February Campaign The February march campaign of 1944 had a great political and moral impact. The whole Bulgarian 5th Army, all of the Bulgarian police, as well as the army regiments stationed in
Kjustendil and
Gorna Dzumaja were engaged in the battles. After the February march, the Bulgarian government was forced to change its strategy – organization of the fighting would no longer be the responsibility of the police but of the army, and all organizations would be obliged to help the army.
Destruction of the Vardar Chetnik Corps At the end of January 1944, the High Command of the NOVM decided to launch an offensive, with the intention of destroying the VCC. On 29 February 1944 the partisans of the Third Macedonian Assault Brigade attacked the Chetnik flanks from north, west and south, while the Hristo Botev detachment hit the Chetniks from the east. In the battle for the village of
Sejac, the Vardar Chetnik Corps was totally destroyed, suffering 53 casualties (46 shot by partisans and 7 drowned in the river
Pčinja while attempting to flee). 97 Chetniks, including 5 officers, were captured in the action. On 3 March 1944 in the village of
Novo Selo, Partisan fighters destroyed the remaining force, capturing 30 Chetniks and more than 100 rifles and ammunition. Various local Chetnik bands, decentralized and acting on their own accord, such as the Porech Chetniks, continued to operate in certain parts of Macedonia but they were generally scattered and disorganized.
Actions in northern Vardar Macedonia and south-eastern Serbia After the operations which ended with the destruction of the Chetniks in Macedonia, the HQ of the NOVM, now acting as supreme commander of the partisan units in Vardar Macedonia, Kosovo and South Morava, decided to engage in three new attacks on the Bulgarian police and administration. On 26 April 1944 the Third Macedonian Assault Brigade together with the Kosovo detachment successfully attacked the city of
Ristovac, where 130 Bulgarian soldiers were killed and 20 captured by the Macedonian partisans. On 3 April 1944 the 3rd Macedonian Assault Brigade attacked the mining town of
Zletovo, where about 100 miners entered the ranks of the brigade.
Spring Offensive Because of increased partisan activity, the main supply lines for the German Army group "E" stationed in Greece and Albania were constantly ambushed and at the same time, the HQ of the MNOV was making plans to liberate western Macedonia and sent the 1st Macedonian-Kosovo Assault Brigade there. Pushing towards
Debarca, the 1st Macedonian-Kosovo Assault Brigade had clashes with the Bulgarians and Germans in
Zavoj and
Velmej. The Germans obtained reinforcements and on 8 May 1944 they counter-attacked. The fighting ended on 20 May 1944 with the Germans being pushed out of the region. After recapturing the Debarca area, more reinforcements became available, so the brigade was split in two brigades – the 1st Macedonian and 1st Kosovo Assault Brigades. In order to prevent the Germans and Bulgarians from taking total control of the action, the NOVM decided to make surprise attacks on enemy positions and to try to exhaust the enemy any way they could. The 2nd Macedonian Assault Brigade was sent to conduct several actions in
Povardarie (central Macedonia) and
Pelagonia near Prilep and Bitola.
ASNOM On 2 August 1944, on the 41st anniversary of the
Ilinden Uprising, the first session of the newly created
Anti-Fascist Assembly of the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) was held in the
Prohor Pčinjski Monastery, on which a Macedonian state was proclaimed under the name
Democratic Federal Macedonia. А
manifesto was issued outlining the future plans of ASNOM for unification of the whole Macedonian people and declaring the
Macedonian language as the official language of Macedonia. In spite of Tito's hopes to the contrary, the presiding committee of ASNOM was dominated by elements that were not known for their pro-Yugoslav sentiments. To the displeasure of those preferring joining the
Yugoslav Socialist Federation,
Metodija Andonov-Čento was elected president and
Panko Brashnarov (former member of
IMRO) vice-president. The assembly tried to secure as much independence as possible for Yugoslav Macedonia and gave priority to the unification of the three parts of Macedonia. Several sources state that Čento had made plans for creating an independent Macedonia which would be backed by the US. ASNOM was the governing body of Macedonia from its formation until April 1945.
