Battle of the Drina

The Battle of the Drina (Serbian: Bitka na Drini, Битка на Дрини) was fought between Serbian and Austro-Hungarian armies in September 1914, near Loznica, Serbia, during the First Serbian campaign of World War I. After a first failed invasion of Serbia where he lost 40,000 men, Oskar Potiorek, the Austro-Hungarian commander of the Balkanstreitkräfte, launched a new offensive across the River Drina at the western Serbian border; after successfully crossing the river the night of 7—8 September the Austro-Hungarian forces were stopped facing strong Serbian defensive positions. In the meantime, the Serbian army was forced to end their offensive into Austrian Syrmia and regroup their forces to face the threat. Meanwhile, in the far west, a smaller force of Serbian and Montenegrin troops moved into Bosnia, taking Višegrad. In the South, the Austrians took Shabatz (Šabac). On 17 September, a counterattack pushed the Austrians back to the Drina, where both sides settled into trench warfare. The Battle of the Drina is considered one of the bloodiest on the war's Balkan Front. After being defeated in the Battle of Cer in August 1914, the Austro-Hungarian army retreated over the Drina River back into Bosnia and Syrmia. Under the pressure of the Allies, Serbia conducted an offensive across the Sava river into the Austro-Hungarian region of Syrmia taking Zemun going as far as 20 miles into enemy territory. Meanwhile, the Timok First Division of the Serbian Second Army suffered heavy loss in a diversionary crossing when a bridge collapsed, causing panic, suffering around 6,000 casualties while inflicting only 2,000. With most of his forces in Bosnia, general Oskar Potiorek decided that the best way to stop the Serbian offensive was to launch another invasion into Serbia to force the Serbs to recall their troops to defend their homeland. On 7 September, a renewed Austro-Hungarian attack started from the west, across the river Drina, this time with both the Fifth Army in Mačva and the Sixth Army further south.