Chapter 189: 1942 - Annual Report
AuthAAR’s Note: We will look back briefly to the beginning of the Comintern’s “Great Liberation War” on 1 June 1940, chart the broad sweep of the war to the present, then focus on the key/largest battles for Turkey in 1942, finishing with a summary of world naval losses during the year and a chance to ponder what may follow in the Balkans for Turkey in 1943. See at the end re response to strategic suggestions so far, which will come eventually 
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Context: The Great Liberation War Begins and France Falls – May to December 1940
As Belgium capitulated on 31 May 1940, the Germans had broken through to the north of the
Maginot Line and then Italy had infamously stabbed France in the back.
Turkey had hoped to bring the Soviets into a war with the fascists while France was still viable – and now it was failing. The end of May finally also brought the absorption of the Baltic States by the Soviet Union. And though the Soviets had not yet had a chance to garrison the Baltic border with Eastern Prussia, France was on the brink. Inönü acted, declaring war on Germany; and to his relief the Soviets followed. He had his two-front war with Germany.
The Turkish plan was to defend a shortened line on good defensive terrain, dubbed the
Yeniçeri Line, in their sector and rely on a Soviet and Romanian offensive to take advantage of Germany’s divided attention. If that failed, their final fall-back would be to the heavily fortified
Iskandar and
Calistar Lines in Southern Greece and the Bosporus.
Comintern dispositions on the eve of the Greatr Liberation War. This theatre would become known as the Patriotic front.
But the initial Soviet offensive, while it made some ground, was slower and less decisive than had been hoped for, while French resistance proved more fragile than expected despite this massive distraction in the east. France eventually fell on 3 December 1940.
This set the scene for the industrial scale slaughter in eastern Europe and the Balkans for the following two years.
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The Sweep of War – December 1940 to December 1942
The following maps show changes in the front lines from year to year since December 1940.
On the Patriotic Front, by 31 December 1940 the Soviets and Romanians still held footholds in East Prussia, German-occupied Poland and a large swathe of Hungary. The
Yeniçeri Line was holding in former Yugoslavia. But with the flow of armoured units in particular from France to the east, these lines were all pushed back considerably by December 1941.
In 1942, Turkey clawed back much ground in the Adriatic-Sava River sector, west of
Beograd. Romania lost some ground, but stayed largely stable. The Soviets at first lost much ground in Ukraine, but had made most of it back by December 1942, with
Kyiv lost then regained. Not so in the centre and especially the north, where the Germans had made their biggest gains, including the recent capture of
Leningrad.
The Far East had been a sorry tale for most of the war, as the Japanese and their henchmen advanced relentlessly for the best part of two years, until the latter part of 1942 when this encroachment was slowed down and even pushed back in some areas. Afghanistan had unwisely entered the war on the side of the Axis, but then been defeated by Turkish and Soviet forces.
In North Africa, there had been wild swings of fortune. In December 1940, the British had been on the cusp of expelling the Italians from Libya entirely, their advance making it just short of Tripoli. But the Fall of France and a failure to provide adequate forces and supplies had seen the Italians advance all the way to Cairo and Alexandria by December 1941, both of which they briefly occupied at separate times. But some British (and Allied) reinforcements and a suspected collapse in Italian supply lines had seen the Axis advance halted and then thrown back to where it is now – between
Tobruk and
Bengasi. During these years, the British had sunk every major ship of the Italian Navy and the vast majority of their smaller vessels and transports.
NB: The Japanese had run riot in South East Asia and advanced in the Pacific in the last year, but current progress has been covered sufficiently in recent updates.
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Annual Naval Report
These tables show the recorded naval losses of all major combatants in Great War Two in 1942 and the totals to date since the start of the war. The US has not yet suffered any ships sunk.
Japan and the UK suffered the most losses in 1942, especially of Major Fleet Units. Italy’s losses were mainly in destroyers and especially transports, which they continued to build – and sacrifice. But Italy has still lost by far the most vessels of any power so far in the war.
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1942 – Highlights
Part One: On the Defensive (Jan-Jun 42)
Making newspaper headlines in early 1942 was the ‘Big Four’ meeting in
Tehran. The professed to have plans in place to defeat all Axis forces. But how far would the year take those plans?
