Usable History?
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Usable History?
Representations of Yugoslavia’s diicult past
– from 1945 to 2002
Tea Sindbæk
Aarhus University Press | a
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Usable History?
© the author and Aarhus University Press
Typeset by Graisk SIGNS
Cover design by Graisk SIGNS
Printed by Narayana Press, Denmark
Printed in Denmark 2012
ISBN 978 87 7934 568 3
Aarhus University Press
Aarhus
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DK – 8200 Aarhus N
Copenhagen
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DK – 2400 Copenhagen NV
www.unipress.dk
Published with the inancial support of Landsdommer V. Gieses Legat and he Aarhus University
Research Foundation
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Contents
1
Preface
7
Introduction: hematization, historical culture and genocide
9
hematization and cardinal theme
Historical culture and use of history
he importance of context
Genocide, term and theme
he term and theme of genocide in Yugoslavia
Sources
2
he Second World War in Yugoslavia
25
Disintegration and war regimes
Massacres and war crimes
3
Establishing an oicial narrative, 1945‑1948
39
he communist reconstruction of Yugoslavia
he irst oicial accounts
he oicial report on Jasenovac
Settling accounts
Tito’s 1948 report of the war
4
Massacres in memoirs and iction, 1945‑1952
57
he bloody cloth of Krajina – massacres in memoir literature
Jasenovac
he war and its massacres in songs and poetry
Partisan novels
5
Titoist institutional historiography, 1945‑1960
71
Breaking with Stalinism
Historiography and society
Education
Titoist historiography of the massacres
6
New perspectives on wartime history, 1960‑1980
91
Yugoslav politics
Professionalized historiography
Republican and national research environments
New perspectives on Second World War history
Genocide becomes an issue
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7
Public commemorations and popular culture, 1960‑1980
113
he memorial area of Jasenovac
Partisan poetry
War ilms
History schoolbooks
8
he breakdown of communist history
and the theme of genocide, 1980‑1986
139
Politics of crisis
Fractured historical culture
he breakdown of communist history
hematization of wartime massacres in literature
Wartime history and the concept of genocide in public debate
9
Genocide as a cardinal theme, 1984‑1989
161
Politics and national tensions
he development of genocide historiography
Croatian reactions and genocide discussions in the press
10
National conlicts and national historical cultures, 1990‑2002 189
he establishment of the Croatian national state
he Bleiburg tragedy and the thematization of genocide in Croatia
Towards a Croatian national history
he lack of transition in Serbia
he theme of genocide in Serbia
Teaching Serbian war history
he Bosnian war
Bosnian historical culture and the theme of genocide
Towards a Bosniak national history
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Conclusion
219
Literature
227
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Preface
When in April 1941 Yugoslavia was invaded and split into pieces by Nazi‑
Germany and its allies, what followed was to become as much a Yugoslav civil
war as a war of occupation and liberation. Groups of Yugoslavs, divided along
political, ethnic and regional lines, not only fought with or against the Axis
forces, but they also fought each other. During the warfare from 1941 to 1945,
several hundred thousand Yugoslav civilians were killed by other Yugoslavs in
large‑scale massacres or concentration camps.
After the Second World War, Yugoslavia was re‑established as a socialist
multinational federation. he new communist regime built a large part of its
self‑representation and legitimacy upon the victories of the communist‑led
Partisans in the war. Yet the war had also left a diicult, painful and potentially
divisive historical legacy to Yugoslav society; the history of these massacres
could easily invoke national enmity or reawaken the political divisions of
wartime Yugoslavia. In building their new ideal multiethnic state, how were
the Yugoslav communists to deal with the history of massive internal Yugoslav
war crimes and massacres? How would Yugoslav society and its historians
represent and explain these internal massacres, and how would societal needs
and political demands inluence their representations?
In this book I investigate how the history of Yugoslavia’s internal Second
World War massacres was presented and used in politics, historiography and
popular representations of history in Yugoslavia between 1945 and 2002. he
book shows how this history was drawn upon for political, ideological and
other purposes, and how historical representations were inluenced by political
developments.
hough I frequently refer to the concept of genocide and to the massacres
committed during the Second World War, this is not a book about those
massacres, and it does not seek to determine whether or not the massacres
committed during the war constitute genocide; this question is outside the
scope of the study, and answering it would demand a completely diferent
approach. Rather, this book is about the role of history in society; about the
ways in which painful and potentially divisive history may be present in society
and how such history can be drawn upon for a number of purposes.
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Most of the material presented here was part of my doctoral research, which
I thank the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Aarhus for inancing,
and my supervisors, Henning Mørk and the late Niels Kayser Nielsen for kindly
overseeing. Friends and colleagues in Aarhus and elsewhere commented on
parts of the manuscript, and I am very grateful to each of them. I especially
want to thank Wendy Bracewell, Carol Lilly and Peter Bugge for their insightful
and generous reading of the inal thesis. My gratitude also goes to the Aarhus
University Research Foundation and Landsdommer Gieses Legat for support‑
ing the publication of this revised version. And inally, I thank friends and
colleagues in Zagreb, Belgrade and Sarajevo, especially Petar Bagarić, Srđan
Milošević, Ivo Goldstein, Dubravka Stojanović, Predrag Marković and Hus‑
nija Kamberović, who kindly illuminated me in my ignorance and patiently
accepted my intrusion into a history that they know so much better than I.
My hope is that I, as an outsider, may approach the subject with diferent
presumptions and perhaps detect new patterns. All errors and mistakes remain,
of course, my own.
Aarhus, August 2012
Tea Sindbæk
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Introduction:
1
hematization, historical culture and genocide
Remake, a Bosnian/French ilm from 2002, relates the life of Tarik, a young
writer from Sarajevo in the irst half of the 1990s.1 As the Bosnian conlict un‑
folds, he and his friends ind themselves on diferent sides of a war they cannot
support. Together with other Muslim men, Tarik is imprisoned and tortured in
a camp held by Serbian nationalist forces during the siege of Sarajevo. Remake
shows the brutal maltreatment of prisoners in the camp and the Serbian guards
parading nationalist symbols associated with the Second World War Serbian
Chetnik forces, who had committed numerous war crimes in Bosnia.
Tarik has recently inished a ilm manuscript about his father, who sur‑
vived imprisonment and torture by the Croatian Fascist Ustasha movement
that held power in Croatia and Bosnia during the Second World War. Tarik’s
father was sent to the infamous Ustasha concentration camp, Jasenovac, and
Remake pictures him standing in a queue of naked prisoners on their way to
be executed. Ustasha guards, swinging heavy wooden mallets, crush the skulls
of the prisoners and throw the bodies in the river Sava. Fortunately, Tarik’s
father is saved by chance and returns to Sarajevo.
Remake shifts between the two wars and the parallel stories of individual
sufering within frameworks of ethnic conlict and massacres. As the title sug‑
gests, the two stories could be seen as essentially the same. he story about
Tarik’s father is illed with easily recognisable references to elements of Yugoslav
historiography of the Second World War and its massacres, for example the
heavy wooden mallets used by the killers at Jasenovac. he fact that the part of
the ilm depicting the father’s experiences turns out to be an enactment of the
son’s manuscript underlines Remake’s own re‑enactment of history, relecting
chains of presentations and representations of the past.
he example of Remake illustrates several points: it demonstrates some of
the ways in which history is drawn upon and referred to outside the academic
and educational subject. It also shows how a historical culture, in this case that
of Yugoslavia, holds an archive of historical stock‑references that are connected
to certain understandings of the past. Moreover, it shows how these references
can be re‑contextualised in order to suggest other meanings. While Remake’s
references to the Second World War draws on the communist historiography
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of ‘the people against the fascists’, these references can be seen to imply an ear‑
lier instance of repetitive interethnic violence in Bosnia as well. hus, Remake
also illustrates a particular way of representing recent history in the former
Yugoslav areas during and after the wars of the 1990s: the idea that these wars
were somehow a resumption of the internal Yugoslav ighting of the Second
World War, and that interethnic conlicts and violence were thus repeating
themselves.
Remake is but one example of a wider cultural interest, which had continued
for several decades, in the massacres and war crimes of the Second World War.
he history of the inter‑Yugoslav massacres of the Second World War was a
prominent theme within historiography and popular history in Yugoslavia
from the mid 1980s.
he question of how to write the history of these massacres was rather
delicate throughout most of the existence of Socialist Yugoslavia. In a mul‑
tiethnic state, such as Yugoslavia, ethnic violence and massacres are complex
and sensitive questions. Soon after the end of the Second World War, the
history of these massacres was subordinated to a state‑bearing myth of united
patriotic Yugoslav resistance and revolutionary struggle, and the history of
internal Yugoslav violence was made to it into that narrative. he myth of
united resistance remained oicially unchallenged until the 1980s, when history
was revised, not least from national perspectives, and the history of Yugoslav
war crimes was ascribed a new, much more national meaning.
While Second World War history did not become less embedded in politics
with the dissolution of Yugoslavia, and with the wars and the establishment of
nation states, the relationship between history and politics certainly became
more varied and many‑sided. In the 1990s and the early 21st century, wartime
massacres were crucial elements of the new national histories being written in
the post‑Yugoslav republics. hus, the inter‑Yugoslav massacres of the Second
World War constitute a central problem of what we may call the ‘historical
culture’, that is, historiography and popular representations of history in Yu‑
goslavia from the establishment of the socialist federation from 1945 to 2002,
when it was inally decided to abandon Yugoslavia as a federal state.
his book investigates how the inter‑Yugoslav massacres committed during
the Second World War have been represented and explained in Yugoslavia in
the period from 1945 to 2002, and how these representations interact with
political and cultural developments. By analysing representations of massacres
and the ways in which they changed, the book shows how the events of the
Second World War, through a process of thematisation, were emphasised and
integrated within the ‘theme of genocide’. he aim is to demonstrate how the
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history of the massacres was used in diferent ways for diferent purposes, and
point out some of the consequences of these various uses.
he ways in which Yugoslav society and its historians attempted to come
to terms with – and use – the painful and problematic history of the inter‑
Yugoslav Second World War massacres illuminate some of the problems and
processes at stake when societies are to grasp the many terrible histories of the
twentieth century. What are the roles of history and historians in post‑conlict
societies? How do we represent the past in a way that enables us to contain
the “terror of history”, as Dirk Moses has phrased it, or, to paraphrase Charles
Maier’s study of Germany’s struggles over Second World War historiography,
how do we cope with our “unmasterable pasts”?2
he investigation in this book draws on a handful of concepts that illumi‑
nate diferent aspects of the problem. hey are the concepts of thematization,
historical culture and use of history, all introduced below. Particular emphasis is
laid on the relationships between historical culture and society. Furthermore,
parallels are identiied between Yugoslav genocide historiography and tenden‑
cies within wider international developments of genocide studies.
hematization and cardinal theme
he word theme has, in addition to its more general sense of ‘subject’ or ‘topic’
a speciic linguistic meaning. he theme is the part of the sentence that is in
focus, the point of departure; in essence it is what is being talked about.3 In
English the theme is normally assigned the irst position in the sentence, but
it may also be emphasized in other ways, for example by predication. It may
be marked; if the theme of the sentence is not constituted by the grammati‑
cal subject, but by, for example, the object or a prepositional phrase, it will
obviously be highlighted. Marking the theme in this way can be described as
foregrounding.4
hematization denotes the organization of sentences into theme and non‑
theme. While some linguistic constructions are obviously more common or
natural than others, there is always a certain degree of deliberate selection
in the thematization of a sentence. he choice of theme relects the starting
point of the writer or speaker. According to Norman Fairclough, an unmarked
theme represents what is assumed as given or established. On the other hand, a
marked theme shows which bit of information needs to be emphasized. hus,
the thematization of texts says something about general assumptions as well
as rhetorical strategies.5
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he concepts of theme and thematization of text and discourse are ap‑
plicable at levels other than that of the sentence.6 he decision to introduce
a particular issue in the title of a book instead of in its penultimate chapter
is an act of theme selection, of foregrounding. I will suggest that within his‑
toriography and historical culture, theme and thematization can be used in
an even broader sense as a widespread phenomenon, relecting a perspective
shared or discussed by many individuals. hus, I will argue that in the late
1980s genocide was the thematized element of Second World War historiog‑
raphy in Serbia. At other times, in the 1950s and 1960s for example, the same
events and developments were described with diferent choices of themes and
thematization.
he particularly privileged position that the theme of genocide held in
Serbian historical culture of the 1980s, and later also in a wider Yugoslav
context, requires a concept that captures both this very speciic status and
brings out the resemblance with similar conceptual ‘trumps’ in other debates.
I will suggest that this type of dominant and strongly symbolically invested
issue be referred to as a cardinal theme. By this term I wish to specify those
particular issues of themes that at certain times, in certain cultural contexts,
obtain a special discursive power that tends to subdue other issues or perspec‑
tives within their ield. Other examples of issues privileged as cardinal themes
could be the status of the Holocaust in a general European historical culture,
or the way that any political matter raised as a question of national security
tends to command unlimited attention.7
With the concepts of theme, thematization and cardinal theme, I intend
to describe the process through which genocide became a predominant issue
within Yugoslav historical culture. his, I believe, was partly the result of the
deliberate discursive strategies of individual history writers. But it may also
relect a broader trend, and perhaps even general and shared international
tendencies.
he analyses in this book concentrate on the choices of themes and the‑
matization in representations of the Yugoslav massacres of the Second World
War. Such choices are revealed in the positions that these issues are ascribed in
the internal hierarchies of the texts, in the amounts, frequencies and levels of
detail in which they occur, and in the degree to which they are simply stated
and taken for granted or marked and emphasised by strategies such as wording
and predication.
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Historical culture and use of history
In using the concept historical culture rather than history writing,, or sim‑
ply historiography, I wish to emphasize two aspects that are not necessarily
included in these terms: irstly, that history is represented and drawn upon
in a multitude of forms and ields in society. Historical culture is a broad
concept, which includes historiography as well as the many other ways of
communicating history. Secondly, that historical culture also denotes the
culture of the academic and educational ields of history and the professional
collective of historians. In this sense a historical culture is characterised by
certain ways of researching and communicating history, and inluenced by
particular relationships to society.8
Historical culture includes texts, artefacts, and social practices in which
history is communicated. Important elements of historical culture are popular
representations of history such as schoolbooks and trivial history, as well as
political speeches, commemoration ceremonies, monuments, and various art
products.9 History may be more or less subject to ideological dictates or politi‑
cal control. Often historical culture is connected to nation or state, but the
term can also be used in plural to emphasise that smaller cultures, subcultures
and countercultures exist within a wider historical culture. Inevitably, I shall
have to speak of several historical subcultures in order to distinguish between,
for example, academic historical culture and more popular historical cultures,
or between Yugoslav and national or republican historical cultures.
In the case of post‑Second World War Yugoslavia, the writing and teaching
of history were subjects of concern for nearly all the shifting regimes, and often
the communication of history was subordinated to and penetrated by politics.
Since history was a highly institutionalised and hierarchical ield, academic and
educational history writing played a central role in Yugoslav historical culture.
But history was also very present in media, for example in feuilletons in news
magazines, and ictional representations of history in literature and ilm were
common.
Historical culture shapes and relects historical consciousness.10 he lat‑
ter can be understood as a mental, subjective aspect of historical culture, in
which history is employed by the individual as a source for orientation in time
and for perception of the surrounding world and our expectations of it. At a
more practical level, it is a widespread idea that history is the basis for general
knowledge and predictions of future developments, as when A.L. Rowse sug‑
gested in 1946 that history is the best source for evaluating developments in
the world of international politics.11
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At the core of historical culture lie the communicational processes through
which history is presented and represented. Accordingly, these processes are
the objects of analysis in this book. In this it difers from most studies of
collective, collected or public memory, the focus of which are, obviously, on
representations of memory rather than history.12 Nevertheless, approaches
and methods of memory studies are often very like those used in studies of
historical culture, and insights from memory studies can contribute to the
understanding of historical culture. his is not least relevant in the present
case, since the events included in the historical themes that are under question
here occured within the living memory of many Yugoslavs in the period under
investigation.
Indeed, most of the history about the Second World War was, for several
decades, written as a more or less oicial memory by persons who had par‑
ticipated on the winning side of that war. But outside oicial historiography
other memories existed, the articulation of which would later challenge hith‑
erto accepted representations of the war and the events that took place in its
shadow. In this way, diferent memories entered historical culture, supplying
bases for historical counter‑cultures, or maybe even for a historical cultural
transformation.13 Memories were regarded as more authentic and legitimate
representations of the past than oicial historiography.14 In general, however,
I will deal with the issue of memory mainly as a communication of history
and hence as an element of historical culture.
Historical culture is often intimately connected to ideology – among the
most obvious examples are the relations between historiography and national
states, or between historiography and communism. In these cases history has
been used to make certain political constructions appear natural and legitimate.
However, use of history can take many other forms.
Deined broadly by Klas‑Göran Karlsson, use of history is “… when
aspects of a historical culture are activated in a communicative process in
order for certain groups to satisfy certain needs or look after certain inter‑
ests.”15 In Karlsson’s terminology use of history need deinitely not be abuse
or misuse. Rather, his approach emphasises the functions that articulations
of history have in society. Scholarly historiography, according to Karlsson,
is just one way of using history, aimed at explaining the past on its own
premises according to causal models, sources and established knowledge. He
proposes a handful of other ways of using history, which include: general
‘existential’ uses, relecting the common human need to remember and feel
rooted in time and space; ‘moral’ uses, related to the idea that something
should be remembered, and often based on indignation because of missing or
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insuicient attention to these particular elements of history; ‘political’ uses,
characterised by metaphoric, comparative and symbolic representations of
history, and often directed at or directly addressing later or contemporary
issues; and ‘ideological’ uses that situate the past within particular contexts of
meaning and select historical elements in order to convince, rationalise and
legitimise certain concepts. A special way of using history, dubbed ‘non‑use’,
is the deliberate and ideological endeavours to ignore or downplay certain
elements of history.16
he diferent ways of using history are most often overlapping. Works of
academic history may well include existential and ideological uses of history.
Nevertheless, the diferentiation of uses of history according to function, points
to some of the ways in which historical culture interacts with and inluences
society. he intentions behind these uses may be countless, as may the conse‑
quences, many of which are surely unintended.
he concepts of historical culture and use of history are closely related, yet
functionally distinct. Historical culture denotes the communication of history
in general. Use of history refers to the aims and the more or less intentional
functions of the communication of history.
he importance of context
Representations of history take place in communicative acts, in the forms of
texts, or discourse. I suggest that any act communicating history may be un‑
derstood as a discursive act in the sense of Norman Fairclough; a form of social
practice within a socially and materially constituted reality.17 hematization
is one type of discursive act, which denotes what is of high priority or what
could be assumed within a particular text or discourse.
Discursive acts contribute to characterising and constituting society, but
are themselves shaped and constrained by what is already socially and materi‑
ally constituted. Obvious examples of constraining structures in our case are
established institutions of historiography and the presence of political power
close to the production of historical discourse. Political and social contexts are
fundamental in enabling and constraining the communication of history.
hese contexts remain essential to every re‑representation of historical
discourse. As texts and discourse travel from context to context they are sur‑
rounded by changed conditions of replication and commentary, and inlu‑
enced anew by relationships of power, as well as the inscription of ethnic and
other categorisations. When discursive acts reappear in new contexts, they
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are invested with new meanings.18 he medium and genre in which they ap‑
pear constrain and enable discursive acts, too. A historian interpreting past
events in a newspaper article will inevitably have to state points in a sharp and
concise manner, without the lengthy hedging, clariication, and emphasis on
important exceptions and complexities that would be standard in a scholarly
book. While chances are that the statements made in the newspaper will reach
a larger audience, these statements will probably also seem less balanced and,
in sensitive cases, more confrontational.
Political and social contexts are also crucial to the reception of discursive
acts. Once a discursive act has left its author, its interpretation is essentially
the property of the reader or receiver, and this interpretation is necessarily
inluenced by the context in which the act is received.19 hus, the contexts in
which history is communicated are of crucial importance to the production
of historical representations as well as to their reception and further commu‑
nication. A text thematizing genocide is received diferently in a context of
common interethnic interests and agreed future perspectives than in one of
polarised ethnic relations and political instability.
Since the part of Yugoslav historical culture concerned with twentieth
century history was strongly inluenced by politics, political circumstances
and agendas set a framework of constraints and possibilities for the commu‑
nication of history. herefore, in this book, the main political developments,
and especially cases in which the ield of history is speciically addressed, are
discussed in relation to productions of historical accounts.
Genocide, term and theme
Genocide represents the ultimate threat, that of extinction, against an ethnic or
national group. When in 1944 the Polish‑Jewish lawyer Rafael Lemkin coined
the term genocide, he saw it as directed “against the national group as an entity”
and against individuals “as members of the national group”. Later, the United
Nations genocide convention of 1948 deined the possible victims of genocide
as members of “national, ethnical, racial or religious groups”.20 Founded in a
national perspective on history, the term ‘genocide’ does not correlate easily
with a communist class‑based historiography. A history of genocide will also
have to be, at least partly, a victim‑centred and civil history, rather than one
of military feats, class struggles and economic progress.
hough discussed by the United Nations prior to the genocide resolution
of 1946 and the convention of 1948, the term genocide was not widely used
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in the irst decades after its creation. It probably did not enter more common
vocabularies before the 1970s.
Studies of the history and public commemoration of the Second World
War and the Holocaust, seen by many as the archetype of genocide, have
shown that during the irst decades after the war neither historians nor the
general public showed any great interest in massacres, victims and genocide.21
In general the technical and political aspects of the war, and the ‘national
sufering’ of states under Nazi‑occupation were much more in focus. With
the aim of reconstructing depraved and fractured national communities after
a devastating war, most European nation‑states created positive narratives of
united and heroic national resistance against external axis enemies.22
In Israel, where memory of the war and its victims would indeed be
pressing, the Holocaust was largely absent from history and other scholarly
ields until the early 1960s, when the Eichman trial brought this history into
focus.23 In Western Europe and North America, the Holocaust stayed out of
focus for even longer. In the United States the Holocaust was hardly identi‑
ied as a particular tragedy until the end of the 1960s, and public interest rose
markedly from the late 1970s.24 he historiographies of the countries of the
East European socialist bloc followed a line of communist ‘anti‑fascism’, hav‑
ing as its important themes the heroic struggles of the Partisans, the people’s
armies and the Red Army.25 he Nazi politics of genocide and its victims
were almost entirely absent from these histories: in 1981, the historian Lucy
S. Dawidowicz, while researching a book on the Holocaust, found reason to
fear that “the history of the 6 million murdered Jews would vanish from the
earth as they themselves and their civilization had vanished”.26
his has certainly not been the case. Concerning Holocaust research, it has
been pointed out that as much material was published between 1985 and 1995
as had been published in the entire period from 1945 to 1985.27 As scholarly
ields, Holocaust studies and Genocide studies have gained in strength since the
1970s and lourished since the early 1980s.28 In the last decades, research and
memorial centres dedicated to the Holocaust and more generally to genocide
have been established throughout the world. It seems plausible to conclude
that since the end of the 1970s there has been an unseen historical – as well as
a public and general academic – interest in atrocities, genocide, and victims
across the world as well as in Yugoslavia.
here may be several reasons for this increased interest in genocide and
victims. Perhaps there was a need for distance in time before these issues could
be addressed.29 Other causes may lie in a widespread change in world view and
perspectives on individuals in relation to institutional and stately structures.
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he anti‑war movements of the 1970s, the rise of individual human rights
and the end of the Cold War have shifted the points of identiication within
historical culture, at least partly, from states and military power to civil and
individual human beings.
he term and theme of genocide in Yugoslavia
he Serbo‑Croatian equivalent of the word genocide, genocid, was not widely
used in the irst decades after the war. he word is not discussed in the com‑
mon encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia, Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, published in the
1960s.30 Nevertheless, the Genocide Convention of the UN was included in
the Yugoslav criminal code of 1951.31 In the Military Encyclopaedia, Vojna
Enciklopedija of 1960, genocide is described as a crime under international
law, of which the Fascist and particularly Nazi‑German persecution of Slavic
peoples, Jews and Roma during the Second World War is the main example.
Yugoslavia and the Ustasha wartime practices are not mentioned.32 hat the
term was also available for political use is shown in a 1951 speech by Tito, ac‑
cusing Molotov and the Soviet Union of genocide against the Crimean Tartars,
Chechens and Volga Germans.33 It seems that for the irst decades following
the Second World War, the term of genocide was applied only to issues of
international and foreign politics. In this period, it was hardly ever used to
denote the wartime events in Yugoslavia.
One of the irst historians to use genocide as a general term to describe
nationally motivated persecution within Yugoslavia was the journalist and
Partisan historian Vladimir Dedijer, in his chapters in Istorija Jugoslavije
from 1972.34 Dedijer participated as a Yugoslav representative at the United
Nations negotiations on the question of genocide in the late 1940s, and in
the grassroots ‘Russel Tribunal’ of the late 1960s, at which the United States
of America was convicted of genocide in Vietnam.35 Dedijer may indeed
be one of the sources for the later widespread use of this word. During the
1970s and especially in the 1980s the term was used much more frequently
among Yugoslav scholars and journalists, referring to past events as well as
current events.
In her eminent study of the Serbian intelligentsia in the 1980s, Jasna
Dragović‑Soso points out the tendency on Serbia’s intellectual scene of rewrit‑
ing Second World War history from the perspective of national victimisation
and genocide. his is combined with widespread mention of genocide history
within the Serbian press, sometimes suggesting that the Serbian nation in Yu‑
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19
goslavia continues to be endangered. Dragović‑Soso identiies these currents
as the ‘theme of genocide’.36
Other researchers have addressed the theme of genocide in the late 1980s
and early 1990s. Bette Denitch and Robert Hayden particularly should be
credited for showing how ‘genocide history’ inluenced public and political
discourse in this period.37 Yet none of these studies are concerned with the
issue of how the massacres of the Second World War were dealt with in Yu‑
goslav historiography before 1980. Wider studies of Yugoslav Second World
War historiography touch the issue supericially, but the development of the
theme of genocide over a longer period of time remains to be studied.38
In the present book, the theme of genocide will be understood broadly as
referring to the waves of historical works and popular representations of history
that point out genocide as an important element. In the second half of the
1980s, groups in Serbian historiography would claim that questions of genocide,
particularly in relation to the wartime ‘Independent State of Croatia’ and the
concentration camp at Jasenovac, were deliberately silenced, misrepresented
or down‑scaled, all for political reasons.39 Outside observers have suggested
that the issue of the Ustasha’s persecution of Serbs was efectively buried, or
that Titoist historiography attempted to exclude all ethnic aspects from oicial
representations of the war.40 Approaches to the history of Yugoslavia’s wartime
massacres were certainly constrained in the early post‑war period. However,
as this book shows, the internal Yugoslav massacres of the Second World War
were neither ignored, nor silenced. hough they were not deined as genocide
in the decades after the war, the events that were to become the central focus of
genocide history in the 1980s were undeniably described in Yugoslav historical
writing immediately after the war’s end. Wordings, perspectives and emphasis
were diferent, but the internal Yugoslav massacres of the Second World War
were certainly present in Yugoslav historical culture.
Sources
As all aspects of the thematization of genocide in Yugoslav historical culture –
the subject of this book – are far too wide‑ranging to be thoroughly covered
in the present publication, I have instead foregrounded the developments and
examples that seem to me to be the most crucial. hese are cases in which
particular political attention is paid to representations of the war and its mas‑
sacres; examples of statements and representations of massacres and war history
that have caused heated disputes among historians or in the public sphere;
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usable history?
and introductions of new perspectives and points of focus in academic or
popular representation of wartime massacres. In deciding what seems to have
had an impact, I have relied on later reviews as well as the degree to which
statements and representations are referred to and quoted in later research
and presentations.
Since the subject of history was a highly institutionalised and hierarchical
ield, academic and educational history writing played a central role in Yugoslav
historical culture. herefore, scholarly monographs, periodicals and school‑
books form the backbone of the analyses in this book. But history was also
heavily drawn upon in the wider public sphere and therefore other methods
of its communication are regularly included in the investigation. As political
inluence on the communication of 20th century history was critical, speeches,
statements and accounts from communist and post‑communist leading politi‑
cians are essential. Furthermore, I discuss representations of the war and its
massacres in ilm and ictional literature, as some of the representations that
were to challenge oicially established versions came from this ield. I also refer
to war memorials: monuments to the victims of war crimes and the disputes
surrounding them. Finally, I explore the publication and popularisation of
historical representations in magazines and other printed media.
N ote s
1
Remake, directed by Dino Mustaić, Bosnia‑Herzegovina/France, 2002.
2
A. Dirk Moses, ‘Genocide and the Terror of History’, Parallax, 17, 2011, 4, 90‑108;
Charles Maier, he Unmasterable Past: History, Holocaust, and German National Identity,
Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1988.
3
See Michael A.K. Halliday, System and function in language. Selected papers edited by
Gunther Kress, London: Oxford University Press, 1976, 179‑182, and Michael A.K. Hal‑
liday, An introduction to functional grammar, London: Edward Arnold, 1989, 38‑67.
4
Halliday, System and function in language, 181; Halliday, An introduction to functional
grammar, 45; Norman Fairclough, Discourse and social change, Cambridge: Polity Press,
2003, 184.
5
Fairclough, Discourse and social change, 183 (It should be noted, however, that Halliday
distinguishes between ‘theme’ and ‘given’ as two functionally distinct concepts that of‑
ten collide in the same elements).
6
Indeed, Michael Halliday himself points to an example where the theme of a group of
sentences is also the theme of the book in which they occur. Halliday, An introduction to
functional grammar, 67.
7
On Holocaust, see Klas‑Göran Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust as a Problem of Historical
Culture. heoretical and Analytical Challenges,’ in Klas‑Göran Karlsson and Ulf Zan‑
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21
der, eds., Echoes of the Holocaust, Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2003, 15. On politics of
national security, see Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, Jaap de Wilde, Security: a new framework
for analysis, Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Rienner, 1998, 23‑26.
8
For a similar understanding of the concept, see also Jan Eivind Myhre, ‘Den Norske
Historiske Kultur. Om sammenheng og fragmentering i norsk historieforskning’, Historisk Tidsskrift (Oslo), 1994, 3, and William H. Hubbard et al., eds., Making a Historical
Culture. Histioriography in Norway, Oslo: Scandinavian University Press, 1995.
9
Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust as a problem of historical culture’, 32; Claus Bryld, ‘Fra hi‑
storieskrivningens historie til historiekulturens historie? Idéer til en udvidelse af det
historiograiske begreb’, in Historien og historikerne i Norden efter 1965, Aarhus: Aarhus
Universitetsforlag, 1991; Jörn Rüsen, ‘Was ist Geschichtskultur? Überlegungen zu einer
neuen Art über Geschichte nachzudenken’, in Klaus Füßmann et al., eds., Historische Faszination. Geschichtskultur heute, Köln: Böhlau Verlag, 1994, 3‑5. he importance of many
of these elements has also been emphasised in studies of public or collective memory; see
for example: James E. Young, he Texture of Memory. Holocaust Memorials and Meaning,
New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993; Claus Bryld and Anette Warring, Besættelsestiden
som kollektiv erindring, Copenhagen: Roskilde Universitetsforlag, 1998. In Maurice Hal‑
bwachs’ groundbreaking studies, the role of space is emphasised as well. See e.g. Maurice
Halbwachs, he Collective Memory, New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1980.
10
Bryld, ‘Fra historieskrivningens historie til historiekulturens historie’, 87; Karlsson, ‘he
Holocaust as a problem of historical culture’, 45; Jörn Rüsen, ‘Was ist Geschichtskul‑
tur?’, in Klaus Füßmann et al., eds., Historische Faszination; and Rüsen, ‘Gescichtskultur
als Forschungsproblem’, in Klaus Frölich et al., eds, Geschichtskultur, Jahrbücher für
Geschichtsdidaktik, 1991‑1992, Pfafenweiler: Centaurus Verlagsgesellschaft, 1992, 40.
Rüsen’s approach is more oriented towards cognitive aspects of historical culture and
historical consciousness. On the relationship between historical culture and historical
consciousness, see also: Carsten Tage Nielsen, Historie til aftenkafen. En historiekulturel
analyse af tv-nyhedsformidlingen som historieproducerende diskurs, PhD thesis, Roskilde
Universitetscenter, 1996, 37‑58; Carsten Tage Nielsen, ‘Historiekultur og historiebevidst‑
hed – alternative diskurser om historie’, Den Jyske Historiker, December 1995.
11
A.L. Rowse, he use of history, (3. ed.), London: English Universities Press, 1947, 26.
12
For discussions of the concept of ‘collective memory’ see Amos Funkenstein, ‘Collec‑
tive Memory and Historical Consciousness’, History and Memory, 1, 1989, 1, 5‑26; Noa
Gedi and Yigal Elam, ‘Collective Memory – What Is It?’, History and Memory, 8, 1996,
1, 30‑50; Anette Warring, ‘Kollektiv erindring – et brugbart begreb?’, in Bernard Eric
Jensen et al., eds., Eridringens og glemslens politik, Roskilde, Roskilde Universitetsforlag,
1996, 206‑231. he concept ‘collected memories’ was suggested by James E. Young in
order to take into consideration the individuality of remembrance, Young, he Texture of
Memory, xi.
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usable history?
13
For a parallel example, see Francesca Cappelletto’s studies of the ways memories of war‑
time massacres in Italian villages have been preserved and sometimes solidiied into ixed
narratives, thereby forming alternatives to the oicial and national version of the events:
Francesca Cappelletto, ‘Memories of Nazi‑Fascist Massacres in Two Central Italian Vil‑
lages’, Sociologia Ruralis, 38, 1998, 1, 69‑85; Francesca Cappelletto, ‘Long‑term memory
of extreme events: from autobiography to history’, Journal of Royal Anthropological Institute, 9, 2003, 2, 241‑260.
14
For a discussion of the recent changes in the relationship between memory and history,
see Pierre Nora, ‘Reasons for the Current Upsurge in Memory’, Eurozine, 19 April 2002.
15
Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust as a problem of historical culture’, 38.
16
Ibid, 40‑43, Karlsson, Klas‑Göran, Historia som Vapen, Stockholm: Natur och Kultur,
1999, 57‑61.
17
Fairclough, Discourse and Social Change, 63f.
18
Stef Slembrouck, ‘Explanation, Interpretation, and Critique in the Analysis of Dis‑
course’, Critique of Anthropology, 21, 2001, (1), 45.
19
Fairclough, Discourse and Social Change, 81f.
20 Both quoted in Samuel Totten and William Parsons, ‘Introduction’, in Samuel Totten
et al., eds., Century of Genocide. Critical essays and eyewitness accounts, New York: Rout‑
ledge, 2004, p. 3‑4. he U.N. resolution of 1946 included a broader scope of victims,
but in a less precise way, and these were later excluded from the convention. See also
Anders Bjørn Hansen, ‘Folkemordsforskningen gennem 50 år – en deinitorisk tilgang’,
Den Jyske Historiker, 90, 2000, 41.
21
David S. Wyman, ‘Introduction’, in David S. Wyman, ed., he World Reacts to the Holocaust, Baltimore: he John Hopkins University Press, 1996, xix‑xxiii.
22
See e.g. Tony Judt, ‘he past is another country: myth and memory in postwar Europe’,
Daedalus, 121, No. 4, 1992, 83‑118; R.J.B Bosworth, Explaining Auschwitz & Hiroshima.
History Writing and the Second World War, 1945-1990, London: Routledge, 1993.
23
Orna Kenan, Between Memory and History. he Evolution of Israeli historiography of
the Holocaust 1941-1961, New York: Peter Lang, 2003; Dalia Ofer, ‘Israel’, in David S.
Wyman, ed., he World Reacts to the Holocaust, 873‑880, 885‑889.
24 Peter Novick, he Holocaust and Collective Memory. he American Experience, London:
Bloomsbury, 2000.
25
Klas‑Göran Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust and Russian Historical Culture’, in Klas‑Göran
Karlsson and Ulf Zander, Echoes of the Holocaust, 201‑222; Pär Frohnert, ‘he Presence
of the Holocaust. Vergangenheitsbewältigung in West Germany, East Germany and Au‑
stria’, in Ibid, 81‑114; Livia Rothkirchen, ‘Czechoslovakia’, in David S. Wyman, ed., he
World Reacts to the Holocaust.
26 Lucy S. Dawidowicz, he Holocaust and the Historians, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni‑
versity Press, 1981, 1.
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23
27 Torben Jørgensen, ‘Udforskningen af folkemordet på de europæiske jøder’, Den Jyske
Historiker, 90, 2000, 60.
28
Helen Fein, Genocide: A Sociological Perspective, London: Sage Publications, 1993, 5;
Hansen: ‘Folkemord gennem 50 år’, 39‑59. his tendency can also be detected from the
amount of works cited and the years of publication in Israel W. Charny, ed., Genocide.
A Critical Bibliographic Review, London: Mansell Publishers, 1988.
29 Charles S. Maier, ‘A Surfeit of Memory’, History and Memory, 5, 1993, 140.
30 A new Yugoslav Encyclopaedia was under publication in the 1980s, but the project was
abandoned around the letter K. he volume containing G does not mention Genocide.
Genocide is, however, included in the new Croatian Encyclopaedia, but without refe‑
rence to Ustasha or Yugoslav Second World War history. See Hrvatska Enciklopedija, vol.
4, Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod ‘Miroslav Krleža’, 2002, 150.
31
Vojna Enciklopaedija, vol. 3, Belgrade: 1960, 340.
32
Ibid, 339.
33
Josip Broz Tito, ‘Govor na proslavi dana ustanka na Kozari’ (27th July 1951), in Josip
Broz Tito, Govori i Članci, IV, Zagreb: Naprijed, 1959, 74.
34
Ivan Božić, Sima Ćirković, Milorad Ekmečić and Vladimir Dedijer, Istorija Jugoslavije
(second edition), Beograd: Prosveta, 1973, 476‑543.
35
Vladimir Dedijer, Vatikan i Jasenovac: dokumenti, Belgrade: ‘Rad’, 1987, 10‑11. See also
Det internationale Krigsforbrydelsestribunal, 2. session, Danmark 1967, Copenhagen, 1967;
Vladimir Dedijer and Arlette Elhaim, eds., Tribunal Russel: Le jugement de Stockholm,
Paris: Gallimard, 1967.
36
Jasna Dragović‑Soso, ‘Saviours of the Nation’. Serbia’s Intellectual Opposition and the Revival of Nationalism, London: Hurst, 2002, 100‑114.
37
Bette Denich, ‘Dismembering Yugoslavia: nationalist ideologies and the symbolic
revival of genocide’, American Ethnologist, 21, 1994, 2, 367‑390; Robert M. Hayden,
‘Recounting the Dead. he Rediscovery and Redeinition of Wartime Massacres in
Late‑ and Post‑Communist Yugoslavia’, in Rubie S. Watson, ed., Memory, History and
Opposition under State Socialism, Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, 1994,
167‑184. See also David Bruce MacDonald, Balkan Holocausts? Serbian and Croatian
victim-centred propaganda and the War in Yugoslavia, Manchester: Manchester University
Press, 2002, in which elements of this tendency are investigated from a perspective of
national myths and propaganda.
