αναδημοσίευση από: http://thesis.haverford.edu/dspace/handle/10066/5378?show=full
Hans-Joachim
Hoppe, Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora 11(3), 41-54. (1984)
Introduction
This
presentation will deal mainly with the Bulgarian occupation policy toward
Greece, but at first, a short survey will be given about the relations between
Germany, Bulgaria, and Greece, as the very harsh occupation policy of Bulgaria,
which stood in contrast to its cautious foreign and internal policy, cannot be
understood without reflecting the mutual relationship between the three
countries. The rapprochement between Germany and Bulgaria[1]
in the late thirties culminated in the Bulgarian entry in the Tripartite Pact
on March 1, 1941, and the transit of German troops through Bulgaria for the
campaign against Greece. The Bulgarian readiness was rewarded by territorial
promises at the expense of Greece. German-Bulgarian relations have to be, seen in the context of the
German-Greek relationship:[2]
the inclusion of both Bulgaria and Greece in the national-socialist concept of
Southeastern Europe and Hitler's decision to support the unsuccessful Italian
troops and expel the British from Greek territory to secure it for the Axis hemisphere.
The
Bulgarian-Greek relationship,[3]
with its short periods of friend-ship and longer ones of hostility, also has to
be considered. As a result of the events of the Second Balkan War and the First
World War, Greek-Bulgarian relations were determined by Bulgaria's wish to
regain its lost territories. It was a tragedy for the fate of Southeastern
Europe that the two countries did not succeed in reaching an understanding
because of the lack of readiness to compromise on both sides. The un bridgeable
contrasts between the two countries facilitated the influence of the Axis in
the Balkan region. The Bulgarian policy in the Occupied-Aegean-Macedonia-Thrace
zone will be shown in the context of the German policy in this area. Special
consideration will be given to the anti-Jewish measures in the occupied
territories.
The Relations Between Germany, Bulgaria, and Greece
Greece and
Bulgaria were included in the mid-thirties in Germany's "informal
empire" in Southeast Europe.[4]
By growing economic penetration, Germany by 1939 occupied first place in the
trade of all Balkan states. The German share in trade with Bulgaria was by far
the highest-67.8% of exports, 65.5% of imports—while that with Greece was the lowest-29.9%
of exports, 31.9% of imports.[5]
Increasing German power in Central Europe also effected more or less, a
political orientation of the Balkan states toward Germany, which was combined
from the Munich Agreement onward, in the case of Bulgaria (and Hungary), with
the hope of territorial revision, and in the case of the First World War
winners such as Yugoslavia, Rumania, and Greece, with anxiety about maintaining
their possessions. To secure its economic and political interests in that
region, however, Germany urged the opposing states into a modus vivendi between
winners and losers on the basis of the status quo. Whereas Bulgaria pursued a
cautious policy of neutrality (with a pro-German accent) and of peaceful
revision (recalling the unlucky event of the First World War), Greece was
driven by tensions with Bulgaria—and even more with Italy, which controled the
Greek border through its satellite, Albania—to its traditional orientation to Great
Britain. One cause of tension between Bulgaria and Greece was the unsolved
Thracian Question: with the Treaty of Neuilly (1919) and Lausanne (1923),
Bulgaria had lost its access to the Aegean Sea. Although both countries agreed
upon a voluntary exchange of population in Thrace and Macedonia, Greek
authorities exerted pressure to
diminish the
proportion of Slays in this region, and they settled Greek refugees from Asia
Minor there. Nevertheless, Sofia demanded some outlet to the Aegean Sea, but
Athens was only willing to concede a trade deposit. Bulgaria refused this in
order not to jeopardize its future claims. A war with Bulgaria was almost
caused by General Theodoros Pangalos, who, after a serious border incident in
October 1925, ordered Greek troops to invade the Bulgarian border district and
to bombard the town of Petrich.[6]
Because of the unsolved question of revision, Bulgaria did not join a Balkan
Entente, but remained isolated when, in February 1934, Greece, Turkey,
Yugoslavia, and Rumania concluded the Balkan Pact, which aimed directly against
Bulgarian revisionist claims. But even in the following years, Bulgaria did not
imitate Hitler's policy of unilateral and arbitrary revision, wanting instead
to avoid risks and waiting for a favorable situation to realize its demands.
