,
Tsar Ferdinand I of Bulgaria and
Field Marshal August von Mackensen in
Niš,
Serbia, 18 January 1916.
Occupation zones Two administrative zones supervised by a military commander were created: • Military Inspection Area of Morava: The zone for Serbia with its command in
Niš, it encompassed the territories of Eastern and Southern Serbia, (as laid down in the secret treaty between Bulgaria and Germany of 6 September 1915), which meant the
Južna Morava river valley east of the Morava river, divided into six districts and the
Pirot area. • Military Inspection Area of Macedonia: The zone encompassing
Macedonia, with its center in
Skopje; the greater part of
Kosovo field –
Pristina,
Prizren,
Gnjilane,
Urosevac,
Orahovac was also placed in that zone; the Bulgarians intended to include all of Kosovo and even parts of
Albania occupied by their troops into that zone, in the spring of 1916, this nearly resulted in armed conflict between Bulgarian and Austrian forces.
System of occupation Bulgarian policy in Macedonia, and to some degree in occupied Serbia, was motivated by what historian Alan Kramer has termed a 'dynamic of destruction' a desire not just to defeat the enemy militarily, but also to erase all traces of its culture and destroy any evidence that it had ever been there at all. To create pure Bulgarian territories, the Bulgarian military government started implementing in eastern Serbia, Macedonia, and parts of Kosovo a political system of systematic denationalization,
Bulgarisation, and economical exploitation. In the Morava zone, where the majority of the population was Serbs, transforming the region into a part of the Kingdom of Bulgaria, meant the extermination of the Serbian nation and culture and for this the removal of all representatives of Serbian national spirit; teachers, clergymen, journalists as well as members of Serbian Parliament as well as former soldiers, officers and military official between 18 and 50 years of age were interned, shot or deported to Bulgaria as prisoners of war or to work as forced labourers. In the zone of
Macedonia, Bulgaria, like Serbia, did not recognise the local Slav population as a separate ethnic or national group. Both Bulgaria and Serbia considered the Slavic-speaking population as being ethnically linked to their nation and thus asserted the right to seek their integration. The Bulgarian denationalisation policy, including its paramilitary aspect, was almost identical in its intent and execution to the
Serbianisation policy that preceded it in the contested region between the two countries. About half of
Vardar Macedonia, as the region was called by Serbia, was also inhabited by various ethnic groups who did not identify as Bulgarian; according to a 1912 survey by the British Foreign Office, namely Serbs,
Turks,
Albanians,
Greeks, Vlachs,
Jews and
Gypsies. In the eastern parts of the region, where a considerable part of Macedonian Slavs had pro-Bulgarian sentiments or felt themselves to be Bulgarians, that population welcomed the Bulgarian army as liberators. For the rest of the population and in particular for the Macedonian Slavs who identified as Serbs (or those who felt neither Serb nor Bulgarian), the brutality of the Bulgarian army, the irregulars
Komitadji and the later civil administration had all the features of ethnic cleansing.
Role of paramilitaries paramilitaries as part of
11th Macedonian Infantry Division a Bulgarian military unit c.1916 members, such as
Todor Aleksandrov and
Aleksandar Protogerov, played a prominent role in the oppression that took place during the Bulgarian occupation of Serbia. Besides the regular army, Bulgaria's paramilitary groups played an immense part in the fighting capabilities of Bulgaria, they were used as auxiliaries to provide knowledge of local conditions. They were known as komitadjis, these irregular troops also contributed strongly in brutalising the war. The notorious
Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) served as a gendarmerie working hand in glove to
Bulgarianise the region. During the war the
IMRO arose from a clandestine organization into an important factor of the Bulgarian nationalistic policy supporting the Bulgarization of the area. Some paramilitary companies joined the Bulgarian Army forming the
11th Macedonian Infantry Division. Additionally, this division had guerrilla companies formed by IMRO-irregulars, that participated at the beginning of 1916 in several massacres of Macedonian Serbs in the areas of
Azot,
Skopska Crna Gora and
Poreče. After the massacres, the Military police chief informed the Minister of Internal Affairs that he could not cope with the lawlessness of the paramilitaries. Regular Bulgarian troops took control of the region while komitadjis were appointed mayors and prefects and took control of the whole police structure. Every major town was controlled by a komitadji leader whose power became absolute and legitimized through a new administrative system. IMRO member
Naum Tomalevski, whose house was the headquarters of the
Ilinden Uprising of 1903, was appointed mayor of
Kruševo. After 1917 the Bulgarian government started using paramilitary groups to gain control over the internal situation in both
Pomoravlje and Macedonia.