38
For overviews of Yugoslav Second World War historiography, see e.g. Wolfgang Hoepken,
‘War, Memory, and Education in a Fragmented Society: he Case of Yugoslavia’, East
European Politics and Socities, 13, 1999, 1, 190‑227; Wolfgang Höpken, ‘Von der Mytholo‑
gisierung zur Stigmatisierung: “Krieg und Revolution” in Jugoslawien 1941‑1948 im Spie‑
gel von Geschichtswissenschaft und historischer Publizistik’, in E. Schmidt‑Hartmann,
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ed., Kommunismus und Osteuropa. Konzepte, Perspektiven und Interpretationen im Wandel,
München: R. Oldenburg Verlag, 1994, 165‑201.
39
See for example Dedijer’s introductions to Milan Bulajić, Ustaški zločini genocida i
suđenje Andrije Artukovića 1986. godine, vol. I, Beograd: Rad, 1988, 9‑10, and to Vladimir
Dedijer and Antun Miletić, Proterivanje Srba sa ognjišta: 1941-1944: Svedočanstva. Beo‑
grad: Prosveta, 1990, 8.
40 Denich, Bette, ‘Dismembering Yugoslavia’, 367, 370; Jasna Dragović‑Soso, ‘Saviours of
the Nation’, 104; Wolfgang, Hoepken, ‘War, Memory, and Education in a fragmented
Society’, 200; See also Wendy Bracewell, ‘National histories and national identities
among the Serbs and Croats’, in M. Fulbrook, ed., National histories and European
history, Boulder 1993, 157; Robert M. Hayden, ‘Recounting the dead’, 173.
1228_usable_history_3k.indd 24
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he Second World
War in Yugoslavia
2
he events of the Second World War in the Yugoslav areas are considerably
more complex than many of the histories constructed to recount them. he
interwar kingdom of Yugoslavia was dismembered by the occupying Axis
powers. Yugoslav forces, divided along political, ethnic, religious and regional
lines, fought with or against the occupiers, and they fought internally. Large
scale massacres and war crimes were committed by the occupiers as well as
by domestic groups against each other.1 hese events left sore memories and
a complicated history to the post‑war Yugoslav state.
his chapter aims to give a brief survey of the events of the Second World
War in the Yugoslav areas, as they have since been illuminated by research,
and to point out the elements of war crimes and massacres that were to cause
particular dispute and sensation in Yugoslav historical culture.
Disintegration and war regimes
he Second World War entered Yugoslavia on the 6th April 1941, when Nazi‑
Germany bombed Belgrade and several Yugoslav airports. Germany was joined
by its Axis allies, Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria, and a poorly prepared Yugoslav
army was unable to resist the forceful attack. he king and the government
went into exile on the 14th and the 15th April, and on the 17th an armistice, in
fact an unconditional Yugoslav surrender, was signed in Belgrade.2
Yugoslavia was disintegrated, and parts of it were given to the pro‑axis
states surrounding Yugoslavia. Bulgaria annexed most of Macedonia, and bits
of southern Serbia and Kosovo, while Hungary obtained Bačka north of the
Danube and the northern regions of Prekomurje and Međumurje. Germany
and Italy each seized a part of Slovenia, and the Italian controlled Albania seized
north‑western parts of Macedonia, most of Kosovo and some neighbouring
districts in Serbia. Italy also annexed most of Dalmatia and occupied Monte‑
negro. he rest of Croatia was united with Bosnia and Srem in the so‑called
‘Independent State of Croatia’, (Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, known by the
acronym ndh). he ndh was divided along the so‑called demarcation line,
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26
usable history?
which ran from the North‑West, south of Zagreb, Banja Luka and Sarajevo,
and ended north of Foča in the South East, leaving the Northern zone with
the largest natural resources under German control, and the Southern zone
connected with Dalmatia and Montenegro under Italy.
Serbia was occupied by Germany and a quisling government was set up,
which was headed by the pro‑German general Milan Nedić from late August
1941. Nedić, however possessed very little real power. In all important matters
Serbia was ruled by the German administration, which murdered most of the
country’s Jewish population and exploited resources of food, labour and raw
material. Acts of resistance were harshly punished. As widespread insurrection
broke out in Serbia in the summer of 1941, the German High Command
reacted in September by issuing a directive according to which 100 hostages
were to be shot in retribution for every German soldier killed. In 1943, the
number of hostages to be shot was reduced to 50, and later the procedure was
gradually abolished.
Ustasha
he ndh was ruled by Croatian fascists, the Ustasha movement, which was
in fact a marginal group that was dependent on German and Italian sup‑
port to stay in power. he Ustasha government proved to be the most brutal
of several excessively violent occupation and quisling regimes in Yugoslavia
during the war. he Ustasha were characterised mainly by their fanatic anti‑
Serbianism, their cult of the Croatian state, and unconditional obedience to
their leader, or ‘poglavnik’, Ante Pavelić. he Ustasha were conservative and
patriarchal, and idealized an imagined traditional Croatian lifestyle. hough
their ideology was not predominantly founded on religion, they developed and
proited politically from ties to the Catholic Church. While the church’s main
representatives cooperated with the Ustasha administration and never openly
condemned the regime, other parts of the Catholic clergy actively supported
and even joined the Ustasha.
In the ndh, Serbs, Jews, Roma and all opponents of the regime were
subject to brutal persecution. Shortly after the proclamation of the new state
on the 10th April 1941, the Ustasha instigated an exceedingly violent campaign
against the Serbian population, constituting about 1.9 million, or approximately
one‑third of the population of the ndh.3 In Bosnia the Ustasha courted the
Muslims, claiming they belonged to the best of Croats. Some Muslims joined
the Ustasha militias and participated in massacres against Serbs, particularly
in the Bosnian Krajina, Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina.4
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chapter 2
27
he Ustasha’s massive persecution of the Serbian population severely desta‑
bilised the ndh. he mass violence forced the Serbian population to lee into
forests and mountains, where they were to form the initial cores of the Partisan
and Chetnik resistance movements within the ndh. his meant that large areas
of the state came under Partisan or Chetnik control during the war, and the
Ustasha proved unable to crush the riots and control the state’s territory. On
its establishment, the Ustasha regime was supported by parts of the Croatian
public, who had felt oppressed in the Serbian dominated interwar Yugoslavia.
However, its brutal politics cost the Ustasha government most of the popularity
it had initially gained from providing a Croat national state.
During the summer of 1941 spontaneous revolts broke out in many Yugoslav
areas. From July and August some of these became part of centrally organised
uprisings, led by either Chetniks or Partisans.
Chetniks
he Chetnik movement was headed by a group of oicers from the Royal
Yugoslav Army. hese oicers refused to surrender with the rest of the army,
and led by Colonel Draža Mihailović they established a guerrilla resistance
movement with headquarters at Ravna Gora in western Serbia.5 he Chetniks
were conservative and patriarchal with veneration for the Serbian kingdom and
the Serbian Orthodox Church. he aims of the Chetnik movement were to
prepare a strong guerrilla army for an allied landing in the Balkans, and then
to assist the liberation of Yugoslavia and the re‑establishment of a Yugoslav
state under Serbian domination and ruled by the Serbian royal house. It was
also proposed, partly in reaction to the anti‑Serbian politics of the ndh, to
establish a Greater Serbia and ‘ethnically clean’ Serbian areas.6
he political programme of the Chetniks could only appeal to the Serbian
parts of the Yugoslav population. Yet, they were supported by the king, himself
a Serb, and the Serbian dominated government in exile. Mihailović was pro‑
moted to general and appointed minister of Army, Navy and Air Force. hus
recognized by Yugoslavia’s oicial international representations, Mihailović’s
Chetniks also received assistance and military aid from the allies.
Nevertheless, Mihailović’s hold of the movement was never irm, and Chet‑
nik units often acted independently – such as the so‑called ‘legalized’ Chetniks,
who assisted the Germans and the Nedić administration in ighting the upris‑
ings. In the ndh, Chetnik bands collaborated with the Italian occupiers, some‑
times to protect Serbs against Ustasha raids, sometimes to ight the Partisans.
Occasionally they even sided with the Ustasha against the Partisans.
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usable history?
Partisans
he Partisans were headed by the Yugoslav Communist Party, under command
of its secretary general, Josip Broz Tito. Outlawed since the early 1920s, the
Communist Party was a small but disciplined and devoted organisation, trained
in underground work, and most probably consisted of approximately 12,000
members when the war started in 1941. he communists engaged actively in
resistance ighting after the German attack on the Soviet Union on 22nd June
1941 and Party cells in many parts of the country organised Partisan detach‑
ments. During the autumn of 1941, the main efort was in Serbia, where the
Partisans, often in cooperation with Chetniks, took control of areas in western
Serbia.
It soon became clear that Chetnik and Partisan aims were incompatible.
he programme of socialist revolution was scarcely hidden from the Partisans’
agenda. hough the great majority of their forces in the irst years of the upris‑
ing were Serbs, the Partisans advocated inter‑ethnic cooperation and aimed
at including all nationalities, as opposed to the Chetniks’ exclusively Serbian
appeal.7 Furthermore, the two parties disagreed on strategy: While the Chetniks
preferred to postpone large scale ighting until an expected allied landing, the
Partisans insisted on ighting the occupiers regardless of what the cost might be
for themselves or for the Yugoslav population. his disagreement was sharpened
as the cruel reprisal politics of the German administration made the Chetniks
desperate to avoid wasting Serbian lives.
In November 1941 German and Yugoslav collaborationist forces, assisted
by some Chetnik groups, drove the main Partisan force out of Serbia. From
then on, Chetniks and Partisans fought each other ruthlessly, both with the
aim of deciding Yugoslavia’s post‑war political system. he resistance ighting
was thus increasingly combined with a Yugoslav civil war.8 At the local level
the picture was often immensely complex. In Eastern Bosnia, Partisans and
Chetniks cooperated until early 1942. hroughout the war, groups of resistance
ighters switched from Chetnik to Partisan lines or the other way around, and
sometimes whole regiments shifted from the Axis side to that of the resistance.9
Upon their defeat in Serbia, the Partisan main force and headquarters
moved via Sandžak to Bosnia. Large ofensives by combined occupation and
Ustasha forces, the Italians often cooperating closely with Chetnik units, only
succeeded in ousting the Partisans from their positions, from which they moved
on to diferent mountain areas. In 1941‑1942, the Partisans fought with obvious
revolutionary zeal, and did not hesitate to use terror against real or imagined
opponents, supposed class enemies and Chetnik sympathisers. his politics was
imposed most thoroughly in Montenegro, Herzegovina and Eastern Bosnia.
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29
In Eastern Bosnia in the spring of 1942, Partisan warfare aimed mainly at de‑
stroying the Chetniks.10 But as these strategies proved counterproductive, the
Partisans changed their line. By autumn 1942, the socialist goals were down‑
played, and the Partisans began to present their aim as being an all‑Yugoslav,
anti‑fascist, national liberation.
Partisan victory
In September 1943 the allies began to support the Partisans as well as the Chet‑
niks. In the same month the Partisan position was signiicantly improved by
the Italian surrender, which left large areas under Partisan control and brought
much needed supplies of weapons and ammunition. By late 1943 Partisan
popularity had grown enormously. Probably their ranks now consisted of
more than 100,000 ighters. On 29th November 1943, in the Bosnian town of
Jajce, a second meeting was held of the Anti‑Fascist Council for the National
Liberation of Yugoslavia (Antifašističko Vijeće Narodnog Oslobodjenja Jugo‑
slavije, known as avnoj), which was the wider political wing of the Partisan
movement. he 143 delegates from all parts of Yugoslavia formed a provisory
government, as opposed to the royal administration in London, and declared
that post‑war Yugoslavia was to be a federation of six units: Bosnia and Her‑
zegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Slovenia and Serbia. he king was
not to return to Yugoslavia until the country was completely liberated and the
people had decided whether to re‑establish the monarchy.
From then on the Partisans had the upper hand. In the autumn of 1944
they attacked Serbia from the West and South West, and drove out Mihailović
and his forces. At the same time the Soviet Red Army attacked Serbia from
North‑East, and on 20th October the Partisans, in cooperation with the Red
Army, took over Belgrade. he Red Army moved on to Hungary, leaving the
Yugoslav Partisans to ight the remaining occupiers and inish their civil war.
In the spring of 1945, the Partisans, now called the Yugoslav Army, pursued
the former occupying armies and Yugoslav anti‑communist forces towards
Germany. On the 15th May 1945, the last of these forces were turned back by
the allied armies at the Yugoslav‑Austrian border and were afterwards either
killed by or had to surrender to the Partisans.11 In the following months, the
Partisans’ Yugoslav Army eliminated the remaining Chetnik detachments in
Bosnia and Serbia. Albanian nationalists and anti‑Partisan forces remained
powerful in Kosovo, until they were inally crushed in July 1945.
he Communist Party moved swiftly to secure its own hegemonic power
in post‑war Yugoslavia. A provisional government, controlled by an over‑
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usable history?
whelming communist majority, was set up, and elections for a constitutional
assembly were held in November 1945. he election campaign left hardly any
chances to non‑communist parties, and the communist controlled Popular
Front achieved a comfortable majority. he Communist Party then set out to
reconstruct Yugoslavia as a centralised, socialist, federal state.
Massacres and war crimes
All ighting parties of the Second World War in Yugoslavia committed atroci‑
ties and war crimes. Yet, as already mentioned, the crimes of the Nazi‑German
occupation administration and of the Ustasha regime stand out as particularly
excessive.
Nazi‑German war crimes in Yugoslavia included the murder of most of
the Jewish population of Serbia, and, assisted by Bulgaria, most of the Jews
of Macedonia. he German administration also killed thousands of civilians
as part of the politics of shooting civilian hostages in retaliation for insurrec‑
tions and acts of resistance. Among the worst examples are the shooting in
October 1941 of about 2000 people in the town of Kraljevo, and about 3000
in Kragujevac.12 he Germans also organised mass deportations of Serbian
oicers and workers to Germany.
In the ndh, German military fought together with Ustasha forces, often
commanding the latter. Furthermore, special German militias manned by
Yugoslav soldiers were established and used in campaigns in Yugoslavia. he
Handžar SS division, mainly Bosnian Muslim soldiers, was deployed in Bosnia
in 1944 and became notorious for its atrocities. hus the Germans were indeed
co‑responsible if not direct participants in the excessive massacres committed as
parts of the military campaigns. Also the Italian occupation administration, as
well as those of Bulgaria and Hungary, committed their shares of war crimes,
included herein the running of concentration camps.
Yet, in Yugoslav historical culture, crimes committed by groups of Yugoslavs
towards other Yugoslavs were to cause far more dispute than those committed by
the occupying powers. he politics of terror and mass murder directed against
Serbs, Jews and Roma in the Ustasha state has been the most problematic issue.
Ustasha crimes
he radical and violent anti‑Serbian ideology of the Ustasha rule was expressed
by several ministers, but perhaps most clearly on the 2nd May 1941 by the
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31
Ustasha minister of legislation, Milovan Žanić: “there is no method that we
as Ustasha will not use to make this country truly Croatian and clean it of
Serbs …”13 During the spring and summer of 1941 groups of Ustasha soldiers
raided Serbian villages and committed excessive massacres. Serbs were killed
on the spot, or they were tied and locked inside churches or other buildings,
which were then burned. Sometimes they were driven away, slaughtered and
thrown into ravines. In some cases only men were killed, while at other times
women and children were also slaughtered.
he irst round of mass slaughtering took place in late April and early
May 1941, in villages near Bjelovar east of Zagreb, around Glina north of
the Bosnian border and in the Krajina region of Kordun, where probably
200‑300 were killed at each place. During June 1941, the Ustasha instigated
new waves of massacres in Herzegovina and in Dalmatia. After most of the
German soldiers had departed for the Eastern Front, the Ustasha accelerated
their murderous campaign. In July more massacres took place in Dalmatia
and Krajina, of which the burning of several hundred Serbs in the church in
Glina is particularly notorious. he Ustasha also spread their terror to Western
and Eastern Bosnia, where probably tens of thousands of Serbs were killed
in murderous raids.14 In April 1942, the Serbs of Eastern Bosnia fell victim to
a massive wave of Ustasha terror as part of a combined Ustasha‑German of‑
fensive against the insurrection. Special Ustasha units raided Serbian villages,
slaughtered the inhabitants, and forced many Serbs to lee towards the brink
of Drina, where mass slaughtering took place.15
he rate of these massacres was later slowed down in some areas, partly
because of the outbreak of the various insurrections, which controlled large
parts of the ndh, and partly by Italian occupation of ndh territory all up to
the German‑Italian demarcation line.16 But Ustasha raids and massacres con‑
tinued throughout the war. he village massacres left numerous mass graves
and pits full of skeletons. hese graves and pits posed problematic questions
to Yugoslav historiography decades later.
As another means to rid their territory of Serbs, the Ustasha expelled thou‑
sands to Serbia, while many others led to escape the terror. It is estimated that
in the summer of 1942, about 200,000 transferees and refugees from the ndh
were in Serbia.17 In the autumn of 1941, the German administration in Serbia
closed the border for oicial deportations from the ndh. his in combination
with the growing armed insurrection forced the Ustasha to change strategy.
Especially from September 1941 to early 1942 a policy of forced conversions
of Serbian peasants was widely implemented, only to be gradually abandoned
when the Ustasha leadership changed strategies again and opted for the estab‑
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lishment of a Croatian Orthodox Church. It is estimated that about 100,000
Serbs in the ndh were forcibly – or under threat – converted from Orthodoxy
into Catholicism, in order to turn them into Croats.18
he Ustasha regime also ran concentration camps and death camps where
prisoners were worked and starved to death. Others were brought there just
to be executed. he camp guards were notorious for their brutality, using rela‑
tively primitive killing methods; many victims were slaughtered by knife, slain
with heavy mallets, or simply shot and buried in mass graves. But numerous
types of torture and mutilations happened as well. Most of the victims were
Serbs, Jews and Roma, but also communists and all sorts of regime opponents,
Croats as well, were sent to the camps. In the most notorious of these, the
camp complex at Jasenovac, it is now estimated that more than 80,000 per‑
sons were killed, of which at least 50,000 were Serbs. housands perished in
other camps, such as Jadovno and Jastrebarsko.19 he numbers of victims of
the camps, particularly of Jasenovac, have been intensely discussed in Yugoslav
and post‑Yugoslav historiography and popular history.
Chetnik crimes
Chetnik bands also engaged in mass terror, particularly within the ndh, some‑
times in order to avenge Ustasha atrocities. Some attacks were directed against
Croat villages, but most victims of Chetnik terror were Muslims in Eastern
Bosnia, Sandžak and Herzegovina. he worst massacres were conducted in
three waves; the irst between the Autumn of 1941 and February 1942, in which
many villages in Eastern Bosnia and the Foča area in particular were burnt
down and civilians killed; the second in August 1942, mainly around Foča,
from where many led to Sarajevo; and the third – and worst of them – was
conducted in January and February 1943, in Sandžak and Eastern Bosnia,
where villages were attacked and burnt down, and unarmed men, women and
children slaughtered. housands of Muslims were killed in these campaigns.20
In Serbia, where the Chetniks dominated the resistance from late 1941, they
persecuted and executed Partisans and their families as well as supposed Par‑
tisan sympathisers.
Partisan crimes
In Montenegro, Herzegovina and eastern Bosnia, particularly during the irst
years of the war, Partisans engaged in organised terror against civilians, which
was mainly directed against what they saw as pro‑Chetnik villages or potential
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33
class enemies. Sometimes Partisans were also involved in unruly violence and
looting.21 Later, when the Partisan detachments were under stronger central
control, and because the terror proved counter‑productive, this policy was
abolished. hese ‘Left deviations’, as the revolutionary terror and early attempts
at establishing a new revolutionary order were euphemistically called, remained
one of the sensitive issues of communist historiography.
In the Spring of 1945, the victorious Partisan Army mercilessly eliminated
their enemies. Large groups of anti‑communist soldiers – Croatian and Muslim
Ustasha and home guards, Slovenian collaborationist forces and Chetniks,
probably also accompanied by some civilians, attempted to surrender to the
Allies in Austria. hey were rejected, as the Yugoslav army was by then con‑
sidered an allied force and, according to agreements, war prisoners were to
surrender to the local allied authorities. Many were killed, either in vicious
ighting against the Partisans; at the hands of the Partisans after having sur‑
rendered; or in forced marches and prison camps in Yugoslavia. his settling
of accounts with the Partisans’ political and military opponents cost tens of
thousands of lives.22
hese atrocities and massacres from the side of the communist forces were
to become central issues decades later in re‑evaluations of communist history.
he killings at the border were later referred to as the Bleiburg massacre or
the Bleiburg tragedy after the Austrian border town Bleiburg.
Numbers of victims
he zealousness and brutality with which the Second World War was fought
in the Yugoslav areas, as well as the murderous politics led particularly by the
Ustasha and the Germans caused a very high number of casualties. While the
exact number of victims cannot be established, research of the late 1980s has
proposed much more valid estimates than what was initially suggested. Imme‑
diately after the war, the new Yugoslav administration stated an oicial number
of 1,706,000 actual Yugoslav victims; that is persons who had been killed or
had perished as a direct result of the war, and not including demographic
losses such as fallen birth rates. hough the matter was politically sensitive,
it was later attempted to conirm or correct this number, but these attempts
remained abortive during the communist period. Finally, in the second half of
the 1980s, it was convincingly demonstrated by two independent demographic
calculations that slightly more than one million people out of a population
of a little more than 17 million lost their lives because of the Second World
War in Yugoslavia.23 he total number of victims is the most reliable, whereas
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calculations according to ethnicity and region are less precise.24 Most of the
victims, about 500,000‑600,000, fell within the borders of the ndh. Of the
Yugoslav peoples, Serbs and Muslims sufered the heaviest losses, around 7‑8 %
of the populations, while around 5‑5.5 % of Croats perished. Montenegrin
losses were slightly smaller, maybe around 5 %, Slovene losses around 3 % and
Macedonian losses approximately 1 % of the populations. Serbs within the ndh
were particularly hard hit: around 300,000, or 15 %, were killed.
he Jewish and Roma minorities sufered even heavier losses: Due mainly
to Nazi German extermination policies, between 75 % and 80 % of Yugoslavia’s
Jews were murdered, and possibly a third of the Roma population.
he ethnic German population of Yugoslavia was also strongly reduced,
partly because of post‑war deportations and communist retribution, and partly
because of their active participation in German warfare.
N ote s
1
I leave out the word ‘genocide’ from this account, not with the intention of denying
that the massacres committed may have constituted acts of genocide. But since the main
topic of this book is to analyse the discursive creation of a theme around the concept of
genocide, I believe the use of the term here will confuse the matter.
2
For an overview of the events of the Second World War in Yugoslavia, see for example
Jozo Tomasevich, ‘Yugoslavia During the Second World War’, in Wayne S. Vucinich,
ed., Contemporary Yugoslavia. Twenty Years of Socialist Experiment, Berkeley and Los
Angeles: University of California Press, 1969, 59‑118; Stevan K. Pavlowitch’s chapter ‘he
Chaotic Gap: 1941‑1945’, in his Yugoslavia, London: Ernest Benn Limited, 1971, 107‑172;
John R. Lampe, Yugoslavia as History. Twice there was a country, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000, 201‑232. For more detailed accounts, see Stevan K. Pavlowitch,
Hitler’s New Disorder. he Second World War in Yugoslavia, New York: Columbia Uni‑
versity Press, 2008; Jozo Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. he
Chetniks, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1975, and Jozo Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and Collaboration, Stanford: Stanford Univer‑
sity Press, 2001. Tomasevich’s planned third volume on the Partisans was unfortunately
never inished.
3
On the Ustasha and their anti‑Serbian politics, see: Tomasevich, War and Revolution in
Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and collaboration, 335‑415; Fikreta Jelić‑Butić, Ustaše
i Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, 1941-1945, Zagreb: Školska Knjiga, 1978, particularly
158‑187; Aleksa Djilas, he Contested Country. Yugoslav Unity and Communist Revolution, 1919-1953, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1991, 103‑127; Ladislaus
Hory and Martin Broszat, Der Kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 1941-1945, Stuttgart: Deutsche
Verlags‑Anstalt, 1964, particularly 93‑103, 126.
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4
35
On the events in Bosnia, see also: Enver Redžić, Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Second
World War, New York: Frank Cass, 2005.
5
By adopting the name of ‘Chetniks’, they drew on South Slav traditions of outlaw and
guerrilla bands. Chetnik units were used by the Serbian and other Balkan armies before
and during the Balkan wars, 1912‑1913. In the interwar period, a Chetnik Association
with many local brands was established in Serbia, from 1932 led by Kosta Pećanac. See
Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. he Chetniks, 115‑126.
6
hese plans for a large and ethnically clean Serbian entity were proposed initially by Ste‑
van Moljević in the summer of 1941, before he became a central igure in the Chetnik
movement. Similar suggestions were made by others, but not oicially from the side of
the Chetnik top military leadership. For a discussion of this, see Tomasevich, War and
Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. he Chetniks, 166‑178 and John R. Lampe, Yugoslavia
as history, 206.
7
Attila Hoare, ‘he People’s Liberation Movement in Bosnia and Hercegovina, 1941‑1945:
What Did It Mean to Fight for a Multi‑National State?’, Nationalism and Ethnic Politics,
2, 1996, 3, 415‑445.
8
See also Stevan K. Pavlowitch, ‘Neither heroes nor traitors: Suggestions for a reappraisal
of the Yugoslav resistance’, in B. Bond and I. Roy eds., War and Society. A Yearbook of
Military History, vol. 1, 1975, 227‑242.
9
On cooperation and civil war between Partisans and Chetniks, see Marko Attila Hoare,
Genocide and Resistance in Hitler’s Bosnia. he Partisans and the Chetniks 1941-1943, Ox‑
ford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
10
Lucian Karchmar, Draža Mihailović and the Rise of the Četnik Movement, 1941-1942,
New York: Garland Publishing, 1987, 498‑450.
11
hus, the last Yugoslav anti‑Partisan forces surrendered a week after the war had oici‑
ally ended. For a description of the last ighting and the inal surrender from a Partisan
perspective, see Milan Basta, Rat je završen sedam dana kasnije, Ljubljana: Globus, 1976.
12
Venceslav Glišić, Teror i zločini nacističke Nemačke u Srbiji 1941-1945, Beograd: Rad,
1970, 60‑69. he number of victims in Kragujevac remains uncertain; according to
some estimates as many as 7000 were killed there. Ibid, 66. See also Tomasevich, War
and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and collaboration, 69. For an ac‑
count of the crimes based on German sources, see Walter Manoschek and Hans Safrian,
‘717./117. ID: Eine Infanterie‑Division auf dem Balkan’, in Hannes Heer und Klaus
Naumann, eds., Vernichtungskrieg: Verbrechen der Wehrmacht 1941-1944, Hamburg:
Hamburger Edition, 1995, 360‑365.
13
Quoted from the Ustasha paper Novi List, 3rd June, 1941, in Viktor Novak, Magnum Crimen. Pola vijeka klerikalizma u Hrvatskoj, Beograd: Nova Knjiga 1986 (irst published in
Zagreb 1948), 606.
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usable history?
14
See Tomislav Dulić, ‘Mass Killing in the Independent State of Croatia, 1941‑1945: a case
for comparative research’, Journal of Genocide Research, 8, 2006, 3, 255‑281; Jelić‑Butić,
Ustaše i Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, 166‑167; Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and collaboration, 397‑409, Hory and Broszat, Der Kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 100‑103. For a detailed description of the massacres in Herzegovina,
see Tomislav Dulić, Utopias of Nation. Local Mass Killing in Bosnia and Herzegovina,
1941-1942, Uppsala: Studia Historica Uppsaliensia, 2005, 123‑165.
15
Ger Duijzings, ‘World War Two’, Chapter 3 in his History and Reminders in East Bosnia,
appendix 4 from the report Srebrenica. A ‘safe’ area. Reconstruction, background, consequences and analysis of the fall of a safe area, Netherlands Institute of War Documenta‑
tion (NIOD), at http://www.srebrenica.nl/en/a_index.htm. See also Dulić, Utopias of
Nation, 216‑226; Hory and Broszat, Der Kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 126.
16
Srdja Trifkovic, Ustaša. Croatian Separatism and European Politics, 1929-1945, London:
he Lord Byron Foundation for Balkan Studies, 1998, 150‑156.
17
Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and collaboration,
397.
18
Mark Biondich, ‘Religion and Nation in Wartime Croatia: Relections on the Ustaša
Policy of Forced Religious Conversion, 1941‑1942’, Slavonic and East European Review,
83, 2005, 1, 71‑116.
19
On the Ustaša camps, see Mirko Peršen, Ustaški Logori (2nd revised and expanded edi‑
tion), Zagreb: Globus, 1990; Ivo Goldstein, Holokaust u Zagrebu, Zagreb: Novi Liber
2001, 247‑362. On Jasenovac, also Nataša Mataušić, Jasenovac 1941-1945. Logor smrti i
radni logor, Zagreb: Biblioteka Kameni cvijet, 2003. On the number of Jasenovac vic‑
tims, see See e.g. Vladimir Žerjavić, Opsesije i megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleiburga.
Gubici stanovništva Jugoslavije u drugom svetskom ratu, (2nd edition), Zagreb: Globus,
1992, 69‑74; Goldstein, Holokaust u Zagrebu, 338‑343; Mataušić, Jasenovac, 116‑122, and,
for a recent overview of various estimates, see also Dragan Cvetković, ‘Stradanje civila
Nezavisne Države Hrvatske u Logoru Jasenovac’, Tokovi Istorije, 2007, 4, 153‑168.
20 Vladimir Dedijer and Antun Miletić, Genocid nad muslimanima 1941-1945. Zbornik
dokumenata i svjedočenja, Sarajevo: Svjetlost 1990; Dulić, Utopias of Nation, 194‑215;
Redžić, Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Second World War, 124‑151; Tomasevich, War and
Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. he Chetniks. 256‑261. On the irst wave of massa‑
cres, see also Karchmar, Draža Mihailović, 462, 473, 481.
21
Rasim Hurem, Kriza narodno-oslobodilačkog pokreta u Bosni i Hercegovini, 1941-1942, Sa‑
rajevo: Svjetlost, 1972, particularly 142‑162; Redžić, Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Second
World War, 210‑216. For an inside account, see Milovan Djilas, Wartime, London: Mar‑
tin Secker and Warburg, 1977, 147‑156.
22
According to Vladimir Žerjavić, the number of Croatian and Muslim victims may have
been at most about 50,000, possibly less. To this should be added about 10,000 Slovenes
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37
and 2,000 Chetniks. he majority were not killed at Bleiburg, but during the following
forced marches and imprisonment. See Žerjavić, Opsesije i megalomanije oko Jasenovca i
Bleiburga, 77‑79. For a critical discussion of the numbers of victims according to studies
based on Croatian émigré sources see also Tomislav Dulić, ‘Tito’s Slaughterhouse: A
Critical analysis of Rummel’s Work on Democide’, Journal of Peace Research, 41, 2004, 1,
85‑102.
23
Vladimir Žerjavić, Gubici stanovništva Jugoslavije u drugom svjetskom ratu, Zagreb: Jugo‑
slovensko viktimološko društvo, 1989, 70‑75; Bogoljub Kočović, Žrtve Drugog svetskog
rata u Jugoslaviji, London: Naše Delo, 1985, 130. he igures given by these two calcu‑
lations are now widely accepted. For an overview of various calculations of Yugoslav
Second World War victims, see also Srđan Bogosavljević, ‘he Unresolved Genocide’,
in Nebojša Popov, ed., he Road to War in Serbia. Trauma and Catharsis, Budapest: ceu
Press, 2000, 146‑159.
24 Žerjavić, Gubici stanovništva Jugoslavije, 4.
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Establishing an oicial
narrative, 1945‑1948
3
he ‘National Liberation Fight’ of the communist led Partisans during the
Second World War was the core of the founding and state‑bearing myths of
socialist Yugoslavia, providing political legitimacy to the communist hold on
power. he successful ight against the Axis occupiers, their Yugoslav collabora‑
tors and the Partisans’ political opponents paved the way for the establishment
of communist rule in the re‑constructed Yugoslavia. he war had, however, also
been the scene of large scale massacres and atrocities among diferent groups
of the Yugoslav population, which would obviously challenge the rebuilding
of Yugoslavia as a multiethnic common state. hus the communists, while
developing and exploiting the myths of the war, had to manage a recent history
of internal political and ethnic violence and large scale massacres.
At the establishment of communist rule, the complex and many‑sided
conlict that had been the Second World War in Yugoslavia was reduced to
a simplistic Manichaean account, glorifying those now holding power. he
history of war crimes and massacres, many of which had been part of funda‑
mentalist ethno‑nationalist policies involving Yugoslavia’s peasant masses, was
reduced to it that uncomplicated narrative.
his chapter investigates how the internal Yugoslav massacres of the Sec‑
ond World War were presented in oicial accounts immediately at the end
of the war. It shows that the history of massacres and war crimes was embed‑
ded in a simplistic overall interpretative framework according to which the
good Partisans were on the one side and all their opponents on the other. In
comparison to the Partisans’ strategic exploits and the military development
of the war, massacres and war crimes received relatively little attention and
were mainly referred to in order to emphasise the cruelness and bestiality of
the anti‑Partisan forces.
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usable history?
he communist reconstruction of Yugoslavia
he Communist Party of Yugoslavia seized power swiftly as the Second World
War was ending. Already in 1943, Tito had adopted the title ‘Marshal of
Yugoslavia’. In the provisional government established in March 1945 he was
both Prime Minister and Minister of Defence. Pretending to cooperate, the
communists united with non‑communist and pre‑war parties within the ‘Popu‑
lar Front’ (Narodni front), which served as a bogus coalition under strict
communist control. In the campaign leading up to the elections of the new
constitutional assembly in the Autumn of 1945, hardly any space was left to
parties outside the front, and most competitors withdrew. At the elections on
the 11th November 1945, the only alternative to supporting the front was to cast
a protest vote for an empty list. he Popular Front received an overwhelming
majority of votes, approximately 90%, and the Communist Party set out to
install itself with hegemonic power.
As highly devoted Stalinists, the Yugoslav communists intended the new
Yugoslavia to model that of the Soviet Union. he irst post‑war constitution,
ratiied in January 1946, was largely a copy of the Soviet one from 1936. In
accordance with the program adopted at the Second avnoj meeting in No‑
vember 1943, and in order to secure the individual nations against internal
oppression, Yugoslavia was rebuilt as a federation of six republics, Macedonia,
Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia, and within Serbia, which
was the largest of the republics, the two autonomous regions Vojvodina and
Kosovo. Nevertheless, national relations remained sensitive. To avoid clashes,
a law against the incitement of national, racial or religious hatred was passed,
and the granting of privileges based on nation, race or religion was prohibited.
he republics held considerable cultural autonomy, but they remained under
ideological constrains sharply limiting, for example, the praise of national
pasts.1
In spite of its formal federalism, the new state was highly centralised with
all political power in the hands of the Communist Party leadership; Tito as
Secretary General of the party also held the positions of head of government,
Minister of Defence, Commander in Chief and head of the Popular Front;
Edvard Kardelj was responsible for foreign policy; Milovan Djilas headed the
departments for agitation and propaganda; and Aleksandar Ranković was in
charge of internal security and the secret police.
Early post‑war Yugoslavia was a Stalinist police state.2 An oppressive po‑
litical security apparatus, the so‑called Department for the Protection of the
People (Odeljenje za Zaštitu Naroda; ozna), from 1946 renamed the State
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41
Security Administration (Uprava Državne Bezbednosti; udba), ensured that
all opposition was quietened in a couple of years. Non‑communist members
of the Popular Front, pre‑war politicians and other political opponents were
sentenced either to imprisonment with hard labour or death. According to
recent estimates, probably tens of thousands were killed by the udba in the
immediate post‑war years, and many more were held in concentration camps.3
he political and economic aims of the Yugoslav communists were similar
to those of the Soviet Stalinists and focused on heavy industry and forceful
homogenisation of political expression. In 1947, the Yugoslavs introduced
the irst economic ive‑year‑plan outside the Soviet Union, which was highly
ambitious and with a strong focus on industry. Economic reconstruction was
boosted, not least by large war reparations. Supported by massive propaganda
campaigns and driven by the enthusiastic eforts of communist functionaries
and youth brigades, ambitious reconstruction works were realized at impressive
speed. When the workforce was lacking in numbers, brigades were sometimes
mobilised by force, and at times camp prisoners also assisted in reconstruction
projects.4 A cult of leadership was constructed around Tito and the Communist
Party, mainly drawing on the history of the National Liberation War.
he irst oicial accounts
he Yugoslav communists promoted a simple understanding of the war as a
struggle of the Partisans on the one side, representing all Yugoslavia’s peoples
and “patriotic forces”, and the occupiers, collaborators and other enemies
on the other. Among the main issues of Tito’s initial post‑war speeches were
the Partisans’ brilliant victories, their struggle for “Brotherhood and unity”
among Yugoslavia’s diferent ethnic groups and the great sacriices borne by
the Yugoslav peoples. he speeches drew extensively on Partisan rhetoric and
values – for example by inishing with the Partisans’ war motto “Death to
fascism – freedom to the people!”5
he heavy burdens borne by the Yugoslav peoples were repeatedly empha‑
sised, sometimes in connection with negotiations with the allies. In a speech
given at a public meeting on the 27th March 1945 in Ljubljana, Tito, while
criticising the allies’ approach to the disputes on the Yugoslav‑Italian border,
stated:
Our peoples, all jointly, Slovenes, Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Macedonians –
have sufered together and together given enormous sacriices in this great struggle
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42
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of the freedom‑loving nations” … “here are peoples who have given a million and
seven hundred thousands victims in this war.6
his number of 1.7 million Yugoslav victims was to stay the oicial estimate
throughout the history of socialist Yugoslavia. In 1946, when international
reparations were discussed in Paris, the Yugoslavs declared that their country’s
losses amounted to 1,706,000 persons.7 Decades later, the mathematician
Vladeta Vučković revealed that as a young student shortly after the war he
was employed in the Department of Statistics to supply Kardelj, then foreign
minister and vice‑president of the federal government, with scientiic statisti‑
cal support for a signiicant number of victims.8 he number of 1,706,000
was also stated in a report from the Yugoslav reparations commission, from
1946. his number, according to the report, equalled 10.8% of Yugoslavia’s
population. It was underlined that the number of Yugoslav victims was sur‑
passed only by the losses sufered by Poland and the Soviet Union, and when
excluding these two, the Yugoslav war losses constituted 34% of all casualties
on the allied side.9
Ill. 3.1. his table, titled “Allied losses
in human lives”, graphically illustrates for everyone the enormous sacriice
of the Yugoslav peoples, compared to
India, France, Greece, Great Britain,
Czechoslovakia, Holland, the USA
and others. he losses of the USSR
and Poland are conveniently left out,
allowing those of Yugoslavia to constitute 34 % of allied losses. From Ljud‑
ske i materijalne žrtve Jugoslavije u
ratnom naporu 1941‑1945, 7
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he internal massacres were not main themes of Tito’s initial speeches af‑
ter the war. Yet they were regularly, if supericially, mentioned as well‑known
elements of the war. While the single most important enemy and aggressor
in Tito’s accounts were the Germans, the planning and responsibility for war
crimes were ascribed to foreign occupiers and internal, now dead or exiled,
traitors and enemies. By presenting the war in this way, Tito laid the basis
for a narrative that could rally all Yugoslav peoples together against external
enemies. On 21st May 1945, in his irst public speech held in Zagreb after the
war, Tito stated:
Did you see how the German conqueror in that terrible year of 1941, with the help
of his servant Pavelić, and later also with the help of the traitors of the Serbian
people, Nedić and Mihailović, and the traitor of the Slovene people, Rupnik,
did everything to deepen the chasm not only between the Croatian and Serbian
peoples, but also between all the peoples of Yugoslavia?10
Yet, according to Tito’s account, the Partisans erased this chasm when their
ighters consisting of all Yugoslav nationalities fought together for brotherhood
and unity.11 While this way of describing the war crimes served to externalise
guilt and responsibility from the Yugoslav peoples, care was also taken to ‘bal‑
ance’ the blame and guilt for betrayal among the diferent ethnic groups. In
this case Tito mentions Pavelić of the Croatian Ustasha, Serbian Chetnik leader
Mihailović, Nedić of the Serbian puppet government, and next to them Leon
Rupnik, leader of the marionette administration in Ljubljana under Italian
and German occupation and instigator of a Slovenian collaborative militia,
the Slovene home guards (Slovensko domobranstvo). Tito thus includes main
representatives of Yugoslavia’s three largest nations.12
While the ethnic aspects of the wartime crimes were not foregrounded in
Tito’s speeches, they were not ignored or denied either. he word for people,
narod, was mostly used in plural, probably in order to emphasise that the com‑
munists recognised the several individual ethnic groups or nations that consti‑
tuted the population of Yugoslavia, and that, in line with the establishment of
the formally federalised state, national oppression was not to be tolerated.13
hat Serbs were the prime victims of Ustasha slaughtering was regularly
mentioned. On the other hand, it was emphasised in Tito’s accounts that war
guilt should not be ascribed to any of the Yugoslav peoples as such. In Tito’s
speech in Zagreb, Ante Pavelić was openly identiied as a Croat, “the greatest
criminal who was ever born … by a Croatian mother”, who had thrown shame
on the Croat people. But luckily the shame was washed of, claimed Tito, by
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usable history?
the Croat sons and daughters, who went into ighting together with the other
Yugoslav nations.14 Speaking at two public gatherings in Serbia on the 7th July
1945, Tito praised the Serbian Partisans, calling them “true bearers of unity
and brotherhood”. hough nationalist propaganda had thrown responsibility
for the slaughtering of Serbs in Croatia on innocent Croats, the Partisans did
not carry any hint of hatred towards them, he declared:
For them it was obvious that the Croatian people were not guilty because the
Ustasha criminals committed such crimes; that the Slovenian people were not
guilty for what the domobran criminals did; and that the Serbian people were not
guilty for the crimes of various criminals belonging to Nedić or Draža.15
hus war guilt was not attached to the peoples, only to the Yugoslav traitors
and collaborators. hese traitors were often mentioned en bloc, as a common
unity, probably with the aim of underlining that they should be seen as similar
phenomena, and that every nation had its share. hereby guilt was distributed
equally among the Yugoslav peoples.
