Between two wars 1913-1915
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After the
Balkan Wars a lot of artillery stuffs were consumed, wasted or damaged. In
order to improve their state the
Bulgarian Artillery Inspection intended to supply the Army with weapons and
ammunition through imports from foreign countries, and through the repairing
and manufacturing capacities of the In order to rearm the Army the Artillery Inspection
prepared a plan that provided : 1. to replace not quick firing guns with quick firing
ones; 2. to buy an adequate number of mountain guns and field
howitzers; 3. to assure to every gun 700 – 1000 shells according
to the model and the calibre; 4. to arm the infantry only with modern Mannlicher
magazine rifles and carbines; 5. to increase until to 700 the number of the heavy
machine-guns. To achieve this goal 329,756,550 leva were needed,
but in 1914 only 102,000,000 leva were granted. On the basis of this sum,
orders were made in As a result of the reduced possibility to receive supplies from
foreign countries, became inevitable to rely on the repair of the out of
order weapons, a task assigned to the technical service of the artillery.
Owing to the load of the work to carry out, the Artillery Inspector asked to
the War Ministry that the military budget allowed changes in its structure
and organization. In August 1914 at the artillery arsenal in Thanks of this great effort and in spite of the impossibility of
purchasing weapons abroad, the Bulgarian artillery was able not only to
replace the losses suffered
during the Interallied War (at least 138 pieces), but also to increase
the number of its guns, especially the quick firing ones. After the war
gradually one division in every not-quick-firing artillery regiment received
modern Krupp guns, captured from the Turks. However the lack of guns did not
allowed replacing also the second division, and in September 1915 each
divisional artillery brigade had two quick-firing regiments and only one
not-quick-firing artillery division. Nevertheless the authorized
establishments were not reached, and at the beginning of the war some
Infantry Divisions had only 9 quick-firing field batteries, instead of the
planned 12, and some batteries had only 3 guns, instead of 4. The situation of mountain artillery and field howitzers was even
worse. Although during the war mountain batteries proved to be very useful
not only in broken terrain, but also as accompanying batteries, thanks to
their great mobility, only 11 guns could be added to the Army. As for field
howitzers, in 1913 general Savov had concluded that one division (3
batteries) per Army was insufficient, and should be proper to have two
divisions attached to every Army. Consequently 11 batteries
of 120mm Schneider field howitzers were ordered, but at the outbreak of World
War 1, the French Army cancelled the contract, and in 1915 seized the
howitzers that were assigned to the Armée d’Orient and to the Serbian Army. Thanks
to the modern 150mm heavy howitzers and 105mm long guns captured at Odrin
the situation of siege artillery was greatly improved : not only the number
of the heavy artillery pieces increased from 70 to 91, but also 26 of them were
quick-firing Krupp pieces. Unfortunately out of the 18 howitzers and 18 guns
captured, only 14 and 12 respectively could be repaired. Since the long range
gun with a curved trajectory and high explosive shell proved to be very
useful during the previous wars, they were assigned to the fortress artillery
regiments deployed along the Serbian border. The 12 long guns were shared
among six two-pieces batteries, assigned two to every fortress artillery
regiment.
The situation
of ammunition was more critical. At the beginning of the mobilisation, the
Bulgarian field artillery had approximately
1064 rounds per gun. During the war against Already in October and November In March 1913, the Bulgarian Army decided to order shrapnel (25,000 for 75mm field guns, 15,000 for 75mm
mountain guns, 14,000 for 120mm field howitzers and 2,800 for 150mm heavy
howitzers) and H.E. shells (20,000 for 120mm field howitzers and 4,320 for
150mm heavy howitzers). As usually three firms were contacted : Schneider,
Krupp and Ehrhardt. Schneider offered the lower price (7,315,000 leva,
against 7,550,000 leva for Krupp and 7,390,000 leva for Ehrhardt), but the
contract was not signed, since the Artillery Inspector preferred to break up
the order, and give to each firm an order for the ammunition for which it
asked the lowest price. During the Balkan Wars and after their end, 1. in an eventual war how long could last the ammunition available at
that time? 2. how many ammunition could be at disposal at the beginning of the
military operations? 3. what would be the monthly needs of ammunition in wartime? General Naydenov answered that, on the basis of the experience of the
Balkan War, the ammunition available could be enough only for two months, but
he specified that, since at that time the war had a world-wide proportion,
without doubt the waste of ammunition would have been heavier. This meant
that Bulgarian artillery was not ready for a new war. In the event of a war
the Bulgarian General Staff considered that should be required 1500 round per
gun. Recalling the difficulties to purchase weapons and ammunition since the
main powers were involved in a great war, general Naydenov stressed that by
any means the government should regularly assure enough supplies to the Army,
otherwise it would be able even to defend the border. The Minister of War reassured the Artillery Inspector, saying that if In September 1915 at the declaration of the general mobilization, the
ammunition available were greatly decreased compared to the beginning of the
war against |
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