Aleksandar Protogerov who headed the Bulgarian occupation troops in the Morava region crushed the uprising in the Toplica district with the help of IMRO irregulars. Bulgarians paramilitary groups were responsible for multiple instances of war crimes committing during the war in the parts of the Kingdom of Serbia under Bulgarian occupation.
War crimes Counter-insurgency operations Serbian Uprising , one of the leaders of the
Toplica insurrection|alt=Kosta Vojinović From October 1916 to February 1917, a spontaneous Serbian
uprising broke out in the Bulgarian-occupied territories of southern and eastern Serbia, notably in the valley of the
Južna Morava, on
Mount Kapaonik and in Kosovo. It followed attempts by the Bulgarian army to force draft Serbian men into the Bulgarian army and shoot those who resisted. The scheme was identical to that previously pursued by the Serbian army, which in August 1914 had attempted to conscript more than 60,000 people from Macedonia on the frontline defense of Serbia against the Austria-Hungarian attack. Chetnik Lieutenant
Kosta Milovanović-Pećanac was flown by the Serbian supreme command southwest of Niš to locate and organise rebel action against enemy lines of communication, in preparation for a Serbian army offensive from the Salonika front. Most Serbian guerrilla leaders, including both
Kosta Vojinović and Kosta Pećanac, set up their headquarters on Mount Kapaonik. By 3 March guerilla units made of local inhabitants had liberated
Kuršumlija and
Prokuplje as well as regions in the areas of
Vlasotince and
Sokobanja, coming 9 km southwest of Niš. General
Adolf Baron von Rhemen, governor of the
Military General Governorate of Serbia, ordered Austro-Hungarian troops to cross into the Bulgarian zone in support while requesting the Austrian Supreme Command to send assistance. Three armies of around 30,000 men tasked with crushing the uprising were sent to the region in the largest-ever anti-guerilla campaign. Austro-Hungarian, German and Bulgarian troops were brought from the
Macedonian and
Italian front, while in the Mitrovica district, Albanian gendarmes were sent to track down rebel leaders. On 8 March, the Bulgarian army started their offensive while supported by Albanian detachments, artillery and air support. The Austro-Hungarians launched their attack on 12 March 1917. after the rebellion. IMRO leader Aleksandar Protogerov was called to assist the Bulgarian army with the counter-insurgency operations, which were met with harsh reprisals throughout the country. On 10 March 1917 Protogerov issued an ultimatum to the chetniks to surrender within five days or face execution. They did not surrender, so Protogerov and his army attacked the civilian population and their villages. About 20,000 Serbs were killed in fighting, executions or reprisals. In the town of
Surdulica alone about 2,500 Serbian men were executed, thousands of women and children were interned and others were sent to prison. Thirty-six villages near
Leskovac were completely depopulated. Families were left without a house or home. More than 80,000 were deported to Bulgaria, in Niš, almost the entire male population, some 4,000 men, was deported. One batch was sent by train to
Pirot and the rest had to go on foot. On 24 March the Austro-Hungarian ordered its troops out of the Bulgarian zone, on 25 March the Bulgarian command officially ended its operation. On 28 March Protogerov declared an amnesty, promising internment instead of execution; none of the prominent Serb guerrilla and military leaders surrendered and continued instead guerilla actions on the occupiers throughout the rest of the war. The insurrection of the Serb population is remembered as the only armed uprising of an occupied population in the whole of World War One. ==Liberation and aftermath==