To further remove causes for regret and mutual incrimination, Tito claimed
that all these traitors had received their punishment and were now dead or,
very few of them, in refuge. hus, according to Tito, the internal enemies and
collaborators were now “a matter of the past” and were therefore no longer
of any concern.16 his also meant that there would be no further reasons to
discuss guilt and responsibility among the Yugoslav peoples.
With the aim of securing brotherhood and unity and the internal coher‑
ence of the Yugoslav state, Tito’s version of the war externalised all the worst
brutalities and ignored the co‑responsibility of the peoples of post‑war Yugo‑
slavia for the crimes committed during the war. While this strategy obviously
simpliied the reconstruction and stabilisation of the state under communist
authority, it also left aside any chance to properly examine and condemn the
radical nationalist policies and practices of wartime Yugoslavia.
he oicial report on Jasenovac
he Ustasha concentration camp complex at Jasenovac was a main symbol of
Ustasha crimes and terror. Immediately after the war Jasenovac was the subject
of an oicial investigation, testifying to the terror and inhumanity of the place.
he report on Jasenovac was published in 1946 by the Croatian National
Commission for Investigation of crimes committed by the occupiers and
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45
their helpers. In this report, the commission made no attempt to hide the
horrors of the camp system at Jasenovac. On the contrary, it was made
clear that the camp should be seen as an “instrument to the annihilation of
our peoples”.17 he report described how prisoners were worked or starved
to death in Jasenovac, as well as how some were simply brought there to
be killed. he procedures and terrors of the camp were described in detail
through numerous and lengthy citations from victims. One survivor, Jakob
Finzi, recounted:
I worked as a grave digger at the camp cemetery only for 10 days. During this time
I buried corpses without heads, without hands, with cracked heads, with ingers
and toes torn of, with nails driven into the breast, with cut of genital organs,
corpses deformed, blue and black from blows. In those ten days I buried, together
with the comrades, about 3000 corpses …18
In describing the crimes committed in the camp, the report stated that “it
seems unbelievable, impossible, that one can ind criminals who will out of
so much sadism, out of so much perversity imagine and carry out such cruel
ways and means of torturing people.”19
he ethnic identity of the victims – mainly Serbs, Jews and Roma – was
openly stated. When massacres were aimed at only one ethnicity, this was
clearly described, as in the case of a liquidation of about 600‑700 Serbs near
Jablanac.20 Yet the ethnic aspect was not in itself foregrounded. In most in‑
stances, the victims were simply referred to as prisoners. With regard to the
perpetrators, ethnic ailiation was almost completely absent. hey were re‑
ferred to either as Ustasha or Fascists – or sometimes as the Germans and the
Ustasha. he report did not suggest any connection between the Ustasha and
the Croatian people. On the contrary, it was emphasised that “the leaders of
the Ustasha terrorist organisation were well aware, already before their entry
into Yugoslavia, that they did not have support in the popular masses and that
they could only remain in power by means of terror.”21
It was underlined in the report that the precise number of victims at Jase‑
novac could not be established. Yet by adding the number of victims of mass
killings and the number of individuals killed in the camp, the report reached
a igure around 500,000‑600,000.22 In conclusion, the report stated: “Never
did a single criminal in history ever slaughter a tenth of a people, such as
Ante Pavelić did to his own people”.23 hus, the victims were seen as belong‑
ing essentially to one people. In this perspective, the crimes committed by
the Ustasha, and in Jasenovac in particular, were not seen in separate ethnic
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terms, but as a major crime against the common Yugoslav population of the
ndh. At the same time, Pavelić was presented not as a Croatian nationalist,
but as a traitor towards his own Yugoslav people.
Settling accounts
he new Yugoslav regime made little attempt at internal reconciliation, as all
guilt of war crimes and massacres was isolated to the enemies of the Partisans,
and thereby, according to the communist representation, to the enemies of the
people. hese enemies were, apart from the occupying Axis powers, primarily
the Ustasha, the various Chetnik movements, and Serbia’s pro‑Nazi admin‑
istrators. While most representatives of these parties had either led or been
annihilated by the Partisan army at the end of the war, in the immediate post‑
war years regime soldiers still chased remaining Ustasha and Chetnik units.
A number of military trials were held against representatives of the Catholic
Clergy, who were accused of collaboration with the Ustasha and participation
in war crimes and slaughtering. he fact that these trials and condemnations
were not particularly discussed in the public sphere shows that they were mainly
intended as punishment and elimination of former enemies and criminals, not
as oicial statements.24
In 1946, however, major trials were held against top representatives of
anti‑communist and anti‑Partisan movements, and these trials were meant,
at least partly, as public statements. he trials were widely broadcast and sub‑
stantial material from the courtrooms was published with the obvious aim
of stigmatising enemies of the new regime as traitors and collaborators. he
following investigation of the two greatest trials, against the Chetnik leader
Draža Mihailović and the Archbishop of Zagreb, Alojzije Stepinac respectively,
show how these two main enemies of the communists were presented, and
how wartime massacres igured in these representations.
he trial against Mihailović
From 10th June to 15th July 1946, Draža Mihailović was put on trial together
with 23 other “traitors and war criminals” with connections to the Chetnik
movement. he indictment against Mihailović personally consisted of 47
points, holding him responsible for the actions of Chetnik units throughout
Yugoslavia, also the so‑called legalized units under the Nedić administration.
he greatest focus and by far the largest part of the indictment, points 1‑40,
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concentrated on collaboration, betrayal, attacks on Partisans and their support‑
ers, and other anti‑Partisan activity of the Chetniks. Yet a particular chapter,
point 41‑47, was dedicated to Chetnik war crimes.25
Most mentioned victims of these war crimes were Partisans, but the indict‑
ment also held several descriptions of mass murder and large scale massacres of
Muslims and Croats. Sometimes bestial details were included, as in this short
description of a series of massacres in Dalmatia: “In September 1942, the Chet‑
niks of Petar Baćović killed 900 Croats in Makarska, skinned several Catholic
priests alive and set ire to 17 villages.”26 Repeated massacres of thousands of
Muslims, particularly in East Bosnia, were also described. Some instances of
mass murder of up to thousands of civilians were recounted without stating
the ethnicity of the victims – most probably Muslims in these cases.27
he accused were all sentenced to death. he verdict of the trial largely
repeated the text of the indictment; again focus was on the collaboration and
anti‑Partisan activity of the Chetniks, while war crimes were included in a
separate, minor, chapter.
Signiicant eforts were made for the trial against Draža Mihailović and the
other Chetnik leaders to reach the public. According to the oicial excerpts,
Ill. 3.2. Photograph from the excerpts of the trials against Draža Mihailović and other Chetniks
leaders. he original caption states: “he traitor Mihailović on the prisoner’s dock under the
weight of the crimes proved before the court”.29
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usable history?
around 100 journalists were present, many from countries outside Yugoslavia,
and the trial’s proceedings were broadcast from Radio Belgrade.28 his all testi‑
ies to the intention from the side of the communists to stigmatise Mihailović
as a national traitor in the widest possible sphere, inside as well as outside
Yugoslavia. he inclusion of Chetnik war crimes in this widely published trial
also shows that the regime had no scruples about addressing these issues in
public, as long as they were connected to traitors and enemies of the Partisans.
A collection of sources, titled Documents about Draža Mihailović’s betrayal
had been published already in 1945. It followed the same pattern as the trial:
the Chetniks’ collaboration and anti‑Partisan activities were foregrounded,
while massacres and ethnic cleansing received far less attention and were not
even mentioned in the introduction, where Mihailović’s main crimes, as they
occurred in the printed documents, were stipulated.30 A few documents on
massacres were included, though. A letter was reprinted and presented by the
editors of the documents as Mihailović’s instructions to the commanders in
Montenegro to conduct “a truly hitlerish bloodthirsty, terrible slaughter” of
the people, aimed at “the cleansing of stately territory of all national minorities
and un‑national elements”.31 And a small chapter, reprinting internal Chetnik
communication, showed how, according to the editors,
… the Chetniks slaughtered tens of thousands of Muslim and Croat lives, [who
were] unarmed and helpless, while they at the same time drank and fraternized
with the Ustasha, who had killed hundreds of thousands of innocent Serbs, made
agreements and recognized ‘the supremacy of the ndh’.32
he trial, as well as the collection of documents, mirrors the communists’
oicial view and representation that Draža Mihailović and the Chetniks were
primarily traitors and enemies of the people, and secondarily war criminals
and perpetrators of large massacres and ethnic cleansing. In general, the com‑
munists held Mihailović and the Chetniks, as national traitors, responsible for
the Partisan‑Chetnik struggle and what they called “the fratricidal war”.33 his
perspective was also promoted within the historians’ environment.34
he trial against Stepinac
A few months later, on the 9th September 1946, another trial that was also to
receive great publicity began in Zagreb against Erih Lisak, a prominent Ustasha
oicial and police chief, Pavao Gulin, leader of the Slovene legion of Chetniks,
and a number of Catholic priests and friars, some of them members of the
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Archbishop’s administration in Zagreb. Lisak was accused of mass murder and,
together with the others convicted, of organising a conspiracy to overthrow
the new regime. he prosecutor’s questions, according to Stella Alexander,
were designed to point suspicion towards the Zagreb Archbishop Alojzije
Stepinac.35 On the 18th September, the trial was interrupted and Stepinac was
arrested the same day.
he trial was resumed on the 28th, now with Stepinac among the indicted,
being accused of collaborating with and supporting the Ustasha regime, col‑
laborating in the forceful conversion of tens of thousands of Serbs, and partici‑
pating in the conspiracy arranged by Lisak and others. Among the numerous
witnesses for the prosecutor, Serbian villagers rendered gruesome testimonies
of forced mass conversion.36 On the 11th October, Stepinac was declared guilty
and sentenced to 16 years of hard labour. Lisak and Gulin were sentenced to
death. he remaining indicted received prison sentences and two were declared
not guilty.
hat the trial to a large extent was intended as a public event is testiied
by the fact that extracts and reports were published in great detail in several
Yugoslav newspapers, and that an oicial edition of the proceedings from the
trial were published shortly after the verdicts were given.37
he trial against the Archbishop of Zagreb followed a period of growing
tension between the communist regime and the Catholic Church, who tended
to criticise the new government harsher than they had ever spoken out against
the Ustasha, at least in public. At the trials against Lisak and Stepinac, the very
top of the church was linked to the Ustasha and their terror regime, and the
church was held responsible for parts of the Ustasha crimes, the forced mass
conversions in particular. Tito had also pointed to this connection in a public
answer to regime critical statements made by the top of the clergy at a bish‑
ops’ meeting in September 1945. he bishops protested, among other things,
against the persecution and harassments of priests and other representatives of
the church and attacks on church privileges.38 In his response, which was pub‑
lished on the front pages of Yugoslav newspapers, Tito criticised the bishops for
spreading racial hatred when it was time to heal the wounds from the war. He
also wondered why they had never issued such statements against the killing of
Serbs in the ndh, and he reminded them of the many Ustasha leaders who had
been educated in the Catholic seminaries in Bosnia and Herzegovina.39
While members of the Catholic clergy had indeed assisted Ustasha crimes
and thus deserved judicial prosecution, there is little doubt that this trial was
also an oicial statement against the Catholic Church, aimed at de‑legitimising
a major ideological enemy of the communists.
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usable history?
A volume of documents and testimonies about crimes committed by parts
of the Catholic clergy before, during and after the war was also published in
1946. In a chapter on the role of the Catholic clergy in the forced conversions
of Serbs, the responsibility of the clergy was underlined, not only as neces‑
sary accomplices in the act of conversion, but many of them also as active
members of the Ustasha movement and participants in crime.40 he volume
held numerous statements from Serb villagers, who explained how these con‑
versions were conducted under threats and often accompanied by other acts
of persecution. Four persons from the village Crkveni Vrhovci had signed the
following account:
… in January 1942, an order was issued by the local authorities that whoever did
not convert would be driven into a camp, so we had to come to Požega to be con‑
verted by the priest Pipinić, which meant that from our village Pipinić converted
about 150 peasants. … But in spite of all assurances from Pipinić and the Ustasha
that nothing would happen to us when we converted, our village was burnt down
in 1943 by the Ustasha and the Germans and the people were driven into a camp.
In all this, there was not one priest who reacted to this and protected us, but they
stood cold‑bloodedly observing everything that happened to us.41
Another chapter described the direct involvement of representatives of the
Catholic clergy in the Ustasha massacres all over the ndh. In Herzegovina, it
was claimed, priests and friars were inspiring bestial hatred against the Serb
people, and they personally participated in persecution and killing.42
It was to become political and historical dogma that the Catholic Church
carried the main responsibility for the forced conversions of Serbs in the
ndh, and that parts of the clergy had cooperated and participated directly in
Ustasha massacres.43 he issue of Catholic responsibility was to become one of
the dominant themes in the historiography about the ndh and the massacres
committed there.
here is hardly any doubt that these trials against representatives of the
Chetnik, Catholic and Ustasha leaderships, while calling certain persons to
account for the crimes of the war, were also planned as great public showdowns
against the main enemies of the communists. he trials exposed and conirmed
the oicial version of the history of the war. Despite the fact that war crimes
and massacres received far less attention than the issues of national betrayal
and anti‑Partisan activity, they were openly mentioned and included in the
testimonies and accounts of the trials. he ethnicity of victims was freely as‑
serted. Yet in general descriptions, the victims were not speciied as belonging
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51
to any particular group, but as the ‘people’ as a common totality without ethnic
speciication. Neither were the perpetrators, the Chetniks, Ustasha and mem‑
bers of the Catholic clergy, ascribed to any nationality, though in practice they
obviously belonged respectively to the Serbian and Croatian side. In general,
ethnicity was never thematized, and massacres were not described or deined
as genocide.
Tito’s 1948 report of the war
In 1948, the Yugoslav communist leadership was forced to state even more
explicitly how recent Yugoslav history, the Second World War and the com‑
munist seizure of power in particular, were to be understood.
By then the communist regime was solidly established, the reconstruct‑
ing of the country according to Stalinist ideals was developing quickly, and
all possible competitors for power and ideological inluence were efectively
eliminated. Used to seeing themselves as the vanguard of Stalinism outside
the Soviet Union, the Yugoslavs had also been granted the honour of hosting
the Cominform headquarters, which was established in Belgrade in 1947.
Yet, during Spring and early Summer 1948, the self‑perception of the Yu‑
goslav communists was badly shaken by Soviet‑Yugoslav disagreements and
severe incriminations from the Kremlin, claiming, amongst others, that the
Yugoslav communists overestimated their own success in the National Lib‑
eration Struggle and that their victory was in fact caused by the eforts of
the Soviet Red Army.44 On 28th June 1948 Yugoslavia was formally expelled
from the Cominform, its communist leadership accused of incorrect policies,
anti‑Soviet attitudes, revisionist, Trotskyist and Menshevik tendencies, petty
bourgeois nationalism and betrayal of the international solidarity of the work‑
ing people.45
he split deprived the Yugoslav communists of their external source of legiti‑
macy as part of the victorious international communist movement. his meant
that they had to stress their internal sources of justiication even further, and
the National Liberation Struggle now, besides justifying the construction of the
new federal state and supplying heroic national myths for the communists, also
had to serve as a proper autochthonous socialist revolution.46 While feverishly
denouncing the critique of their party and politics, the Yugoslav communists
guarded and exploited the image of the National Liberation Fight.47
In July 1948, shortly after the expulsion from the Cominform, the Com‑
munist Party of Yugoslavia held its ifth Party Congress, largely with the aim
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of proving and securing Party unity in the face of the crisis. For more than
eight hours, Tito explained the history of the Yugoslav communists, partly
meeting some of the Soviet criticism, while stressing wartime solidarity and
post‑war achievements.48 his speech, according to one historian, summed
up “the pragmatic consensus of communist historical interpretation” and
its version of Yugoslavia’s 20th century history was to dominate institutional
historiography through the following decades.49
In Tito’s report, the warring parties are depicted as the ‘heroic Partisans’ on
the one side and on the other an almost undiferentiated group of ‘occupiers’,
‘quislings’ and ‘collaborators’. he enormous sacriices and superhuman eforts
of the Yugoslav peoples are repeatedly emphasised. hrough the 75 pages of
Tito’s speech concerned with the period of the Second World War, war crimes
and massacres are regularly mentioned as part of a general and well‑known
background to the Partisan warfare, but they are seldom discussed in more
than one sentence:
Explaining the beginning of the war, Tito states:
When the Ustasha started already in the month of May to commit the mass slau‑
ghtering of Serbian citizens in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in Lika, and in Kordun,
and the people started to lee into the hills and forests to save their lives, the party
sent its staf to take the leadership of this unfortunate people, in order to resist the
bestial Ustasha mass murderers.50
And later, when discussing the so called “irst enemy ofensive” in the autumn
of 1941, Tito recounts:
See, such a criminal gang burnt, killed, and plundered in the month of September
in the peaceful villages of Mačva and in Pocerina: Ustasha, Nedić‑people, Ljotić‑
people, Pećanac’s Chetniks – all these bandits together with the German fascist
beasts committed this terrible cruelty on the peaceful citizens of Mačva, Pocerina
and Jadar. Eight hundred and sixty Serbian peasants, women, children, and old
people, who were found killed in the valley of Jadar, were strewn with lour to
make the swine eat them. hey were victims of an organised bestial gang, made
up of German, Ustasha, Nedić, Ljotić, and Pećanac’s bandits. … But in spite of
this cooperation of German, Serbian and Croatian degenerates, in this ofensive
they did not succeed in defeating the heroic Partisans.51
As earlier in Tito’s accounts, the fascist occupiers are the main culprits, assisted
by Yugoslav traitors and collaborators. he ethnic identities of both victims
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and perpetrators are mentioned, but not thematized as such. In fact, there is
hardly any diferentiation between the Yugoslav collaborators, none of whom
are essentially worse than anyone else.52
Tito’s speech had an immense impact in setting a pattern for Yugoslav
historiography of the war and its massacres, according to scope as well as
perspective on war crimes.53 In this version of Yugoslav wartime history, focus
was on the Partisans’ strategic exploits, the development of the Partisan army
and the strategic course of the ight for liberation. Compared to the Partisans’
military achievements the wartime massacres received relatively little attention.
Second World War history was to glorify the Partisans’ exploits; it was to be
told as a story of heroes rather than victims. In this grand narrative the short
descriptions of massacres and brutal violence would serve mainly to underline
the cruel and inhumane character of the enemies.
N ote s
1
Paul Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, New York: Columbia Uni‑
2
See Pavlowitch, Yugoslavia, 175‑187.
3
Lampe, Yugoslavia as History, 238. See also Marko Milovojević, ‘he role of the Yugoslav
versity Press, 1968, 101‑124.
intelligence and security committee’, in John B. Allcock, John J. Horton and Marko
Milovojević, Yugoslavia in transition, New York: Berg, 1992, 206‑207. he UDBa
(Uprava Državne Bezbednosti, or State Security Administration) was created in 1946 to
replace the wartime security service, ozna (Odeljenje za Zaštitu Naroda, or Department
for Protection of the People), also headed by Ranković.
4
On reconstruction, propaganda and the labour brigades, see Carol S. Lilly, Power and
Persuasion. Ideology and Rhetoric in Communist Yugoslavia, 1944-1953, Boulder: Westview
Press, 2001, especially 115‑136; Carol S. Lilly, ‘Problems of Persuasion: Communist Agi‑
tation and Propaganda in Post‑war Yugoslavia’, Slavic Review, 53, 1994, 2, 395‑413.
5
his phrase was used in several speeches held during the summer of 1945, see e.g. Josip
Broz Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije I, Beograd: Kultura, 1948 (collection of articles, spe‑
eches, interviews and declarations), e.g. 50, 69, 78, 81.
6
Josip Broz Tito, ‘Jugoslavija ne traži ništa drugo do ujedinjenje svojih naroda’, in Tito,
Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije I, 22.
7
8
Žerjavić, Opsesije i megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleiburga, 15.
Vladeta Vučković, ‘Žrtve rata’, Naša Reč, 368, 1985, 2‑3. Vučković’s account seems to
hold some inaccuracies. He claims that he was preparing statistical material for the
Peace conference in Paris in the spring of 1947, which should, obviously have been 1946.
9
Reparaciona komisija pri vladi Federativne Narodne Republike Jugoslavije, Ljudske i
materijalne žrtve Jugoslavije u ratnom naporu 1941-1945, Belgrade, 1945, 5.
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usable history?
10
Josip Broz Tito, ‘Prvi govor u oslobođenom Zagrebu’, in Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije
I, 13.
11
Ibid.
12
On Rupnik, see e.g. Tomasevich, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945. Occupation and Collaboration, 95‑96, 122‑126.
13
he concept of narod denotes people both in the sense of “the common citizens” or “the
broad masses” and as an ethnic people, close to the German concept of “Volk”. In 1946,
ive groups were recognised as nations, or narod: Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Montenegrins
and Macedonians, each with a home republic in Yugoslavia, as opposed to narodnosti
(nationalities), which were assumed to have a home country outside Yugoslavia. In 1968,
the Central Committee of the League of Communists of Bosnia‑Herzegovina stated that
the Muslims were to be recognised as Yugoslavia’s sixth narod. See e.g. Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav national question, 114f; Mustafa Imamović, Historija Bošnjaka,
Sarajevo: Preporod, 1998, 565; Pedro Ramet, Nationalism and Federalism in Yugoslavia,
1963-1983, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984, 147.
14
Josip Broz Tito, ‘Prvi govor u oslobođenom Zagrebu’, in Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije
15
Josip Broz Tito, ‘O Srbiji u narodno‑oslobodilačkoj borbi’ in Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugo-
16
Tito, ‘Jugoslavija ne traži …’, in Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije I, 23.
17
Zemaljska komisija Hrvatske za utvrđivanje zločina okupatora i njihovih pomagača,
I, 9.
slavije I, 72.
Zločini u Logoru Jasenovac, Zagreb: Novinsko‑izdavačko poduzeće ‘Naprijed’, 1946, 3.
18
Ibid, 25.
19
Ibid, 19.
20 Ibid, 58.
21
Ibid, 3.
22
Ibid, 38‑39.
23
Ibid, 39.
24 Stella Alexander, Church and State in Yugoslavia since 1945, London: Cambridge Univer‑
sity Press, 1979, 61f.
25
Izdajnik i ratni zločinac Draža Mihailović pred sudom. Stenografske Beleške i dokumenta
sa suđenja Dragoljubu-Draži Mihailoviću, Beograd: Izdanje saveza udruženja novinara
narodne republike Jugoslavije, 1946. Point 1‑40, describing collaboration, attacks on Par‑
tisan units, support for the Germans, anti‑Partisan propaganda, takes up pp. 17‑53. he
war crimes indictments, point 41‑47, are covered on pp. 54‑59.
26 Ibid, 56.
27 Ibid, 57.
28
Ibid, 9.
29 Ibid, 23.
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30 Dokumenti o izdajstvu Draže Mihailovića, knjiga 1, Državna Komisija za utvrđivanje
zločina okupatora i njihovih pomagača, Beograd, 1945, 5‑6.
31
Ibid, 10.
32
Ibid, 501.
33
Izdajnik i ratni zločinac Draža Mihailović pred sudom, 61; Dokumenti o izdajstvu Draže
Mihailovića, 11.
34
See Viktor Novak’s review ‘Istoriska građa u izdanjima Državne komisije za utvrđivanje
zločina okupatora i njihovih pomagača’ Istoriški Časopis, 1, 1948, 1‑2, 335‑337.
35
Stella Alexander, he Triple Myth. A life of Archbishop Stepinac, New York: Columbia
University Press, 1987, 141.
36
Ibid, 166 (also 141).
37
Suđenje Lisaku, Stepincu, Šaliću i družini, ustaško-križarskim zločincima i njihovim
pomagačima. Dokumenti o protunarodnom radu i zločinima jednog dijela katoličkog klera.
Zagreb 1946. On the newspapers, see Alexander, he triple myth, 148. he trial was
also covered in numerous newspapers outside Yugoslavia, largely perceived as a classic
communist show trial, and Stepinac as a martyred religious leader.
38
he “pastoral letter” with the bishops’ protests are reprinted in Richard Pattee, he case
of Cardinal Aloysius Stepinac, Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company, 1953, 470‑480.
Pattee’s study is very pro‑Catholic and overtly anti‑communist.
39
Josip Broz Tito, ‘O pastirskom pismu’, from Borba, 25th October 1945, reprinted in Tito,
Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije I, 169‑172. See also Alexander, Church and State in Yugoslavia,
70‑73.
40 Dokumenti o protunarodnom radu i zločinima jednog djela katoličkog klera, Zagreb:
Rožankowski, 1946, 54.
41
Ibid, 66.
42 Ibid, 140, 124‑180.
43
For a strongly anti‑Catholic appreciation of the documents and Stepinac trial, see
Viktor Novak’s review ‘Dokumenti o protunarodnom radu i zločinima jednog dijela
katoličkog klera’ Istoriški Časopis, 1, 1948, 338‑339.
44 See the letter from Molotov and Stalin to Tito and Kardelj, 4th May 1948, in Stephen
Clissold, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union 1939-1973. A documentary survey, London: Ox‑
ford University Press, 1975, 183‑197. Also in Ernest Halperin, he Triumphant Heretic.
Tito’s struggle against Stalin, London: Heinemann, 1958, 66‑67.
45
See e.g. Clissold, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, 202‑207.
46 Höpken, ‘Von der Mythologisierung zur Stigmatisierung: “Krieg und Revolution” in
Jugoslawien 1941‑1948’, 175‑176.
47 For an example of the Yugoslav communists’ defence of the national liberation war, see
e.g. Kosta Popović, ‘Za pravilnu ocenu oslobodilačkog rata naroda Jugoslavije’, Komunist
1949, no. 3.
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usable history?
48 Pavlowitch, Yugoslavia, 213.
49 Ivo Banac, ‘Historiography of the countries of Eastern Europe: Yugoslavia’, American
Historical Review, 97, 1992, 4, 1085‑1086, quote from page 1085.
50
Josip Broz Tito, ‘Izvještaj na V kongresu KPJ’, in Josip Broz Tito, Izgradnja nove Jugoslavije III, Zagreb 1951, p. 187 f. he translation is not quite true to Tito’s words, as he used
the word ‘narod’ to refer to the people, conveying both the idea of an ethnic group and
of ordinary people, whereas he refers to the party representatives with the fairly neutral
word ‘ljudi’ meaning people in the sense of a group of persons.
51
Ibid, 211.
52
See also Ljubodrag Dimić, ‘Od tvrdnje do znanja’, Vojnoistorijski Glasnik, 1996, 1‑2,
53
he speech is widely cited in Yugoslav historiography and, according to the ten year
203‑205.
report and bibliography of the National Committee of Yugoslav Historians, accounts for
the basic source on the beginning of the Second World War in Yugoslavia. Jorjo Tadić,
ed., Dix années d’historiographie Yougoslave 1945-1955. Belgrade: “Jugoslavija”, 1955, 578.
See also Đorđe Stanković and Ljubodrag Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom. Prilozi istoriji istoriograije, Belgrade: Službeni List SRJ, 1996, vol. 1, 292‑297.
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Massacres in memoirs
and iction, 1945‑1952
4
Yugoslavia’s socialist revolution in 1945 was soon to be relected in wider his‑
torical culture. Following the break with the Cominform in 1948 and the de‑
Stalinisation of the following years, Yugoslavia’s cultural sphere was allowed a
growing artistic freedom. While the overall interpretative framework of the war
had been established in speeches, trials and reports immediately after the war,
more detailed representations of particular incidents, including war crimes and
massacres, were developed within the realms of memoirs, novels and poetry.
his chapter investigates how internal Yugoslav massacres of the Second
World War were presented in literary representations of history in the early
period of Yugoslav socialism from 1945 to 1952. It shows how, compared to
oicial accounts in political statements and reports, personal memories and
literary descriptions enabled stronger emotional evocation and made room
for terrible details of individual sufering that did not it easily into general
accounts of war history. It also shows that communist cadre played key roles
in producing these representations within memoirs, poetry and novels.
he bloody cloth of Krajina – massacres in memoir literature
In the irst years after the war, Yugoslav communism was overtly Stalinist.
Stalinism was also the dominant principle in cultural politics, dictating that
culture was to serve and support the revolutionary cause and the establishment
of socialism.1 he Partisan war and the national liberation were industriously
used to boost the popularity of the new regime and to justify the reestab‑
lishment of the multiethnic community, which had been shattered by the
interethnic massacres committed during the war.
Immediately after the war, high‑ranking Partisans published personal mem‑
oirs of the war years. While these were of course personal accounts, they also
became oicial memories of the war and they were regarded as signiicant and
authentic contributions to war history.2 he most inluential diaries, among
those the diaries of Vladimir Dedijer and Rodoljub Čolaković, were reprinted
numerous times throughout the communist period.
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usable history?
During the war, Vladimir Dedijer, who was a journalist by profession, stayed
with the supreme staf of the Partisan army, recording large and small daily
events and developments within the Partisan movement in his diary. Allegedly
his work was encouraged by Tito, and the diary was published immediately
after the end of the war, thus constituting an oicial inside account of the
Partisan warfare from the viewpoint of the supreme staf.
In Dedijer’s wartime diary, massacres and war crimes are regularly recorded,
sometimes in detail and in touching prose. A chapter recounting events in
July‑August 1942, titled “he bloody cloth of Krajina”, holds several references
to the Ustasha slaughtering of Serbs and to the praxis of throwing bodies and
living people into deep pits.3 Included in this chapter is an emotional account
by Milovan Djilas of his visit to the village of Urije shortly after an Ustasha
attack and massacre:
… We continued down the road, hedges of ferns and hazels on both sides, and, at
once, in the middle of the road, I don’t remember the exact number, ten or twelve
bodies. It seemed to me, just two middle‑aged men. he rest were women, girls,
boys, little children. hree or four steps from this pile of blood and lesh – an
empty cradle, without napkin, without child, with the hay still humid from the
child’s urine. his hay in the cradle seemed as if it was still warm from the child’s
body. he child lay in the pile of bodies. But the head was all crushed, without lid,
without a drop of blood in the hollow scull. A brain – that of the child? – actually
a bit of white solid mush lay next to the head with bits of lesh. What had killed
this child? Maybe a bullet, maybe a rile butt, maybe a stone or maybe the infant’s
head had been suiciently soft for a hobnailed Ustasha boot? …4
Djilas further recounts how he walked through the village, from one house
to another, all illed with blood and dead bodies. As Djilas was then one of
Tito’s most trusted lieutenants, his account represents a wartime testimony of
the very top of the Partisans’ communist leadership. It was reprinted several
places after the war, and Dedijer included it in his collection of documents
about the Vatican and Jasenovac.
Dedijer’s diary also holds a description of Chetniks massacres of Muslims
in Eastern Bosnia. In late January 1942, when the supreme staf of the Partisan
movement was near Foča, which was recently taken over from the Chetniks,
Dedijer recounts the scene:
Today I walked next to the Drina. Clear, icy. I watched the rocks. Some people
stood at the edge of the bank. One cried: ‘hat is Ibro’. Corpses in the water – one,
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Ill. 4.1. History in the
making: Vladimir Dedijer
(right) writing his Partisan
diary in the Montenegrin
mountains, here together
with colonel in the Partisan forces, Pavle Ilić.6
two, three … on the bank lay one – like a statue of wax in the Museum of Madame
Tussaud. It threw its head back. hat was Muslim families who buried the victims
of the Chetniks. he tailor tells me that they slaughtered 86 people in one night!5
Massacres in Eastern Bosnia are also described in the memoirs of Rodoljub
Čolaković, who was Political commissary of the general staf of the Parti‑
san movement in Bosnia. In the Autumn of 1941, according to the diary,
Čolaković was travelling from Serbia to the headquarters in Eastern Bosnia,
where he was to support the establishment of the Partisan movement. On his
way, Čolaković hears about massacres and crimes committed by the Ustasha.
One morning he talks to an old lady, whose three sons were murdered, and
Čolaković recounts the incident, which he already heard about in the café
the evening before:
Just a few hundred meters away was the local warehouse, in which the Ustasha had
slaughtered about one hundred Serbian peasants from the surrounding villages.
hey had led them here, locked them in the loft and then one by one to “inter‑
rogation”. In one part of the warehouse was a large barrel. hey led the victim
there, cut his throat, and collected the blood in the barrel. Before the slaughter,
the Ustasha chopped the nose or mouth of some victims, on some they crushed
an arm or a leg.7
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usable history?
What characterises the Ustasha in Čolaković’ account is their senseless anti‑
Serbianism and their lust for blood. here is no attempt to downplay the
ethnic element of this violence.
In this area many of the Ustasha were Muslims, and Čolaković mentions
that the local Chetniks were not always able to distinguish between the local
“turks” and the Ustasha and that the mutual hostility among the peasants led
to reciprocal attacks on Serbian and Muslim villages.8
Terror and massacres were also regularly described and referred to in mem‑
oirs by local Partisan leaders.9 In the memoir literature, war crimes and mas‑
sacres are described freely and often in detail, but the focus of attention stays
on the Partisan warfare. he ethnicity of victims is openly stated, and conlicts
are sometimes described as interethnic warfare. Yet, the main enemies remain
the occupiers and their collaborators, who are seen as traitors and class enemies
and not emphatically ascribed to any nationality or ethnicity. he amount of
this type of material published after the war clearly shows that the communist
regime did not mind a widespread addressing of these issues, as long as it stayed
within the Partisan perspective.
Jasenovac
he Ustasha concentration camp complex at Jasenovac has become a main
symbol of Ustasha terror and persecution of Serbs, Jews, Roma and regime
opponents in general. Shortly after the war Jasenovac was the subject of several
accounts and memoirs testifying to its terror and inhumanity.10
One of the most frequently quoted descriptions of conditions in the camp
is Jasenovački Logor, a personal account by Nikola Nikolić, a medical doctor
and communist, who was brought to the camp in 1942 and worked in the
camp’s hospital. According to Nikolić, Jasenovac was part of a large project
by Hitler’s Nazi‑Germany to annihilate all peoples – Slavs particularly, who
were in the way of the Nazis’ ambitions to construct a greater Lebensraum. he
Germans chose as their helpers Croatian clero‑fascists, Ustasha and Serbian
Chetniks, and inspired and led them “in the basic principles and methods of
mass extermination”. Similar camps, claims Nikolić, were established by the
Serbian Nedić‑regime and by the Chetniks.11
here is an obvious equalisation of Chetniks and Ustasha in Nikolić’s
account. As a rule, the ethnic aspect is down‑played. In a common, undif‑
ferentiated categorization, the main victims are described in general accounts
as “human beings” or “the Yugoslav peoples” 12 he ethno‑national policies of
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the Yugoslav warring parties are not mentioned. he main explanatory factor
is the Nazist racial ideology. In more detailed descriptions of individual events,
however, Nikolić often points out the ethnicity of the victims. He describes
mass killing of Serbs in 1941, and afterwards massacres of Serbs, Croats, Jews,
Muslims, Roma and communists in individual chapters.
A large part of the book is dedicated to a catalogue of “Mechanisms of
killing humans” in Jasenovac. In this long record, Nikolić mentions diferent
types of ire arms and cold weapons such as knives, mallets, whips, hammers
etc. Of further killing methods, he emphasises hanging, burning, cold, gas,
sufocation, hunger and diseases and epidemics intentionally caused via the
inhuman conditions and lack of hygiene in the camp. he most infamous
weapon of the Ustasha were knives, about which Nikolić states:
he dearest weapon and speciality of the Ustasha was the knife … he killing of a
child by knife was the greatest bravery. In order to demonstrate this their ‘bravery’,
with which the Ustasha had to distinguish themselves, they overcame all the inner
restraint that they had.13
Another particular Ustasha tool was a specially developed knife with a bracelet
for cutting the throats of many victims. Also the heavy wooden mallets that the
Ustasha camp guards used to crash the sculls of victims are often mentioned.
According to Nikolić, these mallets were used very skilfully, ensuring that the
victims were immediately silenced and immobilised.14 A particularly morbid
tale from the camp claims that human bodies, immediately after being killed,
were used to produce soap at the factories in Jasenovac.15
Nikolić does not attempt to give a total number of victims for the Jasenovac
camp complex, but he suggests that in the part of it around Gradina alone,
6‑700,000 people were slaughtered.16
Ill. 4.2. Drawing of Ustasha slaughtering knives from Nikolić’s catalogue.
he original caption reads: “he Ustasha
massively used these bloody arguments of
Nazi ‘culture’.”18
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usable history?
