Greek general officers
are escorted to the surrender conference. Greece would be
garrisoned by German and Italian troops.
Supporting the offensive were the bombers of VIII
Flightcorps. As the German dive bombers swooped down on the Greek defences they
were disconcerted to met by heavy anti-aircraft fire, for alone amongst the
great European fortifications of the time, the defences of the Metaxas Line
included turret-mounted 37mm anti-aircraft guns. And unlike the poor-grade
fortress divisions that manned the Maginot Line, the Greek defenders were
members of high-grade units. The German XXX Corps was thrown back when it
attempted to cross the Nestos, suffering heavy casualties. The German mountain
troops, fighting their way down the Rupel Pass, were also forced to retreat.
Eventually, the XVIII Corps was able to make some progress against the Metaxas
Line, bringing up high-velocity guns in order to fire directly into the
embrasures of the Greek defences.
The German breakthrough did not come on the Metaxas Line,
however, but through the outflanking actions of the 2nd Panzer Division and the
XL Panzer Corps (General Stumme), which had invaded Yugoslav Macedonia before
turning south into Greece.
German breakthrough
Lieutenant General Vieil's 2nd Panzer Division - which had
played a prominent role in forging the Panzer Corridor in France in 1940 -
advanced into Yugoslavia on the 6th, eliminating the Bregalnica Division and
capturing Strumica. It then turned south down the Axios valley and entered
Greece on 8 April, encountering only limited opposition. An attempt to block
the progress of the German panzers at Kilkis was brushed aside, and after a
dash of some 90km (56 miles), the port of Salonika was in German hands. As a
consequence, all the Greek troops holding the Metaxas Line were cut off from
the rest of Greece, and at 1400 hours on 9 April, the Greek commander holding
the line, General Bakopoulos, instructed his 70,000 men to lay down their arms.
The main thrust into Greece was made by the XL Panzer Corps,
having first destroyed the Yugoslav army in and around Skopje (20,000 troops
and seven generals taken prisoner). The main axis of advance lay through the
Monastir gap, which ran through the high mountains into Greece. Spring had not
reached this region, and the Germans were forced to battle through snow and
freezing temperatures.
The German advance had been spearheaded by the 9th Panzer
Division and the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler, a reinforced motorised brigade
that had won its spurs in the fighting in France. On 10 April, the
Leibstandarte was ordered to take the Klidi Pass, the main route into Greece.
Instead of Yugoslavs, the SS troops faced better-trained Australians and New
Zealanders of the British expeditionary force. Germans casualties mounted but
after two days of hard fighting the defenders were prised from their positions,
and the Germans made their way into the heart of Greece.
Shortly afterwards, the reconnaissance battalion of the
Leibstandarte found itself engaged in a tough battle with Greek troops holding
the Klisura Pass. The battalion commander, Kurt Meyer, sent two of his
companies to attack the position from the flanks, while he led a detachment up
the main road to the pass. During his advance, the Greeks let off a series of
demolition charges and raked the advancing SS troops with machine-gun fire.
Meyer and his soldiers were pinned down by heavy fire, seemingly unable to
move. Meyer recounted how he solved this problem, using 'dynamic' SS
leadership:
A feeling of nausea
tightens my throat. I yell to [Untersturmführer] Emil Wawrzinek to get the attack moving. But the good Emil just looks
at me as if he has doubts about my sanity. Machine-gun fire smacks against the
rocks in front of us. How can I get Wawrzinek to take that first leap? In my
distress, I feel the smooth roundness of my (egg) hand grenade in my hand. I
shout at the group. Everybody looks thunderstruck at me as I brandish the hand
grenade, pull the pin, and roll it precisely behind the last man. Never again
did I witness such a concerted leap forward as at that second. As if bitten by
tarantulas, we dive around the rock spur and into a fresh crater. The spell is
broken. The hand grenade has cured our lameness. We grin at each other, and
head forward to the next cover.
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