Italian invasion of Kosovo | |||||||||
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Part of the Invasion of Yugoslavia of World War II | |||||||||
Italian Bersaglieri during the invasion | |||||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||||
Yugoslavia Local Slavic residents | |||||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
Vittorio Ambrosio Alessandro Pirzio Biroli (WIA) Ugo Cavallero Prenk Pervizi Enno von Rintelen |
Dušan Simović Danilo Kalafatović Milorad Petrović Petar Nedeljković Dušan Trifunović | ||||||||
Units involved | |||||||||
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Strength | |||||||||
c. 300,000 men[2] in 22 divisions[3][4] Around 600 aircraft[5] |
c. 700,000 men on all fronts[6] 110[7]–200 tanks[8] (50[8]–54[7] of which were modern) 460[9]–505 aircraft (including 103 modern bombers[8] and 107 modern fighters[10]) | ||||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||||
800 killed[11] 2,500 wounded[12] c. 10 aircraft shot down 22 aircraft damaged |
c. 30,000 captured[13][14] 49 aircraft shot down[15] 210–300 aircraft captured[16] |
The Italian invasion of Kosovo, also called Operation "Marita",[17] was an invasion that took part during the Invasion of Yugoslavia in World War II, when Italian soldiers marched through Kosovo and occupied the region.[18] After the invasion, a conference was held in Vienna (21–24 April 1941)[18] which decided that the majority of Kosovo would have been given to Italian-controlled Albania, including Pristina after the Germans withdrew from taking the city.[19]