Serbian State Guard

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Српска државна стража /
Srpska državna straža Serbian State Guard

active February 10, 1942 (officially March 3, 1942) to May 1945
Country Flag of the Government of National Salvation (occupied Yugoslavia) .svg Serbia
structure 5 battalions
Strength 17,000 (February 1942)
36,716 (late 1943)
Origin of the soldiers Serbia
Nickname Nedićevci ( Nedić's men)
commander
Important
commanders

Jovan Trišić
Borivoje Jonić

The Serbian State Guard (short SSW; Serbian Српска државна стража Srpska državna straža , short СДС / SDS) was the paramilitary gendarmerie association of Serbia during the Second World War .

The anti-communist Serbian State Guard, together with the Serbian Volunteer Corps , a fascist party militia , openly collaborated with the German occupying power in Serbia.

founding

Serbian gendarmes (from 1942: Serbian State Guard) comb through an area in search of insurgents (1941).

The gendarmerie association was set up on February 10, 1942 by Milan Nedić , Prime Minister of the Serbian puppet government (officially "Government of National Salvation", Serbian Влада Националног Спаса / Vlada Nacionalnog Spasa ). Formed from the two gendarmerie - regiments of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia Drinski and Dunavski , the Serbian State Guard was strong at its inception some 17,000 men. The official establishment took place on March 3, 1942 . The military leadership took over Colonel Jovan Trišić (1893-1974), later replaced by Major General Borivoje Jonić . In January 1943 the Serbian State Guard already numbered 36,716 men.

organization

Tito partisan Stjepan Filipović shortly before his execution by a unit of the Serbian State Guard (in the background)

The Serbian State Guard was divided territorially into the five oblasts (districts) Belgrade , Kraljevo , Niš , Valjevo and Zaječar , each with a battalion . Each region was divided into three okruge (circles) with additional units.

Internally, the Serbian State Guard was divided into “City Guard” ( Gradska straža ), “ Land Guard ” ( Poljska straža ), “Village Guard ” ( Seljačka straža ) and an approximately 2,500-strong “Border Guard” ( Srpska granična straža ).

history

The Serbian State Guard was used within Serbia mainly in the fight against communist Tito partisans.

On October 6, 1944, 5,000 men from the Serbian State Guard under Lieutenant General Stefan Radovanović joined the Serbian militants , so-called Chetniks , in Bosnia and formed the 1st Serbian Assault Corps ( 1st Srpski udarni korpus ).

About 3,000 men were assigned to the Todt Organization in Austria .

In March 1945, 2,000 men in Slovenia joined the Chetnik Sumadija Division under Miodrag Damjanović and surrendered to British forces in Austria in May 1945.

literature

  • Ana Antić: Police Force Under Occupation: Serbian State Guard and Volunteers' Corps in the Holocaust . In: Sara R. Horowitz (Ed.): Back to the Sources: Re-examining Perpetrators, Victims and Bystanders (=  Lessons and Legacies ). tape X . Northwestern University Press, Evanston 2012, ISBN 978-0-8101-2862-0 , pp. 13–36 ( google.de [accessed on November 10, 2013]).
  • Jozo Tomasevich: War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration . Stanford University Press, San Francisco 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3615-4 .
  • Nigel Thomas, Krunoslav Mikulan: Axis forces in Yugoslavia 1941-5 [The Axis Powers in Yugoslavia 1941-5] . Osprey publishing, Oxford 1995, ISBN 1-85532-473-3 , pp. 21 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Jozo Tomasevich: War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration . Stanford University Press, San Francisco 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3615-4 , pp. 183 .
  2. Nigel Thomas, Krunoslav Mikulan: Axis forces in Yugoslavia 1941-5 [The Axis powers in Yugoslavia 1941-5] . Osprey publishing, Oxford 1995, ISBN 1-85532-473-3 , pp. 21 .
  3. Jovan P. Trišić in the database of Find a Grave . Retrieved November 10, 2013.