In the descriptions of Jasenovac, the brutality of the Ustasha movement
and the camp system is clearly emphasised. Yet, extermination procedures
in the camp are seen as much as an element of German Nazist politics as an
Ustasha project. Ethnicity is not ignored, but it is deinitely not foregrounded
either. he Ustasha are always described as one of several fascist movements;
at no point are they seen as a national movement or as Croat at all. In fact
Nikolić explicitly states that the notion of the Ustasha as a Croat government
was incredibly shameful.17
Nikolić ends his account by declaring the end of this brutal past and salut‑
ing the construction of a new and better system under socialism:
he people have won and on this wasteland, on the graves of hundreds of thou‑
sands of innocent victims and heroic ighters, it will soon build a new, free, happy
fatherland that will be a bulwark against fascism, against the return of this terrible
past, which it has forever defeated.19
his belief in the new state system’s ability to overcome the shadows of history
largely characterised the communists’ approach to the past.
he war and its massacres in songs and poetry
Already during the war, the communist Partisans described their quest in forms
very much like the traditional South Slav epic poetry. Folk songs about the
ighting and sufering were composed and collected, and proved useful also
for raising support for the Partisans’ cause.
After the war, these songs were reprinted and contributed to create the
party’s own heroic symbolic imagery.20 Generally, these songs presented the
Partisans as traditional heroes in a merciless war of good versus evil. Most
songs called to ight and encouraged more volunteers to join the struggle or
simply praise the Partisans and partisan units. Many also lamented the deaths of
well‑known or local Partisan heroes. Battles, blood and sufering are described,
sometimes in great detail, as well as grief for lost relatives.
he Partisans’ enemies were presented as national traitors and called to
justice for their crimes and the sufering and waste of blood that they had
caused. In a song recounting the Partisan attack on Banja Luka, the Yugoslav
enemies were presented as agents of the Germans and equipped with one‑line
characterisations:
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Do you remember, my dear brothers,
his struggle was not long ago,
When our heroic brigades
Attacked the German Fascists,
he Ustasha, our bloodsuckers,
And the Chetniks, disgusting traitors,
And other agents of the Germans
Who wished to plunder from the people,
hat many tormented the people
And committed bloody violence.
…21
At times massacres and atrocities against civilians were described. In a song
commemorating the German‑Ustasha ofensive against the mountain area
Kozara in Bosnian Krajina, the crimes of the Ustasha, the concentration camps,
the plundering and the many deaths were recounted:
When I remember the misfortune and sorrow
of the ofensive in forty‑two.
he Ustasha drove us into camps
and plundered all our houses.
…
Grave by grave in the green wheat,
but Kozara takes the oath to Tito.
Pavelić, you also intended
to annihilate the people of Kozara.
…22
Here it is claimed that the main aim of the Ustasha and Pavelić was the an‑
nihilation of the people of Kozara. Yet the victims are the people in general;
it is not mentioned that most victims in the Kozara area were Serbs.
Some songs commemorate individual acts of terror. One song tells the story
of twelve young girls who were killed by an Ustasha soldier. he song dwells
on the sorrow and worries of the mothers as they imagine what torments the
girls may have sufered at the hands of the Ustasha:
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usable history?
…
he poor mothers run through the woods,
everyone asks: where is my child?
My daughter, my green stalk,
stretch out your hand to your poor mother,
tell us, our dear daughters,
have the Ustasha tortured you?
Have they killed you with a rile?
Or thrown you alive into a pit?
…23
his song clearly refers to some of the most infamous Ustasha practices, such
as mutilation with knife, leaving people to die in pits, and possibly also rape.
hese songs often talk about the torments of the war on individual and
generally human levels. hey express sufering and sorrow, and crimes and
massacres are commemorated. But it is not from a national perspective, and
ethnicity is not a theme. hough it is of course possible that the term ‘Usta‑
sha’ in the minds of the public had connotations of Croats and Muslims as
such, this was not how it was presented in the songs. Rather, the fundamental
dichotomy suggested in these representations is again between violent fascist
traitors and patriotic progressive people and Partisans.
he most famous poem of the Partisan war, Jama (the Pit), was written by
the Croatian poet Ivan Goran Kovačić, who supported and stayed with the
Partisans from December 1942 until he was killed by Chetniks in July 1943.
Jama is a long description of Ustasha practices of torture and murder. he
poem talks in the voice of one of the victims, who describes how the execu‑
tioners mutilate him and the other victims, cut their eyes and earlobes, and
afterwards rest and celebrate with food and wine. Later the narrator and the
other victims are thrown half alive into a pit, illed with sufering and dying
people. He manages to crawl out, smells the ire from his burning village and
in the end dies in the arms of a female Partisan, member of a unit that has
chased away his tormenters.24
he text of Jama is incredibly bloody and illed with poetic and detailed
descriptions of torture and pain. his is contrasted with the advancing Parti‑
sans, who represent the better future that the victim wishes he could ight for,
had he only been able.
What is thematized in Jama is the torture and massacres committed by
the Ustasha against villages in the ndh. Jama’s addressing of these issues was
probably stronger and more legitimate, because Kovačić was a Croat, killed
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by the Chetniks, and because of his support and idealisation of the Partisans.
Kovačić’s poem was widely cited immediately after the end of the war, and it
was reprinted numerous times.25 Clearly, the communist regime regarded it
as a worthy and usable account of the most infamous Ustasha practices.
Partisan novels
In the early 1950s, following the break with the Cominform, Yugoslav cultural
politics was gradually relaxed. Soviet artistic dogma was deprecated, and more
artistic freedom was allowed. his was most famously expressed by the Croatian
writer Miroslav Krleža in a speech at the 3rd Congress of the Yugoslav Writers’
Union, November 1952, where he openly denounced the concept of Socialist
realism.26 Yet, socialist realism and party dogmatism remained inluential in
Yugoslav post‑war literature. War and revolution were the main preoccupation
of prose writers in the irst post‑war decades.27
Among the best known of the “Partisan novels” is Daleko je sunce (Far away
is the sun), published in 1951 from the hand of the Serbian writer and Partisan
veteran, Dobrica Ćosić. his book depicts a group of Serbian Partisans strug‑
gling to survive the winter of 1942‑1943 in a mountain area, sufering from
cold, hunger and heavy losses in encounters with the enemy. he action takes
place in Serbia, and ethnic issues are almost absent. he main enemies are,
along with the Germans and Bulgarians, various Serbian collaborators. he
book mentions how Chetnik units terrorise the civilian population, kniing
down real and imagined enemies, plundering the villages and kidnapping
women, one of them the wife of a leading Partisan. At a Partisan trial, Chet‑
niks admit to having murdered numerous civilians. Yet, most of the Chetnik
followers are described as weak and ignorant peasants, who accepted Chetnik
conscription to save themselves and their families.28 In a disturbing literary
stroke, Ćosić lets one of the Partisan heroes, the young political commissary
Pavle, lead the trial of a Chetnik leader, who turns out to be Pavle’s old friend
from school. In this meeting, Ćosić emphasises the similarities between these
two uncompromising idealist young commanders, yet the reader is never left
in doubt that Pavle is ighting for the right side.
Rather than thematizing massacres and war crimes as such, the main point of
Daleko je sunce is the darkness and tremendous human sufering caused by war,
and the heavy sacriices that follow from ighting for a just cause. he Partisan
leaders are not infallible; they worry, get confused and at times react strongly
out of impulse and temperament rather than ideology and political sense.
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usable history?
Another well‑known Partisan writer, Branko Ćopić, authored several novels
about experiences of Serbian peasants in the Bosnian Krajina during the Second
World War. In Prolom, (Breach) from 1952, Ćopić depicts how young men
from the Serbian peasantry are captured by the Ustasha. One of them, Todor,
is held – together with his uncle and numerous other Serbs – as prisoner in
an old school. One night, the Ustasha order the prisoners into the schoolyard,
where they are maltreated and severely beaten. Afterwards they are tied together
two by two, driven onto trucks and taken into a nearby mountain area. he
scene of the mass liquidation is described:
Deep in the mountains they drove them out of the trucks, they lined them up pair
after pair as they were already tied together, they surrounded them with Ustasha
and they drove them about twenty meters to the right of road, on to the stony
plateau among the sparse knotty beeches. At the edge of the plateau, illuminated
by the ghostly light from the headlights, a small unimpressive depression was seen,
overgrown with tiny bushes and mountain grass. In this messy bunch of grass and
thorny branches was a deep cleft known by all shepherds, charcoal peddlers and
hunters from the surrounding villages. here, the Ustasha already waited with rolled
up sleeves, leaning on heavy square stone carving hammers on long handles. …
he two Ustasha emigrants, properly uniformed and belted, separated the irst
pair of peasants from the row and shoving them with the bayonets they drove
them towards the cleft. When they had forced them out on the overgrown edge,
the two with the rolled up sleeves quickly swung the hammers and by full force
hit the peasants on the heads. … Moving ever closer to the terrible depression, in
wooden walk and as under foreign command, the men were purely bewitched by
the unbelievable and gruesome spectacle that renewed itself uniformly before their
eyes, with few words or totally silent, in details the same and yet every time new,
closer to the men and with a better view from shorter distance …29
Ćopić thus describes the experiences of the Serbian peasants and the immense
cruelty of the Ustasha in realistic prose. He recounts how the Ustasha throw
a grenade into the cleft and go to pick up more prisoners, while discussing
whether it would be more eicient to shoot the prisoners ten by ten with a
machine gun. Ćopić also describes how one Ustasha leader tortures a young
girl.30
hough most of the prisoners at the mountain cleft are killed, Todor and
his uncle manage to escape. Many other young men seek refuge from the
Ustasha and hide in mountains and forests. hey become the core of a Parti‑
san detachment, established and led by a local communist and a former army
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oicer. Wounded and hiding in the forests, Todor is saved by the Partisans,
and in the end he joins the Partisan detachment.
In the Bosnian Krajina described in Prolom, many Ustasha were Muslims.
he novel frequently refers to enmity between Serbs and Muslims, often called
‘Turks’. Yet numerous young Muslims join the Partisan detachment, and the
Partisan leaders endeavour to convince the peasant Serbs that they should ight
together with these Muslims against Ustasha, Chetniks and other enemies.31 At
the end of the novel, a successful tolerant and multiethnic Partisan detachment
is established.
While Ćopić’ novel describes in detail Ustasha massacres and interethnic
violence in the Bosnian Krajina, the main focus of the book is on the devel‑
opment of the Partisan detachment and the evolution of the main characters,
the young Partisans and their leaders. he book is a strong celebration of the
Partisan struggle, but even more it is a patriotic praise of the Bosnian peasant
as heroic and invincible.
N ote s
1
Ljubodrag Dimić, Agitprop kultura. Agitpropovska faza kulturne politike u Srbiji 1945.1952. Belgrade: “Rad”, 1988, 191f. See also Lilly, Power and Persuasion, 92‑100.
2
See Viktor Novak’s review of Vladimir Dedijer, Dnevnik, Dragoje Dudić, Dnevnik 1941,
Čedomir Minderović, Za Titom. Zabeleške jednog partisana, and Rodoljub Čolaković,
Zapisi iz oslobodilačkog rata, in Istoriški Časopis, 1, 1948, 1‑2, 328‑331.
3
‘Krajina, Krvava Haljina’, Vladimir Dedijer, Dnevnik, prvi deo, Belgrade: Državni
Izdavački Zavod Jugoslavije, 1945, 230f. he Diary was reprinted in a shorter edition in
1951, and in its full length in 1970 and 1981.
4
Ibid, 237‑238.
5
Vladimir Dedijer, Dnevnik. Prva Knjiga, od 6 aprila do 27 novembra 1942, (3rd ed.) Bel‑
grade: Prosveta, 1970, 90. See also 78‑79, 87, concerning massacres of Muslims and
Serbs in Hercegovina, 88.
6
From Savo Orović, Fotograije iz narodnoooslobodilačkog rata, Belgrade: Vojnoistoriski
7
Rodoljub Čolaković, Zapisi iz oslobodilačkog rata I, Belgrade: Prosveta, 1956 (irst publis‑
Institut ja, 1951.
hed in Sarajevo, 1946), 309‑310. Čolaković’ memoirs were also reprinted in 1966. After
the war, Ćolaković was minister and later president of the government of Bosnia and
Hercegovina.
8
9
Ibid, 314.
See for example Todor Vujasinović, Ozrenski partizanski odred, Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1950,
75f or Drago Gizdić, Dalmacija 1942. Prilozi historiji Narodnooslobodilačke borbe, Zag‑
reb: Izdavačko odeljenje glavnog odbora saveza boraca Hrvatske, 1959, 573‑587.
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usable history?
10
E.g. Drago Čolaković, Jasenovac 21.8.1941/31.3.1942, Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1948, especially
35‑110. See also Novak’s review: Viktor Novak, ‘Nikola Nikolić, Jasenovački Logor’, Istoriski Časopis, 1, 1948, 1‑2, 340‑342.
11
Nikola Nikolić, Jasenovački Logor, Zagreb: Nakladni Zavod Hrvatske, 1948, 5‑6. Also
12
Often described as “ljudi” and “naši narodi”, e.g. ibid, 49.
31f, 49.
13
Ibid, 77.
14
Ibid, 83‑84.
15
Ibid, 59‑61.
16
Ibid, 434.
17
Ibid, 204.
18
Ibid, 80.
19
Ibid, 421.
20 See also Maja Brkljačić, ‘Popular Culture and Communist Ideology: Folk Epics in
Tito’s Yugoslavia’, in John R. Lampe and Mark Mazower, eds., Ideologies and National
Identities. he Case of Twentieth-Century Southeastern Europe, Budapest: ceu Press, 2004,
180‑210.
21
Salko Nazečić, ed., Slavne Godine. Narodne pjesme iz narodno-oslobodilačkog rata i borbe
za socijalizam, Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1949, 63. he rhyme and rhythm of the songs are un‑
fortunately lost in the translations.
22
Ibid, 78.
23
In this case, even the name of the Ustasha perpetrator, Bale Markovljević, is mentio‑
ned. From the song ‘From the silence there is no answer’ (Iz tišine odgovora nema), in
Vladimir Popović, ed., Narodne pjesme borbe i oslobođenja, Zagreb: Prosvjeta, 1947, 35.
See also ‘A mother’s song’ (Pjesma jedne majke), which were allegedly printed in a local
women’s newspaper, Ženski List, in Kordun during the war and in 1955 in Hrvatske žene
u NOB, Zagreb 1955. See Stanko Opačić‑Ćanica, ed., Narodne pjesme Korduna, Zagreb:
Prosvjeta, 1971, 253, 461, note 229.
24 Ivan‑Goran Kovačić, ‘Jama’, Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1959 (graphically illustrated edition
to celebrate the 40 years anniversary of the establishment of the Communist Party of
Yugoslavia). Also Ivan Goran Kovačić, ‘Jama’, in Le pont/he bridge, 49, Zagreb, 1976,
(Published by the association of Croatian writers, Zagreb) where it is translated in rhy‑
mes into English and other languages.
25
See previous note and, e.g, the quotes from the Serbian daily Politika, January 1945, in
ibid, 5.
26 Dimić, Agitprop Kultura, 256‑257. See also Lilly, Power and Persuasion, 29‑242; Carol S.
Lilly, ‘Propaganda to Pornography: Party, Society, and Culture in Postwar Yugoslavia’, in
Melissa K. Bokovoy, Jill A. Irvine, and Carol S. Lilly, State-Society Relations in Yugoslavia
1945-1992, London: Macmillan Press, 1997, 139‑162.
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27 Sveta Lukić, Contemporary Yugoslav Literature. A sociological approach, Urbana: Univer‑
sity of Illinois Press, 1972, 12f, 31; Antun Barac et al., Geschichte der jugoslawischen Literaturen von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart, Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1977, 308f,
341f. See also Dimić, Agitprop kultura, 198f.
28
Dobrica Ćosić, Daleko je Sunce, Belgrade: Prosveta, 1966 (12th edition, irst published
in 1951); On the trial and the Chetnik followers, see 365‑374, on Chetnik terror, 27‑28,
233‑234, 247. Ćosić became a member of the Yugoslav Communist Party in 1941 and
took part in the Partisan struggle as political commissary of a unit in central Serbia.
29 Branko Ćopić, Prolom, (Sabrana dela Branka Ćopića, knjiga treća), Beograd: Prosveta,
1966 (irst published in Belgrade, 1952), 124. See also 100f. During the war, Ćopić was
political commissary of a Partisan unit and correspondent of the communist newspaper
Borba.
30 Ibid, 121‑122, 126.
31
Ibid, e.g. 267, 280‑281, 472‑473.
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Titoist institutional
historiography, 1945‑1960
5
Actual historical accounts of the Second World War and its massacres came
several years later than the addressing of these issues in oicial statements,
memoirs and poetry. he historical studies, however, relect a more planned
and lasting interpretative strategy that would continue to be presented and
represented within the ields of academic and educational history in the fol‑
lowing decades. he ield of twentieth century history and the interpretation
of the Partisan war remained issues of essential concern for the Yugoslav com‑
munists through the irst decades after the war.
his chapter investigates the communication of the history of inter‑Yugoslav
Second World War massacres from the standpoint of public institutions of
history research and education, in the late 1940s and in the 1950s. It shows
how the communist regime endeavoured to dominate historical culture and
ensure that history communication remained in concurrence with the general
interpretative framework promoted from the oicial side. It also shows that
history writing did indeed refer to the massacres, in detailed studies as well as
in general syntheses.
Breaking with Stalinism
From its establishment in 1945 Yugoslavia was swiftly working its way towards
a Stalinist system. But due to its relatively short period as oicial ideology,
Stalinism was never thoroughly established outside the political and adminis‑
trative system. Yugoslavia’s break with the Soviet bloc in 1948 brought major
changes. On the one hand, it led to new conditions within politics and the
spheres of cultural production and, on the other, to new and further demands
to the interpretation of the Partisan struggle. he Partisan war and the national
liberation now had to serve also as an autochthonous socialist revolution, as
worthy as that of the Soviet Union.
he Soviet‑Yugoslav conlict, the damning accusations from the Soviet
leadership and the formal expulsion of Yugoslavia from the Cominform in June
1948 dealt a hard blow to the self‑perception of the Yugoslav communists.1 As
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they sincerely believed that this was all based on misunderstandings, the Yugo‑
slavs initially handled the crisis by trying to prove themselves proper Stalinists,
sternly following the marked road.2 Among the harsh points of criticism from
the Cominform had been the slow progress of the collectivisation of agriculture.
After their expulsion, the Yugoslav communists accelerated collectivisation by
ruthless use of force. Stalinist methods were employed to clean the Yugoslav
party of all real and suspected Soviet sympathisers who were then interned
in concentration camps not unlike the Gulag. Particularly infamous was the
camp at the Adriatic island Goli Otok, which was to become a major theme
in dissident literature of the 1980s.
As their condemnation and isolation from the rest of the Soviet bloc proved
to be a lasting condition, the Yugoslavs were forced to search for alternatives.
At the turn to the 1950s a new ideological line was on its way. In June 1950,
Yugoslavia’s irst law declaring workers’ self‑management was adopted. At the
Sixth Party Congress in November 1952, Tito declared that by placing the
management of enterprises in the hands of the workers, the state had taken its
irst step towards ‘withering away’.3 To emphasise the break with Soviet‑style
communism, the Communist Party of Yugoslavia was renamed the League of
Communists of Yugoslavia. It was decided that communists were to inluence
politics and economics by persuasion rather than command. In 1953 Yugoslavia’s
Stalinist constitution was revised with the aim of manifesting a new line of
decentralist socialism.
Yugoslavia also had to establish itself in a diferent position internationally.
he Yugoslavs turned to the Western capitalist powers, and economic aid, much
of which came from the USA, started to low into the country, peaking in 1953.4
here were, however, limits to the liberalisation of communist Yugoslavia.
When in late 1953 Milovan Djilas, one of Tito’s most trusted lieutenants, in a
series of articles attacked the communist system, warning against the dangers
of bureaucratisation and calling for further democratisation, he passed the
line of acceptable communist behaviour. In January 1954, at a live broadcast
Central Committee plenum, Djilas was renounced by Tito, Kardelj and other
top communists. He received a inal warning and was purged from the Central
Committee and the presidium.5 A few months later Djilas left the League of
Communists on his own initiative and continued his ierce criticism of the
communist system. His activities resulted in several prison sentences. Never‑
theless, the fact that a communist top igure escaped from such heresy and
abundant attacks on the League of Communists alive testiies to the less severe
character of the Titoist regime in comparison with conditions in the countries
of the Soviet bloc.
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Soon after Stalin’s death, in the summer of 1953, the new Soviet leadership
initiated a process of reconciliation between the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia.
his culminated in 1955, with an excuse from the side of the Soviets, and in
1956, when Tito visited Moscow and signed an agreement of cooperation be‑
tween the Soviet and the Yugoslav Communist Parties. However, relationships
soon deteriorated following the Soviet invasion of Hungary in November 1956,
which Tito reluctantly supported, while at the same time criticising the Soviets
for alienating the Hungarian people. However, communist Yugoslavia clearly
preferred to see itself as belonging within a socialist community.6
he Djilas crisis and the fear of a Hungarian style counter‑revolution
worried Yugoslav communist leaders and made them cautious against further
liberalisations in the following years. But Yugoslavia’s insistence on communist
ideals and the courting of alliances with the Soviet bloc aside, it remained
independent, following its own path of gradual reforms, decentralisation and
limited liberalisation.
he particular Yugoslav style also characterised the relationship between
regime and historiography. hough not as Stalinist or strictly directed as in
other communist states, history, especially that of the recent period, remained
an area of political concern and supervision.
Historiography and society
Due to its short period in authority, Stalinism never thoroughly penetrated
Yugoslav historiography.7 Already in 1949, Kardelj encouraged Yugoslav histo‑
rians to strive for a more creative use of Marxist historical theory.8
In spite of the introduction of a new ruling ideology, it was not possible
to install thoroughly a new line of history at the universities. In general, the
Communist Party did not have much support at the Universities. In 1948
only 7% of the University professors were party members, and most of them
were newly accepted into the party and often not very dogmatic.9 In Belgrade,
many of the old ‘bourgeois‑educated’ professors remained in place after the
introduction of the new regime, partly by escaping into more ancient and less
politically sensitive ields of history.10 Nevertheless, academic history research
and writing remained under the supervision of the League of Communists
through the ideological commissions for history.
Historical associations were established on communist initiative in all
Yugoslav republics shortly after the Second World War. he Party used these
associations to inluence the historians’ environment politically and ideologi‑
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cally. According to one communist oicial, the main responsibilities of the
historians were to clean history of bourgeois falsiications and to supply the
youth with a correct assumption about their history.11 Republican Historical
Associations began to cooperate in 1950, and in 1955 an umbrella association,
the League of Historical Associations of Yugoslavia, was established. Coop‑
eration between the historians’ environments in the Yugoslav republics was
thereby formalised under the supervision of the party.
Certain parts of Yugoslav historical culture were deeply politically embed‑
ded. Modern and contemporary history were ields that touched on themes
relevant for the political legitimacy of the League of Communists, and these
ields were strongly characterised by political considerations and inluenced by
personal ties to the party. Whereas the communists generally struggled with
mobilising Yugoslav academic historians, party membership was the norm
among historians of the twentieth century.
According to one observer, Yugoslav contemporary historiography did not
understand itself as an independent science. Rather, contemporary historiogra‑
phy played a functional role in relation to politics by accepting the task of the
socialisation of people according to communist conformity.12 Speeches from
the party’s leading igures possessed strong “normative powers”, and at times
politicians demanded that certain aspects and explanations be emphasised.13
More than ideologically constrained, twentieth century history was subordi‑
nated to and supervised by practical politics.
he history of the Second World War in Yugoslavia was particularly im‑
portant. In the irst decades after the war, accounts of the National Liberation
Struggle were the property of Partisan veterans and much of the material
published consisted of personal memoirs.14 As stated in one of the earliest
historical overviews of the war:
he National Liberation Struggle of the Yugoslav peoples can only be described
fully and regularly by the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, for its cadres partici‑
pated in, led and carried out our peoples’ revolution to inal victory and lay the
foundations for a new social order in our country – socialism.15
Under the supervision of the department of Agitation and Propaganda, headed
by Milovan Djilas, an image of the war was forged, which, rather than rejecting
the violent nationalism that had cost so many lives, stressed a joint Yugoslav
Partisan struggle against the Germans. In spite of relaxations and ideological
changes, this struggle was to remain the central theme of Yugoslav historiog‑
raphy until the 1980s.16
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he Communist Party was reluctant to admit the signiicant variation in
support for the National Liberation Struggle among the Yugoslav nations, and
it hesitated to recognise that in some regions Croats may have supported the
Ustasha. hough the war had been fought largely between peasant populations
supporting diferent war parties, national hatred was blamed on the foreign
invaders, the ruling class and the bourgeoisie in general, and not on the work‑
ing people. he purpose of this was not only to consolidate communist power,
but also to strengthen post‑war national equality. his insistence on national
equality or symmetry in the contribution to the Partisan war was, according
to some observers, one of the fundamental principles in Tito’s Yugoslavia.17
Education
Education is a crucial element of historical culture. Primary and secondary
school, the formative years of childhood and youth, are obvious ields for a
stately structure to attempt to inluence the self‑perception and world‑view
of its future citizens.18 his was no less so in Socialist Yugoslavia, where the
education system and children’s pioneer organisation aimed at raising good
workers and citizens with a healthy socialist conscience.
From the establishment of the federal state, responsibility for education
lay, at least oicially, at the republican level. hough it had been proposed
to centralise education and introduce uniied textbooks, this was abandoned.
In 1948, the Party criticised some of the republican curricula in history and
literature for being overtly nationalistic, and initiatives were taken to centralise
education planning. A federal Ministry of Science and Culture was established,
but shortly afterwards abolished.19 here were no common curricula either. he
republics were allowed to choose their own texts for cultural disciplines, such
as history and literature. his gave room for diferences in the study programs,
which were planned and published by the republican Ministries of Education.
An analysis of the programs published in 1947 has shown signiicant variations,
for example regarding the degree of speciicity on required reading about the
interwar period.20
At the 3rd plenum of the Communist Party’s Central Committee in 1950,
Milovan Djilas as head of the Department for Agitation and Propaganda gave
a speech in which he discussed “the problems of the school system in the
struggle for socialism in our country”. Djilas claimed that Yugoslavia’s socialist
revolution was the beginning of a new historical era, for which everything else
was just a long prehistory. As the revolution had been founded in Marxism‑
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Leninism, Djilas argued, so also must the educational system be based on
these principles. he goal of the education was the construction of “a socialist
man who loves his country and honours other peoples”.21 Djilas emphasised
the importance of pre‑school education and leisure activities, such as the
pioneer and youth movements and the involvement of the families in school
activities, obviously also with the aim of framing and reforming the citizens
of socialist Yugoslavia. Finally, he pointed out the need for new and better
schoolbooks, particularly in the social sciences, “because they are translated
from Russian, and in them are not only great general ideological weaknesses,
but also erroneous, unscientiic and underestimating treatments of not just
other peoples’, but also of our own national history”.22 he third plenum of
the Central Committee adopted a statement on the tasks of the school system
that echoed Djilas’ points.23
he statements of Djilas and the Central Committee plenum regarding the
politics of education in Yugoslavia in 1950 clearly demonstrate how the school
system was seen as instrumental in the construction of the desired socialist
citizens. Furthermore, it is clear that the break with the Soviet bloc and the
consequent new demands to the interpretations of social science and history
in particular resonated also in the sphere of schooling. hus, Yugoslavia’s
denunciation of its Soviet communist heritage also led to the rewriting of its
history from a patriotic Yugoslav rather than an internationalist communist
perspective.
To my knowledge, no detailed study has yet been published on the rep‑
resentation of the Second World War in Yugoslav history textbooks from
the irst decades after the war. But studies of individual examples testify that
history textbooks were strongly ideologised, teaching the students patriotism,
glorifying the communists and the Partisans, and expecting the students to
study the history of the National Liberation Struggle.24 In the introduction to
a textbook for the third grade of primary school, printed in 1952, Tito wrote to
the young students: “Every pioneer must know the history of our struggle. …
It is easy to learn because it is very interesting and because it is the duty of
every pioneer”.25 he simple schematic presentation of the war was repeated
in a more outspoken version in the textbook material: in the war, the good
patriotic Partisans fought and protected the people against enemies and trai‑
tors. he textbooks hardly diferentiated between Ustasha and Chetniks, and
the ethnic element was strongly downplayed: in one case the people killed in
Jasenovac were simply termed patriots.26
An analysis of abc textbooks from these years also demonstrates that Tito
and the Partisan struggle were featured prominently.27 he students were to
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imitate and follow the ofered idols: Tito and the Partisans. Numerous read‑
ings were about the Partisans’ eforts. Tito was clearly the prime focus of
identiication; one of the earliest textbooks, published in 1944, even started
with the letters I, O and T, to enable the students to spell the name of their
great leader.28 In some of the early textbooks, the enemies of the Partisans were
dedicated substantial space. In a textbook from 1944, which was also in use
after the war, the students could read:
For all evil and misery, not only the Germans, but also the domestic traitors will
be responsible … he degenerates of the Croatian people are Ustasha, and the
degenerates of the Serbian people are the Chetniks, Ljotics and Nedics. …29
he early textbooks show that the Yugoslav educational system developed a
cult around Tito and the Partisans, who were idolised as good examples to
follow. On the evil side were the Partisans’ opponents, the traitors, carefully
balanced between diferent Yugoslav peoples.
he education of able and politically acceptable teachers for primary and
secondary schools was among the main duties of the higher educational insti‑
tutions. Due to its political sensitivity, contemporary history was not taught
at the University of Belgrade for more than a decade, from 1944 to 1958. In
1953 Vladimir Dedijer, Partisan veteran, political commissary during the war,
journalist and author of Tito’s oicial biography, was appointed professor for
the new subject “History of the people’s revolution”. But due to Dedijer’s sup‑
port for Milovan Djilas in the latter’s confrontation with the party elite, his
lectures were boycotted and he was expelled from Belgrade University. Instead
the irst course on contemporary history was given in 1958 by Jovan Marjanović,
who was director of the historical archives and absolutely trustworthy for the
League of Communists because of his credentials as Partisan veteran and top
communist functionary.30
History was a central concern in the education of the Communist Party
cadre as well. his meant that history was also taught at various types of Party
schools and courses. he Party’s research institutions, such as the Institute of
Social Sciences, were used to educate the Party cadre and Party historians. his
institute was also entrusted with delicate problems, as for example investigat‑
ing the interwar period in a manner acceptable to League of Communists
perspectives.31
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usable history?
Titoist historiography of the massacres
Within the academic and professional ields of history, signiicant eforts were
made to document the experiences of the National Liberation War and the
Partisans’ exploits. Large collections of sources from the warfare in each re‑
public and region were published, a project that was also accelerated as a
consequence of the break with the Cominform and the need to emphasise
the merits of the domestic revolution.32 he war was described as an uncom‑
promising, superhuman and all‑sacriicing efort, and the Partisan leadership
would be exorbitantly praised for their genius and clear‑sightedness.33 It was
regularly underlined that each region and republic followed its own individual
road via Partisan struggle to social revolution, which probably also relected
the Yugoslav need to insist that theirs was as valuable a revolutionary path as
that of the Soviet Union.
In comparison to the strong focus on the strategic developments of the
Partisan warfare, war crimes and massacres received relatively little attention.34
But in spite of the relatively few publications about wartime atrocities, these
were not completely absent. In the late 1940s and in the 1950s, historical studies
were published, in which harassments and massacres committed by Ustasha or
Chetnik units were described. he dominant themes of these books were the
Ustasha and their relation to the Catholic Church. Later, during the 1950s,
the irst attempts were made at synthesising the Partisan war. Main examples
of these trends are analysed in the following.
he NDH and the Catholic Church
From the late 1940s, the Ustasha movement and the question of its relationship
with the Catholic Church were the subject of several studies.
One of the irst and most comprehensive studies of this relationship is Vic‑
tor Novak’s Magnum Crimen, published in 1948. hough belonging to the old
group of bourgeois historians, Novak was highly respected in the historians’
environment in Socialist Yugoslavia.35Magnum Crimen constitutes more than
1,100 pages dedicated to the investigation of Croatian clericalism in the 20th
century. One of the main theses of the study is that the Croatian Catholic
Church was accomplice to the Ustasha movement in the forced conversion
of the Serbs in the ndh, and that members of the Catholic organisation were
active leaders of some of the worst excesses of the Ustasha regime.36 More than
200 pages of Novak’s book are concerned with terror and forced conversions
in the ndh.
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Novak recounts the persecution of Orthodox clergy, and he cites numerous
examples of massacres and harassment of the Serbian population from all over
the ndh.37 He describes how terror, torture and mass murder of thousands of
villagers was used to create a psychological pressure to make the Orthodox Serbs
convert to Catholicism. he book also gives examples of cases in which the call
for conversion was used as an opportunity of mass slaughtering, or for collecting
young girls, who were then locked in Serbian churches, raped and killed.38
he book contains lists and proiles of individual priests, friars, teachers at
Franciscan schools and lay brothers, who supported and sometimes actively
participated in massacres against Serbs. Some were also regular members of the
Ustasha movement.39 his cooperation, according to Novak, existed even at the
top of the Ustasha and Catholic hierarchies, also at the level of the Bishops,
and the ndh is presented as a common product of the Ustasha leader Ante
Pavelić and the Zagreb Archbishop Alojzije Stepinac.40
In Novak’s account, the main victims of the Ustasha and Catholic crimes
are openly deined as Serbs, though it is underlined that also supporters of the
Partisan movement were subject to terror. he perpetrators are the Ustasha
and to a large extent also the Croatian Catholic clergy. Novak does not use the
word genocide for the crimes against Serbs in the ndh, but his descriptions
cover many of its related meanings: for example “cleansing”, “extermination”,
“terror”, “slaughtering”, “persecution” etc.41
Novak’s book was received with acclaim, it is widely cited, and it was
reprinted in 1986.42 Novak’s point about the Catholic Church’s complicity
in the crimes against Serbs in the ndh was also restated in other works in
the following years. In an account and selection of ‘secret documents’ on the
relationship between the Vatican and the ndh, published by the Society of
Croatian Journalists in 1952, it is claimed that the reprinted documents should
convince any reader that the Vatican played a “satanic role” during the Second
World War, and that the Vatican, headed by the Pope, were open and brutal
enemies of Yugoslavia and its peoples.43 In this book, Ustasha crimes are regu‑
larly mentioned, but only supericially described. Yet it is clearly stated that
Orthodox Serbs were by far the main victims of these crimes committed by
the Ustasha with support and assistance from the Catholic Church.44
Massacres and crimes are largely absent in another study on the role of
the Catholic Church in the ndh, Prekrštavanje Srba za vreme drugog svetskog
rata, (Conversion of Serbs during the Second World War), published by Sima
Simić in 1958. Rather than recounting the brutal circumstances, Simić analyses
published speeches by leaders of the Ustasha movement, in which the program
of either forced assimilation or abolishment of Serbs was clearly expressed.
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Simić concludes that the aim of the Ustasha was a Croatia without Serbs and
that it shows from their praxis that “…they had two plans for the realisation
of this goal: mass killings and forced conversion to Catholicism.”45 Examining
statements from representatives of the Croatian Catholic clergy, Simić then
proposes that the policy of the Catholic clergy ran parallel to this and that the
Ustasha plans and practices of forced conversions was welcomed and accepted
by the Croatian Catholic clergy, and also by the Vatican.46
As is clear from the title of the study, in Simić’s presentation the Orthodox
Serbs are explicitly thematized as primary victims of this policy. Guilt is not
associated with the Croat nation, and Simić underlines that Croat politicians
in exile criticised the conversions.47 he Ustasha and the clergy, collectively,
are the culprits, that is, Catholicism and fascism are to blame.
hough focusing on the crimes and massacres of the Second World War,
these books about the wartime complicity of Catholic clergy and the Vatican
were obviously not in conlict with regime perspectives. On the contrary, their
descriptions and condemnation of the actions and attitude of the Croatian
priesthood and the Vatican were quite in concurrence with the communists’
enmity towards religion, and the Catholic Church in particular. he ethnic‑
ity of the victims was freely and even pointedly stated. But even though the
Catholic clergy was obviously Croatian, none of the books connect the war
crimes with the Croatian nation.
Pavelić and the NDH
he booklet Pavelić constitutes a short popular history about the leader of the
Ustasha and the ndh, published in 1952 by the communist writer and jour‑
nalist Šime Balen.48 his relatively short book is written in an unproblematic
language. It is easy to read and with few references and no notes, but numerous
excerpts from sources, it was clearly intended for the general public.
Balen is quite explicit in his judgement of Pavelić and the Ustasha organi‑
sation: in his introduction he states that Ante Pavelić was the bloodiest of all
European quislings, that none of the others have committed equal crimes in
their own countries and that the concentration camps of the Ustasha in no
way lagged behind the most infamous of Himmler’s camps. Furthermore,
according to Balen: “Pavelić placed in his program an unprecedented task –
to physically annihilate a whole people, the Serbian people, which made up
one‑third of the population of his Independent State of Croatia.”49 Pavelić’
massacres against the Serbs, according to Balen, are in the same class as the
acts of Attila and Dzengis Khan.
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Ill. 5.1. Ustasha slaughterers. he
original caption reads: “he Ustasha
swam so much in blood that they
often photographed how they slaughtered …”. From Balen, Pavelić.50
he crimes and terror of the Ustasha regime are obviously thematized in this
book. he ndh is described as a “bloody jungle of lawlessness and terror”.51
he massacres and terror of the Ustasha are openly accounted for, some of
the most brutal examples in thorough detail. Balen quotes a long testimony
from a young Ustasha soldier, who describes how he was educated as a proper
Ustasha killer by being forced to knife young children.52 Jasenovac is described
as far worse than Dante’s hell; “here is no pen that can describe it! All words
are too weak. …”53 Balen also recounts the widespread massacres of mainly
Serbian but also pro‑Partisan villages by Ustasha units all over the ndh. In a
long quote, the single survivor of a massacre in Glina testiies how about 700
Serbs were collected in a church to convert to Catholicism, but instead they
were tortured with knifes, killed and thrown into pits.54
he focus of Balen’s book is, as the title suggests, Ante Pavelić. In discussing
the causes for Ustasha’s brutal politics, Balen points out that Pavelić nursed
an old hatred towards Serbs and, furthermore, that he, and his wife as well,
were perverted sadists.55 It is emphasised that Pavelić and the Ustasha had no
hold on the Croatian population and that the take over of power in the ndh
was based on betrayal. he author thereby distances the common Croatian
people from the practices of the ndh.
Balen also suggests that the politics of massacres and persecution were
actually a service to the Ustasha’s masters in Berlin and Rome, who beneited
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from a fratricidal war in Yugoslavia. he reader is further reminded that Draža
Mihailović and the Chetniks executed the other half of this politics, and Balen
thereby, while focusing on Pavelić and the Ustasha, spreads war guilt and
complicity among several nations.56
Towards a historical synthesis
While most early writings about the National Liberation War tackled particular
regions and local developments, few attempts were made to synthesise the
complex war history.
