The Belgrade Offensive or the Belgrade Strategic Offensive Operation (Serbo-Croatian: Beogradska ofenziva/ofanziva, Београдска офензива/офанзива; Russian: Белградская стратегическая наступательная операция, Belgradskaya strategicheskaya nastupatel'naya operatsiya) (14 September-24 November 1944) was an offensive military operation in which Belgrade was liberated from the German Wehrmacht by the joint efforts of the Yugoslav Partisans, the Soviet Red Army and the Bulgarian People's Army. This forces launched separate but loosely coordinated operations that successfully forced the Germans out of the Belgrade area.
The offensive involved the 1st Army Group of the Yugoslav Partisans to the west, the Soviet 3rd Ukrainian Front (including the Bulgarian 2nd Army), elements of the 2nd Ukrainian Front to the north and First, Third and elements of the Fourth Bulgarian Armies to the south. They conductied an offensive against part of Germany's Army Group E (Korpsgruppe "Schneckenburger" and "Stern") which included the forces of the Serbian fifth column, the Chetniks and the Serbian State Guard. The objective was to destroy the forces of the German Army Group E in the Suva Planina region, and those of Army Group F east of Velika Morava river, and ultimately to free Belgrade from Nazi occupation.
A secondary objective for the offensive was to sever the line of retreat for German Army Group E from Greece, Albania and the southern regions of Yugoslavia through Belgrade to Hungary, including the Salonica-Belgrade railroad.
Read more about Belgrade Offensive: Background, The Offensive, Aftermath
Famous quotes containing the word offensive:
“I abide by a rule concerning reviews: I will never ask, neither in writing nor in person, that a word be put in about my book.... One feels cleaner this way. When someone asks that his book be reviewed he risks running up against a vulgarity offensive to authorial sensibilities.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)