Very late at the end of July 1938, Prime Minister Metaxas and his Bulgarian colleague
Kioseivanov signed an agreement in Salonika, which freed Bulgaria from armament
restrictions and allowed Bulgarian troops to enter the hitherto demilitarized
southern border districts. Kioseivanov and Metaxas, in the name of the Balkan
Pact members, confirmed their mutual wish to renounce violence.[7]
In June 1938,
Bulgaria was called upon for the first time to incline more clearly to the Axis
powers. King Boris refused. But the Munich decisions and the German and
Hungarian successes in their territorial claims awakened in Bulgaria a wave of
nationalism which the government could not neglect. In October 1938, there were
talks with Belgrade about joint endeavors to obtain access to the Aegean Sea.
In December, the Bulgarian envoy to Berlin explained the Bulgarian claims on
Greece; the officials of the German foreign ministry were evasive, but
nourished the Bulgarian wishes in the hope the country would enter into closer political
connections with Germany. They wanted Bulgaria to take part in a contest for
German favor between revisionist and anti-revisionist states in the Balkans.
After the Italian occupation of Albania (April 7, 1939), Britain and France
guaranteed their support to Rumania and Greece, but they failed to bring
Bulgaria into an anti-Axis position. Considering, too, the Turkish change of
policy toward Britain and France (declaration in May/June 1939), Hitler, for
the first time (in July), supported Bulgarian aspirations toward the Aegean
Sea, "that on one of the most important straits not only Turkey, but also a
friendly country (to the Axis) maintains its influence." [8]
After the
outbreak of the Second World War, the Bulgarian government emphasized its policy
of nonalignment. In autumn 1940, it also turned down plans for a combined
Italian-Bulgarian attack against Greece. And when Italy alone invaded Greece,
Bulgaria facilitated Greek resistance by its own passivity. When Germany called
on Bulgaria to enter the Tripartite Pact and make its territory available as a base
for a German attack on Greece, the Bulgarian leadeship succeeded in retarding
the talks. At the same time, the Soviet Union, as a Balkan rival to Germany,
tried to entice Bulgaria into concluding a pact of mutual assistance by
offering the whole of western and eastern Thrace at the expense of both Turkey
and Greece.[9] Instead
of this, in March 1941, Bulgaria joined the alliance with Germany for
territorial promises. It took this step, as the action seemed to be inevitable.[10]
German and Bulgarian Decisions on Thrace and Macedonia
At the solemn
ceremony of joining the Pact in the Belvedere Palace in Vienna, the German
Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ribbentrop, confirmed in a special note "that
Bulgaria shall obtain by a new regulation of borders in the Balkans an access
to the Aegean Sea approximately from the mouth of the Strum in the West to the
mouth of the Maritsa in the East."[11]
On April 6, 1941, German troops simultaneously invaded Yugoslavia and Greece.
Even during the campaign, the Bulgarians pressed for realization of the
territorial promises to them. On April 17, Berlin allowed them to occupy Greek
Thrace and Serbian Macedonia. But the final border regulations were not to be
made before the conclusion of a peace treaty. On April 24, the Bulgarians
occupied
Thrace, except
for a small corner at the Turkish border, the region of Salonika—which remained
under German occupation—and a small part of western Thrace, which was given to
the Italians.
Although
Bulgaria annexed the "new territories" on May 14, 1941, by a formal
act, which Berlin tolerated, the regulations remained provisional. Thus it was
to the Bulgarians to secure possession of the new regions by creating harsh
facts. But actually, they only had full sovereignty in the region by virtue of
Germany, which showed the remaining German influence in economic, political,
and military affairs. Thus the Bulgarians had to concede to Germany numerous
mining and railway claims. The agreement, signed on April 24/27 by Carl Clodius
and Bulgarian Foreign Minister Ivan Popov, stipulated, among other decisions:[12]
"In the territory ... occupied by Bulgaria, Germany can continue without
restrictions the exploitation of industrial raw materials, above all minerals. This
does not only concern the grants already made, but also projects which will be
started now or later...." Other points concerned the
expenses for
German military areas and the presence of German troops, questions of enemy
property, and the recruitment of workers for Germany. Not only the authority,
but also the border regulations in occupied territories remained unsecured. So
the Salonika district remained occupied by German troops temporarily for
strategic reasons; in the long term, the Bulgarians could hope to obtain this
region as well, when German troops were needed more urgently on other fronts.