One of the irst overviews of wartime history was made in the early
1950s by two communist veterans and army oicers. In this Pregled historije
narodnooslobodilačkog rata i revolucije naroda Jugoslavije (Survey of the history
on the national liberation war and the revolution of the Yugoslav peoples), inter‑
Yugoslav war crimes and ethnic issues in general are close to absent. Focus is
exclusively on strategic developments and Partisan tactics. he mass slaugh‑
tering of Serbs in the ndh is only barely mentioned, but apart from that, the
victims mentioned are communists, antifascists and “our country”. he book
refers to the concentration camps at Jasenovac and elsewhere and states that
“freedom ighters” were taken there and mass slaughtering committed.57 hus,
in this presentation, focus is on the anti‑communist and anti‑Partisan rather
than the nationalist and racial side of Ustasha crimes.
A short overview of the war was also given in another of the authoritative
works from the standpoint of the Yugoslav communists, the classic Tito biogra‑
phy of 1953, written by the renowned Partisan and journalist‑historian Vladimir
Dedijer. Here massacres and atrocities are described in some detail. Referring
to Ustasha’s practices of “mass extermination” and “some of the worst murder‑
ing” of the Second World War, Dedijer describes how “whole villages were led
in front of huge graves and here men and women, mothers and children were
slaughtered and thrown into them. At other places people were simply thrown
into ravines.”58 However, Dedijer immediately afterwards points to the massa‑
cres committed by Serbian “quislings” on Muslims and Croats in Bosnia, though
these are accounted for less explicitly. he war crimes committed by Serbian and
Croatian quislings are literally described as two sides of the same thing, namely
Hitler’s occupation policy in Yugoslavia. hus the crimes and responsibility are
associated with the occupation forces, and crimes of complicity are carefully
balanced between collaborators of diferent Yugoslav nationality.
he concentration camp of Jasenovac, one of the issues to be hotly dis‑
puted from the 1980s, not least by Dedijer himself, is hardly mentioned in the
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biography. Dedijer turns to it only in a note in the inal chapter dealing with
the post‑war reconstruction of Yugoslavia, claiming that more than 200,000
were killed in that camp during the war.59 his number was signiicantly lower
than what was stated elsewhere and also in Dedijer’s own later accounts.
Among the irst attempts at a serious synthetised overview of the history
of the Second World War in Yugoslavia from the standpoint of professional
historiography was Jovan Marjanović and Pero Morača’s Naš oslobodilački
rat i narodna revolucija 1941-1945. Istoriski pregled (Our liberation war and
national revolution 1941‑1945. Historical Survey), published in Belgrade in
1958. Marjanović and Morača were prominent igures in the historiography
of Yugoslavia’s Second World War, and both had strong ties to the League of
Communists.60 his book was intended as a survey of the history of the war
and was written for the general public: short, without notes and in an easily
comprehensible language. Marjanović and Morača’s book illustrates the state
of the art of narrating the Second World War in socialist Yugoslavia. he Par‑
tisans’ warfare is simultaneously described as a patriotic liberation war and a
struggle for social revolution.
In Marjanović and Morača’s presentation, the war is largely a project of
the Nazi and Fascist enemies. From this perspective, the Ustasha and their
crimes are tools of the occupiers, aimed at destroying the unity of the Yugoslav
peoples.61 Genocidal policies and massacres are described only supericially, and
crimes as well as perpetrators are parallelised, meaning that on the one side
are enemies and collaborators committing atrocities, and on the other are the
communists and the people protecting Yugoslav unity:
he communists together with the people sharply condemned the national persecu‑
tions that were committed from the irst days of the occupation by the Ustasha in
parts of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, by the Magyar fascists in Vojvodina,
and by the Germans in Slovenia.62
he authors emphasise that the Ustasha were totally dependent on the Axis
powers and weapons, and that the Croat people did not support them.63
War crimes and massacres are thereby externalised as belonging to the
occupiers and collaborators, while the whole Yugoslav people, here referred
to in the singular, probably to emphasise its unity and disregarding ethnic
diferences, stands united against them.
Marjanović and Morača’s study is carefully balanced also when it comes
to participation in the Partisan struggle. he book contains regular summa‑
ries of strategic developments and victories in every Yugoslav region, thereby
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emphasising that every Yugoslav nation and region contributed vitally to the
Partisan struggle.
he Chetniks, one of Marjanović’s ields of expertise, are analysed in greater
detail. According to Marjanović and Morača, their main task, rather than ight‑
ing for liberation of the country, was to safeguard the position of the royal
government. hus they were against the Partisans, because they supported “the
rotten and corrupt bourgeois order of Yugoslavia”.64 Instead of contributing to
the uprising, they turned the people’s enthusiasm “in the direction of plundering
and annihilation of Muslim and Croat citizens, exploiting in their propaganda
the terrible Ustasha terror against the Serbian people. …”65 Numerous examples
of Chetnik massacres against non‑Serb citizens and villages are mentioned, but
never in detail. According to the authors, the Chetniks were used in much the
same way as the Ustasha to sharpen the hatred between Serbs, Muslims and
Croats and spread “the fratricidal slaughtering”. In general, the Chetniks are
presented as co‑responsible for much of the inter‑Yugoslav ighting during the
war, and they are particularly blamed for the conlict with the Partisans.66
One of the main themes of Marjanović and Morača’s book, as the title
itself suggests, is the way the Partisan war should be seen as both a national
liberation ight and a social revolution. he authors argue that the Partisan
motto “Death to fascism – freedom to the people” covers both of these aims.
Fascism thus refers to the Axis occupiers as well as to their Yugoslav helpers,
who support an ideology of hunger, death, plundering, slavery, massacres
and terror. Freedom means freedom to the working people as well as freedom
from fascism, but also freedom from everything dark and reactionary, from
national oppression, exploitation and hunger. To the communists, according
to Marjanović and Morača, the Partisan struggle was not only a contribution
to the international anti‑Axis front, but also a possibility of establishing a new
Yugoslav army, free territories and new types of people’s government.68
hus, in this synthesis of the wartime history, liberation struggle and social
revolution are united, which means also that the Partisans’ opponents carry
the combined functions of traitorous collaborators and reactionary counter‑
revolutionary forces. In this double stigmatisation, perpetrators of massacres
are not emphasised or singled out. he issue of mass war crimes is, so to speak,
drowned in a very politically loaded narrative of the Partisans’ and the people’s
struggle for national liberation and social revolution against the occupiers and
all the “traitorous forces of counterrevolution”.
Marjanović and Morača recount how the Yugoslav Partisans had to ight
for six more days at the Austrian border, after the Germans had capitulated
all over Europe:
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85
Ill. 5.2. “he Pavelić guard at
its bloody work in Bosnia, 1943”,
in Marjanović and Morača, Naš
oslobodilački rat i narodna revo‑
lucija.67
In this last ofensive for the inal liberation of the country, JA [the Yugoslav Army]
annihilated all enemy forces that were in the spring of 1945 located on Yugoslav
soil. On this occasion, about 300,000 enemy oicers and soldiers were killed or
captured. …69
hough the word “annihilation” is used in the description, the more trou‑
blesome details about this inal showdown with the enemies, including the
massacre of thousands of these soldiers and oicers by Partisan are not at all
discussed.
he book repeats the oicial number of victims stated by the State commis‑
sion in 1946, that is 1,706,000 people, emphasising that “the largest number
of these victims perished in the bestial fascist slaughtering of the population”,
and that 800,000 men, women and children were killed in Jasenovac.70
Marjanović’ and Morača’s book summarises the main points and perspec‑
tives of Yugoslav Second World War historiography. Included herein are also
massacres and war crimes against speciic ethnic groups. But these issues are
largely overshadowed by the main narrative of patriotic peoples and Partisans
against traitors and fascists. As shown, this way of narrating Yugoslavia’s Second
World War characterised most communist historiography in this period.
he political and ideological use of wartime history was manifest, not least
in the educational system. Historians created a single monolithic narrative
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about a united patriotic and freedom loving Yugoslav people. In focus was all‑
Yugoslav patriotism as opposed to fascism and collaboration. Chetniks, Ustasha
and other anti‑Partisan forces were not seen as Yugoslav national parties, but
as traitors and collaborators subordinated the main enemies, the Nazi‑fascist
occupiers. Representations of wartime history downplayed Yugoslav national
and ethnic questions, and thereby they also avoided the stigmatisation of any
nation or national idea.
Compared to the Partisans’ achievements, war crimes and massacres received
very minor attention. Nevertheless, crimes and massacres were accounted for
and at times analysed in great detail, openly stating the ethnicity of the victims
as the cause of these crimes. As long as these accounts stayed in concordance
with the oicially promoted narrative of the war, they did not trouble the
communists.
Yet, two points seem untouchable in Titoist historiography: On the one
hand, guilt of war crimes was not to be ascribed to any of the Yugoslav na‑
tional parties. And secondly, brutality and crimes on the part of the Partisans
were not to be described. he atrocities committed against surrendered enemy
forces did not become part of Yugoslav Second World War history before the
end of the 1980s. By then, accounts of these massacres would fundamentally
shatter the heroic image of the Partisans, not least in the Croatian public.
N ote s
1
See e.g. Clissold, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, 202‑207.
2
Dennison Rusinow, he Yugoslav Experiment 1948-1974, Berkeley and Los Angeles, Uni‑
versity of California Press, 1977, 33f. For an almost contemporary account, see Adam
B. Ulam, Titoism and the Cominform, Cambridge, ma: Harvard University Press, 1952,
96‑134, also Halperin, he triumphant heretic, 69‑94. For a discussion of changes and
continuities in the Yugoslav politics, see also Lilly, Power and Persuasion, 161‑191.
3
Woodford McClellan, ‘Postwar Political Evolution’, in Wayne S. Vucinich, ed., Contemporary Yugoslavia. Twenty Years of Socialist Experiment, Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univer‑
sity of California Press, 1969, 134.
4
Lampe, Yugoslavia as history, 257‑260. Also Branko Petranović, Istorija Jugoslavije
5
A summary of the Djilas afair can be found in Stephen Clissold, Djilas. he Progress of
6
On the relationship between the Yugoslav and the Soviet leadership in these years, see
1918-1988, III, Belgrade: Nolit, 1988, 242‑246.
a revolutionary, Hounslow, Middlesex: Maurice Temple Smith, 1983, 231‑246.
e.g. Russinow, he Yugoslav Experiment, 87‑95.
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7
87
See e.g. Mirjana Gross, ‘Die Jugoslawische Geschichtswissenschaft von heute’, Osterreichische Osthefte, 8, 1966, 239.
8
Kardelj in Istoriski Časopis, 2, 1949‑1950, 11. Quoted in Höpken, ‘Von der Mythologisi‑
erung zur Stigmatisierung’, 172.
9
Lilly, ‘Problems of Persuasion’, 410.
10
Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 200. Also Stevan K. Pawlovitch, he
11
Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 239‑240.
12
Höpken, ‘Von der Mythologisierung zur Stigmatisierung’, 171.
13
See e.g. Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav National Question, 198‑201; Höpken, ‘Von
14
Ibid, 204. See also Dimić, ‘Od tvrdnje do znanja’, 201‑203; Gross, ‘Die Jugoslawische
15
Tomo Čubelić and Milovan Milostić, Pregled historije narodnooslobodilačkog rata i revo-
improbable survivor. Yugoslavia and its Problems, 1918-1988, London: Hurst, 1988, 129‑130.
der Mythologisierung zur Stigmatisierung’, 168.
Geschichtswissenschaft von heute’, 239, 241.
lucije naroda Jugoslavije, Zagreb: Matica Hrvatska, 1963 (11th edition, reprint of 2nd enlar‑
ged edition, Zagreb, 1952) 5.
16
Lampe, Yugoslavia as history, 236‑237.
17
Predrag Marković, ‘Istoričari i jugoslovenstvo u socijalističkoj Jugoslaviji’ Jugoslovenski
18
On the relationship between schooling and the national state, see e.g. Ernest Gellner,
Istorijski Časopis, 34, 2001, 1‑2, 154; Djilas, he Contested Country, 162.
Nations and nationalism, Oxford: Blackwell, 1996 (irst published 1983), 35f.
19
Lilly, ‘Problems of Persuasion’, 402‑403; Lampe, Yugoslavia as history, 237.
20 Andrew Wachtel and Predrag Marković, ‘A Last Attempt at Educational Integration:
he Failure of Common Educational Cores in Yugoslavia in the early 1980’s’, in Lenard
J. Cohen and Jasna Dragović‑Soso, eds., State Collapse in South-Eastern Europe. New
Perspectives on Yugoslavia’s Disintegration, West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University
Press, 2008, 205‑206.
21
Milovan Đilas, Problemi školstva u borbi za socijalizam u našoj zemlji. Rezolucija III. plenum CK KPJ o zadacima u školstvu, Zagreb: Kultura, 1950, 13.
22
Ibid, 20.
23
Ibid, 47‑55.
24 Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom., 206f.
25
Quoted in ibid.
26 Ibid, 207.
27 Radina Vučetić, ‘abc textbooks and Ideological Indoctrination of Children: “Socialism
Tailor‑made for Man” or “Child Tailor‑made for Socialism?’, in Slobodan Naumović
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usable history?
and Miroslav Jovanović, eds., Childhood in South East Europe: Historical Perspectives on
Growing Up in 19th and 20th Century, Belgrade: Čigaja, 2001, 251.
28
Ibid, 253.
29 Quoted in ibid, 256‑257. his textbook was originally intended for the education of il‑
literate Partisans, but it was also used in primary school in the irst post‑war years.
30 Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 1996, 211‑212. Also in Predrag
Marković, Miloš Ković and Nataša Milićević, ‘Developments in Serbian Historiography
since 1989’, in Ulf Brunnbauer, (Re)writing History: Historiography in Southeast Europe
after Socialism, Münster: lit Verlag, 2004, 278.
31
Ibid, 256f, 262.
32
Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 186.
33
See e.g. the introduction to Zbornik dokumenata i podataka o narodno-oslobodilačkom
ratu jugoslovenskih naroda. Tom V, Knjiga 1. ‘Borbe u Hrvatskoj 1941. God’. Beograd
1952.
34
In the oicial bibliography of Yugoslav historiography from 1955 more than 300 works
on the National Liberation Struggle are mentioned, of which about ten are said to be at
least partly about the massacres. See Tadić, ed., Dix années d’historiographie Yougoslave.
35
Born and educated in Croatia, Novak was employed at the University of Belgrade in
the interwar period. During the war, Novak was interned by the Germans in a prison
camp near Belgrade. In 1947 he was appointed director of the Historical Institute of the
Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, and from 1948 he edited the institute’s periodical
Istoriski Časopis (Historical Journal). See his obituary: Vladimir Stojančević, ‘Viktor
Novak (10.II 1889 – 1.I 1977)’, Istoriski Časopis, xxiv, 1977, 5‑7. Also Ko je ko u Jugoslaviji. Biografski podaci o jugoslovenskim savremenicima, Belgrade: Sedma Sila, 1957, 500.
36
Novak, Magnum Crimen. Pola vijeka klerikalizma u Hrvatskoj, xii‑xiii.
37
Ibid, particularly 617f, 645f.
38
Ibid, e.g. 685.
39
Ibid, eg. 662‑678.
40 Ibid, eg. 784.
41
“čišćenje”, “istrebljenje”, “teror”, “pokolj”, “progon”. Ibid, 599‑804.
42 M. Marjanović, ‘Viktor Novak, Magnum Crimen’, Istoriski Časopis, 2, 1949‑1950, 268‑271
(at this time, Novak himself edited that journal).
43
Tajni dokumenti o odnosima Vatikana i ustaške ‘ndh’, Zagreb: Biblioteka Društva Novi‑
nara Hrvatske, 1952, 6.
44 Ibid, 86‑100.
45
Sima Simić, Prekrštavanje Srba ze vreme drugog svetskog rata. Titograd: Graički Zavod,
1958, 45.
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89
46 Ibid, 49, 143f. See also Sima Simić, Vatikan protiv Jugoslavije, Titograd: Graički Zavod,
1958, in which he elaborates his interpretation of the Vatican’s anti‑orthodox policies in
South Eastern Europe, particularly p. 129, 132.
47 Simić, Prekrštavanje Srba, 151‑152.
48 Balen had been a member of the Communist Party since 1935 and participated in the
Partisan struggle as member of the avnoj as well as the Croatian regional anti‑fascist
council, the zavnoh. See e.g. his obituary: Bozidar Novak, ‘Osnivac “Vjesnika”, vjernik
novinarstva’, Vjesnik, 18th March 2004, 5.
49 Šime Balen, Pavelić, Zagreb: Hrvatska seljačka tiskara, 1952, 6. Also p. 60.
50
Ibid, 81.
51
Title of chapter 4 in ibid, 55.
52
Ibid, 78‑80.
53
Ibid, 83.
54
Ibid, 121‑126.
55
Ibid, 60‑61.
56
Ibid, 60, 112.
57
Čubelić and Milostić, Pregled historije narodnooslobodilačlog rata i revolucije naroda Jugoslavije, 58‑59. Čubelić taught at one of the Communist Party’s educational institutions,
Milostić was a major in the Yugoslav army.
58
Vladimir Dedijer, Josip Broz Tito. Prilozi za biograiju, (2nd ed.), Belgrade: Kultura, 1953,
59
Ibid, p. 545.
289.
60 Partisan veteran and major of the reserve, Marjanović was a communist insider. In 1953
he was appointed director of the State Archives in Belgrade, and from 1958 he taught
the course in contemporary history at the University of Belgrade. See Ko je ko u Jugoslaviji, 418. See also Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 211‑212; and
Marković, Ković and Milićević, ‘Developments in Serbian Historiography since 1989’,
278. Morača held similar credentials: member of the communist youth movement since
1936, party member since 1941, and political commissary in a Partisan brigade during
the war. After the war he headed the Department of the History of the Communist
Party at the Military Academy in Belgrade, and he was director of the Military Museum
and the Archive of Military History. From 1958 he was also secretary of the League of
Communists’ commission for history. See Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol. 6, Zagreb, 1965,
160; Morača’s obituary in Istorija 20. veka, 1993, 1‑2, 258‑260.
61
Jovan Marjanović and Pero Morača, Naš oslobodilački rat i narodno revolucija 1941-1945.
(Istoriski pregled), Belgrade: Prosveta, 1958, 30.
62 Ibid, 40.
63
Ibid, 38‑39.
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usable history?
64 Ibid, 62.
65
Ibid, 63‑64.
66 Ibid, e.g. 89‑91.
67 Ibid, 144‑145.
68 Ibid, 65f, 71.
69 Ibid, 288.
70 Ibid, 290.
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New perspectives on wartime
history, 1960‑1980
6
In the 1960s and 1970s, socialist Yugoslavia provided a relatively stable politi‑
cal framework and comparatively high living standards. his was relected in
historical research, which was signiicantly expanded and, along with the politi‑
cal system, decentralised, resulting in individual and more nationally oriented
research environments in each republic. he Yugoslav communists, feeling safe
and self‑suicient, allowed re‑consideration of their main legitimizing myth,
that of the National Liberation Struggle.
his chapter describes the main developments within Yugoslav historiogra‑
phy and investigates how wartime history, including questions of inter‑Yugoslav
massacres and war crimes, were re‑addressed. It shows how new approaches
challenged the politically dictated narrative of the Partisan war, and how, as a
part of this, genocide was introduced as an issue within Yugoslav historiography.
Yugoslav politics
he 1960s and 1970s were probably the proudest and most self‑assured years of
Yugoslav socialism. he communist regime remained safely in power, champi‑
oning its own version of socialist ideology under the catch phrase of ‘self‑man‑
agement’ socialism. Seeing itself as an exponent of a successful line of socialist
development, Yugoslavia held a prestigious position on the international scene
as one of the leaders of the movement of non‑alignment.
Internally, the period was characterised by a continuing decentralisation of
political power to the republics and provinces of the Yugoslav federation. he
incitements for reforms were initially economic, but soon initiatives spilled over
in the political sphere as well. In the summer of 1966, Aleksandar Ranković,
vice president of the League of Communists and head of the security service
udba (in 1964 renamed sdb), was ousted from the power circles on accusations
of conspiracy against Tito and other party leaders.1 he removal of Ranković,
who was regarded as a Serbian centralist hard‑liner, was a clear victory to the
liberal pro‑reform wings of the Party. he road was paved for further liberalisa‑
tions and decentralisations of the Yugoslav system.
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usable history?
From the mid‑1960s the communist leadership, parallel to the trends of
political decentralisation, abandoned whatever ideas had existed of a unitary
Yugoslav nationality and stated that the individual Yugoslav nations would not
be eliminated. he republics were now regarded as legitimate agents of popular
sovereignty, and this laid the ground for subsequent political decentralisation.
Beginning in 1969, regional party conferences were scheduled before the con‑
gresses of the Federal Party, the League of Communists of Yugoslavia. From
then on, agendas and decision‑making power emanated from the periphery
rather than from the federal centre, which was also conirmed by the 1974
constitution.2 Also, from the late 1960s, the autonomous provinces Kosovo
and Vojvodina, which were integral parts of the Serbian republic, had obtained
largely the same autonomy and inluence in federal organs as the republics.
From the 1960s, Yugoslav politics experienced several outbursts of social
and national dissatisfaction. In 1968 Belgrade and other university cities were
the scenes of massive student protests against market reforms and unemploy‑
ment, which probably warned the regime against too much openness and
liberalisation. From 1967 to 1971, the so‑called “Croatian Spring” or “Maspok”
(from masovni pokret, meaning mass movement) dominated public life in the
Croatian republic. Maspok was initiated by intellectuals who protested against
what they saw as consistent discrimination against Croatia, both economically
and culturally. he Croatian communist leadership, belonging to the liberal
pro‑reform wing of the party, allowed public manifestations of Croatian na‑
tionalism to continue until late 1971, when they culminated in massive student
strikes and demonstrations. he Federal Party top then forced the Croatian
leadership to resign, and the Croatian Communist Party was purged of thou‑
sands of its members, while the leading intellectuals received prison sentences.3
In Kosovo signs of dissatisfaction had been in the open since the fall of
Ranković and his repressive security regime. In November 1968, Priština was
the scene of violent anti‑Serbian demonstrations, to which the regime reacted
swiftly by imprisoning riot leaders and purging the League of Communists of
Kosovo. Afterwards, however, concessions were made to the Kosovo Albanians,
granting among other things a proper university in Priština and the right to
ly the Albanian lag.4
In the early 1970s, after the implementations of liberal and decentralist
reforms, liberal communist leaderships were removed in most republics, signal‑
ling the end of the reform process. Stable and reactionary Titoist cadres were
to run Yugoslav politics through the 1970s.
hough Yugoslavia’s economy remained troubled and the course of reforms
was swaying, the country upheld comparably high living standards which
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93
enabled its citizens to participate in international consumer culture. Yugoslav
society was rapidly modernised and urbanised, and an extensive educational
system was established.5 In the face of economic recession in the early 1960s,
Yugoslav workers were allowed to travel abroad as guest workers in German
and other European industries. To facilitate the expanding tourist industry,
Yugoslavia abolished the tourist visa in 1967.6 he considerable freedom of
movement across the Yugoslav borders also allowed massive cultural imports
and exports.
Professionalized historiography
he conditions for Yugoslav historiography changed signiicantly in the 1960s
and 1970s. During the 1960s, Yugoslav history research was signiicantly ex‑
panded, particularly the ields of modern and contemporary history.7 Party
research institutions dedicated to the history of the workers’ movement were
established in all Yugoslav republics. hese were exclusively research institu‑
tions, in the same sense as the traditional ‘Academies of Sciences’ in Ljubljana,
Zagreb and Belgrade, which also held departments of historical studies. he
history of the Second World War in Yugoslavia was a subject of research at
the federal level at the Military History Institute, at the Institute of Social
Sciences in Belgrade, and at the republican institutes for the study of the
workers’ movement.8
From the 1960s, academic historical culture in Yugoslavia was increasingly
professionalised, and based on academic education and formal methodological
standards. Numerous skilled young history teachers and researchers were edu‑
cated. Contemporary history was taught at the universities in most republican
and provincial capitals, that is, in Ljubljana, Zagreb, Sarajevo, Belgrade, Novi
Sad, Skoplje, Priština and also in Zadar in Croatia.9 From mid‑1960s a new
generation of Second World War historians was entering Yugoslav historical
culture. Instead of experience from the Partisan War, these young researchers
had earned their credentials from university education and methodological
and theoretical training. In the mid‑1960s, the Party dominated institutes of
the History of the Workers’ Movement and housed about 120 young educated
researchers.10
A signiicant amount of Yugoslavia’s research in contemporary history was
produced at these Institutes of the History of the Workers’ Movement. he
work of these institutes was under more direct control from the Party’s histori‑
cal commissions than that of other research institutions. Yet it was an explicit
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aim from the side of the communists that historical research was to be of high
scientiic quality, produced by educated historians, and free of political pres‑
sure. hus, more history was left to the historians, but the liberalisation was
not unlimited. Historians were not allowed to be under “foreign inluence”,
they had to distance themselves from “bourgeois historiography” and avoid
“individualism”, all of which were considered erroneous. In the end, the party
had the last word, and it was still posing questions and demanding answers.11
Yugoslav academic history was mainly empirically oriented and much work
was invested in collecting and editing sources as well as recording information.
Between 1949 and 1965, enormous collections of documentation on the Na‑
tional Liberation War, amounting to 116 volumes, were edited and published
by the Institute of Military History.12 Furthermore, new archives were opened,
meaning that sources and circumstances inally allowed proper historical work
on the National Liberation War, which, according to a contemporary judge‑
ment, had not been possible until then.13
Marxism, interpreted in traditional tones of dialectical materialism, re‑
mained a necessary interpretative framework, but after the irst post‑war decade
most ideological obligations could be fulilled by paying lip service in “alibi
footnotes”.14 Most Yugoslav academic history stayed traditionally positivist,
closely based on primary sources, and evaded theoretical challenges. In this
way, it remained traditional into the 1980s.15
Yugoslav academic historiography was characterised by international aware‑
ness and orientation. Often West European and North American studies and
journals were reviewed in Yugoslav historical journals. Academics were able to
travel, participate in meetings and conferences and study abroad. Historical
research cooperation crossed Yugoslavia’s borders, and though the majority
concentrated on East European Socialist States, a signiicant part involved
Western Europe or North America.
Republican and national research environments
Parallel to the professionalisation and expansion of the ield of historiography,
the historians’ environments were distributed among the individual republics
and provinces, each having their own universities and research institutions.
hough extensive contacts remained across republican borders, for example
at the meetings in the Yugoslav historians’ association, the republican and
regional distribution of history research eventually led to separate research
environments, each publishing their own academic journal, and each with
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their own regional ields of expertise, in efect regional and often national
history. As a consequence, history was increasingly separated into local and
national research. his allowed for more national perspectives on historical
questions.
In the 1960s and 1970, history polemics repeatedly evolved along national
lines. Among the examples were the attempts to write an oicially sponsored
multivolume national history, Istorija Naroda Jugoslavia (History of the Peo‑
ples of Yugoslavia), which stranded in the 1960s, allegedly because it proved
impossible for the historians of various nationalities to agree on how to write
the third volume that was to cover the nineteenth century and the Yugoslav
national movements.16 Another sensitive and iercely disputed topic in Yugoslav
historiography of the early 1960s was the role of Croat bourgeois politicians
during the Second World War, particularly the Croat role in the April war of
1941 and the Axis invasion. his issue was most hotly debated between two
Partisan veterans and army generals turned historians, Velimir Terzić and Franjo
Tuđman, who was to be Croatia’s president in the 1990s. hese two ex‑Partisans
seemed eager to establish a certain amount of national responsibility for the
collapse of the Yugoslav Army in April 1941. Terzić proposed that the Croatian
bourgeois politician Vladko Maček was to blame for the lack of enthusiasm
among Croat soldiers in the defence of Yugoslavia. Tuđman defended the Croat
efort, while underlining the negative inluence of “great Serbian hegemon‑
ism” of the interwar period and of the government in exile.17 In reaction to
the increasing nationalisation of historical discussions, Tito and the League of
Communists criticised Yugoslav historiography repeatedly trough the 1960s
for bourgeois nationalist tendencies.18
During the Croatian Spring in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the issue of
Croatian history was interwoven with the national revival. In 1971, schoolteach‑
ers and authors of textbooks proposed that Croatian schoolbooks should allot
more space to national history.19 he issue of Ustasha history and Second World
War victims was raised by the journalist Bruno Bušić in Hrvatski Književni
List, a journal of independent Croatian writers and one of the mouthpieces
of the Maspok. Bušić argued that the numbers of victims were deliberately
manipulated and that while Chetnik crimes were not really talked about, the
horrors of the Ustasha regime were frequently described and the blame was
ascribed to all of the Croatian people.20 hus attacking the oicial interpre‑
tation of the war, which still stated that 1,706,000 had been killed, Bušić
implicitly suggested that war history was anti‑Croat propaganda. In fact, his
critique of oicial wartime history was partly a call for Croatian national pride
in opposition to the oicial communist version of history.
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As director of the Zagreb Institute of the History of the Worker’s Move‑
ment, Franjo Tuđman was closely associated with the circles of nationalist
intellectuals. In 1967 he was forced to retire, and in 1972 he received a prison
sentence together with numerous other Zagreb intellectuals. Tuđman was
replaced as head of the Institute by Dušan Bilandžić, and the Party afterwards
stated that “In the year 1967, the Institute was considered a nationalistic cen‑
tre. he same year the situation was cleaned up. hus the weaknesses in the
development of the institute were confronted.”21
Yet ierce historical discussions along national positions continued into the
1970s. In 1972, as the publication of the third volume of the common History
of the Yugoslav Peoples was perpetually postponed, Vladimir Dedijer, Ivan Božić,
Sima Ćirković and Milorad Ekmečić published a one‑volume Istorija Jugoslavije
(History of Yugoslavia). Unlike the History of the Yugoslav Peoples, this volume
was not an oicial project, but an initiative from the Belgrade publishing
house “Prosveta”.22 Particularly the contributions by Milorad Ekmečić on the
nineteenth century and the national politics of this period caused consider‑
able dispute, not least from the Croatian historians’ side.23 As the book was
written by four Serbian historians, three of them Belgrade‑based, the discus‑
sions developed along national lines. At issue was the relationship between
19th century individual nationalism and Yugoslavism, but some observers,
including Ekmečić himself, have claimed that below the discussion of Croa‑
tian nationalist politicians lay also the question of continuity from Croatian
national awakening and ideologies of the nineteenth century to the Ustasha.24
he discussion could be seen as parallel to German confrontations with the
past and continuity. Yet, it was inevitably even more sensitive and complicated,
since it also involved divisions and confrontations among Yugoslavia’s nations,
both in the case of 19th century Croatian and Serbian national ideologies and
with regard to the underlying question of Croatian nationalism developing
into Ustashism.25
New perspectives on Second World War history
In spite of the growing independence of research in contemporary history, the
general narrative and interpretative framework of Second World War history
remained largely the same during the 1960s as dictated in the early post‑war
years.26 Yet, from the beginning of the 1970s, part of the mythical Partisan
history was gradually relaxed and some of it was challenged by academic his‑
tory research and intellectual critique.
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One of the irst openings of the hitherto orthodox narrative came from
the very top of the communist hierarchy. On the occasion of his 80th birthday
in 1972, Tito was interviewed about his life and career by Belgrade Radio
and tv. As the discussion touched on the Second World War, the interviewer
asked: “Much has been said and written about the events during the time of
the armed struggle. Is there any signiicant moment or event about which
you have not talked until now?”27 To this Tito answered in the airmative,
mentioning the example of the failed attempts to cooperate with Draža
Mihailović, which developed into a class struggle between the bourgeoisie,
including Draža, supporting the occupiers, and the Partisans standing on the
side of the people. Tito further recounted, “it came to a heavy and bloody
struggle. It came to a showdown, like in Croatia between Partisans and
Ustasha”. Tito then admitted that the Ustasha in fact had a great inluence
on parts of Croatian society, and that the situation was similar in Slovenia.
And then he stated: “It was, therefore, a civil war. But we did not want to
talk about that during the war, because it would not have been useful for
us.”28
Here Tito actually admitted that the National Liberation Struggle was not,
as it had been presented earlier, simply a struggle between the Yugoslav peoples
and the Partisans on the one side, and the fascists occupiers supported by the
bourgeoisie on the other. Rather, it was a civil war in which large groups of
people supported diferent sides, and though Tito insisted on the class struggle
perspective, he admitted that there was a heavy and bloody struggle between
Yugoslav forces.
From the early 1970s, professional historians questioned the previous re‑
search on the war period. At a roundtable conference arranged by the periodical
Gledišta in early 1972 several speakers criticised the low scientiic level of this
research, which, they complained, had predominantly been conducted by
veterans of the Partisan movement and not by proper historians. hey further
criticised that the research had almost exclusively concentrated on military
aspects of the war period, and one participant at the conference noted that the
war historiography held several scientiic blank spots, among them the actual
numbers of victims and ighters during the war.29
hus, it was argued from the side of academic historiography that it was
time to open new perspectives on the war history. One of the issues pointed
out was the real number of war victims, which in 1945 was established rather
quickly to amount to 1,706,000. Attempts at more precise calculations had
been initiated since then, but the conclusions were not published, probably
due to the political sensitivity of the issue.30
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One of the most ambitious new approaches to Partisan history came from
Rasim Hurem in his doctoral thesis Kriza NOP-a u Bosni i Hercegovini krajem
1941. i početkom 1942. (he crisis of the National Liberation Movement in
Bosnia and Hercegovina at the end of 1941 and beginning of 1942), published
in Sarajevo 1972. Hurem’s thesis was defended in East Berlin and one of his
supervisors was an East German professor. his connection to an academic
environment outside Yugoslavia would have supplied Hurem’s work with
outside perspectives as well as with relative independence from the academic
environment in Sarajevo, which probably contribute to explaining the radi‑
cally new theses proposed in Hurem’s study. As suggested by the title, the book
argued that the Partisan movement in late 1941 – early 1942 went through a
severe crisis that developed most clearly in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It further
claimed that the crisis manifested itself as ‘left deviation’ and ‘red terror’.31 In
doing so, it did in fact constitute a strongly revisionist stand against hitherto
written Partisan history.
According to Hurem, Second World War historiography had until recently
treated the National Liberation War and the revolution exclusively as epics,
emphasising the ight against the occupiers and the Partisans’ success in uniting
the Yugoslav peoples.32 In line with Tito’s statements in his birthday interview
in May 1972, Hurem now argued that “the National Liberation Struggle was to
a great extent mixed up with class struggle, and as such became a thing which
mainly concerned the communists.”33 his class struggle perspective meant,
amongst others, that the struggle against Chetnik supporters in fact included
actions against a social stratum of powerful and wealthy farmers. Under the
pretext of the ‘struggle against kulaks’ and the beginning of the ‘second phase’
of the revolution, a veritable pogrom against respected and wealthy farmers
began.34
An essential element of this phase of the Partisan struggle was, according
to Hurem, the so‑called “ight against the ifth column”, classiied by the
Communist Party’s Central Committee as belonging to the most important
tasks of the National Liberation Fight. he ifth column was deined as not
only those in the service of the occupiers, but also included numerous political
‘enemies’ (neprijatelji) and ‘neutral’ (neutralci), people of diferent professions,
ownership situation and societal status.35 Hurem further stated:
Under the pretext of ighting the ifth column, liquidations were carried out not
only of “today’s” enemies, that is of recognised opponents of the nob [Narodna
oslobodilačka borba, the National Liberation Struggle], but also of persons who
were not opponents: persons whose only error consisted in their having diferent
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political views, or simply being politically undecided. In other words, liquida‑
tions were carried out of persons who were not opponents: i.e. persons whom
“the people” were not convinced were really enemies of the National Liberation
Struggle.36
Hurem further described how the Shock Battalion of the Operative staf of
the National Liberation Movement’s detachment for Hercegovina, known as
the First Shock Battalion, served as an instrument for the physical liquidation
of the ifth column. And he claimed that the First Shock Brigade, formed by
the supreme staf, mercilessly eliminated anyone whom it considered to be
ifth columnists paid by the occupiers.37
Among Hurem’s iercest accusations is the claim that the Hercegovinian
Partisan leadership and units terrorised, burnt and looted Muslim and Croat
villages that were considered to be in opposition to the National Liberation
Movement. Often the inhabitants of these villages were killed. Hurem suggests
that in the irst months of 1942, around 250 persons accused of belonging to
the ifth column were shot. In the same period, more than 500 prominent
Chetniks were killed in this ‘unmerciful cleansing’.38
In Rasim Hurem’s account, it is presented as a tremendous deed that the
communists and the Partisan movement made their way through this crisis
and broke with these policies in order to establish a broadly based anti‑fascists
peoples’ liberation movement, which in the end won the war and liberated
Yugoslavia. Nevertheless, his attempt to write the ideological crisis, strategic
mistakes and war crimes into a history of the Partisan movement was manifestly
at odds with the ways Partisan history had been written until then. he idea in
itself that the National Liberation Movement had experienced a severe ideologi‑
cal crisis was an anathema to traditional Yugoslav Second World War history.
his attack on the infallibility of the Partisan movement came at a time
when the ideological constraints of Yugoslav society were loosening and the
regime felt safe enough to relax and open its own mythical genealogy. Even
Tito had done so in his birthday interview. Yet, Hurem went further than
most communists and contemporary historians were willing to accept.
he book provoked various reactions. he sociologist Nebojša Popov quoted
Hurem’s research as proof that the communist leadership of the Partisan move‑
ment, believing that the war would not last long, introduced already in 1941
“the second phase of the revolution”. his meant, according to Popov, that
they had immediately from the start of the war initiated a class struggle and a
struggle for political power in Yugoslavia, in essence a civil war parallel to the
war for liberation.39
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Hurem’s book was severely criticised from various sides, including the
Bosnian party leadership.40 he fact that the book was at the limits of what
was tolerable within Yugoslav historical culture became obvious at a discussion
in June 1975, which was arranged by Hurem’s own employer, the Institute for
History in Sarajevo (until 1973, the Institute for the History of the Worker’s
Movement).41 In his welcome and introduction, Rafael Brčić of the Institute
regretted and apologised that this discussion had not taken place earlier. Brčić
recounted how afairs had been rather busy at the institute, but, he empha‑
sised, Hurem’s work had indeed been criticised among the historians at the
institute. Furthermore, Hurem’s work had raised criticism at several confer‑
ences.42 At the meeting, 12 of Hurem’s associates at the institute contributed
to the critical discussion. Among the main points raised was that though the
communist leadership might have made some mistakes, there was no sources
or literature documenting that the leaders initiated terror and harassments, as
Hurem argued.43 Furthermore, Hurem’s colleagues rejected the thesis that the
National Liberation Movement underwent a crisis at all, and they rebufed the
argument that a multitude of the uprising in Bosnia could have been outside
the planning and direction of the Communist Party. Indeed, if the communists
did not plan, initiate and lead the uprising, who did?44 he idea that many
local riots were spontaneous and that there was a signiicant overlap between
Partisans and Chetniks in Bosnia in 1941‑1942 would certainly not have been
an acceptable explanation in this forum.
