Greece to roman road

After getting the consent of the two people, Constantine solemnly took the document representing the black plan, took out a pen, and signed his name on it.

While signing, countless thoughts flashed through Constantine's mind.

The Second Balkan War at this time was a completely different situation from the war in the original time and space.

Due to the expansion of Greece in the Balkans, the political and military situation in the Balkans was greatly different from that in history.

In the original history, during the Second Balkan War, Greek-speaking Serbia signed an alliance treaty, and the weak united to fight against the powerful Bulgaria.

The current situation is that Greece and Bulgaria have serious differences in interests due to the issue of carving up Macedonia.

Bulgaria believed that it had the greatest credit for defeating the main force of the Ottoman Empire in the First Balkan War against the Ottoman Empire. It hoped to obtain Vardar Macedonia (now the Republic of Macedonia) and the territory near Salonika, Macedonia on the Aegean Sea. .

In the eyes of Bulgarians, Macedonians are Bulgarians. They want to save their compatriots and establish a greater Bulgaria.

The Greeks certainly did not share the Bulgarian view.

First, the Greeks believed that those Macedonians who believed in Orthodox Christianity were Greeks.

The national identity of contemporary Greeks is originally reshaped by religious belief (Orthodox Christianity).

Especially within the territory of the former Ottoman Empire, those who believe in Orthodox Christianity are Greeks, and Greeks believe in Orthodox Christianity. This is the common understanding of Greeks.

It is for this reason that the Greeks regard the Orthodox Christians who still live in the Ottoman Empire as Greeks and consider them their compatriots.

It is precisely because of this national sentiment that in recent years, with the rapid development of Greece's economy, more and more "Greeks" who originally lived in Asia Minor have immigrated to Greece.

Not only do the local Greek people not resent these outsiders, but they welcome them.

The Greek people believed that this was to rescue their compatriots who suffered from the barbaric rule of the Ottoman Empire.

In fact, the Orthodox Christians in the Ottoman Empire were a very complex group.

A considerable number of Orthodox Christians are Slavs who migrated from the Balkans.

Secondly, the Macedonian region was Greece's main victory in the last war, so there was no reason to give it to Bulgaria.

Among the three Balkan countries, Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria, Serbia is the weakest, while Greece and Bulgaria are slightly stronger.

In the last war, Serbia benefited the least among the three countries and only received the areas surrounding Kosovo.

In addition, there are 300,000 Albanians living in Kosovo, making it the largest Albanian-inhabited area outside of Albania.

In any case, it is impossible for these Albanians to identify with Serbia.

It is conceivable that Serbia is naturally very dissatisfied with the fact that Kosovo has only received a small area (relative to Macedonia) and there are still a large number of YSL believers who are incompatible with the Serbs (Albanians believe in YSL).

Serbia, which did not benefit much from the competition between Greece and Bulgaria for Macedonia, has yet to express its position.

The Greek ambassador in Belgrade has visited the Serbian Prime Minister several times to inquire about the Serbian government's attitude, but there has been no clear result.

According to the ambassador's feedback, Serbia is also very conflicted in its attitude. It neither rejects nor agrees to Greece's overtures, and its attitude is ambiguous.

Serbia neither wants Greece to win nor does it want Bulgaria to win.

Whichever of the two is born will gain a huge advantage in the competition for the legacy of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans.

In order to prevent the Serbian army from taking advantage of the war between the Greek army and the Bulgarian army to take advantage of North Macedonia and even Albania, which borders Kosovo, Greece has also deployed troops in Skopje (the capital of North Macedonia) in addition to the Macedonian army confronting the Bulgarian army. The Albanian Legion numbered 150,000.

This makes Greece even more stretched when facing the highly mobilized Bulgarian Army.

The top brass of the Greek army, including Constantine, were worried about the role that Serbia, an unknown figure, would play in this war.

Once Serbia sides with Bulgaria, many variables may arise in this war, and the General Staff will lose control of the direction of this war.

But now that the Bulgarians have taken the initiative, Greece has no other choice.

Seeing this scene, Emmanuel and Giannis looked at each other.