But officially Salonika's fate had not been determined, and rumors circulated
that the town was to be returned to the Greeks as a reward for obedience. So the
Germans effected discontent on both sides and a race between the competitors
for favor. The area of Florina and Edessa, which was disputed between the
Bulgarians and Italians, was temporarily incorporated into the Salonika zone;
one reason was to put the strategically important road and railway line between
Salonika and Bitolja under German control. To secure the supply transit
Edirne-Salonika, and as a
friendly
gesture to Turkey, the Germans also retained the Edirne salient under their
rule; but when the hitherto Greek section of the railway line was given to
Turkish administration (in connection with the conclusion of the German-Turkish
treaty of friendship on June 18, 1941), the Bulgarians regarded this act as
prejudicial to a future border regulation.[13]
The German decisions about administrative borders in the South Balkans caused
permanent conflicts between its partners and disquiet in the population of the
occupied areas; the regulations in no way led to the necessary pacification of
the Balkans or a reduction of German forces, which were needed urgently on the
Eastern front.[14]
The Bulgarian Occupation Policy in Thrace and
Macedonia[15]
In April 1941,
the Bulgarians received from Greece an area of 14,430 square kilometers, with
590,000 inhabitants. The Bulgarian occupation in Aegean Thrace was considerably
harsher than in Vardar Macedonia, where the population was largely Slavic.
Whereas the Bulgarian policy was to win the loyalty of the Slav inhabitants,
the policy in the Aegean littoral was to Bulgarize forcibly as many Greeks as possible
and to expel or kill the rest. Bulgarian colonists were encouraged to settle on
land expropriated from Greeks in the hope that a Bulgarian majority in the
region would ensure permanent Bulgarian control.
During the first
few months of the Aegean occupation, the Bulgarians made an effort to gain the
support of the local inhabitants. They conducted an extensive propaganda
campaign, established Bulgarian schools, and distributed food and milk to Greek
children. It quickly became apparent, however, that this approach had little
chance of success. The occupation authorities therefore resorted to more
drastic measures. The Bulgarians closed Greek schools and expelled the
teachers, replaced Greek clergymen with priests from Bulgaria, and sharply
repressed the Greek language: even gravestones bearing Greek inscriptions were
defaced. Bulgarian families were encouraged to settle in Thrace and Macedonia
by government credits and incentives, including houses and land confiscated from
the natives. The authorities also confiscated business property and gave it to
Bulgarian colonists. In the town of Kavala, for example, over seven hundred
shops and other enterprises were expropriated. Large numbers of Greeks were
expelled, and others were deprived of the right to work by a license system
that banned the practice of a trade or profession without the express
permission of the occupation government.[16]
Even by a
German report,[17] the
Bulgarian occupation has been described as "a regime of terror which can
only be described as Balkan"—a regime with expulsions, displacement of
refugees, social misery, and shortages of essential goods. But considering this
harsh policy, one should not forget that to a large extent this continued the practice
which was applied by the Greek government after 1919 to diminish the Slav
population in the same former Bulgarian region.
The unclearness
of the situation, the change of troops and occupiers, and the provisional
character of borders caused the Bulgarian wish to create facts and incited the
Greeks to resist the Bulgarian plans. The Greeks were also able to derive a
profit from the controversies between German, Bulgarian, and Italian occupiers.