Rasim Hurem’s study is but one important example of the readdressing of
Yugoslav Second World War history. Not even the Partisans and the commu‑
nist movement were untouchable anymore.45 Yet, attacks on their status met
with signiicant obstacles, not least within the historians’ own environment.
A considerable amount of internal censorship was at play, especially in the
research institutions connected to the League of Communists. Nevertheless,
new questions were addressed and new perspectives added. While Hurem
emphasised the aspect of civil war and introduced the issue of communist
terror and war crimes, others were to introduce more ethno‑national per‑
spectives. his was accompanied by the issue of genocide, which was later
to signiicantly contribute to a change of discourse on Yugoslavia’s Second
World War history.
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Genocide becomes an issue
Before 1970 Yugoslav historiography rarely used the word genocide, or genocid
in Serbo‑Croatian; it was mainly connected to international law and associ‑
ated with Nazi‑German war crimes.46 In 1966 the concept of genocide was
introduced in the last chapter of Mirko Peršen’s study Ustaški Logori (Ustasha
Camps) to deine the scope of terror committed by the Ustasha in the camps
in the ndh. Peršen referred to the United Nations’ genocide convention, but he
also associated the crime of genocide with Nazi and Gestapo terror methods.47
In the early 1970s, however, two studies of the Second World War, authored
by Vladimir Dedijer and Mladen Colić, openly focused on genocide as an
aspect of Yugoslav war history.
Dedijer’s Istorija Jugoslavije
In Vladimir Dedijer’s chapters on the Second World War in Istorija Jugoslavije
(History of Yugoslavia) from 1972, the issue of genocide occupied a prominent
position. he word genocide was mentioned in a chapter headline; it was
described as a concept; and it was referred to in the text.48
Describing the persecution of Serbs in the ndh, Dedijer argued that the
Ustasha were driven partly by the ideology and war aims of Nazi‑Germany,
which they served, and partly by radical Croatian nationalism as championed
by the so‑called Frankists (Frankovci) in the early 20th century:
hus in 1941 two nationalist positions colluded, the great‑German and the Frankist‑
Ustasha, which developed into racism. From Hitler, Pavelić also adopted the met‑
hods of denationalization of other peoples, no longer just by way of assimilation
through cultural genocide, such as nationalist politicians had proposed in earlier
periods, but through nationalization of territory, through its fundamental clean‑
sing of all those belonging to a people doomed to annihilation, that is, through
pure genocide.49
In this analysis, Dedijer introduces a distinction between cultural genocide,
kulturni genocid, by which he refers to eforts to assimilate diferent cultural
groups by removing cultural symbols and practices, but otherwise leaving the
human carriers of these symbols and practices alive, and pure genocide, čisti
genocid, which is the direct elimination of certain human beings from an area,
either by killing or expulsion. he Ustasha’s massacres and persecution of Serbs
were pure genocide, the method of which having been learned from Nazism.
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hough Dedijer emphasises that the idea to persecute Serbs also had Croatian
roots, and that it was realised by Pavelić’ Ustasha movement, he nevertheless
ascribes the main initiative and responsibility behind the genocide of Serbs to
Hitler and the Nazis. Like earlier accounts of the war, Dedijer’s presentation
argues that the German occupiers exploited and encouraged internal Yugoslav
enmities. he Chetniks, according to Dedijer, constituted the other side of
this politics, equally committing pure genocide:
… Hitler had not arranged this destiny only for the Serbian people … It is sig‑
niicant that also the right wing of the Serbian bourgeoisie, headed by Draža
Mihailović and Milan Nedić, used the Hitlerist concept of genocide (territorial
cleansing) against Muslims and Croats.50
Included in this argument is the point that the Serbian war criminals were
hardly any better than the Croatian ones, and that both sides had their trai‑
tors and war criminals. hus guilt of war crimes was nationally balanced, and
much of the responsibility was externalised, assumed to belong mainly with
the Nazi occupiers.
Nevertheless, Dedijer suggested that the wartime massacres were also an
internal Yugoslav issue, rather than solely initiated and organized by the oc‑
cupiers. Some of the accounts of massacres recounted in Dedijer’s narrative
of the war were ascribed to “the social psychology of the peasantry”. Dedijer
argued that confessional and national diferences, as well as inluence from
chauvinist circles and pressure from the Ustasha onslaught, made Serbian
peasants attack and plunder Croat and Muslim villages.51
In general, Yugoslav massacres occupied a signiicant part of the chapters.
Region by region, Dedijer mentioned campaigns and incidents: he Ustasha’s
murdering of Serbs in Hercegovina and Bosnia, revenge attacks by Serbian
rioters on Muslim civilians, Chetnik terror against Muslims and Croats and
Partisans’ counter‑terror in Montenegro and Hercegovina against villages seen
as pro‑Chetnik, and against class enemies.52 he references to this “terror”,
“sharp course” and dogmatism of the Partisans were similar to some of the
points made by Rasim Hurem.
Dedijer’s history of Yugoslavia’s Second World War was an account thema‑
tizing, amongst other issues, inter‑Yugoslav conlicts and violence. Parts of his
war history focused on cultural and ethnic conlicts instead of clashes between
occupiers and patriotic resistance or class‑based conlict between progressive
workers and fascist bourgeoisie. By using the term genocide, Dedijer underlined
that the victims of these conlicts and massacres were cultural and ethnic groups
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rather than individuals or progressive working people. Dedijer’s emphasis on
the war as also being an ethnic war was probably the most important new
perspective introduced into the debate.
Dedijer’s version of Yugoslavia’s wartime history met considerable criticism
from the academic historiography side. While most reviewers welcomed the
attempt to write a general synthesis of the war, they disapproved of Dedijer’s
text. hough his approach was described as interesting, his work was largely
seen as a piece of subjectivist essay‑writing, troubled by numerous factual er‑
rors, hence not a piece of proper historiography.53 Two reviewers speciically
criticised Dedijer’s treatments of war crime and massacres, suggesting that he
had a craving for sensational stories. One of them further pointed out that
Dedijer’s description of a particular massacre at Glina was incorrect and was
probably the result of his confusing two diferent massacres, and the reviewer,
suggesting that Dedijer’s igures for Serbian war losses were signiicantly over‑
estimated, warned against the uncritical parading of numbers of victims.54 his
comment seems to emphasise the need for a responsible and sober treatment
of the more troublesome sides of Yugoslavia’s wartime history – an approach
that was not to characterise later treatments of the issue.
Colić’ Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska
While Dedijer’s wartime history and his focus on war crimes and genocide
were not received very positively among his academic colleagues, some shared
his perspective. In 1973, the year after Istorija Jugoslavije, Mladen Colić’ study
Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska 1941., (the so‑called Independent State
of Croatia, 1941) was published. A main part of the book was based on Colić’
magister thesis, which was defended at Belgrade University. According to a
reviewer in the Croatian historical journal Časopis za suvremenu povijest, this
was the best part of the book, whereas the rest was less well researched.55
Colić claimed that no work until then had treated in detail and complete‑
ness the establishment and development of the Ustasha movement and the
role and place of the ndh in the occupation system in Yugoslavia. His book
was intended as a modest contribution to the historical investigation of this,
“… for the sake of a more complete view on the proper place and evaluation
of the really anti‑national, anti‑Yugoslav, anti‑communist, criminal, traitorous
and servant role of the Ustasha and the ndh…”56
In the Colić account, as in Dedijer’s, the politics of the ndh was described
as genocide: “he Ustasha government began the terror already in the irst days
after the establishment of the ndh. … he terror took the massive measure
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and character of genocide.”57 hough the groups of victims mentioned as be‑
ing subjected to terror politics included communists, Serbs, Jews, Roma and
all other pro‑Yugoslav anti‑fascists, it was emphasised that a large part of the
terror was aimed mainly at Serbs. Massacres of Serbs were represented as a
purposeful efort to change the ethnic structure of the population of the ndh
by annihilating the Serbian population as well as all antifascists from the rows
of Croats and Muslims in Bosnia and Hercegovina. he Colić account gives
numerous examples of the massacres in villages and of people being thrown
into ravines, and of the mass slaughtering of Serbs.58
Furthermore, the forced conversion of Serbs was described as a state plan
aimed at their removal as an ethnic community.59 Colić, like many before him,
stated that the Catholic Church carried a great deal of the responsibility for
events in the ndh, since Church representatives with few exceptions placed
themselve openly and unconditionally in the state’s service, and a considerable
number of the lower clergy belonged to the rows of the Ustasha slaughterers.
In Colić’ account, the Catholic Church was also ascribed the responsibility for
inciting genocide: “he leadership of the Catholic Church in ndh … eagerly
accepted ndh and Pavelić. It had thereby, on its side, given the initial stroke
to the Ustasha state to ight on religious and national foundations, committing
the crime of genocide.”60
Mladen Colić’ perspective on the history of the ndh was inspired by Ed‑
mond Paris’ Genocide in Satellite Croatia 1941-1945, which was published 1961
in Chicago. In this work, Paris thematized the Ustasha’s murderous persecu‑
tion of Serbs as genocide in accordance with the Genocide convention of the
United Nations. Paris compared the anti‑Serbian politics of the ndh to the
Holocaust and to the genocide on the Armenian population in the Ottoman
Empire, claiming that “the greatest genocide during the Second World War,
in proportion to a nation’s population, took place not in Nazi‑Germany, but
in the Nazi‑created puppet state of Croatia”.61 According to Colić, Paris in
this account pioneered in placing the necessary emphasis on the crimes of the
Ustasha.62
In thematizing the crimes in the ndh as genocide, Colić, like Dedijer,
described the victims primarily as members of ethnic communities. In the
Colić study, the emphasis in his examination of the ndh was outspokenly on
the persecution of Serbs, though he might just as well, from the same logic,
have discussed the mass killing of Jews or Roma.
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Towards a theme of genocide?
Numerous similarities exist between Dedijer’s Second World War chapters in
Istorija Jugoslavije and Mladen Colić’ Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska
1941. Both emphasise internal Yugoslav conlicts and massacres addressed from
the perspective of genocide. In both accounts, the main victims are subject to
ethnically motivated persecution. he massacres are, so to say, “Yugoslavised”
and situated within an ethnic logic. he extent of this, however, is limited.
he perpetrators are distanced from the Yugoslav peoples as such. A main part
of the initiative behind the inter‑Yugoslav massacres remains ascribed to the
occupiers’ manipulation, and the Chetniks are seen as the Serbian equivalent
to the Ustasha in this project.63
he almost simultaneous introduction of the issue of genocide by Colić and
Dedijer deserves further consideration. Why was the perspective of genocide
brought into Yugoslav Second World War history in the early 1970s?
he emphasis of massacres and genocide in Dedijer’s account of Yugoslavia’s
Second World War may have a lot to do with his personal worldview. Dedi‑
jer was confronted with and repeatedly engaged in discussions on genocide
through his career: During the Second World War, he assisted in collecting
sources documenting war crimes of the occupiers and their domestic col‑
laborators; he was present when the United Nations negotiated the Genocide
convention in the late 1940s; and in the 1960s and 1970s he was a key member
of the grass‑root “Russel Tribunal” that prosecuted and condemned the USA
for genocide in Vietnam.64
Both Dedijer and Colić were acquainted with and inspired by discussions
and studies of genocide outside Yugoslavia. heir emphasis on the genocide
aspect of Second World War history may well be seen as part of a general and
international turn towards such issues within historiography and social sciences.
his was also expressed in the growth of Holocaust and genocide studies as
international scholarly ields in the 1970s, and in the discussions of genocide
and Holocaust that were beginning to generally appear in Western Europe,
North America and Israel, the Russel Tribunal being one example of this.65
At the core of this turn there also lay a growing focus on people rather than
states as historical actors, and on civilians rather than military as victims and
heroes.
By applying the perspective of genocide, the Dedijer and Colić accounts
of Second World War history emphasised exactly civilian and ethno‑national
victimhood, as well as internal Yugoslav conlict. hereby, they were part of an
increasing presence of nationalism and ethnicity in Yugoslav history writing,
which was in part an efect of the establishment of national research institutions
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usable history?
and national prerogatives within professional historiography. Yet, the writings
of these books had hardly been possible without the general loosening of the
narrative of the Partisan war.
Dedijer’s and Colić’s introduction of the issue of genocide did not signal
an immediate rise in Yugoslav genocide studies. hough the interest in the
history of war crimes was clearly increasing, this was not automatically ac‑
companied by a growing focus on the issue of genocide. In the late 1970s,
several thorough and well researched studies of the Ustasha were published,
particularly from the side of Zagreb‑based historians. In Fikreta Jelić‑Butić’s
Ustaše i Nezavisna Država Hrvatska 1941-1945 (he Ustasha and the Independent
State of Croatia 1941-1945), published in Zagreb 1977, the Ustasha movement,
its road to power and particularly its state administration were investigated
in great detail.66 According to Jelić‑Butić, terror was an essential element,
the basic idea, of the Ustasha movement. While their anti‑Semitism was
adopted from German Nazism, the massacres and prosecution against Serbs
was a particular Ustasha project, aimed at the expulsion and extermination
of Serbs as a nation within the ndh.67 hus, in line with Dedijer and Colić,
Jelić‑Butić emphasised the war crimes of the ndh as an internal Yugoslav
matter and part of a particular national program. Nevertheless, she did not
term it genocide.
Jelić‑Butić’ account of Ustasha terror and massacres was close to echoed
in another very detailed investigation and presentation of the Ustasha, made
by Bogdan Krizman, professor of history of law at the University of Zagreb.68
Like Jelić‑Butić, Krizman did not describe the Ustasha’s practices as genocide,
though the concept was obviously known to him, as in one of his introductions,
he referred to Edmond Paris’ Genocide in Satellite Croatia for a description of
“he Ustasha genocide”.69
It was an increasing tendency within Yugoslav historiography to investigate
war crimes and anti‑Partisan forces, both aspects that were overlooked by earlier
accounts of the war. hus, from the 1970s, the ethnic tensions and political
conlicts that were among the main causes for the internal Yugoslav massa‑
cres and violence committed during the Second World War, but which had
remained largely backgrounded in the patriotic all‑Yugoslav accounts written
in the irst post‑war decades, were gradually written into war historiography.
Yet, historians with an institutional connection to the regime seem to have
avoided obvious thematization of ethnic conlict and genocide. his was left
to more independent maverick historians like Dedijer. Not before the 1980s
was the concept of genocide to take a dominant position in Yugoslav historical
culture.
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107
N ote s
1
See Russinow, he Yugoslav Experiment, 179f.
2
Ramet, Nationalism and Federalism in Yugoslavia, 55‑56, 73f.
3
Ibid, 104‑140. For a contemporary account of the Students’ protests, see D. Plamenic,
‘he Belgrade Student insurrection’, New Left Review, 54, 1969, 61‑78. On “Maspok”,
see George Schöplin, ‘he Ideology of Croatian Nationalism’, Survey – A journal of East
and West studies, 19, 1973, 1, 123‑146.
4
Ramet, Nationalism and Federalism, 156f, 195.
5
Lampe, Yugoslavia as history, 276‑321.
6
Pavlowitch, Yugoslavia, 287‑288, 305‑307.
7
Gross, ‘Die Jugoslawische Geschichtswissenschaft von heute’, 242‑245.
8
Dimitrije Djordjević, ‘Yugoslavia. Work in Progress’, in Donald Cameron Watt, ed.,
9
Ibid, 251.
10
Stanković and Dimić, Istoriograija pod nadzorom, 230.
11
Ibid, 230‑237.
12
Zbornik dokumenata i podataka o narodno-oslobodilačkom ratu jugoslovenskih naroda, i‑ix,
Contemporary History in Europe, London: George Allen and Unwin, 1969, 250.
1‑166, Belgrade, 1949‑1965.
13
Gross, ‘Die Jugoslawische Geschichtswissenschaft von heute’, 239.
14
Drago Roksandić, ‘Globalna istorija i istorijska svest’, Marksistička misao, 1983, 4, 54. See
15
Roksandić, ‘Globalna istorija i istorijska svest’, 50‑51.
16
Wayne S. Vucinich, ‘Nationalism and Communism’, in Wayne S. Vucinich, ed., Con-
also Djordjević, ‘Yugoslavia. Work in Progress’, 254.
temporary Yugoslavia. Twenty Years of Socialist Experiment, Berkeley and Los Angeles:
University of California Press, 1969, 280‑281; Milorad Ekmečić, ‘Odgovor na neke kri‑
tike “Istorije Jugoslavije” (xix Vijek)’, Jugoslovenski Istorijski Časopis, 13, 1974, 1‑2, 280.
17
Velimir Terzić, Jugoslavija u aprilskom ratu, Titograd: Graički zavod, 1963, 498‑499;
Franjo Tuđman, ‘Narodnooslobodilački rat’, Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol. 4, Zagreb,
1960, 273‑278; Franjo Tuđman, Okupacija i revolucija, Zagreb: Institut za Historiju
Radničkog Pokreta, 1963, 211‑212. See also Wayne S. Vucinich, ‘Nationalism and
Communism’, 277.
18
See e.g. Marković, ‘Istoričari i jugoslovensto’, 154‑155, Vucinich, ‘Nationalism and
Communism’, 277; Shoup, Communism and the Yugoslav national question, 198‑201.
19
Schöplin, ‘he Ideology of Croatian Nationalism’, 133‑134. hough there were appa‑
rently no attempts to rehabilitate Pavelić and the ndh as such, it has been argued that
the outburst of Croatian nationalism and reports of anti‑Serbian demonstrations caused
deep worries among the Serbian minority in Croatia. See D. MacKenzie, ‘Yugoslavia
since 1964’, in G.W. Simmonds, ed., Nationalism in the USSR and Eastern Europe in the
era of Brezhnev and Kosygin, Detroit: University of Detroit Press, 1977, 454.
1228_usable_history_3k.indd 107
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108
usable history?
20 Bruno Bušić, ‘Žrtve rata’, Hrvatski Književni List, 15th July 1969, 3. A similar argument
was posed from a more marginal side by Zvonimir Kulundžić in his Tragedija Hrvatske
Historiograije. O falsiikatorima, birokratima, negatorima Hrvatske Povijesti, Zagreb:
Vlastita Naklada, 1970, 5‑6. See also Ante Cuvalo, he Croatian National Movement
1966-1972, New York: Columbia University Press, 1990, 115‑125, for a survey of the hi‑
story debates from the perspective of the Croatian nationalists.
21
‘Deset godina Instituta za historiju radničkog pokreta Hrvatske’ Časopis za Suvremenu
Povijest, 4, 1972, 1, 234. Franjo Tuđman was director of the Croatian Institute of the
History of the Workers’ Movement from its establishment in 1961. In 1972 he was im‑
prisoned, accused mainly of contacts with émigré circles. See Darko Hudelist, Tuđman:
Biograija, Zagreb: Proil, 2004, 303f, 428f, 484f; Sava Bosnić, ‘he political career and
writings of Franjo Tudjman’, South Slav Journal, 14, 1991, no. 1‑2.
22
Michael B. Petrović, ‘Continuing Nationalism in Yugoslav Historiography’, Nationalities
Papers, 6, 1978, 2, 164.
23
See Mirjana Gross, ‘Ideja jugoslavenstva u xix. Stolječu u “Istoriji Jugoslavije”’, Časopis
za Suvremenu Povijest, no. 2, 1973, 8‑21; Vera Ciliga, ‘O interpretaciji hrvatske povijest
xix. st. u “Istoriji Jugoslavije”’, Časopis za Suvremenu Povijest, no. 2, 1973, 22‑31; Mirjana
Gross, ‘Ideja jugoslavenstva u xix., stoljeću i “Dogmatski Nacionalizam”’, Jugoslovenski
Istorijski Časopis, 1975, 3‑4, 121‑160; Vera Ciliga, ‘O pogledima Milorada Ekmečića na
hrvatsku povijest’, Jugoslovenski Istorijski Časopis, 1975, 3‑4, 161‑169. For Ekmečić’ an‑
swers, see Ekmečić, ‘Odgovor na neke kritike’, 217‑281; Milorad Ekmečić, ‘Završna riječ
o polemici sa Mirjanom Gross’, Jugoslovenski Istorijski Časopis, 1976, 1‑2, 150‑156.
24 Ekmečić, ‘Odgovor na neke kritike’, 276f. See also Petrović, ‘Continuing Nationalism in
Yugoslav Historiography’, 163, 171‑173.
25
See also Marković, ‘Istoričari i jugoslovensto’, 157‑159.
26 Höpken, ‘Von der Mythologisierung zur Stigmatisierung’, 178f.
27 ‘Intervju Predsednika Tita Radio‑Televiziji Beograd’, Politika, 24th May 1972, 6.
28
Ibid. See also Pavlowitch, he improbable survivor, 33, 132.
29 ‘Istoriograija i revolucija’, Gledišta, 1972, 1, particularly 32, 34, 35, 40‑41, 63‑64; See also
‘Šta reći o revoluciji danas’, NIN, 13th February 1972, 40.
30 Žerjavić, Opsesije i Megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleiburga, 33‑36; Bogosavljević, ‘he
unresolved Genocide’, 152‑155.
31
Hurem, Kriza NOP-a u Bosni i Hercegovini, 9.
32
Ibid, 11. For an example of this traditional ‘epic’ version, see the oicial history of the
Communist Party of Yugoslavia: Rodoljub Čolaković, Dragoslav Janković and Pero
Morača, eds., Pregled istorije saveza komunista Jugoslavije, Beograd: Institut za izučavanje
radničkog pokreta, 1963, 362.
33
Hurem, Kriza NOP-a u Bosni i Hercegovini, 155, also 279‑283.
34
Ibid, 146.
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35
Ibid, 142.
36
Ibid, 149.
37
Ibid, 150‑151.
38
Ibid, 153, 155.
39
109
Nebojša Popov, ‘Les formes et le caractere des conlits sociaux’, Praxis. Revue Philosophique, edition internationale, 8, 1971, 3‑4, 355‑356.
40 See Husnija Kamberović, ‘Najnoviji pogledi na Drugi svetski rat u Bosni i Hercegovini’,
in Husnija Kamberović, ed., 60 godina od završetka Drugog svetskog rata – kako se sjećati
1945. godine, Sarajevo: Institut za istoriju, 2006, 25‑29.
41
he Institute of the History of the Workers’ Movement in Sarajevo was founded in 1959
with the aim to investigate “major questions of the history of the establishment and de‑
velopment of the labour movement in Bosnia and Hercegovina, the National Liberation
War and Revolution as well as the period of construction of the socialist society”. Enver
Redžić, ‘Riječ redakcije’, Prilozi, 1, 1965, 1, 4‑5. In 1973, as the Institute was renamed the
Institute for History, its program of orientation was signiicantly expanded to include
“research and academic treatment of the history of the peoples and nationalities of Bos‑
nia and Hercegovina and Yugoslavia … from the arrival of the Slavs in this region to
today”. Nikola Babić, ‘Riječ redakcije’, Prilozi, 9, 1973, 1, 9.
42 ‘Diskusija o knjizi dr Rasima Hurema Kriza narodnooslobodilačkog pokreta u Bosni i
Hercegovini krajem 1941. i početkom 1942. godine’, Prilozi, 11‑12, 1975‑1976, 343‑344. At
the conference “avnoj i Narodnooslobodilčka borba u Bosni i Hercegovini (1942‑1943)”
held in Sarajevo on 22nd and 23rd November 1973, Party historian Pero Morača strongly
criticised Hurem’s thesis about the kpj’s emphasis on class struggle. See Pero Morača, ‘O
jednoj interpretaciji razvitka nop‑a u bih krajem 1941. i početkom 1942. godine’, in av‑
noj i Narodnooslobodilčka borba u Bosni i Hercegovini (1942-1943). Materijali sa naučnog
skupa održanog u Sarajevu 22. i 23. novembra 1973. godine, Belgrade: Rad, 1974, 97‑112.
43
‘Diskusija o knjizi dr Rasima Hurema’, 357.
44 Ibid, 356‑357, 360, 362‑362.
45
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Communist Party’s “left deviations” in 1941 and
1942 were the subject of several studies; e.g. Miša Leković, ‘Reagovanje cnetralnog komi‑
teta kpj i Vrhovnog štaba na razvoj situacije u Crnoj Gori u toku 1942. godine’, Istorjski
Zapisi, 22, 1969, 2‑3, 421‑433; Đuro Vujović, ‘O lijevim greškama kpj u Crnoj Gori u
prvoj polovini 1942. godine narodnosolobodilačkog rata’, Istorijski Zapisi, 20, 1967, 1,
45‑113; Branko Petranović, ‘O levim skretanjima kpj krajem 1941. i u prvoj polovini
1942. godine’, Zbornik za istoriju, 1971, 39‑82. See also Morača, ‘O jednoj interpretaciji
razvitka nop‑a’, 97 and note 1.
46 See e.g. the military encyclopaedia, Vojna Enciklopedija, vol. 3, Belgrade: 1960, 340.
47 Mirko Peršen, Ustaški Logori, Zagreb: Stvarnost, 1966, 177‑178, 165.
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110
usable history?
48 Božić, et al., Istorija Jugoslavije, 457, 467f. Dedijer also introduced the concept of
genocide to describe Austro‑Hungarian practices against Serbs in Bosnia during the
First World War, see ibid, 392, 394‑396. Dedijer was a former top communist and close
employee of Milovan Djilas in the Department for Agitation and Propaganda. As aut‑
hor of a renowned wartime diary and Tito’s oicial biography from 1953, Dedijer used
to be some sort of oicial party historian of the war. However, as he followed Djilas in
the latter’s fall from grace, Dedijer spent years banned from the Yugoslav public sphere,
travelling between various European and North American universities. From the late
1960s, however, Dedijer returned to the Yugoslav historians’ scene, inter alia as corre‑
sponding member of the historical department of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and
Arts. See e.g. his obituary in Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti Godišnjak XCVII za
1990, Belgrade: sanu, 1991, 471‑473.
49 Božić et al., Istorija Jugoslavije, 467. he Frankists were followers of Josip Frank and his
politics of Croatian national uniication within the Austro‑Hungarian monarchy, in the
late 19th and early 20th centuries. Frank and his followers were radically anti‑Serbian and
viewed Serbian identity as an act of political treason. See e.g. Ivo Banac, he National
Question in Yugoslavia. Origins, History, Politics, New York: Cornell University Press,
1994, 94f, 260f.
50
Božić et al., Istorija Jugoslavije, 467. See also 473.
51
Ibid, 480‑481.
52
Ibid, 477‑478, 481, 498, 500‑501, 519.
53
See ‘Diskusije o “Istoriji Jugoslavije”’, Gledišta, 14, 1973, 3, particularly 268, 276‑277,
317; Ivan Jelić, ‘O pristupu povijesti jugoslovenske revolucije u “Istoriji Jugoslavije”’,
Časopis za suvremenu povijest, 2, 1973, 63‑64; Slobodan Žarić, ‘O nekim pitanjima pri‑
kaza NOB‑a i revolucije u “Istoriji Jugoslavije”’, Časopis za suvemenu povijest, 2, 1973,
72‑73. See also Kosta Nikolić, Prošlost bez istorije. Polemike u jugoslovenskoj istoriograiji
1961-1991, Belgrade: Institut za savremanu istoriju, 2003, 46‑56 and Petrovich, ‘Continu‑
ing Nationalism in Yugoslav Historiography’, 165.
54
See Đuro Stanisavljević’ and Alija Bojić’ contributions in ‘Diskusije o “Istoriji Jugosla‑
vije”’, Gledišta, 14, 1973, 3, 290, 308‑309.
55
Rafael Brčić, ‘O knjizi Mladena Colića’, Časopis za suremenu povijest, 4, 1974, 3, 121f. See
also Nikolić’ Prošlost bez istorije, 67f.
56
Mladen Colić, Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska 1941., Belgrade: Delta Press, 1973,
4.
57
Ibid, 341.
58
Ibid, 356f.
59
Ibid, 367.
60 Ibid, 167, 175, quote on p. 402.
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chapter 6
61
111
Edmond Paris, Genocide in Satellite Croatia, 1941-1945. A Record of Racial and Religious
Persecution and Massacres, Chicago: he American Institute of Balkan Afairs, 1962
(translated from the French by Lois Perkins, irst published in 1961), 3f, 9.
62 Colić, Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, 4.
63
Ibid, 401.
64 Dedijer, Vatikan i Jasenovac:, 9‑11; See also Det internationale Krigsforbrydelsestribunal,
2. session, Danmark 1967, and Dedijer and Elhaim, eds., Tribunal Russel. See also his
biography in Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti Godišnjak za 1978, Belgrade, 1979,
431‑432.
65
Fein: Genocide: A Sociological Perspective, 5; Hansen: ‘Folkemord gennem 50 år’, 42‑44.
In Israel, public interest developed after the Eichman trial in Jerusalem in 1961, and
since the 1970s the Holocaust has been frequently referred to in political discourse,
Kenan: Between Memory and History; Ofer: ‘Israel’. In the USA, public interest in the
Holocaust, which was hardly identiied as a particular tragedy until the end of the
1960s, rose markedly from the 1970s. Novick, he Holocaust and Collective Memory.
See also Tea Sindbæk, ‘Anden Verdenskrigs massakrer og folkedrab og genopdagelsen af
ofrene – tendenser inden for det socialistiske Jugoslaviens historiograi i et internationalt
perspektiv’, Den Jyske Historiker, 112, 2006, 145‑156 / Tea Sindbæk, ‘Masakri i genocid
počinjeni u Drugom svetskom ratu i ponovno otkrivanje žrtava’ in Kamberović, ed., 60
godina od završetka Drugog svetskog rata – kako se sjećati 1945. godine, 63‑74, and the In‑
troduction to this book.
66 Jelić‑Butić, Ustaše i nezavisna država Hrvatska. On Ustasha terror see particularly 159f;
on village massacres, particularly 166‑167. Jelić‑Butić was educated in Zagreb and
employed at the Institute for the History of the Workers’ Movement in Zagreb. Ustaše
i nezavisna država Hrvatska 1941-45 was her doctoral thesis, defended in Belgrade and
later published in Zagreb.
67 Ibid, 163, 158, 178.
68 Krizman’s study of the Ustasha movement was published in several volumes: Bogdan
Krizman, Pavelić i Ustaše, Zagreb: Globus, 1978; Bogdan Krizman, Pavelić između
Hitlera i Mussolinija, Zagreb: Globus, 1980; Bogdan Krizman, Ustaše i treći Reich (2
volumes), Zagreb: Globus, 1982. His descriptions of Ustasha massacres are mainly in
Krizman, Pavelić između Hitlera i Mussolinija, 123f, 124‑126 in particular.
69 Ibid, 8.
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Public commemorations and
popular culture, 1960‑1980
7
In the 1960s and 1970s, the temporal distance to the Second World War
approached a generation and the obvious signs of warfare were fading and
covered by the reconstructed Yugoslavia. he Partisan war was thus becom‑
ing history and had to be commemorated in words and monuments in order
to remain present in the Yugoslav public sphere. By then, war crimes and
massacres took a more prominent position in popular historical culture and
public manifestations of war history. In 1966 a monument was raised for the
victims of Jasenovac, testifying to the need to represent and commemorate
wartime massacres. he sufering and massacres of the war were described and
commemorated more explicitly in new collections of Partisan songs and in
feature ilms about the Partisan war. And along with the teaching of numerous
strategic details of the war, school pupils had to read about the history of war
crimes and the perspective of genocide.
his chapter explores how public communications of history, in the forms
of memorials, song collections, ilms and schoolbooks, addressed questions
related to internal Yugoslav war crimes. It shows how popular representations
of wartime history, parallel to the revision and readdressing of the Partisan war
within academic historiography, relected a growing interest in the massacres
as such, while school books retained a more conservative perspective on war
history.
he memorial area of Jasenovac
he ields on which the Ustasha’s infamous concentration camp complex
Jasenovac had been situated constituted a particularly troublesome “site of
memories” from the Second World War in Yugoslavia.1 Immediately after
the war, the bombed areas of the camp were cleared. Most of the buildings
and interior disappeared, possibly to be reused in the reconstruction of the
surrounding villages. Nothing happened to the site of the camp as such for
more than a decade.
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Yet, the camp system at Jasenovac remained a central issue in Yugoslav
historical culture. As has been shown already in this book, Jasenovac was
described in reports and memoirs immediately after the war.2 In the follow‑
ing decades, academic as well as general public interest in the history of the
camp was steadily growing, which can be seen from the increasing number of
publications dedicated to that subject.3 In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Jase‑
novac was described as the most horrible example of the brutality of the Axis
occupiers and the Ustasha, modelled after Nazi annihilation camps elsewhere
in Europe. According to Mirko Peršen’s study of the Ustasha concentration
camps, printed in 1966, camp III in the Jasenovac camp complex “… was in a
true sense a factory of death and could by its cruel deeds and large number of
murdered men, women and children be compared to the largest annihilation
camps in Nazi Germany”.4
Usually, Jasenovac was assumed to have cost the lives of around
600,000‑700,000 prisoners. hese were also the numbers given in various en‑
cyclopaedias, which, as standard reference works edited by large professional
boards, summarised the oicial stances of research and knowledge on the con‑
cepts described. In Enciklopedija Jugoslavije (the Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia),
volume 4, from 1960, under the heading ‘Jasenovački logor’ (the camp of Jase‑
novac) it was stated that the exact number of victims could not be established,
but that an estimate founded on documents and testimonies from victims and
Ustasha guards suggested that around 700,000 were killed there. According to
this publication, the victims were “antifascist Serbs and Croats, as well as Jews
and Gypsies.”5 hus, Serbs as a nation were not singled out as victims. his was
diferent in Vojna Enciklopedija (the Military Encyclopaedia), volume 10, from
1967, where, under the heading ‘Ustasha’, one could read: “Mass annihilations
of Serbs, Jews and antifascists were conducted in Ustasha concentration camps:
In Jasenovac about 600,000 …”.6 Following a description of the Ustasha’s per‑
secution and mass murder of Serbs and Jews in the ndh, this exact phrase was
reprinted under the heading ‘Ustasha’ in the Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, volume
8, from 1971, with due reference to Vojna Enciklopedija.7
he Jasenovac camp system was an obvious symbol of the sufering of
the war. Yet, its importance in Yugoslav historical culture was probably also
enriched by the very large estimated number of victims, which, as the total
number of war victims was oicially established to be 1,706,000, meant that
the number of victims of Jasenovac alone would have constituted between 35%
to 41% of all victims of the war.8
he irst attempts to preserve the remains of the actual site of the camp
system in Jasenovac and the numerous mass graves in connection with it were
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115
made in the late 1950s.9 In 1966, on the initiative of the Yugoslav association
of veterans of the National Liberation Struggle, a monument in the shape of
a giant lower was erected. he lower was chosen to symbolise the strength
of life.10 In the crypt below the lower, lines from Kovačić’ poem ‘Jama’, prais‑
ing peaceful homely happiness, was engraved. In 1968 a memorial area was
established, housing a research institution and museum of the camp system of
Jasenovac, as well as an exhibition cinema showing documentary ilms about
the camp.11 According to a tourist guide from 1986, the permanent exhibi‑
tion at the memorial museum “ofered many documents and details about
the criminal activities of the occupiers and domestic traitors, as well as about
what happened in the camp system. It is a striking testimony of horror and
terror.”12
he memorial museum in Jasenovac was a monument for the victims
of the Ustasha in general, and while the national aspects were increasingly
included in war history, for Serbs and Jews in particular. Yet, it was also a
monument of the inhumanity of the enemies, and thus of the victory of the
Partisans in the great Yugoslav narrative of the Liberation Struggle. School
children were bussed there on educational excursions.13 Even by the end of
Ill. 7.1. he monument at the
site of the concentration camp at
Jasenovac, Kameni cvijet (Stone
lower) designed by architect
Bogdan Bogdanović, erected
1966. Photo: Polfoto.
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usable history?
the 1980s, Jasenovac was emphasised as an important means for educating the
citizens of the self‑managing socialist society.14 he monument and memorial
museum at Jasenovac thus represented existential needs to remember human
loss and sufering, combined with remembrance of victims of particular
nations, and a politically toned, institutionalised commemoration of the
Partisan’s victory.15
In the 1970s, the monument represented a general consensus of communist
wartime commemoration. However, through the monument and museum,
Jasenovac was becoming one of the main symbols, or stock references, of war‑
time history in general and of Ustasha crimes in particular. As such, it was to
become a main focus of Serbian genocide history in the 1980s, and a central
element of Serbian national remembrance. By the end of the 1980s, the his‑
tory of Jasenovac would be sharply disputed among historians from various
Yugoslav republics. he monument and symbol of Jasenovac only began to
cause national tensions when it became contested as a national symbol and
was invested with signiicant national loading.
Apart from the Jasenovac memorial area, numerous monuments were raised
in honour of the Partisans throughout the Titoist period. According to one
observer, 14,000 monuments were raised for the Partisans between 1947 and
1965.16 Victims of war crimes and massacres were also commemorated. In
Herzegovina, on the initiative of predominantly Serbian Partisan veterans,
memorials were raised to commemorate the victims of the Ustasha. In some
cases, local Croats held responsible for Ustasha crimes were allegedly pressured
to pay the costs of these memorials.17 Also in Eastern Bosnia, memorials were
raised to the victims of “Fascism”.18
As in the historical accounts, ethnic aspects of the war and its internal
conlicts were never foregrounded on monuments. Often, only the names of
the victims were listed, while perpetrators remained unnamed. Some victims
were not really commemorated at all: in Eastern Bosnia, according to one
observer, monuments for Muslim victims hardly existed, even though numer‑
ous innocent civilian Muslims had been killed.19 he Muslim population had
been the main recruiting basis for the local Ustasha, while the majority of the
Partisans were Serbs, who also dominated the post‑war political system. hese
examples demonstrate how the politics of commemoration were signiicantly
interwoven with political agenda and power, also on the local level.
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Partisan poetry
Collections of Partisan poetry and war songs were continuously printed
throughout the Titoist period. In the 1970s, songs printed in these collections
increasingly addressed themes of war crimes and massacres. Terror and mas‑
sacres were accounted for more explicitly, and victims were to a larger extent
identiied nationally. Some songs and poems described particular events and
individual massacres.
Partisan songs
At times references to massacres and crimes were mainly used to stigmatise the
partisans’ opponents as traitors and criminals. In a song called “he Partisans
from Zelengora”, Ante Pavelić is warned that he will receive a judgement for
his crimes. he song refers to some of the most infamous Ustasha practices:
Partisans from Zelengora
Pass by Pavelić’ court,
Judge him for what he has done,
He killed boys and girls,
He killed old men and women,
He illed pits and caves,
He depopulated villages and towns
…20
Unlike the emphasis on Pavelić’s responsibility for massacres and harassments
of civilians, the Chetniks, as in earlier songs and accounts, were mainly seen
as national traitors. An example is the song “traitors”, the focus of which is
Chetnik collaboration:
hey carry the Serbian tricolour,
But with the Germans they go to war!
…
Oh Chetniks, shameful cowards,
for you traitors is a beautiful name.
…21
In comparison to earlier collections of Partisan lyrics, violence and massacres
featured prominently in an anthology of poems and songs from the moun‑
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tainous area Kordun in Croatian Krajina, one of the places where the Ustasha
persecution of Serbs had been most brutal. he songs were collected from
various sources, but all allegedly originated from Kordun. In this collection,
printed in 1971, it was often explicitly stated that the victims of massacres were
Serbs. An example is the song “At Kordun, the sun has darkened”:
At Kordun, the sun has darkened,
Great and small began to cry
When darkness overloaded Veljun,
Swallowed ive hundred Serbs.