"As the supreme commander of the Greek army, I approved the black plan formulated by the General Staff." Constantine stood up and solemnly handed the document to the Chief of General Staff Emmanuel.

"Notify the commander of Macedonia's Manujianaski Corps as soon as possible and ask him to deploy and mobilize troops according to the black plan as soon as possible."

"I hope the Greek army can receive God's favor and win another glorious victory"

Emmanuel carefully took the document, and after confirming it was correct again, he also took out a pen from his pocket and signed his name under Constantine's signature in the lower right corner of the document.

"Greece must win," he said, and handed the document to Arms Minister Giannis.

Giannis took a deep breath, followed Emmanuel's example, and signed his name in the lower right corner of the document.

The signatures of the three people showed that the black plan on this document had been unanimously approved by the three people at the highest level of the Greek army.

If this war fails, the three people who signed the document will definitely be held accountable by the Greek people.

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On the morning of June 19, the headquarters of the Macedonian Legion was located in Thessaloniki.

"Your Excellency, Commander of the Army, urgent military information from the General Staff," the Chief of General Staff of the Metaxas Army came to the office of the Macedonian Army's supreme commander, Manu Gianaski, with a telegram in his hand and said nervously.

Manugianaski, who was dealing with military affairs, immediately stood up, walked quickly to Metaxas, and said eagerly: "How about it, what is the choice of the General Staff?"

"The General Staff ordered that the Macedonian Army immediately execute the black plan after receiving the news." Metaxas straightened his body and read out the order.

Many staff officers at all levels in the office who were affiliated with the Macedonian Legion started talking with a "boom" after hearing this.

“Unexpectedly, the General Staff ultimately chose the conservative black solution.”

"It's no wonder that Basil's plan is too radical and the risk is too high. At the same time, we must be careful to prevent Serbia from taking advantage of the opportunity. Naturally, we must be more careful."

"Okay, stop talking. Since the General Staff has made a decision, we must now strictly implement the combat plan," Manugianasky shouted loudly.

Having said that, he glanced at the division-level staff officers of the Macedonian Army and continued: "According to the main purpose of the black plan, all units of the Macedonian Army rely on the complete fortifications built to contain, snipe, attack, and weaken the Bulgarian army, and seek opportunities to counterattack. "

"Now you immediately return to your troops, support your military ambitions, implement the black plan, and execute it."

After receiving the order, the staff officers filed out and went to their respective troop garrison locations.

"Chief of Staff Metaxas, let's discuss the military situation on the front line," Manugianaski opened the military situation distribution map on the table and said to Metaxas.

After the London Conference failed to reach an agreement with Bulgaria, the Macedonian Legion had already begun to build fortifications on the Macedonian border.

In the same situation, Bulgaria is also actively mobilizing troops on the border.

According to intelligence, the Bulgarian side divided its army into two parts, mainly Kavala on the Aegean coast, and Petrich in northwest Bulgaria.

Against the Macedonian Army, the two Bulgarian armies presented an obvious pincer offensive. They wanted to attack the Macedonian Army from the northwest and southeast, which was generally deployed around Salonika. They defeated the enemy Macedonian Army in one fell swoop and occupied Vardar. Macedonia and Aegean Macedonia.

After the Black Plan was formulated, the Macedonian Army received instructions from the General Staff to focus on defense, with the central Macedonian city of Serre and the Aegean city of Nizhnytarovs at the root of the Chalkidiki Peninsula as fulcrums. U-shaped defense line.

The plan has been implemented for two months. With the efforts of the Macedonian Legion, the two cities of Serre and Nizhnytarovs have been turned into two heavily guarded fortresses.

In addition, there are trenches connecting various defense points. According to reports from various armies, in two months, in addition to the natural obstacles formed by rivers and mountains, the Macedonian Army has built more than 200 bunkers, 500 kilometers long. of trenches.

The entire eastern Macedonia has simply become a large construction site. 400,000 troops and other mobilized people, whose number may reach 300,000, a total of 700,000 people, were organized by the Macedonian Legion to build steel defense lines.