The lack of clarity in the situation was realized by the Bulgarian King Boris during
a tour of inspection of the occupied territories in spring 1941.He reported
"that in some places, for example, in Dedeagach, there is a rather good
cooperation between Bulgarian military authorities and
Greek
authorities and the population. In general among the German authorities there
is to be seen ignorance about the future of Thrace and frequently the opinion
that the Bulgarians have no right to be there; this view of course is supported
by the Greeks." [18]
To avoid such
dissension and to improve contacts with German forces, the Bulgarian government
recommended the nomination of a mediator, whereas the German ambassador
in Sofia, Richthofen, demanded the opening of a German consulate in Kavala, in
order to secure the influence of the German foreign ministry and German
economic interests in that region. Besides that, he advised:[19]
that the administration of the region, so long as
German troops are in Thrace and we [the Germans) are able to exert an equalizing
influence, will be passed over to Bulgarian hands gradually ... a sudden
transfer of the administration might have serious difficulties as a
consequence. As the [Bulgarian) Foreign Minister told me, even German generals
had to admit, that still about 10,000 (ten thousand) infantry guns are hidden,
also prisoners move freely, especially in the towns numbers of Greek officers
are to be seen.
Because of such
stocks of weapons, combined with the growing unrest of the population, the
situation grew to be very "explosive." Already a few months after the
Bulgarian takeover, hatred mounted in the population, manifesting itself in
several terrorist acts and finally in insurrection. The revolt broke out in the
city of Drama on the morning of September 28, 1941, and quickly spread
throughout Greek Thrace and Macedonia. In Drama, a crowd attacked the city hall
and killed four Bulgarian policemen; in Doxato, the entire Bulgarian police
force of twenty men was massacred; in Choristi, armed Greeks seized the town
and called on other towns to join them; and in many other villages there were
clashes between Greeks and Bulgarian authorities. The rebellion was
short-lived. On September 29, Bulgarian troops moved into Drama and the other
rebellious cities and seized all men between the ages of 18 and 45. Over three
thousand people were reportedly executed in Drama alone; in the countryside,
entire villages were machine-gunned and looted. An estimated fifteen thousand
Greeks were killed during the next few weeks.[20]
About the same uprising, the Bulgarian prime minister, Filov, told the
German ambassador, Adolf-Heinz Beckerle, the following on October 6: [21]
On September 28 the insurrection
broke out. It had encroached on about 30 villages south, west and north of
Drama. About 2,000 insurgents had taken part. The starting-point was the
village of Doxato. There the police guard was attacked. The rebels were excellently
armed. Besides guns they also possessed machineguns. The policemen had
barricaded themselves in the police office and contacted the police chief of
Drama. He had come to help them with 12
other policemen. But this reinforcement could not effect anything,
either, and had to retreat into the police building as well. During the night,
after two policemen had been killed by shots of the rebels, the building was
set on fire by them.
The policemen then tried to escape.
One group of them numbering 6 men was killed. Apparently the plan was, by means
of the insurrection in the surrounding villages to withdraw the police and army
forces from Drama. But this did not work. Drama was then virtually encircled by
the insurgents and cut off from the outside world. For 48 hours no contact with
there was possible. The rebels had also blown up a railway bridge near Angista.
The situation was cleared up by action of Bulgarian troops and air force. On
the Bulgarian side the losses sustained were about 20-30 dead police and army
personnel. After this the rebels retreated into the mountains of Bostagh. They
took with them some deputy village mayors as hostages. During the attack of
(our) groups the rebels were annihilated. The hostages succeeded in escaping.
Since yesterday it has been relatively peaceful, apart from occasional raids.
Important is, that it has evidently been a communist uprising. A large number
of leaflets have been found which were apparently printed in Salonika and which
clearly showed the communist tendency ... A further important point is that the
leaders of the insurgents had come over from the Greek area from Salonika ...
Also the rations they carried with them did not originate from Bulgaria. So
biscuits of English origin were captured from them. The news lead to the
conclusion that the rebel movement was only a first attempt, and that the rebels
had expected and had been told that similar uprisings would be attempted in
other parts of Bulgaria at the same time.
