Satellite images of the sacred Serbian mountain Pastrik: The battlefield of the second-largest battle in 1999 today looks like a "Moon's surface"

The Battle of Pastrik was one of the two most fierce battles during the war in Kosovo and Metohija during the NATO bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. 

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It began on May 26, 1999, with a land offensive of the members of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, with the support of the Albanian artillery and NATO aviation. There was a 549th motorized brigade of the Yugoslav army on our side, under the command of the general Bozidar Djelic with the headquarters in Prizren.

The aim of the operation "Arrow", as the NATO called the operation, was to break into the valley of Beli Drim in the region of Mountain Pastrik with the military base "Gorozup", and the opening of the corridor which would enable ground troops to enter into Metohija and to cut our communication on the line Pec-Prizren. 

Satelitski pogled na planinu Paštrik iz pravca juga, iz ptičje perspektive. Foto: Google Maps

They failed, the 549th motorized brigade did not allow it, they resisted it, inflicted heavy losses on the enemy (our sources say about 1,400 dead and 500 wounded, while Albanian claims 800-1,000 dead) with its minimum casualties (25 dead and 126 wounded), and completely deserved the Order of the People's Hero and it was given to it on June 16th. 

"Battle for Kosare was terrible. With great sacrifices, we have stopped the breach of Albanian terrorists on Drenica from April 9th to Juna 14th 1999. But, the battle on Pastrik, which lasted from May 16th to June 14 (of the last day of the war), was recorded in our battle documents as the hardest one", said the general Nebojsa Pavkovic, the commander of the Third Army.

In addition to the terrain, an important factor contributing to this was the frenzied action of the American Strategic Aviation which, in the first five days of the battle, delivered over 200 destructive unguided Mk-82 bombs to Pastrik from B-1 and B-52 bombers, each of them weighing 227 kilograms. The airstrikes were so intense on our positions during the battle on Pastrik that on May 29th alone, the NATO alliance had 150 flights in that region. 

Satelitski pogled na planinu Paštrik iz pravca severa, postrance. Foto: Google Maps

They did everything in their power to enable Albanian terrorists to break through our first line of defense, occupy the heights, and open the corridor. And they only managed to capture some of the highs, thanks to the fact that they retreated between our ranks during the terrible artillery and aviation attacks, and nothing more than that. The corridor remained closed.

However, the NATO planes succeeded in doing something themselves: they succeeded in turning parts of the holy Serbian mountain Pastrik into the "moonland," as General Pavkovic described.

We don't know how this mountain at the border of Serbia and Albania looked like. 

We would have to have access into much older satellite records created before 1999, and we don't have it. You can see on the pictures what it looks like today. It is still beautiful, perhaps even more beautiful than before.

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(Telegraf.co.uk / P.L.)