Denationalisation and depoliticisation learning Latin characters after the
Cyrillic script was banned by the Austro-Hungarian authorities. A portrait of Emperor
Franz Joseph can be seen on the wall. The occupational authorities considered Serbian national consciousness an existential threat to Austria-Hungary. Thus, the policies of the Military Governorate were aimed at depoliticising and denationalising the Serbian population. Public gatherings and political parties were banned, the
Cyrillic script was termed "dangerous to the state" () and banned from schools and public spaces, streets named after people perceived as being significant to Serbian national identity were renamed, the wearing of traditional Serbian clothing was proscribed and the
Gregorian calendar replaced the
Julian. Additionally, all Serbian students had to be educated in the German language, according to Austrian academic standards and through teachers imported from Austria. Significant cultural institutions such as the
Royal Serbian Academy, the
National Museum and the
National Library were closed down and looted of their historical artifacts and art collections. The
University of Belgrade, as well as various publishing houses and bookshops, were closed down. Schoolbooks and books in French, English, Russian and Italian were banned. Political expression was severely limited with the prohibition of newspaper publication except for the official MGG/S propaganda newspaper
Belgrader Nachrichten (published in Serbian as
Beogradske novine), which featured letters and photographs purporting to show how well those who stayed behind in occupied Serbia were living. Such propaganda was intended to convince Serbian soldiers who came across the
Belgrader Nachrichten to desert.
Repression In 1916, both Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria announced that Serbia had ceased to exist as a
political entity, and that its inhabitants could therefore not invoke the international rules of war dictating the treatment of civilians as defined by the
Geneva Conventions and the
Hague Conventions. The occupational authorities carried out numerous
summary executions with little or no legal process. Upon being found guilty by a military court, victims were usually shot or hanged. Martial law, such as (the martial law of self-defense), was employed to quash dissent and severe preventive measures were undertaken against civilians. The occupational authorities were gripped by the fear of
levée en masse and of civilians taking up arms. The Austro-Hungarian Army consequently employed the seizure of hostages from the general population and the burning of villages in punitive raids as a means of quelling resistance. These measures, as well as summary executions, were all permitted under section 61 of the (k.u.k army regulations). Disarming the populace was done by holding village elders responsible for handing over a certain quota of weapons that were judged to be held before the war began. The sentence for possession of a weapon was death by hanging. Military courts also tried civilians for newly defined offenses, including the crime of
lèse-majesté. Civilians suspected of engaging in resistance activities were subjected to the harshest measures, including hanging and shooting. The house of an offender's family would also be destroyed. Victims were usually hanged on the main squares of villages and towns, in full view of the general population. The lifeless bodies were left to hang by the noose for several days so as to clearly show the treatment reserved for "spies" and "traitors".
Deportation and forced labour The MGG/S, as well as the High Command in Vienna, considered sending civilian prisoners to internment camps as a preventive measure to discourage insurgent activities. During the occupation, between 150,000 and 200,000 men, women and children were deported to various camps in Austria-Hungary, it has been estimated they represented slightly more than 10 per cent of the Serb population. Since Serbia did not have its own
Red Cross, Serbian prisoners did not have access to the aid the Red Cross provided to other
Allied prisoners. Moreover, Serbian prisoners were not considered "enemy aliens" but "internal enemies" by Austria-Hungary's
Ministry of War. By defining them as "terrorists" or "insurgents", the Austro-Hungarian authorities were not obliged to disclose the number of captives they held, and which camps they were being held in, to Red Cross societies.Four significant waves of deportations occurred in occupied Serbia. The first occurred at the very start of the occupation, when Salis-Seewis rounded up 70,000 "dissidents", mostly able-bodied men, ex-soldiers, politically active individuals, as well as members of the political and cultural elite who had remained in the country after the retreat to Corfu. University professors, teachers, and priests, especially those who had participated in political, cultural or even athletic associations, were arrested and sent to internment camps. The second and largest deportations took place after
Romania entered the war on the side of the Allies on 27 August 1916. From mid-August to late October 1916, an order to arrest all males between the ages of 17 and 50 was issued. These men were targeted because they were of fighting age. More than 16,500 males were sent to internment camps during this round of deportations. During the
Toplica uprising, in the Spring of 1916 when armed resistance seemed to be spreading, more deportations took place. The fourth and final round of deportations occurred after the Allied breakthrough on the Salonica front in late 1918. In
Bohemia, the camp at Braunau (modern-day
Broumov,