The German
ambassador also presumed that the revolt had been plotted by the Anglo-American
side and was connected with the simultaneous dropping of Soviet parachutist
agents near the Bulgarian harbor of Burgas. Another version had it that the
entire rebellion had been instigated by Bulgarian agents provocateurs. Whatever
its origins, the revolt allowed the authorities to justify the subsequent
atrocities by claiming "military necessity." The massacres
precipitated a mass exodus of Greeks from the zone of Bulgarian control into
the German-occupied region. Bulgarian "reprisals" continued after the
September revolt, adding to the torrent of refugees. Villages were destroyed
for sheltering "partisans," who were in fact only the survivors of
villages previously destroyed. There were some Greek partisans in Macedonia,
but they were of little significance.[22]
The terror and
famine became so severe in the region that the Athens government considered
plans for evacuating the entire population of Aegean Macedonia to
German-occupied Greece. The exodus of many Greeks and the settlement of
Bulgarian families in "Belomorie" altered the ethnic composition of
the region in favor of the Bulgarians. But the disturbances in the Aegean zone
by no means suited the Germans because it seemed to require the intervention of
German troops, which were more necessary in other war areas, and it disturbed
relations with the Athens government and German economic interests (especially the
production of tobacco) in that region.
New unrest was
evoked by the Bulgarian citizenship law of June 10, 1942, which penalized those
who did not take Bulgarian citizenship with loss of property and expulsion.[23]The
Greek politicians Louvaris and General Liotis protested against it in an
aide-memoire directed to the German plenipotentiary for Greece, Giinther
Altenburg, in Athens on August 24, 1942.[24] The German ambassador several times applied to
the Bulgarian government for Changes in this law because of the severe
consequences. The commander southeast and the plenipotentiary for Greece
reported to the German High Command (OKW) their objections to the Bulgarian
act. In their reports to OKW and the foreign ministry, they referred to the
provisional nature of boundaries in the Greek regions and disputed the
Bulgarian right to make such laws in their occupation zone. Apart from that,
they thought that the Greeks should not be aroused; on the contrary, because of
German defeats in North Africa, Greece ought to be kept quiet, perhaps by the
prospect of revision of boundaries.
The German
authorities often had to intervene in Bulgarian occupation policy because so
many measures aggravated the German position in Greece. Thus it was not
well-received when Bulgaria, desiring Salonika, Florina-Edessa, and western
Macedonia, established propaganda centers to secure the allegiance of the
approximately 80,000 Slays in these regions. And the German government
repeatedly had to urge Bulgaria to make an adequate contribution to supply
Greece, which was threatened by increasing prices and famine.
But because of
the critical development of the war, Germany needed more and more to rely on
the Bulgarians to control the Balkan region. Thus it had to tolerate Bulgarian
measures. The heavy losses on the Eastern front, the collapse of Italy, and the
growing partisan movement in Yugoslavia, forced Germany in 1943 to thin out its
forces in the southern Balkans. Germany had first requested Bulgarian
participation in Balkan occupation duties in late 1942, but Bulgarian
assistance now became a necessity. Hitler raised the problem at a meeting with King
Boris in August 1943, urging the. Bulgarians to occupy northeast Serbia and an
additional section of Greek Macedonia. The king agreed in principle but
postponed a decision pending "consultations,' during which he vacillated
between territorial avarice and the fear of further involvement in the war
(especially in partisan-infested areas to which Bulgaria had little valid
claim). His death left to his successors the task of expanding the Bulgarian
occupation zone.
In the summer
of 1943, the Germans ceded to the Bulgarians a new zone of occupation west of
the river Struma. The Bulgarian occupation in Greece was further expanded in
February 1944 by the addition of three additional provinces in western
Macedonia. But it was an illusion to believe that the region would be pacified
thus, because Bulgarian policy increased the hatred Greeks felt toward their
occupiers. And the Greeks blamed the Germans for inflicting the Bulgarians on
them. Bitterness was also caused by the policy toward Thracian Jews.
