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Austria-Hungary
was the second supplier of Bulgarian Army in World War I. The ties between
the two Armies were very bound, probably because the Bulgarian Chief of Staff
and many Bulgarian officiers had studied in Vienna. Only a few days
after entering the war in October 1915, the Bulgarian High Command sent an
urgent request to the Austro-Hungarian General Staff for immediate delivery
of 50,000 Mannlicher rifles and 50 million rounds for them, 300,000
greatcoats, 500,000 pair of boots, 250,000 rucksacks, 250,000 cartridge
belts, 500,000 aluminium canteens, 100,000 woolen blankets, 1,600,000 meters
of cotton cloth, and much more. During the war the
co-operation between the two Army was unfailing and Austria-Hungary supplied a lot of
Schwarzlose machine guns and a great number of
weapons and equipments.
As
for artillery, the Bulgarian Army received by Austria-Hungary some batteries of
150 mm
heavy howitzer and 75 mm
mountain gun, both made by Skoda. The last was probably the best mountain gun
introduced during World War I and was intensively used also
during World War II by various Army. Even if it was designed “kanone”
it was a true howitzer able to fire in curve trajectory, that was very useful
in mountain warfare.
For
Skoda it was essential to take other consumers into account in order to
maintain gun production after the end of the war. This referred particularly
to Austro-Hungary’s allies, and the 75mm mountain gun was to prove an
unrivalled product. In 1916 a delivery of 31
batteries (124 guns) to Bulgaria could be seen as the beginning of long-term
deliveries, especially because it was the first time that Bulgarian Army
ordered artillery from Skoda, instead of Schneider or Krupp, as previously did.
But
such a great zeal of Skoda works in manufacturing guns for export, caused
perplexity and apprehension in the Danube Monarchy. In the light of the
deteriorating raw material situation, the Austro-Hungarian War Ministry was
astonished that Skoda could meet its delivery obligations to the
Austro-Hungarian Army for heavy artillery only with great difficulty, but
used raw materials and productions capacities for manufacturing mountain guns
for export, especially because such deliveries also included ammunition. But
in that case economic factors prevailed against military ones.
More
serious tensions grew up with Germany
in spring 1916. The Prussian war Minister, Lt.Gen. Adolf
Wild von Hohenborn, accused Austria-Hungary of using the raw materials
supplied by Germany to manufacture guns sold to the allies, whilst the Danube
Monarchy was trying to compensate for its own artillery deficits by guns and
material deliveries from Germany. He judged that the deliveries to Bulgarian
and Turkish Army were reprehensible, because he assumed that German subsidies
were used to pay for them.
In
his reply the Austro-Hungarian War Ministry, General of Artillery Alexander
von Krobatin, stated that the last reproach was
quite unjustified, since not only the deliveries by Skoda had not yet been
paid, but Bulgaria was
also supported financially by Austria-Hungary.
He added “that it must be in the interests of the overall situation of the
Central Powers to remedy as much as possible the military weakness of the
other allies, i.e. Bulgaria
and Turkey”.
The
Prussian War Minister was not satisfied by this reply and suggested to effect
deliveries to the allies after joint consultation to avoid misunderstandings
in the future. The project of jointly negotiable deliveries was not rejected
outright, but reserved for later comments. In the light of the fact that
Austrian deliveries abroad did not even make up 5% of the total wartime
production of guns, the Prussian War Minister reproaches seems excessive.
Apart
from Skoda mountain guns, Bulgaria
mainly received captured Serbian guns. After the defeat of Serbia a large quantity of guns
fell into Austrian hands. Many of them were found in the depots at Kragujevac and Kraljevo. The
recaptured Austro-Hungarian material lost in the 1914 battles was immediately
put in service, while the majority of the Serbian artillery of French origin,
although modern, was not introduced in the Austrian Army. Some of them were
exhibited as trophies in public places in Vienna and in other cities of the
Monarchy, but in 1916 they were handed over to the allies, above all
Bulgaria.
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