A Hill to Die On: Britain's role in the Yugoslav War.

The Battle of Belgrade was set to be a bloody fight. It had taken hundreds of casualties for NATO to push this far into Yugoslav territory, and there were fears from some that it would take thousands to secure the well-defended capital city. The most prevalent concerns were about the city turning into another Fallujah, except one where both sides had tanks and sophisticated ATGMs. The city, SACEUR had decided, needed to be occupied regardless; the civilian casualties that would result from a protracted siege prevented the city from simply being encircled.

Three weeks into the ground campaign, Allied forces moved to isolate the city. From the east, the division leading the charge of the VII US Corps took up positions from the outside of Belgrade, sealing off the key routes into and out of the Yugoslav capital. This unit, the US 1st Cavalry Division, was supported by artillery and attack helicopters as it moved in. Moving up Highway 1, the American tanks and Bradleys encountered stubborn resistance. This was mostly in the form of dismounted infantrymen using pillboxes and foxholes; anti-tank weapons were fired at American armour while sniper and machinegun fire made life treacherous for the dismounted infantry. Soldiers advanced behind the cover of their Bradleys, moving out to clear enemy positions whenever they were encountered.

For the British Army, the push to the northern side of the city took place with only light resistance after the Danube had been crossed in force. The Light Dragoons, the lead battlegroup of the 4th Armoured Brigade, led the assault towards the city as they had done to the north, using the sheer weight of firepower offered by their Warriors and Challenger 2s to push any opposition aside. One notable exception was the movement of two battalions of mechanised infantry, supported by a company of tanks, northwards at Indija. After this Yugoslav troop concentration was discovered by Wildcat helicopters of the Army Air Corps, dozens of attack runs were made by British helicopters, before the 1st Battalion, Royal Regiment of Fusiliers and its supporting armoured squadron slammed into the enemy formation, destroying thirty-one T-72s and over fifty trucks and IFVs. Beyond this battle, the whole 1st Armoured Division was able to make it to the northern outskirts of Belgrade with relatively minor casualties.

One key concern was the rising insurgency behind NATO lines. Already, die-hard Serb troops who had discarded their uniforms were causing problems when they ambushed Allied supply columns. In one such ambush, two soldiers of the Royal Logistics Corps were captured and subjected to roadside executions by the partisans. Furthermore, logistics convoys now had to be escorted by larger numbers of troops; this would eventually lead to the British government deploying an additional pair of infantry battalions for convoy protection duties. These were reservists with the 5th Battalion, Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, and 3rd Battalion, Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment. It was a major deployment of the Territorial Army, the scale of which had not been seen since the later stages of the Iraq War.

With their Lines of Communication (LOCs) secured, the British Army began to press on its attack into Belgrade. MLRS and self-propelled howitzer batteries pummelled the Yugoslav defensive positions which were ringed around the city for three straight days, while American and British troops watched from their hilltop positions surrounding the city, waiting for the order to attack to come. It did not come yet. In a final effort to subdue the defences prior to the assault, American B-52s from RAF Fairford took to the skies and headed for Belgrade. They dropped cluster bombs all along the out defensive ring of the city, causing huge damage to both the defenders and to large numbers of civilian dwellings. This act eventually resulted in SACEUR being relieved of his command for authorising the raids, which became seen as an atrocity after the slant put on them by several Russian television news channels and the pro-government China Daily newspaper. While the attack was arguably barbarous, perhaps even criminal, it successfully supressed the defences for long enough for an assault to be attempted on the ground.

Three infantry battlegroups with the 4th Armoured Brigade moved into the Altina and Zemun residential districts, finding themselves opposed by infantry and missile teams. Securing the two residential areas on March 29, the British briefly paused their attack in this sector. The 7th Armoured Brigade hit Belgrade from somewhat further south, driving into Belgrade Nikola Tesla International Airport across open farmland before capturing the airstrip. A heavy fight was offered here when the Royal Anglian Regiment and elements of 1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards were met with ATGM fire and several barrages by concealed, Russian-built BM-21 rocket launchers. One Challenger 2 was knocked out along with two Warriors, with a total of twenty British soldiers killed before the airport was secured.

On April 1, the attack continued once again as the two armoured brigades finally punched through the inner ring of Belgrade’s defensive on the E-75 Highway. Through residential areas, blocks of flats and housing estates, office buildings, and government facilities, the British soldiers fought day and night. Belgrade burned as bombardment after bombardment was called in, often causing many civilian casualties. It seemed that at every corner, a BMP armed with its 30mm cannon was waiting to ambush the British Warriors. In high-rise buildings, lone snipers or missile teams could kill individual soldiers or take out vehicles as they tried to advance deeper into the Yugoslav capital. In one case, a pair of YNA snipers hidden in the ruins of a bombed-out supermarket kept a company of Irish Guards pinned down for almost an hour, killing five of their number, before an artillery strike was successfully called in, which levelled the shopping mall. Houses were a nightmare for soldiers to clear. Days were spent kicking down doors to root out insurgents and YNA regulars alike. Grenades and bayonets were the tools of the job. Tanks and armoured vehicles could destroy buildings above-ground structures, but they often failed to totally eliminate resistors in dugouts and bunkers.

One British soldier, Sergeant Andrew Warren of the 1st Btn, Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, said; “It’s like fucking Stalingrad. Yesterday, we had to dismount our Warriors to clear three blocks of houses. Soon as we pushed on from there, a sniper emerged and killed by lieutenant, right from the window of a house we’d just cleared. It’s a maze.”

It took until April 9 for Belgrade to finally be secured by Allied troops; French, German, Dutch, Canadian and Italian as well as Americans and British contributed to the fight. The last elements of the YNA began to surrender throughout the first week of the month as their ammunition finally ran dry. Pre-positioned ammunition stocks beneath the city did them no good, running out in a matter of a few days with the sheer intensity of the fighting. It was during these final days that American commandos finally rescued the hostages taken when the US, British, and French embassies had been seized. Delta Force commandos and Army Rangers with the 75th Regiment stormed a compound near the headquarters of Milosevic’s Yugoslav National Party (the party had been formed in 2001 as a means of promoting national unity amidst a bloody crackdown). Here, some 200 men and women were located. Beatings and rapes had been commonplace and the freed captives were in a terrible state; deprived of food, water and dignity, it was a miracle that they had survived. Furthermore, when the SAS, supported by a column of American Bradley fighting vehicles, stormed the headquarters of the State Security Administration, they found the thirty-seven Allied POWs held there. They had likewise been subject to cruel treatment, though as military personnel they had followed their duty to resist their captors where possible and were physically in a better condition than many of the diplomats due to their somewhat better health and fitness at the beginning of the POW’s captivity.

Slobodan Milosevic was caught trying to flee Belgrade by British troops. A platoon of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers guarding the exits to the city after their intense three-week battle stopped a pair of cars to search them for weapons; instead, they found the near-catatonic dictator and his bodyguards. All were captured without a fight subsequently arrested by military police. Milosevic was headed first to Aviano Air Base, then to The Hague under heavy armed guard to face justice for his actions. Though his trial was to be international, the Yugoslav ruler of almost three decades would have to undergo his sentence in the United Kingdom as part of a deal reached between the British government and the UN War Crimes Tribunal for Yugoslavia.

By the time the Battle of Belgrade was over, 102 British and 211 American soldiers had lost their lives.