The Policy Toward Jews in Bulgarian-Occupied Thrace
and Macedonia
How much
Bulgarian occupation policy differed from the otherwise moderate home policy of
the government can be teen especially in its policy toward the Jews in the
occupied territories.[25]
In the summer of 1940, the Bulgarian government introduced measures against
Jews, which proved unpopular with the Bulgarian population "because of its
lack of understanding for racism." Under German pressure, the Bulgarian
minister of internal affairs presented the Council of Ministers with a
"Law for the Defense of the Nation" on October 7, 1940, which imposed
several restrictions on Jews, but in contrast to German laws, it applied religious
criteria rather than racial ones, which gave some Jews the chance to avoid
prosecution by a quick conversion to Christianity. Parliament and the king were
in no hurry to pass the unpopular law, the latter waiting with his signature
until the end of January 1941, when Bulgaria's accession to the Tripartite Pact
became inevitable. And even after this, the Bulgarian authorities were not
zealous in applying it. In October 1941, there followed certain professional
restrictions, which prohibited Jewish activities in trade and industry. These
and other restrictions were extended to the Jews in the "new
territories" from summer 1941 onward.
After the
ill-famed "Wannsee Conference" of January 20, 1942, with its talk of
"the final solution of the Jewish question," Bulgaria enacted sterner
legislation against Jews, involving high taxation, the need to wear a Star of
David, the dissolution of Jewish organizations, the evacuation of Jews from
several towns to the country. On August 26, 1942, a "Commissariat for
Jewish Affairs" (KEV) was set up in Sofia, with Alexander Belev as its
head, which was to prepare "the transfer of Jews into the province or
outside the Kingdom." On January 21, 1943, Theodor Dannecker, an
SS-Hauptsturmfiihrer and a colleague of Adolf Eichmann, came to Sofia for talks
with Belev. On February 22, they concluded an agreement "for the
deportation of the first 20,000 Jews from the new Bulgarian lands Thrace and
Macedonia into the German eastern regions."[26] It seemed that the Jews of Macedonia and
Thrace had to be sacrificed in favor of Bulgarian Jews.
The Bulgarian
government succeeded in postponing the eventual deportation of Jews from
Bulgaria by arguing that its "own" Jews were needed in Bulgaria for
public works, especially for road construction. Jews were temporarily settled
in the provinces and assembled in labor camps. But in the critical weeks of
March 1943, because of massive opposition (by prominent persons, deputies,
church representatives) and also later because of the German defeats, the
Bulgarian government did not agree to the deportation of its own Jews to the extermination
camps in Poland. In August 1944, Bulgaria was already preparing to change
sides, contacting the Western allies. The commissariat for Jewish affairs was
dissolved; the Jewish community obtained its old rights. Full rehabilitation
was conferred by the "Patriotic Front" government in September. Thus
nearly all 51,000 Bulgarian Jews survived the war.[27]
A different
fate was in store for the Jews in the occupied territories. The decree of June
1942, which prevented them from obtaining Bulgarian citizenship, had already
led to the expectation of deportations, which in fact began in March 1943.
Nearly at the same time, deportations began from Vardar-Macedonia and formerly
Greek Thrace. On March 11, 1943, the Jews of Macedonia, most from Skopje,
Bitola, and Shtip, were transported in goods trains to the Skopje camp and, at
the end of March, in three trains from there to the Treblinka concentration camp
in Poland. A total of 7,144 Jews were deported, and none of them returned.[28]
The deportation
of the Thracian Jews began on March 4, 1943,[29]
even before Bulgarian deputies had drafted their protest. In all the cities of
Eastern Thrace with major Jewish populations—Giumiurdzhina, Dede Agach, Kavala,
Drama, Xanthi, and Seres—the commissariat representativei proceeded in a
similar manner: for the duration of the action, the police placed the cities
under blockade and curfew, beginning sometime after midnight until seven or
eight in the morning. Shortly before the action began at 4:00 a.m., policemen
in groups of three received their instructions, including the lists of Jewish
families to be assembled and the necessary equipment for sealing Jewish
homes.The police informed the Jews that the government was sending them
into the
interior of Bulgaria and that they would return to their homes shortly. They
were then marched through the main streets of the cities, their numbers
swelling at each intersection until they reached their destinations—the tobacco
warehouses which served as temporary camps. The Jews remained in the camps for
one or two days, then they were sent to the major departure centers at Dupnitsa
and Goma Dzhumaia. The German general consulate in Kavala reported the
following to the German embassy in Sofia:[30]
The evacuation of the Jews from the
Belomorie-region has been ... largely finished. Some of the Jews are on the way
to the Gorna Dzhumaia assembly camp with their luggage, others have already
arrived there and been interned. According to reports received so far, a total
of about 4,500 Jews in the Belomorie district have been registered. As far as I
could establish, their deportation is proceeding without particular
difficulties or incidents. The only remarkable thing was the evident sympathy of
the Greek population, which in Kavala and Drama, for example, offered the
departing Jews presents and disgustingly hearty farewell ovations. As reported
by reliable German sources, some Bulgarians, evidently communist influenced,
have also taken part in this unpleasant spectacle in Drama. The Jews themselves
are said to have taken the evacuation at least outwardly with indifference.