There had been some limited success and a breakout by Turkey in the Wolf Pack offensive of summer 1941 (fought mainly to distract the Axis and save Romania). But a vicious Axis counter-offensive had followed, which not only pushed Turkish forces back to their start line, but had then rolled them further back to a new line based on rivers, mountains and hills, from the Adriatic, through
Beograd and along the Danube to the Romanian border.
Early April saw the Axis once again putting very heavy pressure on the Turkish line in the Adriatic sector. This culminated in fierce battles for the ‘Three Ps’ which ended between 6-9 April 1942 in hard-fought victories for the Turkish-led Comintern forces. In these three major battles alone, Turkish losses were around 4,300, while the Axis lost over 9,000 killed.
Meanwhile, in Russia, the further loss of ground to the German led to Stalin declaring their ‘Great Patriotic War’ on 12 April. Axis pressure on all parts of the Front was building, while the Japanese still ran riot in the east. An almost-disastrous confusion of Soviet objectives and strategic redeployment between the two fronts occurred in the middle of the year and took some time to sort out, briefly threatening the collapse of both.
Another feature of 1942 was repeated large-scale Axis attacks on
Beograd, seeking force the Sava and Danube rivers and take the symbolic and material centre of Turkish resistance in the Balkans. Some of these attacks came closer to success than others, but they were almost always very expensive for the Axis.
Axis pressure was still being applied – and successfully resisted – in
Pozega and
Podgorica in early May.
And the Axis were handed another large butcher’s bill in early June from a big attack on
Beograd.
Part Two: Turkish Summer Offensive and the Adriatic Pocket
In early July, the Axis were the ones being subjected to pressure as the Turkish Summer Offensive of 1942 began in the Adriatic sector. It aimed to push back the Axis line and see if some divisions could be surrounded and eliminated in the process. 4 July saw an Axis attack on
Pljevlja (3 Mtn Div to the fore again) beaten off with heavy casualties, while the
Battle of Danilovgrad was one of the first major successes of the new Turkish push.
With Turkish air support now possible from more and improved licence-built aircraft (which had seen some epic air duels over the span of the year), the Summer Offensive gathered steam. Steady advances were being made and a major victory at
Ljubinje on 24 July plus progress to its north was setting the scene for a major encirclement operation.
But the Turkish armoured thrust to the north along the Sava River finally met strong resistance in
Gradiska, where 2 Mot Div tried and failed to gain a prized river crossing after a bloody solo attempt was called off on 17 August, as Axis reinforcements began to arrive from other sectors of the line along the Sava River.
It was at this time that a vile Axis assassination plot, involving the Gestapo, fronted by Italian and Slovakian agents and a Mafia ‘consultant’, was aimed at President Inönü. He narrowly avoided death but was incapacitated for some hours. Hitler misread the situation and foolishly claimed the great man had been killed.
The Turkish President soon proved otherwise, appearing in public in
Moscow for another Anti-Fascist Coalition meeting a short time later. Much to Stalin’s pleasure and Hitler’s humiliation.
At the front, 26 August saw a large group of enemy units cut-off in
Split, but the Axis had taken advantage of the diversion of forces and the arrival of their own reinforcements to start a series of major counter-attacks along the Sava River. They may not have been able to save their surrounded comrades, but they presented a real danger to the line west of
Beograd when
Doboj was forced, opening a gap in the Turkish lines.
But victory in
Split on 29 August meant many formations could now be released to stop Axis counter-attacks and plug large gaps in the line to its north and along the Sava.
Estimated Axis troop losses in the ‘Adriatic Pocket’ approached 50,000 men captured, in addition to those killed in the fighting for it.
Part Three: Securing the Sava
The successful closing of the Adriatic Pocket had left other parts of the line weakened until those units could be redeployed. But Turkey was determined not to suffer the same reverses as had occurred after the equivalent 1941 offensive, which had seen the loss of
Timisoara (a Romanian city soaked in the blood of Turkish martyrs and forever in the memory of all Turkish patriots) and much other ground. By early September,
Doboj had just been retaken and now it was time for an all-in battle to regain
Tuzla. A decisive victory came there on 9 September.
But the Axis was not done yet, a pitched battle for
Banja Luka being lost on 13 September, while
Bosanski Petrovac was under air and ground attack.