"Maximalists" and "Minimalists" in August 1944. The Manifesto of ASNOM eventually became a compromise between the "maximalists" and the "minimalists" – the unification of the Macedonian people was discussed and propagandized but the decision was ultimately reached that Vardar Macedonia would become a part of the new Communist Yugoslavia. The proponents of the "maximalist" line were in favor of the creation of an independent United Macedonian state which would have ties with Yugoslavia, but not necessarily inclusion in a Yugoslav Federation. Proponents of this option included Metodija Andonov-Čento, as well as prominent figures of the former IMRO (United) such as Pavel Shatev, Panko Brashnarov, and others. They saw joining Yugoslavia as a form of Serbian dominance over Macedonia, and preferred membership in a Balkan Federation or else complete independence. led by
Ivan Mihailov. Unlike the leftist resistance, the right wing followers of IMRO were pro-Bulgarian orientated, and did not support the existence of a future Yugoslavia. The Bulgarian interior minister was put in charge to contact Mihajlov, who at the time was an advisor to Croatia's Nazi leader
Ante Pavelić. The state was to receive no military (troops or weapons) backing from Germany, because the Germans were running short on troops and weapons. Telegrams from the time indicate that an orderly Bulgarian-German troop withdrawal would precede the formation of such a puppet state. Bulgaria ordered its troops to withdraw from Macedonia on 2 September. In the evening on 3 September,
Ivan Mihailov was flown in first from Zagreb to Sofia, to see what 'can be saved". Two telegrams from 5 September at 1:7 and 6 September at 2:20 relay
Hitler's reorder for the establishment of such a state. Based on German telegrams from the time,
Ivan Mihailov was offered the establishment of such a state, but by 18:00 (6 pm) on 6 September, he declined for inability to gather support. The failure led to ordering German withdrawal from Greece on 6 September and appointing Senior-Field-Commandant for Greece Heinz Scheeuerlen as the new Senior-Field-Commandant for Macedonia. Germany closed its Consulate in Skopje and evacuated its staff together with
Ivan Mihailov and his wife out of Macedonia. The self-proclaimed state was left "virtually defenseless" following the withdrawal of German troops. The Germans did not support it as their forces withdrew from the region. In the chaos, they just tried to use the new-formed "Macedonian committees" as local police stations. Their members were former activists of
Bulgarian Action Committees.
Bulgaria switching sides In September 1944 the Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria and occupied part of the country. A coup d'état on 9 September led to Bulgaria joining the Soviets. A day earlier Bulgaria had declared war on Nazi Germany. This turn of events put Bulgarian divisions stationed in Macedonia in a difficult situation. German troops had closed round them, while their command was being nonplussed by the high treason of some staff officers, who had deserted to the German side. The withdrawing Bulgarian troops in Macedonia fought their way back to the old borders of Bulgaria.
Josip Broz formed relations with the new pro-Communist authorities in Bulgaria. After Bulgaria switching sides to the Allies negotiations between Tito and the Bulgarian Communist leaders were organized in September–October 1944, resulting in a military alliance between the Yugoslav forces and Bulgaria. That was followed by demobilization of the Macedonian recruits, who formed as much as 40–60% of the soldiers in some Bulgarian battalions. As a result, the
Gotse Delchev brigade was set up and equipped in Sofia by the Bulgarian government providing the basis for the deployment of considerable Yugoslav troops in Vardar Macedonia.
Final operations for the liberation of Macedonia on 14 November. First Bulgarian units entered the city on November 13.
Bulgarian Army Under the leadership of the new Bulgarian pro-Soviet government, four Bulgarian armies, 455,000 strong in total, were mobilized and reorganized. By the end of September, the Red Army
3rd Ukrainian Front troops were concentrated at the Bulgarian-Yugoslav border. In the early October 1944 three Bulgarian armies, consisting of around 340,000-man, together with the
Red Army reentered occupied Yugoslavia and moved from Sofia to
Niš, Skopje and
Pristina to blocking the German forces withdrawing from Greece. In Macedonia the Bulgarians operated in conjunction with the fighters of the NOVM, but this cooperation did not proceed without difficulties. The German Brigade
Angermiler was positioned at the
Kačanik Gorge. Skopje was defended by elements of the 22nd Infantry Division and parts of the 11th Luftwaffe Division (which was mainly involved in the fighting in eastern Macedonia), and units from other divisions. From 8 October to 19 November, the
Stratsin-Kumanovo operation was held and
Kratovo,
Kriva Palanka,
Kumanovo and
Skopje were taken. At the same time the
Bregalnitsa-Strumica operation was led, and the Wehrmacht was driven from the villages of
Delchevo,
Kočani,
Stip,
Strumica and
Veles. In parallel, the
Kosovo operation was also taking a place, aiming to expel the German forces from Kosovo.