Here remain three hundred widows,
hree hundred families begin to lament.
St. George’s day, do not green,
Enemy, do not celebrate,
Pavelić, may you rot alive,
May you strangle in our blood!22
In a song called “One morning, just at early daybreak”, two ravens testify to
the murdering of Serbian civilians, including women and children:
We watched from night to morning
How the executioner slaughtered the Serbian people;
He cut down the father, then the mother and the son,
the innocent angel in the cradle.23
hus the massacres were indeed commemorated as crimes against the Serbian
people, or, one may say, as national tragedies. In the collection from Kordun
was also printed a song cursing the Ustasha commander Jure Francetić and
his infamous “Black Legion”.24
Epic poems
Besides these short songs, Ustasha massacres in the Kordun area were com‑
memorated in the traditional form of long epic poems. Often these epic songs
start with the narrator calling the people to listen to his story, and then he
describes the scenery and circumstances of the drama. In one of these poems,
“Black St. George’s Day”, the narrator accounts the situation in 1941:
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When through the country a mad wind blew,
When the beast judges without law.
/…/
As soon as Ante moved into Zagreb,
Here the bloody deed began …25
his obviously refers to Ante Pavelić and the Ustasha’s take over of government
in the ndh. he narrator then describes how many good communists were
captured by Pavelić, assisted by Vladko Maček, head of the largest Croatian
Party in the interwar period, he Croat Peasant Party. And the narrator quotes
how Hitler from Berlin sent his orders to Pavelić and the bishop in Zagreb,
Alojzije Stepinac:
Baptize, slaughter those who call themselves Serbs,
Like a butcher who slaughters oxen.
And the Croats who stretch them their hands,
Put them under torture without mercy…26
According to this poem, Hitler and Nazi Germany were the main organ‑
izers of the crimes, and Pavelić, Stepinac and the Ustasha movement were
simply servants. he local Ustasha leaders around Kordun set out to fulil
Hitler’s orders and “clean the country of Serbs”.27 he poem describes how
three drunken Ustasha slaughtered the whole family of a Croat, who called
on other Croats to assist their Serbian brothers and kumovi.28 And on St.
George’s Day, 6th May 1941, according to the poem, the Ustasha collected
six hundred men and killed them: “hese men never returned, / hey illed
the pits in Blagaj…”.29
he poem then narrates how in August the same year, communist Parti‑
sans returned to Kordun and captured the guilty Ustasha, who were forced to
confess the massacre on St. George’s Day. In this way, according to the poem,
the people of Kordun learned about the destiny of their loved ones, and young
men and women of the region took arms to revenge them.
In another epic poem, ‘he bloody massacre at Krnjak’, the narrator de‑
scribes a massacre that he himself witnessed in his youth.30 he date and scenery
is set: It all took place near Krnjak on 29th July 1941. he poem describes how
peasants were called to Krnjak to deliver food to Slovenian victims of Hitler’s
deportation plans, but when the peasants arrived, the Ustasha drove them
together in the local prison:
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hey tied both their feet and hands,
Put them under great torture;
In the rooms of the police barracks
hey tore out their dark black eyes.31
he poem continues to describe how this went on from night to morning,
while the Ustasha collected more peasants from other villages and towns. hey
drove the victims in vans to a place where graves were already dug. he victims
were hit by mallets, knifes and axes and thrown into the pits. Afterwards, the
poem describes how mothers, sisters, young widows and children lamented, and
how the blood lew from the pits into the river where the water was no longer
blue, but illed with blood. Only one victim escaped, namely the narrator of
the poem, who was then able to tell this story, which, it is underlined, is an
account of real events.32
In “he bloody massacre at Krnjak”, the massacres are described in detail
and the place and time are precisely noted. Yet no ethnic aspect of the crime
is considered, neither from the victims side nor that of the perpetrators. In
this poem, events are described as simply the Ustasha massacring peasants and
people from the area around Krnjak. he poem ends by forecasting that the
Communist Party will put an end to these crimes and bring freedom to Kordun.
he poem ‘Bloody song’ describes an Ustasha massacre in a village in
Kordun, on 18th April 1942, “hat heavy and bloody year, / When many heads
fell, /…/ And pits were illed with dead bodies”.33 he men are away from the
village, and barehanded and defenseless women and children attempt to lee
into the mountains:
Listen to the sorrow and shed tears
For the destiny of 500 peasants,
Innocent and owing no one,
Because they carried a Serbian name.34
he Serbian villagers are caught and surrounded by Ustasha units. Some are
gunned down, and others are mutilated and killed with knives:
hey began to slaughter women and old men,
Stabbed the children with knives,
With rile butts cracked the heads;
he streams here lew with blood,
Oh, think, nobody remains,
For everyone lies on the bloody ground.35
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he poem then describes how a young girl saves her small siblings and old
mother from an Ustasha soldier. he soldier is killed, and the girl declares that
his rile is to be hidden and given to the Partisans so that they can revenge
the village.
In the “Bloody song” the Ustasha’s crimes and bestiality are described in
great detail, and it is openly stated that the victims of the crimes are Serbs,
killed and mutilated for no other reason than their Serbian identity. he ul‑
timate heroes are the Partisans, Croats as well as Serbs, who are to return to
secure that “the bill is paid”.36
In general, these epic poems from Kordun are very detailed in their descrip‑
tions of Ustasha torture and massacres.37 At times, they even name particular
Ustasha guards and commanders as directly responsible. he Serbian ethnicity
of the victims is regularly stated and sometimes even clearly thematized. Yet the
instigators and perpetrators are never ascribed a national ailiation. he main
initiators are Pavelić and Hitler, while the perpetrators are Fascists, Ustasha
and national traitors. he poems all praise the multiethnic Partisans, who are
to save the people and take revenge in the end.
War ilms
Within Yugoslav historical culture, feature ilms about the Second World
War constitute some of the most popular and widest reaching representa‑
tions of wartime history. As ictional re‑enactments of real events, these
feature ilms could more creatively and freely than academic or educational
historiography address historical issues. As tableau, the ilmic picture is able
to describe complexity, nuances and contradictions, transferring in one mo‑
ment various contemporary and complementing information to the viewer.
he visual communication of ilm and the use of dramatic efect may convey
stronger emotional appeal and reach a diferent and wider public than the
written word.
he Yugoslav communist regime was well aware of the ideological useful‑
ness of ilm.38 Yet, as a non‑compulsory ofer, ilms work diferently than for
example schoolbooks or youth organisations. Watching a ilm is a freely chosen
activity associated with pleasure and entertainment. And in order to raise an
audience, ilms have to appear suiciently attractive to make the cinema goers
pay the price of the ticket. In the 1960s and 1970s ilms reached large audiences
in Yugoslavia; according to a survey from 1960, going to the cinema was the
most popular leisure activity among Belgrade workers.39
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Since Yugoslavia’s break with the Soviet Union, Yugoslav cinema was largely
oriented toward the West. Films produced in the Western capitalist world were
by far the most popular among the audiences.40 his contributed to a turn
towards a more Western style and tendencies within Yugoslav cinema. Fur‑
thermore, the commercial aspects of ilm production increasingly inluenced
the production of Yugoslav ilms. Even more than adhering to the politically
acceptable, producers had to consider how to make ilms appeal to a large
audience in order to make ilm production economically feasible.
Yugoslavia’s many republican ilm companies constituted a rich and diverse
landscape of ilm production.41 As well as commercialisation, Yugoslav cinema
in the 1960s and 1970s was characterised by cultural exchange and internation‑
alisation. Several large productions were realised in cooperation with Western
ilm companies. Yugoslav cinema was of international high quality, renowned
and experimental.
In this period, feature ilm production was one of the most daring and in‑
novative ields of Yugoslav cultural life. At times, feature ilms even challenged
the sacred narratives of the Partisan war and the Yugoslav revolution, picturing
the Partisans as cynical and whoring, as well as the Stalinist brutality of the
early post‑war years.42 In the end, however, the considerable artistic freedom
of Yugoslav cinema was still subject to political control. Films that were too
controversial or daring risked being banned, in which case they would not be
screened in Yugoslav cinemas.
Partisan ilms
A large amount of the ilms produced in the Titoist period were some sort of
representation of the Partisan war, particularly so in the early post‑war decades.
Most feature ilms produced until 1951 idealized the Partisan struggle or
pictured revolutionary enthusiasm in the struggle for reconstruction of the
war‑torn country. he Partisans were represented in naïve, simplistic narratives
of black and white stereotypes.43
In the 1950s, the Partisan war ilm genre gradually expanded, as a wave of
new realism in the war ilms addressed the tragic and human dimension of the
warfare, and the psychological dilemmas caused by these brutal circumstances.
Films like Daleko je Sunce (Far Away is the Sun), produced in 1953 after the
novel by Dobrica Ćosić, and San (Dream) from 1959, pictured cruel, hopeless
struggles of Partisan units against the might of the Germans.44 In the late 1950s
some of the most popular Partisan ilms were shaped as “tightly drawn stories
of action, suspense and bravado”.45
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he expensively produced, well crafted epic of the war, Kozara, from
1963, directed by Veljko Bulajić, became a tremendous success. It broke all
domestic records by selling more than 3 million tickets, and it was also one
of the most popular ilms among the audience at the ilm festival in Pula.46
he key to Kozara’s success was probably a combination of the beautifully
presented tragic narrative, the great emotional appeal of both photography
and story, and the thematization of the sufering of ordinary people. Kozara
distinguished itself from mainstream Partisan ilms in its focus on war crimes
against civilians.
It pictured the German‑Ustasha ofensive in 1942 against the mountain
area of Kozara, which was held by the Partisans. A main theme of the ilm
was the sorrow of war and the sufering of civilians: the opening scene showed
Nazi‑German soldiers, who, assisted by the Ustasha, attacked villages around
Kozara, executed the men and drove women and children to concentration
camps. he villagers took refuge in the mountain woods, and Partisan forces
rose to defend them, entering an impossible battle in order to break through
the Nazi‑Ustasha encirclement and save the refugees. he attempt failed, and
Ustasha and German soldiers, assisted by Chetniks captured most of the villag‑
ers hiding in the woods. Yet, groups of Partisans and villagers avoided capture,
and at the end of the ofensive surviving Partisans and villagers moved on to
continue their liberation struggle.47
Ill. 7.2. A line of Ustasha soldiers, serving the Nazis, execute a row of peasants by shooting. From
Kozara.
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Kozara holds numerous descriptions of terror and civilian sufering: apart
from the deportations of villagers to concentration camps, villages are burnt,
an old man is lobbed into a ravine, children become orphans, a woman is
raped, and the defenceless villagers lament their lost relatives. Yet, ethnicity is
close to absent in the accounts of terror against civilians. While the Partisans
are obviously multi‑ethnic, which is visible from their names and their signs
written in both Cyrillic and Latin letters, the civilians are simply narod (the
people), persecuted as part of the occupiers’ struggle against the Partisans.
hus, the main enemy is the German forces, and the Ustasha and Chetniks
are primarily assistants and collaborators.
In the 1960s and 1970s, a large number of Partisan ilms presented the
Partisan warfare to the public mainly in the form of magniicent war scenes
with enormous amounts of shooting and exploding accompanied by descrip‑
tions of Partisan heroism – as opposed to German brutality and impotence in
attempting to crush the Partisan movement and capture Tito and the Partisan
supreme staf. Among the typical examples of this genre is the ilm Desant
na Drvar (Descent at Drvar) concerning the German attempt to directly
annihilate the supreme staf and Tito at Drvar in Western Bosnia 1944. he
Partisans bravely hold their positions for long enough to allow them to escape
the German attack. Confronted with German brutality, the local citizens, led
by the young sister of one of the Partisans, defy the German demands for
cooperation, and many are killed.48
Some of the most renowned and classic examples of these Partisan ilms
depict famous battles from the Partisan war. Bitka na Neretvi (he Battle at
Neretva), a Yugoslav, American and Italian co‑production from 1969, portrays
the attempts of the combined Axis and Chetnik Armies to destroy the Partisan
main force in early 1943. he Partisans manage to escape the encirclement by
blowing up the bridges over the Neretva River, thus convincing their enemies
that they are not planning to cross the river. Afterwards they cross the water
on wooden leets, defeat the Chetnik forces in ierce battle and save a large
group of wounded and ill Partisans. Yul Brynner is the explosive expert blow‑
ing up the bridges, and Orson Welles is the Chetnik leader. he ilm depicts
great battle scenes and Partisan heroism, also on the part of women. he battle
against the Chetniks irmly underlines the national treason of the Chetnik
army. he Ustasha are referred to as participants on the German side and are
hardly discernible as an individual battle force.49
One of the most expensive Yugoslav ilms, Sutjeska, was released in 1973,
celebrating the 30 year anniversary of the Battle at the river Sutjeska.50 he
ilm was made in cooperation with a British company, directed by Stipe Delić
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Ill. 7.3. Richard Burton as commander Tito riding in front of the Partisan army in the Bosnian
mountains. From Sutjeska.
and featuring Richard Burton as Tito. Sutjeska depicted, just like the examples
mentioned earlier, the Partisans struggle to break out of an enemy encircle‑
ment and save the wounded. While the breakthrough succeeds, the Partisans
sufer great casualties, losing a large section of the army. he focus of Sutjeska
is on the heroism of the Partisans and of Tito himself, as well as on the strong
insistence on solidarity with the wounded Partisans. he magniicent pictures
show much bravery, death and sufering. War crimes and massacres are hardly
referred to, and ethnicity is close to absent. he theme is the struggle of the
Yugoslav Partisans – primarily against the Nazi‑German forces.
What characterised many of these great Partisan ilms was the simple one‑
sided narrative, glorifying the Partisans and the communist leadership as op‑
posed to Axis occupiers. hough sorrow and sufering were often thematized,
as well as the hopeless perspectives of the struggle, the ilms did not question
the war efort, and they did not raise ethnic issues. Usually, they displayed a
complete symbiosis between the Partisans and the Yugoslav people; along with
the Partisans wander old men and women, children, helpless, ill and wounded
persons, who share the hardships of the Partisans and celebrate their victories
with them, often in gay rounds of kolo.51
hough the war ilms were ictional re‑enactments of history, they were
nevertheless closely interwoven with Partisan history, and their aim was to
glorify that history. War ilms would often depict mythological events from
the Partisan war, such as the battles at Neretva and Sutjeska. In many cases,
historical consultants were connected to these ilm productions, or the ilms
referred to particular sets of memoirs in order to underline their credentials
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as history. he fact that some of them were realised with support from the
Yugoslav Peoples’ Army underlines that the Yugoslav state and military saw
a great interest in promoting a glorious Partisan history in an attractive and
even commercially feasible way.
he war as an inter-Yugoslav conlict
During the 1970s, Yugoslav Partisan ilms addressed some of the problematic
issues of Yugoslavia’s Second World War, including internal Yugoslav conlicts
and inter‑Yugoslav war crimes and massacres.
Užička republika from 1974, directed by Žika Mitrović and produced by
the Serbian ilm company Inex, depicted life in the republic of Užice, which
was established in the Partisan held area in the autumn of 1941.52 While the
ilm described the decision by the Nazi‑German leadership to annihilate the
Yugoslav resistance, as well as the Nazis’ brutal retribution politics of killing
civilians in retaliation for German soldiers, the main focus was on the relations
and conlicts between Chetniks and Partisans.
he ilm pictured Draža Mihailović and the Chetnik leadership deciding
that the aims of the movement include the construction of a “Chetnik‑mo‑
narchic dictatorship” and the establishment of a Greater Serbia, cleansed of
all ethnic minorities. It established an obvious opposition between the right‑
eous, sober Partisans conquering German garrisons, and the Chetniks – who
drink, party, ight internally, and cooperate with the Germans. As presented
in this ilm, the Chetniks overtly wanted and aimed at a civil war against
the Partisans.
Ill. 7.4. Chetnik soldiers shooting men, women and children in Serbian villages. From Užička
Republika.
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Chetnik war crimes were also depicted: Chetniks killing Partisans and in‑
nocent villagers; gunning down women and children; attacking and burning
villages; raping and torturing. he Chetniks were also shown assisting the
Germans in collecting Serbian villagers, locking them in a church and setting
it on ire – a type of mass murder usually associated with the Ustasha.
In Užička Republika, the betrayal committed by the Chetnik army was empha‑
sised as in many earlier accounts. But the Chetniks’ brutality and their complicity
in war crimes were far more thematized than in most earlier ilmic representa‑
tions. his was probably due to the increasing recognition of the civil war char‑
acter of the struggle between Partisans and Chetniks, which demanded further
emphasis on the brutality and criminality of the Partisans’ opponents. Yet, Užička
Republika did not present the Chetniks as a single undistinguished mob: it held
a relatively sympathetic Chetnik character, a young royal oicer, who is in deep
doubt and despair about the behaviour of the Chetniks. hus, Užička Republika,
suggested a certain psychological nuance in the historical enemy igure.
Another important ilm from this period, Okupacija u 26 slika (Occupation
in 26 pictures) from 1978, directed by Lordan Zafranović, pictured events in
Dubrovnik in 1941, during the axis invasion and establishment of the new
regime.53 he ilm was extremely popular in Yugoslavia and attracted more
than 6 million viewers in its irst year of release.54 It received several prices
and contemporary critics saluted its ideologically unprejudiced approach and
its appeal to both popular and elitist viewers.55 Okupacija u 26 slika probably
owed its tremendous success to a combination of the brilliant pictures, the
slightly grotesque carnival‑like staging, and the complex narrative, which is
both appealing and disturbing.
Ill. 7.5. Chetnik soldiers decapitating a man by sawing through his neck. From Užička Repu‑
blika.
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Okupacija u 26 slika tells the story of a group of friends: Miho, the son
of Jewish shopkeepers, Niko, a young man from the Dubrovnik upper class,
and Toni, whose family background is Italian. A friend of the family, Toni is
also engaged to Niko’s sister. During the German‑Italian invasion, Toni and
his family join the Italian fascists, while Niko involves himself with the com‑
munist Partisans. Miho and his father are arrested and put on a bus together
with a group of Serb, Jewish, and other prisoners. he bus becomes the scene
of an extremely bestial massacre. Calling out the Serbs irst, the Ustasha, clad
in civilian clothing, start torturing the prisoners, hammering nails into their
sculls, cutting out the tongue of an Orthodox priest, raping the women and
eventually killing most of them. Miho manages to escape, and when he returns
to Dubrovnik, he and Niko kill Toni and leave the town.56
Except from the overtly heroic young communists, and the singularly evil
Ustasha oicers and guards, the characters of the ilm are not without complex‑
ity. Niko belongs to a rich family, but he is driven to side with the Partisans
because of Ustasha and Italian practices and as a good patriot. Miho, the
Jewish boy, is initially quiet and succumbs to the new circumstances of fascist
domination and harassments, but when forced to take action, he is resolute.
Toni is actually a sympathetic igure, but is weak and easily persuaded into a
career as a Fascist oicer.
Ill. 7.6. Civilian clad Ustasha cutting the tongue out of an orthodox priest during a massacre
against prisoners in a bus. From Okupacija u 26 slika.
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While the Italians and Germans are generally described as depraved and
foolish, the ilm is very direct in its depiction of Ustasha brutality. here is no
doubt about the overt condemnation of this element of the Croatian past. Nev‑
ertheless, the complexity of the igures and the humanity with which members
of the wrong side are described allows an understanding of the various sides
of the war, and, to a certain extent, presents the conlict between Fascists and
Partisans as an internal Yugoslav, or in this case, Croatian, question. It is, after
all, Yugoslav and Croat citizens, former close friends and relatives, who are
placed both by will and circumstance on various sides in this conlict. his is
underlined, when Niko by killing Toni also kills the husband of his pregnant
sister.
In these two ilms, Užička Republika and Okupacija u 26 slika, inter‑Yu‑
goslav conlicts and Yugoslav complicity in massacres and war crimes were
thematized. he ilms thereby addressed some of the problematic issues that
had largely been overlooked or avoided in Yugoslav historical culture. his was
possible because ilm production was one of the least conventional spheres of
cultural production in Yugoslavia. It is worth noting that Užička Republika,
addressing the Chetnik betrayal and complicity in war crimes, was mainly a
Serbian production, while Okupacija u 26 slika, confronting the Ustasha past,
was produced by a Croatian ilm agency. hus, the republican ilm institu‑
tions scrutinised the dark sides of these republics’ own nations. his would
presumably be more acceptable within the Titoist logic of “brotherhood and
unity”, which was more vulnerable to condemnations of the wartime activities
of other Yugoslav nations.
Balancing between popular demands, political acceptability and artis‑
tic ambitions, several Yugoslav war ilms were on the forefront of revising
and readdressing wartime history. In the 1970s, ilms like Užička Republika
and Okupacija u 26 slika echoed the new insights and perspectives of aca‑
demic historiography, thematizing internal Yugoslav conlicts and violence.
hus, through war ilms some of the more problematic insights of Yugoslav
academic historiography were popularised and communicated to a wide
audience.
History schoolbooks
Unlike some of the more popular representations of history, particularly the
ilm media, schoolbooks remained under direct communist control via the
republican administrations. History schoolbooks represented the consensus
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of what future citizens were supposed to know and think about the past.
History education was (and is, per se) a coercive and asymmetrical relation‑
ship. he curricula had to be learned in order for students to complete their
education. Here was a ield in which the Yugoslav authorities could be sure
that the country’s future citizens were embedded in what was seen as primary
dogma and values.
hroughout the Titoist period, history education remained a responsibil‑
ity of the individual republican administrations. Yet, regarding the general
interpretative framework of 20th century history, history schoolbooks were
remarkably similar. While the number of texts about Tito in abc textbooks
was signiicantly declining from the 1970s, the Partisan war remained the
dominant theme in the teaching of contemporary history. Textbooks on 20th
century history, used in the eighth grade of primary school and the fourth
grade of gymnasium, dedicated a disproportionally large share of pages to
the Partisans and the military‑strategic developments of the war.57 Serious
eforts were invested in securing that post‑war generations were familiar with
the state’s founding narratives about the struggle of the Yugoslav Partisans
and peoples. Yet, while they wanted the students to know and treasure the
heroism and sufering of the Partisan war, they had no use for shattering
the image of the Partisans or too much emphasis on recent civil war and
interethnic violence.
he schoolbooks were written by professional textbook authors, who were
usually specialised in either primary school textbooks or books for the gymna‑
sium. Textbook authors also edited the so‑called čitanke, reading books with
bits of prose and lyric, which accompanied the general textbooks’ descriptions
of historical events and developments. Both textbooks and reading books were
often reprinted and used for more than a decade and translated into minority
languages within the republics: in the Croatian case into Italian and Hungar‑
ian, and in the Serbian into Romanian, for example.
Eighth grade history books were quite explicit in their representations
of war crimes and inter‑Yugoslav massacres. It was described in a Croatian
schoolbook used in the mid‑1960s, how the greatest misfortunes took place in
the ndh, where 800,000 people, among them a large number of women and
children, were killed. he Ustasha’s concentration camps were mentioned, as
well as the massacres of Serbian villages in Croatia and Bosnia.58
he willingness to address the issues of war crimes and massacres is clear
from one of the exercises at the end of the chapter on the wartime occupa‑
tion regimes in the Croatian 1960s schoolbook: the student was to investigate
“Which crimes were committed by the occupiers and the domestic traitors in
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your region or town”?59 he book thus encouraged the students to engage in
individual relection and to discuss war crimes.
hat the main victims of the Ustasha were the Serbs of the ndh was openly
stated in the Croatian schoolbook, but apart from that national issues were
hardly discussed. he initiative behind Ustasha crimes was ascribed to the oc‑
cupiers as a part of Nazi racial ideology along with the wish to create greater
German living space and enslave non‑German populations. In this project,
according to the textbook, Ante Pavelić and his Ustasha were simply servants
and traitors to their own people. As stated in the conclusion of the chapter
on wartime regimes:
In our country, the occupiers attempted to throw our peoples into a fratricidal war
in order to exterminate them and rule them easier. A particular role was intended
for Pavelić’ Ustasha in the ndh. hey committed massacres on the Serbian popu‑
lation and killed all those who resisted their terror regime.60
hus, the responsibility for war crimes and massacres were externalised: he
initiative was ascribed to the occupiers, and ethnic violence was seen as a
part of Nazi racism and their general politics. he intention was to make the
Yugoslavs kill each other in “fratricidal warfare” in order to ease the work for
the invaders. Yugoslav war criminals and collaborators were simply seen as
traitors and servants of the occupiers. Rather than stressing the dangers of
fanatical national ideologies among the Yugoslavs themselves, this schoolbook
stressed the common Yugoslav struggle against outside enemies and internal
traitors.
In a Bosnian schoolbook from the 1970s, a more critical approach was taken
to Yugoslav national ideologies. Again the mass murdering was generally seen
as the occupiers’ project, in which they were assisted by domestic collaborators
and Fascists.61 Yet, the Bosnian textbook difered from the earlier Croatian
one in its emphasis on Chetnik war crimes, which were dedicated nearly as
much text as the crimes of the Ustasha. he relatively equal stress on Chetnik
and Ustasha practices probably relected the fact that both committed some
of their worst acts in Bosnia and Hercegovina, as well as the need to balance
Bosnian history education fairly among the nations of the Bosnian republic.
he book also shifts between Latin and Cyrillic letters.
In fact, Chetniks and Ustasha were described as rather similar. he Bosnian
textbook argued that both parties aimed to expand their states by embracing
Bosnia. It described how the Chetniks wanted to create a “Great Serbia” and
afterwards stated:
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usable history?
hus, the Fascist powers of the Croatian and the Serbian bourgeoisie, Ustasha and
Chetniks, had the same goal in Bosnia and Herzegovina: in ighting for Bosnia and
Herzegovina, leading a fratricidal war, they threatened its peoples with physical
annihilation.
And later:
Realising the criminal plans of ‘the clean nation’ Ustasha and Chetniks often an‑
nihilated whole settlements with a population of a diferent nationality.62
Implicit in the last part of this quote is an established knowledge that Ustasha
and Chetniks represented some sort of nationalist programme, Croatian and
Serbian, respectively. hus, the nationalist aspects of Chetnik and Ustasha
massacres were indeed recognised. Nevertheless, the national identity of the
victims was not thematized as such. Rather, it was emphasised that Chetniks
and Ustasha were agents of the fascist bourgeoisies of Serbia and Croatia and
on their behalf persecuted and killed all progressive people.63
In efect, what was stressed in this schoolbook was the common struggle of
progressive Yugoslav peoples, headed by the communists, against the occupi‑
ers and their servants among the Yugoslav nationalist bourgeoisie. he main
victims in this narrative were in fact the progressive, pro‑Partisan people, in the
communist sense of the word, rather than any ethnic or nationally identiied
groups. his perspective was also stressed by the fact that in connection to the
teaching of the history of the Partisan war the Bosnian students were to read
Ivan Goran Kovačić’s poem ‘Jama’ about the victims of an Ustasha massacre
dying in a pit.64
Readings of various prose and lyrics from and about the war usually ac‑
companied the teaching of Second World War history. Again, there were no
attempts to hide the horrors of massacres committed by and towards Yugoslavs.
In a Serbian history reading book, used in the 1960s and 1970s, texts about
the war included an eyewitness account of individual and mass murdering in
Jasenovac in late 1942 and extracts from the war diaries of Vladimir Dedijer
and Rodoljub Čolaković, both about Chetnik torture and massacres. he text
by Dedijer described torture and killing against Partisans, whereas Čolaković’s
text recounted how Chetniks in Goražde mutilated Muslims, threw them
dead or alive into the Drina River, or tied them to the bridge and left them
to die.65 Similarly, a Bosnian history reading book from the end of the 1970s
included a testimony from one of the commanders of Jasenovac, describing
the administrative procedures of mass liquidation in the camp.66 Apart from
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such accounts, the books contained numerous descriptions of Partisan strategy
and heroism.
In primary school textbooks, though conservative, the internal Yugoslav
massacres were far more elaborately described than could have been expected.
No attempts were made to hide the fact that brutalities had taken place. But
crimes remained ascribed to the initiative of the occupiers, and accounts were
downplayed in comparison to the main narrative of the people and Partisans
against occupiers and collaborators.
Contemporary history textbooks for the gymnasium, though containing
very large chapters on the Second World War, generally touched only very
slightly – and quite supericially – on the issues of war crimes and massacres.
In a Serbian history textbook, printed in 1974 but used in various other edi‑
tions since the early 1960s, war crimes and massacres were seldom mentioned.
hat the Serbs of the ndh rose to defend themselves against Ustasha terror was
barely referred to. Otherwise, war crimes, massacres and concentration camps
were described as parts of the politics of the occupiers. It was argued that the
enemy attempted to cause a fratricidal war leading to the self‑destruction of
the Yugoslav peoples, particularly between Serbs and Croats, which forced
the communists to invest all means in preventing such a war.67 While the
persecution of Serbs in the ndh was not really described, it was stated that the
enemy committed “systematic and planned annihilation (genocide) of Jews
and Roma”.68 hus, the crimes founded in Nazi racial ideology were pointed
out speciically and deined as genocide, apparently in order to emphasise the
magnitude of the war crimes committed by the Germans and their collabora‑
tors, but the massacres among Yugoslav national groups were hardly mentioned.
hus, war crimes were not represented as a Yugoslav question at all. In stead,
the far majority of material about the Second World War consisted of strategic
and military history.
In a Bosnian gymnasium textbook from the late 1970s, war crimes were
described in more detail. Initially, it was claimed that the Ustasha as well as
the Chetniks were the main supporters of the occupiers in the introduction
of fratricidal war between Serbs and Croats.69 hus, the guilt of war crimes
and collaboration was balanced between the collaborators of both sides. Later,
however, the book stated that:
On the territory of the Independent State of Croatia, the fascist organisers of this
quisling construction … carried out open genocide against Serbs, Jews and Roma,
as well as against all citizens who were dangerous to its security.70
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usable history?
And the book further described how mass slaughtering was committed against
men, women and children in Krajina, Srem, Slavonia, Hercegovina and other
places.71 hese descriptions of war crimes were included in a chapter titled
“the terror of the occupiers”, thus emphasising that the main initiative and
responsibility behind the crimes belonged with the foreign Axis conquerors.
his was also the case with the concentration camps, including Jasenovac,
which were, according to the textbook, set up by the occupiers.72 And the
chapter concluded:
… the whole of Yugoslavia was turned into a place of torture and execution, pri‑
sons and concentration camps, in which repressive measures and genocide were
carried out in its most brutal form against the population. In carrying out these
measures, the fascist occupiers hoped that they could create out of Yugoslavia a
peaceful region and that they would be able to undisturbed carry out in action
their plans of conquest. …73
Hence, while this textbook to a greater extent addressed the issue of war
crimes, including concentration camps and genocide, it avoided distinguishing
individual Yugoslav nations and nationalities in relation to these questions.
War crimes were described as carried out by the fascist occupiers against the
population of the whole of Yugoslavia. In this connection, the concept of
genocide represents a particularly cruel crime committed by the occupiers and
their Yugoslav allies, against the common Yugoslav people, rather than against
any of the individual Yugoslav nations.
he gymnasium textbooks from the 1970s adopted the concept of genocide
from contemporary Yugoslav historiography, yet without the thematization of
internal Yugoslav national conlicts. In the textbooks, genocide was continu‑
ously seen as a crime committed by the occupiers.
hough the Chetniks and the Ustasha, as well as the Serbian and Croatian
bourgeoisies were blamed as collaborators, the initiative and responsibility
behind war crimes and massacres remained a property of the fascist occupi‑
ers. Usually, the victims in these accounts were the Yugoslav people in general
and rarely a national group as such. In most cases, national issues were back‑
grounded. What was stressed in these books, then, was the common struggle
of the progressive Yugoslav peoples against the foreign fascist invaders. While
the Yugoslav collaborators were represented as despicable traitors and collabo‑
rators, they were in reality of secondary importance in this narrative.
As a general rule, in the Yugoslav contemporary history schoolbooks, war
crimes and massacres were included as part of the descriptions of the horrors
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135
and sufering of war as well as the bestiality of the occupiers and their Yugo‑
slav collaborators. Unlike more popular representations of Second World War
history, such as ilms and folk songs, history schoolbooks did not incorporate
the new revisionist arguments included in parts of the Yugoslav academic
historiography of the early 1970s. On the contrary, schoolbook interpretations
were conservative, in accordance with party politics, and were adopted from
the work of historians close to the regime.74 hus, the simplistic narrative that
was constructed in the decades after the war was largely upheld in the history
schoolbooks. here were no attacks on the infallibility of the Partisans and
their communist leadership, and internal Yugoslav conlicts were downplayed
and totally subordinated to the main pattern of liberation struggle against the
fascist occupiers.
Public and popular representations of massacres and war crimes’ history
were continuously used politically and pedagogically. By testifying to the
brutality of the Partisans’ enemies, accounts of war crimes magniied the
victory of the Partisans. he schoolbooks represent a main example of the
way the original grand narrative of the Partisans’ heroic struggle remained a
backbone of Yugoslav historical culture throughout the Titoist period. Even
though the textbooks adopted the term of genocide, they remained faithful to
the traditional way of narrating the Partisan war. he interest in war crimes
aside, public representations of the Second World War in Yugoslav historical
culture remained under considerable inluence of communist agenda and
pressure.
N ote s
1
On the concept of ‘sites of memory’ see e.g. Pierre Nora, ‘Between Memory and Hi‑
2
E.g. Zemaljska komisija Hrvatske za utvrđivanje zločina okupatora i njihovih pomagača,
story: Les Lieux des Mémoires’, Representation, 26, 1989, 7‑24.
Zločini u Logoru Jasenovac; Čolaković, Jasenovac 21.8.1941/31.3.1942; Nikolić, Jasenovački
Logor. See chapters 3 and 4 in this book.
3
See Jovan Mirković, Objavljeni izvori i literature o Jasenovačkim Logorima, Belgrade: Mu‑
zej Žrtava Genocida, 2000, 297f.
4
Peršen, Ustaški Logori, 87. See also Colić, Takozvana Nezavisna Država Hrvatska 1941.,
390‑394; also Nikola Nikolić, Jasenovački Logor Smrti, Sarajevo: Oslobođenje, 1975,
190‑192. (Jasenovački Logor Smrti is a new and extended version of Nikolić’ Jasenovački
Logor from 1948, see this book chapter 4).
5
Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol 4, Zagreb, 1960, 467.
6
Vojna Enciklopedija, vol. 10, Belgrade, 1967, 321.
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136
usable history?
7
Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol. 8, Zagreb, 1971, 444. his article was authored by Ljubo
Boban, a prominent Croat historian who would in the late 1980s become one of the
main critics of Serbian genocide historiography and the inlation in the number of vic‑
tims.
8
More recent estimates, based among others on demographic calculations, suggest that
the number of victims of Jasenovac was probably around 80,000‑90,000. See e.g.
Žerjavić, Opsesije i megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleriburga, 72; Goldstein, Holokaust u
Zagrebu, 342; Mataušić, Jasenovac, 116‑123: also this book, chapter 2.
9
Mataušić, Jasenovac, 145f.
10
On ‘Jama’, see this book, chapter 4.
11
Mataušić, Jasenovac, 149‑152. See also Branislava Milošević, ‘Presentacija spomen‑
područja‑muzeja koncentracionih logora’, in Jelka Smreka, ed., Okrugli stol “Jasenovac
1986” 14. i 15. 11. 1986, Spomen‑područje Jasenovac, 1989, 255‑259.
12
13
Jugoslavija. Spomenici revoluciji. Turistički Vodić, Beograd: Turistički Štampa, 1986, 143.
Between 1967 and 1983, the Jasenovac memorial and museum had 3,300,000 visitors.
See the report in Dobrila Borović, ed., Jasenovac 1984. Okrugli stol. (Materijali s rasprave), Spomen područje Jasenovac, 1985, 12.
14
Dušan Kojović, ‘Stalna postavka Memorijalnog Muzeja “Koncentracioni Logor Jaseno‑
vac 1941‑1945’, Zbornik radova (Muzej Revolucije Bosne i Hercegovine), 11, 1990, 282‑283.
15
On existential, ideological and political uses of history, Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust as a
problem of historical culture’, 40‑43, and Karlsson, Historia som Vapen, 57‑61. See also
the introduction to this book.
16
See Max Bergholz, ‘Među rodoljubima, kupusom, svinjama i varvarima: Spomenici i
grobovi nor‑a 1947‑1965. godine’, in Husnija Kamberović, ed., 60 godina od završetka
drugog svetskog rata – kako se sjećati 1945. godine, Sarajevo: Institut za istoriju, 2006. Also
‘Partizanima tri spomenika dnevno’ (interview with Max Bergholz), Novi List, 13th No‑
vember 2005, 19.
17
See the example of the monument in Surmonci in Herzegovina, raised by local Serb po‑
wer holders in 1973, in Mart Bax, ‘Mass Graves, stagnating identiication, and violence:
A case study in the local sources of “the war” in Bosnia‑Hercegovina’ Anthropological
Quarterly, 70, 1997, 1.
18
Ger Duijzings, ‘Under Communist Rule’, in his History and Reminders in East Bosnia.
19
Ibid.
20 In Sait Orahović, ed., Narodne Pjesme Bunta i Otpora. Motivi iz revolucije, borbe i obnove, Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1971, 156‑157. Unfortunately the rhyme and rhythm of the ori‑
ginal is lost in my translation.
21
In Ibid, 153. For a quite similar song emphasising Chetnik collaboration with the Ita‑
lians, see ‘Oh, Chetniks, Serbian traitors’, Opačić‑Ćanica, ed., Narodne pjesme Korduna,
266.
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chapter 7
22
137
In Opačić‑Ćanica, ed., Narodne pjesme Korduna, 220. Also in Momčilo Zlatanović, ed.,
Sija zvezda. Narodne pesme oslobodilačke borbe i socijalističke izgradnje, Niš: Gradina,
1974, 193.
23
In Opačić‑Ćanica, ed., Narodne pjesme Korduna, 223.
24 ‘At Kordun Francetić has fallen’ (Na Kordunu Francetić je pao), in ibid, 248.
25
From the song ‘Black St. George’s Day’ (Crni Đurđevdan) in ibid, 268.
26 Ibid, 269.
27 Ibid, 270.
28
Ibid, 272. Kumstvo is a close relationship with persons outside the family. he Kum is
a close friend of the family who acts as godfather at baptisms and sometimes also as a
witness or best man at weddings.
29 Ibid, 173.
30 ‘Krvavi pokolj kod Krnjaka’. Allegedly this song was composed and sung by a Partisan
ighter from the county of Krnjak. Ibid, 462.
31
Ibid, 277.
32
Ibid, 281.
33
‘Krvava pjesma’, in Ibid, 282. his song was, according to Opačić‑Ćanica, narrated at
the Gusle by a refugee from Kordun in 1944. Ibid, 453. his song is also discussed and
quoted in Brkljačić, ‘Popular Culture and Communist Ideology’ 200‑201.
34
Ibid, 283.
35
Ibid, 284.
36
Ibid, 290.
37
See also ‘Zločini u selu Liplju’ (Crimes in the village of Liplje), in ibid, 291‑294.
