Page:Robert M. Kennedy - German Antiguerrilla Operations in the Balkans (1941-1944) - CMH Pub 104-18 (1954).pdf/75

 64 Its success in holding open the route of withdrawal to the north could not obscure the fact that Army Group E was in a difficult position. All available troops had been thrown into the fighting against the Russians and Bulgarians along a line roughly paralleling the southeastern Yugoslav border. In the rear areas in Yugoslav Macedonia, Albanian guerrillas and Partisan units roamed almost at will off the main roads and rail lines, and the Partisans had established contact with Bulgarian irregulars operating with their own army as reconnaissance and screening forces. Accordingly, Army Group E directed the complete evacuation of Greece and the establishment of a new defense along the line Scutari–Skoplje–Negotin. (Map 4.) On 14 October headquarters of Army Group E moved to Yugoslav Macedonia, where it estimated it had the equivalent of four German divisions holding a line of 375 miles against 131/2 Soviet and Bulgarian divisions. While the rugged country allowed them to confine their efforts to holding the mountain passes and other avenues of approach, this advantage was more than offset by the German inferiority in numbers and lack of air support and by the activities of the guerrillas. Information from prisoners revealed the Third Ukrainian Front (Army Group) to be in Sofiya directing operations, with the Thirty Seventh and Fifty Seventh Soviet Armies under its control. The Bulgarian armies were the First, Second, and Fourth. The use of Stuka aircraft by the Bulgarians, who had obtained them under the Axis equivalent of lend-lease during the period of the alliance with Germany, was particularly exasperating to the troops of Army Group E.

The few units still remaining in Greece, comprising mostly supply and other service troops, now found themselves in a position similar to that of the island garrisons. Lacking adequate transportation and the fire-power of combat units, these troops were ordered to fight to the last and to destroy all stocks and equipment of any value to the guerrillas. While some carried out the destruction as ordered, in a number of cases installation commanders turned critically needed food, medicines, and clothing over to agencies of the Greek Government. As British troops landed in southern Greece and the occupation rapidly approached its end, ELAS and EDES became engaged in a civil war that prevented both them and the British from participating in the pursuit of the Germans. On 2 November the last organized German units to evacuate Greece crossed the border into Yugoslavia, and German control of Greece was history.

'''III. The Area of Army Group F'''

The German command structure in Yugoslavia as of the first of the year was an anomaly. Army Group F, which controlled all German