Southern and Eastern Serbia, Kosovo and Vardar Macedonia were liberated by the end of November. The 3rd Ukrainian Front in collaboration with the
People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia and
Bulgarian People's Army carried out the
Belgrade Offensive. The 130,000-strong
Bulgarian First Army continued to Hungary, driving off the Germans, while the rest moved back to Bulgaria. On a series of maps from
Army Group E, showing its withdrawal through Macedonia and Southern Serbia, as well as in the memoirs of its
chief of staff, there is almost no indication of
Yugoslav Partisan units, but only Bulgarian divisions. In October 1944, 25 Bulgarian soldiers captured by the Germans managed to escape and hid in the city of
Ohrid. Despite threats that the city would come under artillery fire from the Germans, the soldiers were not handed over by the citizens. Subsequently, the Germans set a condition for a ransom of 12 kg. gold. To accomplish this, even a gold cross was removed from the roof of a local church. Strongly impressed by this act, the Germans refused to take the gold and to look for the fugitives further and left the city. Thus the soldiers were saved.
Macedonian partisans After the German retreat, forced by the Soviet-Bulgarian offensive in Serbia, North Macedonia and Kosovo in the autumn of 1944, the conscription increased significantly. In October 1944 more new brigades were formed. By the end of October 1944 in Vardar Macedonia there were 21 Macedonian, one
Kosovar, one Albanian, and the 1st Aegean Macedonian brigade (composed of 1500 armed former
Slavic-Macedonian National Liberation Front (SNOF) members that crossed the border into Vardar Macedonia after
ELAS ordered the dissolution of their unit). The 1st Macedonian Cavalry Brigade and the 1st Macedonian Automobile Brigade were formed using captured equipment, arms, vehicles, and horses. From August until the beginning of November three Engineering Brigades were formed which started repairing the roads. The new brigades were grouped in six new divisions, which made the total force of the People's Liberation Army of Macedonia three Corps composed of seven divisions, consisting of some 66,000 Macedonian Partisans. By mid-November 1944 the Germans were completely dislodged from Macedonia, and organs of "People's Authority" were established. After the liberation of Macedonia the XV Macedonian corps were sent on the
Syrmian Front with a personnel of 25,000 fighters and officers of which around 1,674 died, 3,400 were wounded and 378 went missing. in January 1945. The letters on the truck say: "For Berlin". Chronological composition by the number of the members of NOVM was as follows:
Aftermath ,
Metodija Andonov,
Dimitar Vlahov and
Lazar Koliševski, while
Mihajlo Apostolski is giving a speech on the
Skopje square in 1945. .The total number of casualties in Macedonia from World War II was approximately 24,000, as follows: 7,000 Jews, 6,000 Serbians, 6,000 ethnic Macedonians, 4,000 Albanians and 1,000 Bulgarians. This includes around 3,000 "collaborationists", "counter-revolutionaries" and civilian victims, 7,000 Jews exterminated in concentration camps, and 14,000 resistance fighters and soldiers. According to
Bogoljub Kočović the relative number of war losses was the lowest among the Macedonians, compared to the other ethnic groups in Yugoslavia: According to a Yugoslav census from 1966 on the casualties of the war, the ethnic Macedonian victims were 6,724. It appears the number of ethnic Macedonian partisans killed from October 1941 to October 1944 in direct battles against Bulgarians is only several dozens. Indicative of the weak resistance for most of the war towards the Bulgarians, a case which is still a taboo topic in North Macedonia. They are result from different reasons as follows: Despite Bulgaria's significant involvement on the side of the Allies at the end of the war, the country was not cast as a co-fighting country at the
Paris Peace Conference, 1946 and was ordered to
pay Yugoslavia war reparations for the occupation of Macedonia and Southern Serbia, which Yugoslavia unilaterally abandoned in 1947. After the war for the first time in history, the Macedonian people managed to obtain their statehood, nation and language. These events marked the defeat of the
Macedono-Bulgarianism and the victory of the
Macedonianism in the area.