Czech Republic) held about 35,000 prisoners, almost exclusively Serbian, civilian, military prisoners, men, women and children. According to a 1918 press report, an epidemic of dysentery almost wiped out all the children in the camp. After the war, a mass grave was found behind the camp containing the remains of 2,674 people (these remains were later moved to the crypt of the
Heinrichsgrün camp). The camp at Heinrichsgrün (modern-day
Jindřichovice, Czech Republic), held mostly Serbs, both soldiers and civilians, from the
Šumadija and
Kolubara districts of western Serbia. An average of 40 people died there every day. (in modern-day
Neusiedl am See,
Austria), where about 17,000 internees, mostly from Serbia and Montenegro, were heldIn Hungary, the largest
internment camps were in the
Nezsider district; Nezsider (modern-day
Neusiedl am See,
Austria) was a concentration camp primarily used to detain civilians from Serbia and Montenegro, and the principal camp for Serbs suspected to be "terrorists" or "agitators". The number of detainees by May 1917 was 9,934, including children as young as nine. Over the course of the war, the Nezsider camp held 17,000 internees, about 4,800 people are known to have perished at the camp. In addition to those deported to Hungary, some 30,000 Serb civilians were sent to Austrian camps or used as forced labour. In Lower Austria, the camps of
Drosendorf and Mittendorf held both Serbian soldiers and civilians. Thousand of Serbs perished during a typhus epidemic at the
Mauthausen camp in Upper Austria when about 14,000 were being held; an official Austro-Hungarian army report mentioned 5,600 prisoners of war buried in the camp graveyard in the early months of the war. According to official figures, between 27 December 1915 and 5 July 1917, 45,791 civilians and prisoners of war from Serbia and Montenegro were held captive at the camp in
Doboj, in
Bosnia. Around 12,000 are estimated to have perished there. Other camps held both civilians and prisoners of war, including
Boldogasszony, Nagymegyer (modern-day
Veľký Meder,
Slovakia),
Arad (modern-day
Romania),
Cegléd,
Kecskemét and
Győr. By May 1917, 39,359 people from Serbia, including women and children, were interned outside the country. These large scale deportations caused concern around Europe quickly becoming an international scandal. The Spanish authorities complained then, in April 1917, the
Holy See intervened through the office of the
Apostolic Nunciature to Austria against the internment of Serbian women and children between the ages of 10 and 15. By the end of the year, Austria-Hungary's Ministry of War admitted that 526 Serb children were in fact being held at Nezsider, but that it was necessary on the grounds of military security. According to a Red Cross report dated 1 February 1918, by the end of 1917, there were 206,500 prisoners of war and internees from Serbia in Austro-Hungarian and German camps. According to the historian Alan Kramer, the Serbians in Austro-Hungarian captivity received the worst treatment of all the prisoners, and at least 30,000–40,000 had died of starvation by January 1918.
Economic exploitation and famine The economic exploitation of Serbia during the occupation was characterised by various measures, including confiscations, requisitions, and the use of economic resources and labor. Extensive requisitions of materials such as wool, copper, brass, nickel, zinc, as well as food and leather were conducted by Special units, known as . Seized materials were sent to , an administrative body in Belgrade then transported to Austria-Hungary. Tensions between the Austrian and German authorities increased after Burián complained that the German military was employing a ruthless system of requisition, resulting in famine and the pauperisation of the population. Behind the front lines, the Germans "" was an area that Berlin had secured as a zone dedicated to agricultural production to feed its troops on the Salonica front. As the German exploitation of resources in occupied Serbia was handled by the German Oriental Society (), the exploitation of mines failed to satisfy the Dual Monarchy's need for vital raw materials because Germany took two-thirds of all production from Serbia as reparations for its military aid. Austro-Hungarian reports on the state of Serbia in 1915 noted famine threatening the occupation zone and a population in a desperate state after nearly four years of constant war. The return of refugees exacerbated the shortage of food. Reports from late 1915 spoke of the necessity of receiving urgent relief to avoid disaster. Starvation loomed after soldiers destroyed or captured much of Serbia's foodstuffs and livestock. Harvest yields and produced goods had to be turned over to authorities while food was rationed. In late 1915, reports from Serbia emphasised the urgent need for relief from Austria-Hungary to avert a looming disaster. Austrian Prime Minister,
Karl von Stürgkh, was inclined to respond positively to these appeals but Tisza and Conrad were firmly opposed to it. In early 1916, Conrad ordered that Serbia's resources be "squeezed dry" regardless of the consequences for the population. As news of the famine in Serbia spread around the world, campaigns were organised asking for Relief for Agonized Serbia. American, Swiss and Swedish
humanitarian organisations offered assistance. According to Red Cross reports, starvation killed more than 8,000 Serbians during the first winter under Austro-Hungarian occupation. By mid-May 1917, figures from the Habsburg High Command reported that 170,000 cattle, 190,000 sheep, and 50,000 pigs had been exported to Austria-Hungary. Austro-Hungarian sources often portrayed Serbia as a land of agricultural abundance during the occupation.
