Serbian Volunteer Corps (World War II) - Active Duty

Active Duty

The volunteers saw their first action on 17 September 1941 in Dražanj village near Grocka, clearing the area of communists with four Yugoslav Partisans and two SDK members killed. In November before an offensive in the Republic of Užice Milan Nedić ordered that the SDK, Serbian State Guard and Kosta Pećanac's Chetniks should be put under joint command. On 22 November a joint military formation called the Šumadija Corps was formed under the command of Mušicki. The Corps was put under the command of the German 113th Division with which they fought between 25 and 29 November after the majority of Partisan troops had escaped to the Italian zone. After defeating Partisan troops, the Germans turned to fighting Draža Mihailović's Chetniks. Konstantin Mušicki informed Mihailović of the German plans and Mihailović managed to evade capture. Due to this Mušicki was arrested on 9 December in Čačak and replaced by Brigadier Ilija Kukić. Nedić intervened to secure Mušicki's release and he was back in command as soon as those Germans that were familiar with the case had left Belgrade at the end of 1942.

By 15 February 1942, the Corps had a strength of 172 officers and 3,513 men, which was very close to the planned strength for the five battalions. During 1942 SDK clashed with Partisans in southern Serbia. Although they inflicted considerable losses on the Partisans they didn't manage to crush them completely in southern Serbia. In western Serbia, SDK with gendarmerie, Germans and Chetniks attacked the Kosmaj, Valjevo and Suvobor Partisan battalions who had returned from Bosnia. They managed to defeat all except the Valjevo unit which escaped through enemy lines. At the end of 1942 there were 12 companies in 5 battalions and Germans granted them formal recognition on 1 January 1943, by officially changing its designation to the Serbian Volunteer Corps.

In 1943, the SDK clashed with the Partisans near Požarevac, Kruševac, Aranđelovac and in Mačva. They also clashed with Mihailović's Chetniks. On 28 September, Chetniks killed Dušan Marković, commander of the 4th volunteer battalion with 20 of his volunteers and soon after Miloš Vojnović Lautner, commander of the 3rd volunteer battalion. On 15 May the Wehrmacht captured 4000 Chetniks under Major Pavle Đurišić in Montenegro. Đurišić was to be sent to Strij camp in Poland but managed to escape and was in Belgrade in November that year. Đurišić was soon captured by the Gestapo but under guarantees of Nedić and Ljotić was released on the condition that he put his troops under SDK command. Đurišić accepted the offer, formed three SDK regiments and became Mušicki's second in command.

The Partisans had meanwhile grown to an army of considerable strength, and by the summer of 1943 were once again active throughout Serbia. This renewed activity greatly worried the responsible German commanders, since the strength of the occupation forces had declined considerably during the relatively peaceful months of 1942. Nedić was also aware of this problem, and went to see Adolf Hitler at Obersalzberg in the hope of finding a solution. The meeting was on 15 September 1943, and Nedić managed to secure an agreement for the reinforcement of the SDK by five additional battalions, with a further five to follow as circumstances permitted. These measures were immediately carried out, and by 20 October each of the five independent battalions had become a regiment with a strength of two battalions. Training for the five new battalions took place at the respective regimental garrison locations: SDK 1st Regiment in Valjevo, 2nd Regiment in Kragujevac, 3rd in Šabac, 4th in Smederevo, and 5th in Kruševac. Corps headquarters stayed in Belgrade. The SDK fought the Partisans throughout the spring (attacking 2nd and 5th Partisan Divisions in western Serbia) and summer of 1944 (in Toplice and Jablanice) in a number of large operations. On June 21 Milan Nedić ordered the formation of the Iron Regiment in Leskovac but during its formation most troops escaped to the Chetniks. By 21 August 1944 the five-regiment SDK had reached a strength of 9,886 officers and men, and from its inception to September 1944 had suffered 700 killed and 1,800 wounded in action.