According to
the reports of commissariat representatives, they accomplished
the Thracian
operation very efficiently.[31]
It did, in fact, proceed as planned, without any significant deviations.
However, the official reports do not show the tragedies and hardships that
occurred along the way. The Jews were evicted from their homes without adequate
warning, placed in camps without sufficient food, water, toilet facilities, and
medical services, and subjected to delousing operations and humiliating searches,
which caused loss and damage to the little property the police allowed them to
bring with them. The long journey in open cars through Thrace was difficult.
Many fell ill, and a few died. Some women gave birth. Observers reported
unbelievable misery: cries of fear and despair among the expellees, including
the lame and sick, children, the aged, and pregnant women, as well as harsh and
sometimes brutal treatment, both physical and psychological, by the guards and
officials. On the other hand, occasionally an official pressed into service
against his will, perhaps feeling the unfairness himself, treated the Jews
decently.
At Demir-Hisar
and Simitli, where the track gauge changed, the Jews had to transfer to
different trains. The first stations on the Thracian Jews' journey to Poland
were the departure centers in southwest Bulgaria—Gorna Dzhumaia and Dupnitsa.
In all, over 2,500 Jews actually went to the former camp and fewer. than 1,500
.to the latter. Apparently only the Giurmiurdzhina and Xanthi Jews went to
Dupnitsa and the entire remainder to Gorna Dzhumaia. At the departure centers,
the authorities revised the story of resettlement in the interior of Bulgaria. Now
they said rather that the government had made arrangements with the British to
send the Jews to Palestine and that they were to leave the camps for ports on
the Adriatic and Black Seas. But the Jews did not believe it.
Responsibility
for the transfer of the Jews from the departure centers to areas under German
authority belonged primarily to the Bulgarian State Railway and the
Commissariat (KEV). The transport of the Thracian Jews to the Danubian town of
Lom required two trains. From Lom, the Jews traveled through Vienna to Katowicz
in Poland under the responsibility of Dannecker. The Bulgarian police served as
guards on the trains, not only through Bulgaria (in conjunction with the Germans)
but also up to Katowicz. Guard groups on the trains consisted of a police
chief, two senior officers, and forty ordinary officers. To accompany the
barges in Lom, the Commissariat ararnged for guard groups of fourteen to
thirty-two—altogether eighty-six men.
On the March 18
train from Gorna Dzhumaia, there were actually 1,985 Jews; the trains on March
19 carried 692 Jews from Gorna Dzhumaia, 1,380 from Dupnitsa, and 158 from
Pirot. The Thracian group leaving the departure centers, not considering those
on the Pirot train, had 4,057 Jews. During their fortnight's journey from Thrace,
some late arrivals and a few newborn children were added to the original group,
but a number of them had already died. The trains arrived in Lom on March 19
and 20, after having stopped at Sofia for an hour and a half, and the barges
left on March 20 and 21. Four ships left Lom, each had 875 to 1,100 passengers,
and in all 4,219 Jews left. As arranged, a Bulgarian guard went along; and
Bulgarian doctors traveled with the Jews as well (they left the convoy at
Vienna). Although most of the security force was Bulgarian, German guards
supervised the operation. The journey to Vienna lasted about five to ten days.