Alan Sked, referencing Jonathan E. Gumz's work, noted that "civilian ration quotas were higher than in starving Austria." This portrayal largely stemmed from Austro-Hungarian propaganda aimed at sustaining morale in the Habsburg hinterland by presenting occupied Serbia as a success story. Reports by neutral relief organisations and historians suggest that Serbia's actual situation was far more complex. The initial chaos of war had left Serbia devastated, with widespread hunger, epidemics, and infrastructural collapse.
Typhus reached epidemic proportions, with a mortality rate of 60%, and more than 150,000 civilian casualties were recorded in 1915 alone. By 1916, the food situation in Serbia temporarily improved due to a harvest that yielded 40% above the normal level. By the summer of 1916, aid to Serbia was effectively terminated, as noted by historian
Piotr S. Wandycz The British and French estimated that any food or supplies sent to Serbia would likely be requisitioned by Austria-Hungary and used for its own benefit. Deprived of large-scale relief and subjected to Austrian and Bulgarian requisitions, Serbia faced worsening conditions in the last two years of the war. By 1917, the number of seriously ill reached well into six figures, and food shortages caused the fatality rate to soar to one-third of the population. Reports from relief agencies and observers indicated that much of the population was vulnerable to famine and disease, exacerbated by continued requisitions and the blockade. Propaganda efforts aimed to obscure these realities. Austro-Hungarian-controlled newspapers, including
Die Belgrader Nachrichten, frequently advertised abundant food supplies and described Serbia as a prosperous, well-managed territory. Travel reports by journalists such as
Hans Richter described Serbia as a "garden of paradise" and confidently predicted it could become "the breadbasket of Europe," feeding not only the army but also Austro-Hungarian civilians. These portrayals stood in stark contrast to the dire conditions reported by neutral observers, which revealed a population enduring significant suffering during the occupation. Wandycz asserts that the scale of Serbia's suffering far exceeded that experienced by Belgium. According to the
Austrian War Ministry, population in the Austro-Hungarian-occupied zone of Serbia dropped by 50 per cent, a figure attributed to the severity of Austrian military courts as well as deaths from diseases caused by
malnutrition.
Resistance Immediately after the withdrawal of the Royal Serbian Army and the start of the Austro-Hungarian occupation, armed individuals and small groups of insurgents, called
Chetniks, made up of former soldiers who had remained in the country, began to wage a guerrilla campaign against the occupiers. The Chetniks had a long tradition as guerrillas after centuries of
Ottoman rule. Their actions were often considered heroic by the population and depicted in epic folk poetry, giving them strong local support. The first organised guerrilla group was formed in the Novi Pazar and Kosovska Mitrovica districts in early 1916, and was led by former army captain
Kosta Vojinović. In March 1916, General Conrad ordered that all resistance be quashed with ruthless severity.
Komitadjis, as the Austro-Hungarian army called the insurgents, were deemed outside international law by the MGG and were to be "completely wiped out".
Jovan Avakumović, a former
Prime Minister of Serbia, suggested to Salis-Seewis that he should issue a joint proclamation for the restoration of peace and order. Avakumović's proposal was turned down and Salis-Seewis ordered his arrest and internment. The Military Governorate responded to the multiplication of guerrilla groups by employing small Ottoman and Albanian counter-guerrilla units based on the
Streifkorps from Bosnia instead of regular patrol troops. In late September 1916, the Serbian High Command flew in the experienced Chetnik guerrilla leader
Kosta Pećanac from Allied Headquarters in Salonica. He was parachuted in by air to organize resistance in Serbia together with Vojinović. In early February 1917, a rebellion led by Vojinović broke out in the vicinity of
Kuršumlija and
Prokuplje. The insurgents, supported by volunteers and Chetniks from Montenegro, liberated Kuršumlija, Prokuplje,
Pusta Reka,
Lebane and
Ribarska. The uprising was planned to coincide with an Allied offensive. Later that month, a large scale
uprising broke out in the
Toplica District in Bulgarian-occupied Serbia. A force of 4,000 armed men and women managed to liberate a significant area in the Morava Valley before the uprising was put down. During the summer of 1917, the Austro-Hungarian Army was forced to bring in troops from the
Isonzo Front to reinforce the Bulgarian Army and Bulgarian paramilitary groups. Without the expected Allied support, the uprising collapsed. In late 1917, Vojinović was killed; Pećanac managed to escape and went into hiding. According to contemporary Austro-Hungarian Army reports, 20,000 Serbs were killed in the course of the rebellion, while 2,600 managed to escape into the forests. Despite the harsh repression, guerrilla groups managed to survive and were able to support Allied offensive operations in the summer of 1918. After the war, Chief of Staff Paul Kirch described the withdrawal of the German 11th Army:{{Quote ==Liberation of Serbia==