Communist repressions After the liberation the
Presidium of the Anti-Fascist Assembly for the People's Liberation of Macedonia (
ASNOM), which was the governing body of Macedonia, made several statements and actions that were contradictory to the decisions of the Anti-Fascist Council of the People's Liberation of Yugoslavia (
AVNOJ), the Yugoslav executive authority. Tito's General Headquarters sent orders asking the forces of the MNOV to participate in the fighting in the
Syrmian Front for the final liberation of Yugoslavia. President Metodija Andonov-Čento and his associates debated whether to send the troops to Srem and help liberate Yugoslavia or to advance the troops under his command toward
Greek Macedonia in order to "unify the Macedonian people" into one country. In January 1945, the former members of the
Gotse Delchev Brigade then part of the XV Macedonian corps artillery platoon stationed at the
Skopje Fortress, and one of its infantry platoons at
Štip revolted against the order to be sent to the Srem front. They wanted to head to Thessaloniki as presumable capital of an imagined
United Macedonia.
Svetozar Vukmanović accused them of had fallen under Bulgarian influences. After they refused to disperse on both places, many were arrested on his order. According to some of the participants in this events there was no one shot as a consequence of the revolt. While according to Bulgarian sources there were dozens shot down. Andonov-Čento and his close associates were trying to minimize the ties with Yugoslavia as far as possible, which was contrary to the decisions of AVNOJ. As result Andonov-Čento was replaced by
Lazar Koliševski, who started fully implementing the pro-Yugoslav line. Čento himself was later imprisoned. The fabricated charges against him were of being a Western spy, a traitor working against the
SR Macedonia as part of
SFR Yugoslavia, being in close contacts with
IMRO terrorist, supporting a
pro-Bulgarian plan of an
Independent Macedonia, etc. The new leadership of the People's Republic of Macedonia headed by Lazar Kolishevski confirmed the decisions of AVNOJ, and Macedonia joined Yugoslavia. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia eventually all became part of the
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The Macedonian national feelings were already ripe at that time as compared to 1941. Subsequently, to wipe out the remaining
bulgarophile sentiments, the new Communist authorities persecuted the right-wing nationalists with the charges of "great-Bulgarian chauvinism". The next task was also to break up all the organisations that opposed the idea of Yugoslavia. So even older left-wing politicians, who were at some degree pro-Bulgarian oriented, were purged from their positions, then isolated, arrested and imprisoned on fabricated charges, as foreign agents, demanding greater independence, forming of conspirative political groups and the like. Besides, many people went throughout the
labor camp of
Goli Otok in the middle 1940s. The number of allegedly killed was 1,260 victims and also it is estimated that 50,000–100,000 were imprisoned, deported, sent to forced labor, tortured, etc. However, some Bulgarian researchers have questioned these figures, also noting that the assertion that these individuals were persecuted and killed solely on account of their Bulgarian national consciousness is deceptive.