From Vienna, the Jews traveled on to Katowicz and then Treblinka, where they
were killed a few days later. Nevertheless, among the German authorities there
remained an undercurrent of dissatisfaction, because the March deportations
from the Bulgarian-occupied territories were only 56 percent successful: under
11,500 of a planned 20,000. And the 51,000 Jews still present in Bulgaria
behind German lines disturbed the RSHA.[32]
Final Remarks
The Bulgarian
occupation authority was restricted in the new territories by the provisional
nature of the boundary regulations and the decisive amount of German economic
and political influence (see Clodius Agreement of April 24, 1941). The Germans
tried to use the boundary question to secure the obedience of competing
partners—Bulgarians, Greeks, and Italians—but in fact they created more unrest instead
of the order and peace which were needed to concentrate all German forces on
the main fronts.
Because of the
lack of clarity, the Bulgarian occupation policy was guided by the wish to
create "facts." So the Bulgarians applied harsh measures to diminish
the Greek population and to increase the Bulgarian one. Their brutal government
in the new territories stood in contrast to the very cautious internal and
foreign policy the Bulgarian leadership otherwise applied, especially in their
relations to Germany. The contradiction between the general political line of
Bulgaria and the occupation policy becomes tragically clear in measures against
Jews: whereas the Bulgarian leadership, in view of pressure from the public and
respect for foreign opinion, was anxious to save the Jews of "Old Bulgaria,"
they "sacrified" those of the occupied territories and assistedthe
Germans to transport them to extermination camps.
In the first
days of September 1944, Bulgarian troops and administrative
authorities left
the occupied territories, including Greek
Thrace and
Macedonia. The following year, the Bulgarian authorities responsible were put
on trial before "People's Courts" for their actions during the war.
Thousands of them were sentenced, many (about 2,000)
to death.
[1]0n
German-Bulgarian relations, see Hans-Joachim Hoppe, Bulgarien-Hitlers eigenwilliger
Verbiindeter, Stuttgart, 1979, and Marshall Lee Miller, Bulgaria During
the Second World War, Stanford University Press, 1975.
[2] Ehrengard
Schramm von Thadden, Griechenland and die Grossnachte im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Wiesbaden,
1955.
[3] See Gunnar
Henning's essay about Greek policy from 1923 to 1974 published in Theodor
Schieder (ed.), Handbucb der europäischen Geschichte, vol. 7,Stuttgart,
1979, pp. 1313-1338.
[4] See Hans-Joachim Hoppe, "Die Balkanstaasen Rumanian,
Jugoslawien,Bulgarien: Nationale Gegensatze and NS-Grossraurnpolitik," in: Erhard Forndran et al (ed.), Innen-und Aussenpolitik unser nation
sozialistischer Bedrochung,Opladen, 1977, pp. 161-175.
[6] For details,
see J. Barms, The League of Nations and the Great Powers:The Greek-Bulgarian
Incident, 1925, 1970.
[12] Hoppe, Bulgarien, p. 123. The text of the "Clodius Agreement" has
been found in the Bundesarchiv Afilitirarchiv in Freiburg.
[13]Hoppe, op.
cit., p. 123; see also Lothar Krecker, Deutschland and die Tiirkei im
Zweiten TVeltkrieg, Frankfurt/M., 1964, pp. 149-151.
[14]See Klaus
Olshausen, "Die deutsche Balkanpolitik 1940-1941," in: Manfred Funke
(ed.), Hitler, Deutschland and die Allichte, Dilsseldorf, 1976, pp. 707-727.
[17] Hoppe, Bulgarien, p. 126. The
secret report about the situation in occupied Greece, dated October 5, 1941,
has been found in the Bundesarchiv/Militararchiv.
[25] See Hoppe, op.
cit., pp. 93-96, 138-141; also the monographs of Wolf Oschlies, Bulgarien—Land
ohne Antisemitismus, Erlangen, 1976, and Frederick B. Chary, The
Bulgarian Jews and the Find Solution, 1940-1944, University of Pittsburgh
Press, 1972.
[26]Text of the
Dannecker-Belev Agreement is published (in English translation) by Chary, op.
cit., p. 208-210.