·······

The city of Nizhnytarovs where the 2nd Division was stationed.

The Border Patrol team that caused the unexpected exchange of fire was part of the 2nd Division.

At this time, on the front line, the fighting between the Greek army and the Bulgarian army had continued for a day and a night.

On the afternoon of the 19th, 100,000 Bulgarian troops, led by General Nikolai Ivanov, had already moved from Kavala to the vicinity of the Greek army's defense line, and impatiently began to attack the Greek defense line.

Bulgaria was a little surprised by the cowardly and massive construction of fortifications by the Greek army.

Of course, senior Bulgarian leaders are still very wary of Greece's intention to engage in a long-term war.

They naturally understand their own weaknesses very well, and any further delay will only give the Greeks more time to build more fortifications.

For Bulgaria, once the army cannot quickly conquer the Greek defense line, Bulgaria, which has recruited almost all the domestic strong labor force into the army, will be defeated without defeat.

In the camp of the Fourth Division of the Macedonian Army, division commander Papademos was seriously awaiting the Bulgarian attack.

As the main force defending the Nizhny Tarovs Fortress, the Greek Second Division, the Fourth Division and two black divisions are mainly deployed here.

"This." When Ivanov arrived outside the Nizhnytarovs Fortress, the trenches outside the city wall made Ivanov's head feel big!

Ivanov had some doubts about the operational purpose of the order issued by his headquarters to quickly conquer Nizhnytarovs, the defense node of the Greek Macedonian Army, and quickly disintegrate the Greek army's defense line.

It's not that he has never seen trenches before, but the one in front of him is completely different from what he has seen. The trenches extend in all directions, like a huge spider web, spreading out rapidly with the center of Xitarovs.

When facing the Bulgarian army, the Ottoman army generally refused to defend the city.

The Greek army in front of them seemed to be acting out of common sense. The depth of the entire defense line had been extended to more than 800 meters!

This puts a lot of pressure on the infantry to charge!

The results of the investigation left Ivanov helpless. The Ottoman Empire had already built complete fortifications in these places, and Greece spent huge sums of money to build a complex and solid city defense system based on the Ottomans.

In Ivanov's view, the city defense fortifications in Nizhniytarovs are tightly designed and reasonably designed. The multi-layered fortifications can provide cross fire cover for each other, and a large number of artillery pieces are deployed.

The morale of the Greeks is also very high. In yesterday's exploratory attack, the Bulgarians suffered heavy losses. In just one afternoon, they suffered more than 700 casualties.

"Otherwise, let's do it as planned! Blast off the artillery at the top of the city first!"

Although the Bulgarian Army began to learn from Russia, it still knew how to concentrate its firepower.

Since they bear the important task of conquering Nizhniytarovs, Ivanov's army carried a total of 424 artillery pieces, which were specially prepared to deal with the tough enemies here.

As a result, four artillery regiments with about 424 artillery pieces were deployed in front of the Greeks.

Step by step, under the watchful eye of the Greeks, they unhooked the artillery from the carriage, then arranged the artillery position and placed the artillery in the gun position. The artillery crew members took off the ammunition from the ammunition cart, and the commander began to measure the distance and prepare for the artillery bombardment.

The Bulgarians' training was pretty good, and the whole process only lasted about 30 minutes!

The Bulgarian artillery was preparing, and the infantry began to gradually approach the Greek army's defense lines.

In this era, in addition to artillery, there are rifles.

The Bulgarians began to build the proposed starting position, and the forward troops also began to move. The troops began to take up positions one by one, waiting for the artillery to be ready to start the bombardment.

While the Bulgarians were busy, the Greek legions were also making final preparations for battle.

Not to mention the 200 75mm and 45 150mm rapid-fire guns behind the defense line, they are responsible for long-range suppression.

The remaining machine guns and mortars have been deployed to pre-arranged machine gun nests and artillery nests, and the troops are deployed in machine gun and mortar positions.

Although the number of soldiers is not as large as that of the Bulgarian army, the firepower is indeed powerful. The close combat firepower of the Greeks is not comparable to the single-mounted rifles of the Bulgarians.