Pressure further west at
Ubdina, the coastal anchor point of the new line, was resisted though, the Axis suffering a bloody repulse there on 26 September.
And three days later, a very determined attempt by German-led Axis forces to retake the recently secured
Tuzla was beaten off, again with heavy enemy casualties.
The line was substantially secured by 2 October, with Turkish IS-2s from 15 Inf Div out-matching the medium tanks of 7 Pz Div in
Banja Luka, where a hard-fought victory to regain it was won.
But the Axis was not quite done yet: they too wished to straighten their lines and they succeeded in doing that in
Bosanski Petrovac on 6 October, just as
Banja Luka was being reoccupied. Turkish casualties in a stubborn but doomed defence were among the highest they had suffered in any battle since 1936.
And another serious attack on
Beograd cost both sides heavily in late October, requiring the garrison there to be topped up again.
While
Tuzla also remained a popular Axis target, with a new six-division attack finally defeated on 4 November.
Part Four: Operation Frost Wolf
As the Turks saw
Leningrad under dire threat and were considering a surprise opportunistic winter offensive in early December, the scene was partly set when the Axis launched a major and bloody attempt to retake
Banja Luka. Over 3,200 Axis troops died trying, up against a formidable defence, the attack failing on 3 December.
This was followed by yet another Axis attack on
Tuzla, which also failed with heavy losses on both sides, but the Axis again losing more than twice the numbers the Comintern defenders had.
The Turks had now begun gathering forces for a mechanised thrust along the south bank of the Sava from
Banja Luka, where the Axis defenders were still recovering from their defeat earlier in the month, while the rest of their line in that sector looked thinner than it had been for some time.
The push began on 10 December and, as we have seen recently, the ‘left hook’ to the coast raced along – but on a necessarily narrow front, with an exposed flank along the Sava River. It was there German armour finally forced its way across to cut the supply lines and open a narrow corridor to the two German divisions trapped in the pocket. But in just an hour on 29 December, the resolution of four separate battles looked to have ‘righted the ship’ for Turkey, beating back three counter-attacks, defeating Rommel in
Perusic (those four results shown below) and then winning the battle for the German bridgehead at
Novi Grad – though it had not yet been reoccupied as 1942 came to a close.
Naturally, this did not stop the
Istanbul Times from claiming a great victory. It now remained for the Turkish Army to make the headlines true.
The map below shows how far Turkey had advanced in the Adriatic sector since the beginning of the year, when the
Yeniçeri Line had been pushed well back south of
Beograd.
Now, the Frost Wolf offensive was almost completed: the retaking of
Novi Grad and holding it and the rest of the perimeter while the two encircled German divisions were eliminated was the last unfinished business. A probe on
Lussino (a cross-strait attack) had not yet shown it would be successful, while German Tiger tanks still led an attack on the pivot point of
Vrnograc. And the northern line of the salient still needed to be secured.
Coming Up: As the Turkish War Cabinet prepared a New Year’s Day strategic direction meeting, a range of choices lay ahead of them. Continue along the Adriatic-Sava line of advance, where
Ljubljana might be liberated and even Italian
Trieste taken against as-yet flimsy opposition? Consolidate instead and perhaps prepare a different attack across the Sava below
Zagreb for another possible encirclement? Or a completely new operation, perhaps closer to Romania, aimed at relieving pressure on
Beograd, threatening Hungary’s heartland and allowing a Soviet-Romanian push to liberate northern Romania?
There was also the question of whether - and if so how and where - to deploy the building strategic reserve of the Turkish-American Marine Corps. Crossing rivers in the Balkans in a new operation (for which weather and thus timing would need to be considered)? Or for a raid-in-force against Italian interests in North Africa, whether on
Bengasi (a defended location) or even further west? Production, research and espionage matters could also be reviewed and considered.
Much advice had already been sought from consultants and advisers
[NB: thanks to all those who have already provided assessments: @diskoerekto; @Wraith11B; @TheButterflyComposer; @nuclearslurpee; @roverS3; @smatsik ]. Those and any further submissions following this annual report to Cabinet Members will be analysed together, in the lead-up to the Cabinet Meeting of 1 January 1943. Also, any further map, screen, unit or equipment etc requests people may have are welcome. The Cabinet Secretary can put out such supplementary info before the Cabinet Meeting if advisers request it.
