize Bitola and drive the refugees and soldiers through the gap into Greece. The Turks then wheeled around and threw all their strength into the teeth of the Serbian and Greek defenders. However, the momentum still lay firmly with the Coalition forces and the Greco-Serbian force held firm around Bitola and the Turks were pushed back and forced to consolidate their Serbian gains while licking their wounds against the Greco-Serbian alliance.

Despite this setback the combined Entente armies succeeded in crushing Serbia. In a little over three weeks they occupied the remaining portions of the country and by September 9th the country had fallen and was placed under the firm occupation of the Entente forces.

The long occupation had begun.

The occupation of Serbia would prove to be particularly brutal. Though the Austrians had no idea if they would be directly annexing Serbia they were interested in propping up a buffer state between themselves and their erstwhile allies in the post-war world. To that end they installed Austrian friendly officials in power and even put in a regency for choosing a new king who would be more amiable to the whims of the Hapsburgs. This met with a fair amount of resistance and in some cases outright riots. These were all put down with extreme brutality by the Austrian occupation forces and any signs of unrest were responded to with swift reprisals, usually the execution of a certain number of Serbs in retaliation for whatever offense had been committed. For an act of sabotage some twenty five Serbs would be killed, for the death of an Imperial soldier fifty Serbs would be killed. The largest such massacre would take place outside of Belgrade when some two hundred Serbs were hung in retaliation for the murder of a pro-Austrian official and his bodyguard.

These acts of reprisal merely fueled local resistance and would require additional Austro-Hungarian soldiers to put down. This policy was implemented by the Ottomans and the Bulgarians as well, with little mercy being shown to those who might be innocent and those who were definitely guilty. Through the coming months Serbian supplies would be siphoned off to help out the Austrian war effort and would cause even more suffering in Serbia.
However, most of the Austro-Hungarian forces were marching out of Serbia and into Hungary proper to face the Russians with Hungarian troops moving into the Carpathians and the Austrian troops moving towards Bohemia. The Prussians and the Russians had not been quiet in this period.

The Crimean Front:

The Russians for their part had continued their offensives into the Caucuses region of Turkey, emphasizing on where they were seeing success, and although it was too late to draw pressure off the Serbians, they could take the fight to the Turks. However, the local Turkish commander, Abdul Kerim Pasha had been replaced by Istanbul and reassigned to lead the forces occupying southern Serbia, his replacement, Ali Riza Kemal, was a sharp witted officer with a record of offensive mindedness who was known for his harsh discipline and willingness to lead from the front.

With Kemal in charge the Turks weathered the first Russian attack on July 11th and counterattacked from the 15th to the 16th taking back ground from the Russians. Throughout the July he would weather Russian attacks then counter attack, taking back ground bit by bit. His strategy paid off as by August the Russians had exhausted their supplies and were incapable of launching further offensives. Kemal ordered his forces on the offensive despite the wishes of Istanbul that he wait. Kemal blithely ignored those orders and on August 21st led his forces in assault against them and drove the Russians back. This saw an unexpected breakthrough as the Russian supply situation was critical with very little shot left for their artillery and their infantry quickly running out of bullets. Many Turkish attacks were only halted by furious Russian bayonet charges while the Turks often withdrew in order to further shell the Russians.

The front would remain mostly quiet for the next three months as supply problems in the vast mountain wilderness prevented either side from making a clear breakthrough, and winter was closing in fast. Kemal realized that unless he could manage to crush the Russians before the first snowfall his lines would turn static and he would be locked in a stalemate until the spring thaw. Unfortunately the government in Istanbul was now focusing its forces on combating the new joint Greco-Serbian forces. The coming snow falls came before either side could organize a new offensive and by December 31st the Turks and the Russians were dug in all along the front and waiting for the spring thaw to resume a general offensive.
 
Things aren't looking good for poor old Serbia indeed right now, poor beggars. An interesting TL with a good bit of background regarding the various nations that make up the movers and shakers. Will be interested to see where this goes, nowhere pleasant I'll bet.
 
Great stuff, and clearly well-researched (e.g. the little tidbit with the Austrian plans to install an Austrophilic monarchy in Serbia).

I know too little to speak one way or the other on the plausibility of all the military stuff, but it's very nicely and dramatically written. For one thing, you've actually got me to feel sorry for Karadjordjevic Serbia, which is quite a feat in its own right.

Thanks for the update!
 
Things aren't looking good for poor old Serbia indeed right now, poor beggars. An interesting TL with a good bit of background regarding the various nations that make up the movers and shakers. Will be interested to see where this goes, nowhere pleasant I'll bet.

Thank you! And yes poor little Serbia is getting the stuffing kicked out of her rigt now, but in fairness she did bring it upon herself :(

Great stuff, and clearly well-researched (e.g. the little tidbit with the Austrian plans to install an Austrophilic monarchy in Serbia).

I know too little to speak one way or the other on the plausibility of all the military stuff, but it's very nicely and dramatically written. For one thing, you've actually got me to feel sorry for Karadjordjevic Serbia, which is quite a feat in its own right.

Thanks for the update!

Thanks for the kind words :) I'm glad you're enjoying it! The military stuff is really based off of what I know of WWI and a bit of imagination thrown in. I'm much more comfortable describing land warfare so we shall see how plausible it remains when I start talking about the naval warfare :p
 
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