'Kreuzotter' (ii) was the German initial preparation for offensive operations by Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm List’s 12^th Army, later in collaboration with Bulgarian forces, to advance to the south from Bulgaria into north-eastern Greece along the north coast of the Aegean Sea within the context of 'Marita' and 'Unternehmen 25' (12 November 1940).

Operating largely to the east of the Axios river, whichs flow into the northern part of the Aegean Sea just to the west of Thessaloníki, in April 1941 the 12^th Army deployed Generalleutnant Bruno Bieler’s 73^rd Division of General Georg Stumme’s XL Corps (mot.) on the right to attack though south-eastern Yugoslavia to reach the upper reaches of the Axios river and follow this waterway downstream, Generalleutnant Hermann Ritter von Speck’s XVIII Corps (Generalleutnant Helge Auleb’s 6^th Division, Generalmajor Karl Allmendinger’s 5^th Division and Generalleutnant Philipp Müller-Gebhard’s 72^nd Division) in the centre against Antistrátegos Konstantinos Bakopoulos’s Greek 2^nd Army (Yperstrategos Leonidas Stergiopulos’s 18^th Division, Yperstrategos Konstantinos Papakonstantinou’s 14^th Division and Yperstrategos Chritos Zoiopoulos’s 7^th Division) and Generalleutnant Eugen Ott’s XXX Corps (Generalleutnant Josef Folttmann’s 164^th Division and Generalleutnant Karl-Adolf Hollidt’s 50^th Division) on the left against Syntagmatarches Kalis’s Nestos Brigade along the line of the Nestos river.