Manipulation of historical events Macedonian communists incorporated their structures into the BCP. At the same time sizable part of the local administration, the soldiers recruited in the Bulgarian Army and the police officers stationed in Vardar Macedonia were native from the area. Even the only victim of the attack on 11 October 1941, celebrated today as the
day of the Macedonian Uprising against fascism, was a local man conscripted in the Bulgarian police. A significant part of the soldiers and some of the commanding officers during the occupation were local staff. Colonel Lyuben Apostolov, himself from
Kriva Palanka, was responsible for the massacre in Vataša. After the
Bulgarian coup d'etat of 1944, Apostolov was arrested and handed over to the authorities in Yugoslavia, where he was sentenced to death. However, after the war, the Yugoslav communist historiography did a lot to equate the term
Bulgarians with "fascistic occupiers". Today are some revisionist opinions in North Macedonia, this conflict was merely a civil war, and the significant resistance movement against the Bulgarians is only a historical myth. from
Kumanovo (01.11.1961). It concerns a military convoy transporting the remains of hundreds of Bulgarian soldiers to a new memorial build in the city of
Niš. They were victims of the fighting with the Germans from the fall of 1944. It became clear in the autumn of 1944, that the Bulgarian army supporting the
Belgrade Offensive of the
3rd Ukrainian Front, was the real force behind the driving the German Army Group E, counting ca. 300,000 soldiers, out of Southern Serbia, Kosovo and Macedonia. Nevertheless, the official Yugoslav and later Macedonian historiography, has played down its role by political grounds, actually at the cost of historical
deceptions. For example, according to Macedonian sources Bulgarians did not participate in the operations for the
capture of Skopje in the mid of November 1944, even as observers. Once the city was seized by the guerrillas, they were not even allowed to enter it. Nevertheless, the city was seized not without the decisive role of the Bulgarian troops. Per German military historian Karl Hnilicka, the Bulgarians developed their advance towards Skopje into a large-scale offensive, which gave rise to the danger for Army Group E of being cut off. The situation was desperate and the town was evacuated urgently at the night of 13/14 November. As result on 13 and 14 November parts of the First and Fourth Bulgarian Armies entered
Skopje. According to the British commissioner in the
Allied Commission in Sofia – general
Walter Oxley, Skopje was seized after several Bulgarian attacks, while the partisans were waiting on the hills around, but they moved on in time to support the Bulgarian entry into the city. Bulgarian sources maintain at first they entered the town, and namely Bulgarian detachments seized also its center at midnight. Subsequently,
a lot of Partisan monuments and memorials were built in SR Macedonia. Meanwhile, ca. 3,000 Bulgarian victims buried in different cemeteries in Yugoslavia, were collected in two ossuaries – in
Nis and in
Vukovar. The rest from the military cemeteries, including all of them in North Macedonia, were obliterated. Some of the Bulgarian victims were returned and buried in Bulgaria. In general 3,422 Bulgarian soldiers were killed and 2,136 were missing in the autumn of 1944 in Southern Serbia, North Macedonia and
Kosovo. reminiscent of the respective
Soviet propaganda style of art.
Modern references According to the Bulgarian Association for Research and Development of Civil Society, the 2016 WW2 Macedonian film
The Liberation of Skopje, is a propagandist piece against Bulgaria and breeds anti-Bulgarian hatred, sponsored by the Macedonian government. Another Macedonian movie
The Third Half was also controversial in Bulgaria over its depiction of Bulgarians in WW2.
Bulgarian
members of the
European Parliamentexpressed outrage over the film and claimed it was an attempt to manipulate the Balkan history and to spread hate against Bulgaria. They have insisted the Macedonian government has overdone with its nationalist activities. In October 2019 the Bulgarian government set tough terms for North Macedonia's EU candidature and part of them are to remove the phrase "Bulgarian fascistic occupiers" from all World War II historical landmarks, as well as to begin the rehabilitation of all people who suffered under former Yugoslav communist rule because of their Bulgarian identity. Bulgaria insists also the two countries must "harmonize" historic literature "overcoming the hate speech" against Bulgaria. In November 2020 Bulgaria blocked the official start of EU accession talks with North Macedonia. In an interview with Bulgarian media in the same month, the Prime Minister
Zoran Zaev acknowledged the involvement of Bulgarian troops in the capture of Skopje and other Macedonian towns, as well as that
Bulgarians were not fascist occupiers. The interview was a shock and was followed by a wave of hysterical nationalism in Skopje as well by protests demanding Zaev's resignation. According to the opinion of the former Macedonian Prime Minister
Ljubčo Georgievski, these reactions are organized by the
post-Yugoslav deep state, and are the result of ignorance, hypocrisy or politicking. On the other hand, another former Prime Minister
Vlado Buckovski, reacted that Macedonians and Bulgarians were natural allies, and were estranged intentionally by the Yugoslav policy after the WWII. == See also ==