38
Daniel J. Goulding, Liberated Cinema. he Yugoslav Experience, 1945-2001, Bloomington:
39
In NIN, 18th September 1960, quoted in Predrag J. Marković, Beograd između istoka i za-
Indiana University Press, 2002, 38f.
pada, 1948-1965, Belgrade: Službeni list SRJ, 1996, 437.
40 Ibid, 454; Lampe, Yugoslavia as history, 238.
41
See e.g. Stevan Majstorović, Cultural policy in Yugoslavia, Paris: Unesco, 1972, 75f; Ni‑
kola I. Kern, ed., Press, radio, television, ilm in Yugoslavia, Belgrade: Yugoslav Institute
of Journalism, 1961, 70f.
42 E.g. Jutro (Morning), directed by Puriša Đorđević, 1967, and Zaseda (Ambush), directed
by Žika Pavlović, 1969. After a short time, Zaseda was banned from domestic circula‑
tion. See Daniel Goulding, Liberated Cinema, 91‑102.
43
Ibid, 7f, 20.
44 Ibid, 47f. On Daleko je Sunce, see this book, chapter 4.
45
Goulding, Liberated Cinema, 46.
46 Ibid, 235, note 26; Marković, Beograd između istoka i zapada, 455.
47 Kozara, directed by Veljko Bulajić, Yugoslavia: Bosna Film, 1963.
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138
usable history?
48 Desant na Drvar, directed by Fadil Hadžić, Yugoslavia: Avala Film, 1963.
49 Bitka na Neretvi, directed by Veljko Bulajić, Yugoslavia: Udruženi jugoslovenski produ‑
centi, 1969.
50
Sutjeska, directed by Stipe Delić, Yugoslavia: Sutjeska Film, 1973.
51
Traditional South Slavic round dances.
52
Užička Republika, directed by Žika Mitrović, Yugoslavia, Inex Film, 1974.
53
According to the ilm’s introductory text, it was based partly on events described in
Drago Gizdić, Dalmacija 1941. Prilozi za historiju Narodnooslobodilačke borbe, Zagreb:
“27. srpanj”, 1957.
54
Goulding, Liberated Cinema, 154.
55
Damir Radić, ‘Filmovi Lordan Zafranovića’, Hrvatski ilmski ljetopis, 6, 2000, 24, 64‑65.
56
Okupacija u 26 slika, directed by Lordan Zafranović, Yugoslavia: Jadran Film, 1978.
57
Wolfgang Höpken, ‘History Education and Yugoslav (Dis‑)integration’, in Wolfgang
Höpken, ed., Öl ins Feuer? Schulbücher, ethnische Stereotypen und Gewalt in Südosteuropa,
Braunschweig, 1996, 105. On the abc textbooks, see Vučetić, ‘abc Textbooks’, 255‑256.
58
Šarlota Đuranović and Mirko Žeželj, Prošlost i sadašnost 3. Udžbenik povijesti za VIII razred osnovne škole, (5th unchanged edition), Zagreb, Školska knjiga, 1967, 105‑106.
59
Ibid, 106.
60 Ibid, 107.
61
Stanko Peravić and Husein Serdarević, Povijest 8. Udžbenik za VIII razred oznovne škole,
Sarajevo: Svetlost, 1974, 111‑113.
62 Ibid, 123‑124.
63
Ibid, 124.
64 Ibid, 113. On ‘Jama’, see this book, chapter 4.
65
Đorđe Grubac, Istorijska čitanka za VIII razred osnovne škole (8th edition), Belgrade:
Zavod za udžbenike i nastavna sredstva, 1973, 119‑121, 153‑154.
66 Tonči Grbelja and Dušan Otašević, Istorijska čitanka za VIII razred osnovne škole (second
edition), Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1980, 92‑93.
67 Đorđe Knežević and Bogdan Smiljević, Istorija najnovijeg doba za IV razred gimnazije
(11th reworked edition), Belgrade: Zavod za udžbenike i nastavna sredstva, 1974, 73, 75,
76.
68 Ibid, 73.
69 Tonci Grbelja and Dušan Otašević, Istorija za IV razred Gimnazije (1st edition), Sarajevo:
Svjetlost, 1978, 115.
70 Ibid, 117.
71
Ibid.
72 Ibid, 116.
73
Ibid, 118.
74 Höpken, ‘History Education and Yugoslav (Dis‑)integration’, 103.
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he breakdown of communist
history and the theme of
genocide, 1980‑1986
8
At the beginning of the 1980s, Yugoslav communism entered a period of
combined political, ideological and economic crisis. Within an atmosphere of
doubt and scepticism, the fundamental historical myths of the Partisan War
and the early communist regime were revised and scrutinised. As part of this,
the interest in the massacres of the Second World War rose markedly within
Yugoslav historical culture. Genocide history became a dominant issue within
creative arts such as literature and drama, and it was also referred to and used
in public debates, particularly – but not only – in Serbia.
his chapter shows how the thematisation of genocide contributed to the
break down of the communist historical mythology in the irst half of the
1980s. It claims that the thematisation of genocide was both a confrontation
with the oicial communist narrative and a readdressing of what was seen as
an over‑looked part of the common Yugoslav past. Yet, the use of genocide
thematisation in public debate also contributed to a polarisation of national
relations in Yugoslavia.
Politics of crisis
he turn of the 1980s constituted in many ways a break in the history of
socialist Yugoslavia. Tito died in May 1980, leaving no obvious heir to take
over the role of mediator between the republican power bases. Since 1974
the chairmanship of federal power was in the hands of a rotating presidency,
ensuring that representatives of every constitutive unit had their time as head
of the federal government, thus avoiding the dominance of any federative
unit. his arrangement, however, had also made the federal centre weak and
unstable.
Tito’s death inaugurated various statements of loyalty towards Titoism.
Initially it seemed that a new turn of conservatism was on its way, with in‑
creased repression against critical intellectuals, particularly in Belgrade.1 But
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140
usable history?
from the beginning of the 1980s, Yugoslav society displayed several signs of
crisis, which would lead to political and cultural changes on both republican
and federal level.
Since the late 1970s, the ever troubled economy was experiencing yet an‑
other period of recession.2 he economic diiculties sharpened the sense of
political paralysis and impotence. By 1983, the League of Communists of
Yugoslavia openly declared that the country was in crisis. Various types of
reforms were suggested, but hardly any action was taken.3 Political stalemate
characterised the League of Communists, with conident and self‑suicient
republican parties not responding to calls from the federal centre and failing
to show up at planned meetings. With the idea of a unitary Yugoslav nation
far gone, the Yugoslav federation resembled now more a community of nations
and national republics.
In 1981 renewed riots in the autonomous province of Kosovo suggested that
reforms had far from solved the problems there. he situation was initially
brought under control by military intervention, causing several deaths, while
the League of Communists of Kosovo was purged and numerous demonstra‑
tors imprisoned.4 Yet, police and military from other republics had to remain
in the area, and unrest was to haunt the province throughout the 1980s. he
continuing trouble and the emigration of Serbs and Montenegrins from the
province caused particular worries in Serbia, whereas Croat, Slovene and Mac‑
edonian representatives tended to support Kosovo’s independence of Serbia.
Serbian representatives thus felt that Serbian interests were ignored by the
other republics, and the Kosovo question increasingly became a source of
disagreement among the republics.
hough the main political debates stayed within the framework of the
League of Communists, the general atmosphere of crisis and instability was
relected culturally. Historiography, literature and intellectual discourse increas‑
ingly uncovered dark sides of Yugoslavia’s 20th century history.5 Revisionist and
“iconoclastic” history added to the gradual de‑legitimising of the crisis‑ridden
communist regime and even to questioning the state structure as such.
Among the most frequently addressed issues within this revising of history
were Second World War massacres, which gradually developed into a politi‑
cally signiicant theme, focusing on the massacres as genocide. his theme of
genocide was promoted and used from various sides, often questioning the
common past from national and anti‑communist perspectives. One of the
conditions that allowed these various ways of communicating and thematizing
the history of the Second World War as genocide was the disappearance of a
unitary Yugoslav historical culture.
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141
Fractured historical culture
he academic ield of contemporary history and in particular the work of
the institutes of contemporary history (the former institutes of the history
of the workers’ movement), remained closely connected to the party. At the
Institute of Contemporary History in Belgrade, 39 of the 45 employees were
members of the League of Communists.6 Many of the leading igures, such as
Dušan Bilandžić in Zagreb or Jovan Marjanović in Belgrade, were also highly
respected party oicials.
Nevertheless, by the early 1980s the continuous decentralisation of the
Yugoslav federation that had taken place during the preceding decades and
the consequent self‑suiciency of the republics had gradually created inde‑
pendent and distinct historical cultures in each republic. he academic side
of Yugoslav historical culture was efectively fragmented in national environ‑
ments. he director of the Institute of Contemporary History in Belgrade,
Petar Kačavenda, claimed in 1984 that the strengthening of the sovereignty
of republics and provinces and the constitution of the federation had led to
the standpoint that also academic activities were to be directed within the
framework of republics and provinces.7 Describing Yugoslav historiography
in 1983, the historian Drago Roksandić suggested that it in fact consisted of a
collection of national historiographies of varying developments.8 As claimed by
the American historian Ivo Banac, it had become increasingly clear from the
end of the 1960s that the unity of Yugoslav historiography was dependent on
regime unity.9 In the 1980s, such a unity was gradually disappearing. his was
also illustrated by the failed attempts at preparing a new common historical
synthesis. hough there was ample political support and even inancial cover‑
age provided for the writing of a History of the Yugoslav Peoples and Minorities,
nothing came of the project.10
In the early 1980s, Second World War history was still a dominant issue
within Yugoslav historiography. In the year 1980, 219 history books were pub‑
lished, of which 125 were about the People’s Liberation War and between 1979
and 1982, 426 historical meetings and conferences were held, focusing mainly
on the Second World War.11 Yet, even the image of the “sacred” National Lib‑
eration Struggle was fragmented: Of the 125 books published on this subject
in 1980, 46 were war stories from particular regions, 26 were mainly about
local Partisan detachments, and 13 focused on local heroes.12
Outside the oicial academic institutions, Yugoslav historical culture was
even more fractured. hough Yugoslavia in many ways constituted a unitary
cultural sphere, the outspoken autonomy of the republics in relation to the
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degree of cultural liberty and freedom of expression meant that limitations
to what could be said and written varied considerably. In the early 1980s,
particularly Belgrade and Ljubljana were scenes of daring criticism and the
breaking of hitherto established norms, but also Novi Sad and other cities
ofered relative openness with regard to cultural expression. his enabled art‑
ists and historians to search for the most tolerant spaces for their works to be
staged or published. his meant on the one hand that it was often possible
to ind alternative places of publication if a daring work had been banned
in one city and, on the other, that the degree of expressions of criticism and
revisionism was very uneven among the republics. In the early 1980s, criti‑
cism and revisionism of Yugoslav history was particularly outspoken among
Belgrade writers, and also in Slovenia and Vojvodina norms were broken and
icons smashed by authors and artists.
he unequal distribution of revisionism meant that the national rethinking
of history developed in some republics, whereas the historical debate was rather
conservative in others. While Serbian historical culture thematized national
victimisation in the Second World War, the Croatian historians’ environment,
which had been eiciently purged and therefore scared of nationalist tenden‑
cies after the Croatian spring, remained largely silent about these issues until
the late 1980s. his also meant that the national debate was relatively debarred
from inputs from the views of other national historiographies.
he breakdown of communist history
One of the irst and most important contributions to the revision of Yugoslav
history came from the ever‑present Vladimir Dedijer. Journalist turned histo‑
rian, Dedijer had a nerve for sensations, but he seemed also sincerely dedicated
to uncovering the truth in every bit of hidden darkness. As a formerly close
associate of Tito, his revelations had an aura of trustworthiness and inside
knowledge.13 In his massive volume Novi Prilozi za Biograiju Josipa Broza
Tita (New Contributions to the biography of Josip Broz Tito), published in
1981, Dedijer aimed mainly at revealing scandals and hitherto hidden contro‑
versial sides of Tito’s person. But he also opened a number of questions that
were to dominate Serbian historical culture during the 1980s: Novi Prilozi re‑
introduced the issue of the persecution of Serbs in the ndh, closely linked to
the question of the concentration camp complex at Jasenovac and the issue of
co‑responsibility of the Catholic Church and the Zagreb Archbishop Alojzije
Stepinac in particular. According to Dedijer, Stepinac was the spiritual father
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and political mentor of Ante Pavelić, he was chiely responsible for the forced
conversion of Serbs, and he and the Catholic Church were closely linked to the
Ustasha’s politics of genocide.14 Parallel to Stepinac and the Ustasha, Dedijer
also raised the issues of Chetnik terror and generally of the “genocidal inten‑
tions” of the Serbian bourgeoisie towards other nations in the Balkans, again
thematizing the perspective of genocide.15
Furthermore, Novi Prilozi contained a speciic chapter on Jasenovac, writ‑
ten by Antun Miletić, colonel in the Yugoslav Army and connected to the
museum at the camp complex. According to Miletić, investigations suggested
that 700,000 people were killed in Jasenovac. he camp, claimed Miletić, was
thus the most terrible in Yugoslavia and the third in all of occupied Europe.16
Miletić’s description strongly emphasised the horror and terror of Jasenovac,
and it is clear from his account that by far the majority of victims were Serbs.
Yet, he underlined that the Ustasha was a minority in the ndh, staying in
power only by their use of terror, and that their camp system was modelled
after Nazi and Fascist practices.17
hough thematizing Serbian national victimisation, Dedijer was not simply
a Serbian nationalist. Faithful to his Partisan adherence and to the ideology of
Brotherhood and Unity, Dedijer constantly underlined that war crimes and
genocide were committed by all sides. Yet, insisting on the need to address
the issues of ethnic conlicts and genocide, he missed no chance to claim that
the Catholic Church and the Vatican were the main culprits.
he arguments and statements in Novi prilozi were not all that new: As
has been shown in earlier chapters of this book, Jasenovac, the persecution
of Serbs and the role of Stepinac and the Catholic Church had all been ad‑
dressed immediately after the war and repeatedly ever since. What was new,
however, was the thematization of internal Yugoslav massacres and genocide
as such, featuring in subtitles and constituting a main element of the massive
description of the Partisan war, and situated within the scandal‑revealing and
taboo‑breaking context of Novi prilozi. Discussions, documents and accounts
of the Second World War occupied more than two thirds of Novi Prilozi’s
1300 pages. Descriptions of internal Yugoslav massacres were foregrounded
in subtitles and in particular supplementary accounts (prilozi), and they were
accompanied by scandal‑revealing accounts of cruel executions and random
liquidations ordered by top igures of the Partisan leadership, material that
was obviously damaging to the myth of the Partisan war.18
Dedijer’s work functioned as a irst call to revise these issues from the
perspective of national conlict, victimisation and genocide, while disposing
of old restrictions and taboos. It is no wonder that Novi Prilozi was severely
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criticised from the oicial side; the Partisan veterans’ organisation accused
Dedijer of slandering the revolution and communist oicials questioned the
motives behind his publication. Nevertheless, the book was a remarkable suc‑
cess and its initial print‑run of 70.000 copies was quickly sold out, testifying
that it was received with interest and enthusiasm by the general public.19
While Novi prilozi signalled the beginning of the breakdown of the estab‑
lished communist history, much of the following revisionism was made by
people outside the established historians’ community and by non‑historians.
A leading role was played by non‑academic and ictional representations of
history. Authors engaged in ictional rewriting of some of the very darkest
sides of Yugoslavia’s communist history. he internment on the infamous
prison‑island, Goli Otok, of thousands of communists suspected of supporting
the Cominform and the Soviet bloc, after the break in 1948, was the subject
of numerous novels in the early 1980s.20 In 1985 a very popular ilm, Otac na
službenom putu (When father was away on business), directed by Emir Kus‑
turica, constituted a beautiful and ironic comment to the oppressive nature of
Yugoslavia’s Stalinist and early post‑Stalinist regime. Kusturica’s ilm presented
the purges of the communist cadre and the sufering it caused them and their
families as essentially unrelated to ideology and politics. Instead, they were
results of petty skirmishes, jealousy and the abuse of power by local oicials
and security service members.21 Also the communist take‑over of power in
the early post‑war years was scrutinised, most famously in the book Stranački
pluralizam ili monizam: društveni pokreti i politički sistem u Jugoslaviji 1944-1949
(Party pluralism or monism: Social movements and the political system in
Yugoslavia 1944‑1949) by two social scientists from Belgrade University, Kosta
Ćavoški and Vojislav Koštunica, the latter of which was to overturn Slobodan
Milošević as president of Yugoslavia in October 2000.22
One of the efects of this revisionism was the realisation that the estab‑
lishment of communist power in Yugoslavia had, in many ways, been just as
cruel as it had been in the Soviet Union and other countries – countries which
Yugoslavia as a more free and democratic country had liked to distinguish itself
from. his raised questions as to whether a system established in this way could
be truly humane. And, furthermore, if this was the type of history that was
hidden through the communist period, how could any communist‑supported
historiography be trustworthy at all?
Not all Yugoslav republics gave room for revisionism, however. In Croatia,
attacks on oicial communist historiography caused harsh retribution. In 1981,
the former general and dissident historian, Franjo Tuđman was tried for spread‑
ing hostile propaganda in foreign media, amongst other things by denying
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the oicial number of victims in Jasenovac. Tuđman was punished with three
years imprisonment and a ive year ban from participating in public life.23
he rehabilitation of the Chetniks
A particular Serbian aspect of the readdressing of the past was the gradual revi‑
sion of the image of the Chetnik movement. hroughout the Titoist period
oicial historiography regarded the Chetniks as national traitors, war criminals
and slaughterers of Partisan supporters and civilian Muslims and Croats. From
the early 1980s, however, as the established communist history was gradually
losing ground, a new perspective on the Chetniks developed within Serbian
historiography.
In his Revolucija i Kontrarevolucija u Jugoslaviji (Revolution and Contra‑
revolution in Yugoslavia) from 1983, the respected communist historian Branko
Petranović proposed that the Chetniks were in origin and principle anti‑fascist,
though their politics of collaboration with the Serbian quisling regime as
well as with the Germans made this stance questionable.24 A far more radical
reinterpretation of Yugoslavia’s Second World War came in Veselin Đuretić’s
Saveznici i jugoslovenska ratna drama (he Allies and the Yugoslav War Drama)
from 1985. Unlike earlier studies of the war, Đuretić’ was not particularly inter‑
ested in Partisan warfare and the revolution. His main aim was to investigate
how the Chetniks lost the support of the allies and the Yugoslav peoples. In
Đuretić’s study, Chetnik and Partisan war strategies were somehow presented
as parallel and equally legitimate. he Chetnik aims were seen as concentrated
on avoiding excessive Serbian war losses, an interpretation quite diferent from
the traditional communist perspective of the Chetniks as national traitors,
servants of the occupiers and of the Serbian bourgeoisie.25
his new perspective on the Chetniks was severely criticised by the com‑
munist regime.26 Also within the Croatian historians’ environment these new
interpretations of the Chetnik movement were met with wonder and critique.
In 1986, Fikreta Jelić‑Butić, historian at the Institute of contemporary history
in Zagreb, published a book on the Chetniks in Croatia, in which she explored
their use of terror against both Croat and Serb civilians.27 In the foreword,
the publisher, with explicit reference to Đuretić’s study, stated that readers of
Jelić‑Butić’s book would easily be assured of the inaccuracy of the claim that
the Chetnik movement was an anti‑fascist organisation.28
While the Chetniks had indeed constituted an organized resistance in
Serbia and other places, the attempts at their rehabilitation made little sense
in Croatia and Bosnia, where Chetnik crimes had been excessive. Yet, this was
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not considered by some Serbian historians. he construction of individual
historians’ environments in each republic had resulted in individual republican
or national histories, which were not necessarily aware of or interested in one
another’s perspectives.
he attempts to rehabilitate the Chetniks, furthermore, were an attack on
the national symmetry that had characterised the Titoist representations of
war crimes and traitors, according to which all nationalities had their traitors,
and all traitors were equally bad. hus, the delicate balancing acts of Titoist
historiography were gradually abandoned.
he Serbian revising of the history of the Chetniks is quite illustrative
of how republican historical cultures went their separate ways. he recast of
the Chetniks’ image was part of a fundamental re‑thematization of Second
World War history from non‑communist, often nationalist perspectives. Far
more explicit than historians in this respect was the readdressing of history in
ictional literature.29
hematization of wartime massacres in literature
In the early 1980s, several novels and theatre plays readdressed the history of
wartime massacres from the perspective of national victimisation.
One of the most important contributions to the dramatical reinterpretation
of Yugoslav wartime history from an ethno‑national perspective was the novel
Nož (he Knife) by Vuk Drašković, published in 1982.30 Representations of
Second World War history in Nož focus on crimes, slaughtering and Serbian
sufering. he book contains several horrible and detailed descriptions of mu‑
tilation and massacres committed by Muslim Ustasha against Serbs, initially
in Hercegovina, but later also in the area around Sarajevo. he book opens
with a description of the celebration of Christmas, January 1942 in a Serbian
family, the Jugović family. he feast is interrupted by the arrival of a group of
Muslim Ustasha of the Osmanović family, who used to be close friends related
to Jugovići by kumstvo, i.e. as godfathers and best‑men. Nevertheless, the
Muslim men tie up the Serbs, rape one of the women, mutilate, torture and
eventually kill most of the family. he elderly uncle, father Nićifor, is locked
together with other Serbian villagers in the local orthodox church, which is
then burned. he only survivor of the Jugović family is an infant, who is taken
to a woman member of the Osmanović family and raised as a Muslim.31
he cruelty and clinical details of this and other descriptions of the torture
committed against Serbs in Nož is extraordinary. Completely at odds with
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the common narrative frameworks of Titoism is the way these horrors are
explained: In the Osmanović case, references to Ustasha ideology are close to
absent; instead Drašković’s account represents the crimes as driven by pure
Muslim hatred of Serbs, a hatred founded in Muslim feelings of inferiority
due to their ancestors’ conversion and, consequently, betrayal against their
own nation and tradition.32
Another heavily symbolic account in the book describes a massacre of Serb
prisoners, who are tied in a ield of grain, as a unit of Ustasha cut the grain
by scythe, simultaneously mutilating and cutting to pieces the captured Serbs,
and thus exterminating them from the ground as they harvest the grain.33 he
Ustasha committing the massacre are driven by a mad lust for blood. he aim
of their project is a Croatia cleansed of Serbs. Here Drašković clearly refers
to the Ustasha project as an essentially Croatian ideology, separate and quite
independent of the Second World War and the Axis occupation.
In Nož, wartime history is signiicantly twisted from its usual version.
he book also plays with the idea of hidden history: the central igure, Alija,
the orphaned child from the Jugović family, is told that he originates from
a Muslim family who were massacred by Serbian Chetniks, but during the
book he slowly unravels his own true story. he relationship between Parti‑
sans and Chetniks is touched upon as well: he local unit of Chetniks are
seen as brave and decent Hercegovinian peasants, led by a worthy local hero.
he struggle between Partisans and Chetniks is described as a pointless result
of communist fanaticism and the communists’ practices of murdering local
“kulaks”.34
While Nož challenged the oicial narrative in several ways, the main efect
of the book was the thematization of Serbian national victimhood caused by
other Yugoslav nations. Yet also the suggestion that history had been manipu‑
lated and that hidden stories of Serbian sufering could be uncovered, had a
powerful impact in a historical culture that was about to reconsider the past,
revealing hitherto hidden dark sides. It seemed to suggest that the crimes com‑
mitted against the Serbian nation were far greater than had ever been revealed
or realised. Furthermore, the book held a clearly diferent and critical view
of communist strategies and behaviour, both during the war in the struggle
against the Chetniks, and afterwards in what was presented as a cynical and
manipulated construction of an oicial history of the war.
Drašković’s public readings of his novel met with great enthusiasm from the
listeners, but the book also caused him to lose his job and party membership.35
Nevertheless, Nož became a remarkable success and was reprinted numerous
times in the late 1980s and in the 1990s.
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hroughout the decade more literature readdressing war history from a
national victim perspective appeared. In Danko Popović’s very popular Knjiga
O Milutinu (he book about Milutin), which was irst published in 1985 and
within a year reprinted 14 times, Serbian and Yugoslav history was described
from the perspective of the main character and narrator, the Serbian peasant
Milutin. In a short chapter, Milutin recounted how he heard Serbian refugees
from the Ustasha state describe the horrors happening there, the stories of
the sufering of children seeming especially terrible.36 Yet, Knjiga o Milutinu
also condemned Chetnik terror during the war and the post‑war communists
regime and its persecution and imprisonment of ordinary farmers, including
Milutin himself, as class enemies or “kulaks”. A main point of the book was
that Serbs had sufered and shed blood in warfare for ideologies, such as Serbian
expansionism, Yugoslavism, communism, and for the fancies of their various
governments, instead of caring for the welfare of their own country and people.
In Knjiga o Milutinu, Popović recounted Yugoslav 20th century history from
an exclusively Serbian perspective: it had been a history of continuous Serbian
sufering, and he presented the idea of Yugoslav brotherhood and community
as something that had only caused loss and misery for Serbs.37
Nož and Knjiga o Milutinu are examples of the way parts of Serbian lit‑
erature in the irst half of the 1980s recomposed Yugoslav Second World War
history along a line quite deiant of the oicial communist narrative of Partisan
heroism and all‑Yugoslav patriotism, thematizing instead Serbian sufering at
the hands of other Yugoslav nations. hese same issues were raised in Yugoslav
playwriting, though from diferent angles.
Drama
he Ustasha regime’s persecution of Serbs was the theme of the Croatian drama‑
tist Slobodan Šnajder’s play Hrvatski Faust (Croatian Faust), which was irst
staged in Belgrade in 1982. In Hrvatski Faust the Ustasha’s racial laws, the sepa‑
ration, deportation and massacres of Serbs and the horrors of Jasenovac lurks
in the background and are sometimes commented upon satirically as the play
simulates the staging of the great German drama Faust at the Croatian National
heatre in Zagreb during the Ustasha reign.38 In a scene in the Cathedral of
Zagreb, an Ustasha leader meets a Catholic priest and asks him to conirm that
Jasenovac is not as rumours have it. he priest replies by handing him a statue
made of human bone and showing him an hour glass measuring the time run‑
ning between one killing and the next in the camp.39 he horror of the Ustasha
system and its connection to the Catholic Church is thus emphasised.
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In the Ustasha version of Faust, the play is gradually transformed and
Croatianised while Šnajder tells a parallel story of an actress of communist
orientation who is raped and tortured to death by Ustasha soldiers, her new‑
born child abducted and probably killed.40 In Šnajder’s play, Ustasha crimes
are explicitly connected to Croatian nationalism and culture. Standing alone,
the actor playing Faust laments to himself:
O Croatia, evil mother,
Mother of many deaths,
What kind of children do you warm under your skirts?41
And later, as the staging of the drama at the Croatian National heatre is con‑
tinuingly disintegrating, and most of the original actors have been replaced by
Ustasha faithful, Mephistoles exclaims: “Father, save me from Serbian heroism
and Croatian culture.”42 In this way, Šnajder points out that the horrors of the
Second World War should be understood as an essentially Yugoslav matter,
closely linked to national ideologies and antagonisms. According to Šnajder’s
play, the bases for the crimes of the Ustasha should be sought within Croatian
national culture.
While the terrible nature of the Ustasha regime is the main issue of Hrvatski
Faust, the play’s description of the communists’ eforts immediately after the
war to re‑establish the National heatre and to control it in a way not unlike
that of the Ustasha seems cynical in the face of the actress’s violent death.
Whereas the play is mainly an attempt to address Croatia’s troubled past, in
essence it condemns any totalitarian ideology and holds a critique also against
the communist take over of cultural life after the war. his point was not lost
on the Yugoslav public. According to a reviewer in the weekly news magazine
NIN, the play’s initial farcical comic tone was translated into a moving drama
and ended with a disturbing, tragic irony.43 he play was received with acclaim
and it received the annual prize at the Yugoslav theatre festival in Novi Sad in
1983.44
Far more troublesome for the Yugoslav authorities was another play about
the wartime past, namely Jovan Radulović’s Golubnjača (Pigeonhole), which
was irst staged in Novi Sad in October 1982. hat Radulović’s play worried the
communist establishment is clear from the fact that its staging in the Yugoslav
Drama heatre in Belgrade was cancelled after eight nights due to pressure
from the local communist party functionaries.45 Furthermore Golubnjača was
banned from participating at the Yugoslav theatre festival in Novi Sad in 1983,
even though it had packed theatres and received a prize in Slovenia.46
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he play is set in 1960 and 1961 in a Serbian village in the Dalmatian
mountain region. It portrays a community characterised by physical and spir‑
itual poverty. he Serbs lament their lost relatives who were killed during the
Second World War by Ustasha militias and thrown into a nearby pit, called the
Pigeonhole (Golubnjača). According to one of the igures in the play, the pit
used to be the home of a colony of pigeons, but the birds led the atmosphere
of blood and death.47
he play describes how Serbs in the village are clearly haunted by psycho‑
logical wounds that are only scarcely concealed by supericial communist slo‑
gans, which people repeat automatically and without conviction. he children
of the village, playing around the pit and knowing about the bones of their
relatives down there, inherit the trauma of the adults. On a pioneer excur‑
sion they meet with a group of Croat pioneers from the neighbouring village.
hough the local communist hero from the Partisan war accompanies the
excursion, praising brotherhood and unity between the Yugoslav peoples, the
atmosphere is clearly hateful. he Serbian children catch a Croat boy, harass
him, force him to declare himself an Ustasha and threaten to throw him in
the pit.48
he theme of Radulović’s play is not the war crimes as such, but rather the
way Serbs in the region were still tormented by the memory and the insensibil‑
ity with which communist oicials and neighbouring Croats treated the issue.
At one point in the play, Croats from the neighbouring village plan to throw a
horse into the pit in order to kill it. he Serbian villagers, angry and horriied,
run to the pit and the Croats are convinced to give up their plan.49 Implicitly,
the play suggests that the new common state based on the brotherhood and
unity of the Yugoslav peoples is a hollow construction, unable to cover the
wounds and bridge the animosity from the war.
he plays by Šnajder and Radulović appeared almost simultaneously and
thematically they had much in common. Nevertheless, their very diferent
receptions by oicial cultural critics may be explained by certain essential dif‑
ferences: In Šnajder’s play, the persecution of Serbs is continuously referred to,
but the main victim in his narrative is the Croatian communist actress. In any
case, as a Croat thematizing Serbian sufering, he could hardly be criticised for
nationalism. And while Šnajder criticised the communist handling of the past,
the problems he referred to were distant and belonged to the Stalinist period of
Yugoslav communism, from which the Yugoslav party had oicially distanced
itself. Radulović’s main victim, on the other hand, was the traumatised and
impoverished Serbian village, the same type of environment from which he
himself originated. Radulović, furthermore, questioned a more recent period,
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namely the 1960s, and a continued communist procedure of handling the
trauma of the wartime past. he perspectives on Yugoslav national reconcili‑
ation suggested in Golubnjača were rather pessimistic.
At the end of the 1980s, Golubnjača was to return to public debate, when
the Literary Society of Vojvodina suggested it should be rehabilitated. By
then Radulović had made himself a voice of the Krajina Serbs and claimed
that Serbs as a nation were threatened in Croatia. In this context, Golubnjača
seemed more like a national statement than it did in 1983, when Radulović
distanced himself from any political or national position.50
Wartime history and the concept of genocide in public
debate
As the history of both the Second World War and the inter‑Yugoslav massa‑
cres was broken down and recast in new versions and from new perspectives,
references to the concept of genocide and the history of the Second World
War massacres became more frequent among the general public. Initially the
Croatian and Serbian churches were at the forefront in public debate, read‑
dressing wartime history by suggesting new forms and contents of wartime
commemorations. Later, also dissident intellectuals, particularly in Belgrade,
used references to wartime history and the concept of genocide in public
statements and debate. he history of Second World War massacres became
a metaphor of national sufering, and genocide as a concept became a readily
accessible accusation in debates of national inequality and suppression. hus, I
will argue, by drawing on Yugoslavia’s painful history the concept of genocide
was on its way to becoming a cardinal theme.
he national churches and wartime history
A key issue within the debates among the Croatian and Serbian churches was
the role of the Zagreb Archbishop, Alojzije Stepinac, who was convicted in
1946 for high treason committed both during and after the war. From 1979,
the Croatian Catholic Church repeatedly called for rehabilitation of Stepinac:
he was commemorated at public masses, and his candidacy for martyrdom was
submitted to the Vatican.51 In 1985, 25 years after his death, another memorial
mass held for Stepinac provoked critical reactions and suggestions of a return
of Croatian clericalism.52 While Stepinac in the eyes of the Croatian Catholic
Church was a victim of communist manipulation and ‘show’ jurisdiction,
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parts of the Serbian public considered him a main instigator of the Ustasha
genocidal politics, the forced conversions in particular.
On its side, the Serbian Orthodox Church, on the occasion of the recon‑
struction of the orthodox parish church at Jasenovac, held a commemoration
mass on the 2nd September 1984 in the rebuilt church. During the ceremony,
the Serbian patriarch called on his listeners to forgive, but never forget.53 Ac‑
cording to the Serbian orthodox metropolitan of Zagreb and Ljubljana, the
commemoration was meant to counter attempts to obliterate the traces of
Jasenovac, to reduce the number of victims and to deny and forget the crime.54
Liturgies in Jasenovac were held every year afterwards, the most massive ones
in the early 1990s.55
he commemoration of Jasenovac within the framework of the Serbian
Orthodox Church meant that the ceremony became an explicitly and overtly
Serbian ritual, thematizing Serbs as ethnic and national victims, and as vic‑
tims of genocide. In this way, the history of Jasenovac was addressed from
an overtly national perspective. he Serbian Church’s insistence on the need
to remember relected existential and moral relationships to the past. he
church presented itself as deiant towards what it saw as attempts to downplay
the issue. he national and religious framework that the church constructed
around remembrance of Jasenovac and the Ustasha past in general thus held
a prominent element of indignation as a primary motive and mobilising force
behind the attempts to gather more interest in these issues.
In the discourse of the Serbian church, a threatening perspective of genocide
was at times woven together with the history of the Second World War, the
Ustasha past serving as a metaphor or metonym for Serb sufering, re‑actual‑
ising senses of threat and victimisation. he term genocide and the histories
of national victimisation became arguments in the discussions of national
relations in Serbia and Yugoslavia, and of the raising of national demands and
worries. A dominant issue within this discussion was the situation for the Serb
and Montenegrin minorities in Kosovo.
In 1983‑1984, the monk Atanasije Jevtić published a series of travel reports
in Pravoslavlje, the organ of the Serbian Orthodox Church. he travel reports,
titled ‘Od Kosova do Jadovna’ (‘From Kosovo to Jadovno’) linked the Serb
emigration from Kosovo to the Ustasha crimes against the Serbs, with the
massacres in Lika and Kordun and the concentration camps at Jadovno and
Jasenovac mentioned as the worst examples.56 Describing various examples
of pressure, harassment and even murder of Serbs in Kosovo, Jevtić’s account
went on to discuss Ustasha practices, arguing that the numbers of victims
must have been signiicantly larger than assumed in standard reference works
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such as the Yugoslav Encyclopaedia. Jevtić argued that during its four months
of existence the camp at Jadovno was “… according to the intensity of the
‘work’ of its horrible ‘mill of death’, perhaps the most terrible of all hitherto
known camps of the Second World War”. He proclaimed Jasenovac the site
of the “most populated Serbian city in the history of this martyred people”.57
Whereas Jevtić believed that the number of Serbs murdered in the ndh
was underestimated in most Yugoslav presentations, he also considered the
sites of massacres and mass graves insuiciently indicated by monuments and
landmarks. His travel account was thus intended to remind everyone of the
need to remember Serbian sufering at the hands of the Ustasha during the
Second World War, as well as that in Kosovo in the 1980s. Jevtić furthermore
underlined that these sufering Serbs in both Kosovo and Krajina, as well as
all other Serbs, will always be connected and united as one people through
religion and ethnic origin.58 he idea of the commemoration of Serb sufer‑
ing during the ndh was thus intimately linked to the Serbs as a national and
religious entity, and as such it was aimed at and appealed exclusively to Serbs.
Genocide as a metaphor – Kosovo and Croatia
During the 1980s, the concept of genocide was increasingly linked to the crisis
in Kosovo and the continuous emigration of Serbs and Montenegrins from the
province. From the early 1980s the Serbian Orthodox Church had positioned
itself as protector of the Kosovo Serbs. By the mid‑1980s a signiicant part of
Serbia’s critical intelligentsia equally adopted the cause of the Kosovo Serbs as
a main point of their agenda.59
When complaining about the fate of Serbs in Kosovo, Serbian clergy and
intellectuals referred to the concept of genocide to describe what they saw as
an ongoing national tragedy in the province. An early example of this was
the appeal sent by 21 representatives of the Serbian Church to the presidency
and parliament of Serbia and the presidency of the Yugoslav federation in
April 1982 stating that, “without any exaggeration it can be said that a well
considered and planned genocide is gradually being committed towards the
Serbian people in Kosovo!”60
In 1985 the Serbian farmer Đorđe Martinović was injured by a broken
bottle in his rectum, allegedly because he was attacked on his ield in Kosovo
by Albanian bandits. he following debate in Serbian press drew on heavily
loaded Second World War references: on the 10th June 1985, in an article called
‘Camp for one man’ in the magazine Duga, a journalist posed the question if
“a Jasenovac for one man was created on Đorđe Martinović’ ield?”61 Jasenovac,
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usable history?
as a main symbol of Serbian historical sufering, was used as a metaphor to
characterise Martinović’s fate, thus transmitting to him the qualities of Serbian
national martyr and victim of nationally motivated persecution in Kosovo.62
he charge in January 1986 that a planned genocide on Serbs was taking
place in Kosovo was repeated in a petition signed by 200 Serbian intellectuals
and sent to the Yugoslav and Serbian parliaments.63 Similar claims were made
in September 1986 in the famous Memorandum, written by a committee of
the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (sanu), which was leaked to the
press and partly published in the newspaper Večernje novosti.64 he focus of the
Memorandum, apart from Yugoslavia’s political and economic crises, was the
diicult status of the Serbian nation in Yugoslavia.65 he document consist‑
ently argued that Serbs were discriminated against and cheated by their fellow
Yugoslavs, Croats and Slovenes in particular. It also claimed that a physical,
political, economic and cultural genocide was taking place in Kosovo. While
this and other points about Kosovo held nothing new according to Večernje
novosti’s journalist, Aleksandar Đukanović, the statement that “… except from
the period of the Independent State of Croatia, Serbs in Croatia have never
in the past been as threatened as they are today…” was seen as especially
problematic and damaging to national relations in Yugoslavia.66
In the Memorandum, the Serbs’ current conditions in Kosovo and Croatia
respectively, were linked to historical examples of massacres, persecution, in‑
terethnic strife and Serbian historical victimisation. he document obviously
used these bits of history to underline and strengthen its main point that Serbs
as a nation were treated unfairly. he reminder of the violent past and the
positioning of the current situation within this historical context inevitably
historicised inter‑ethnic relations and threw a shadow of threat over the pre‑
sent. he thematization of genocide and Second World War history thereby
contributed to troubling and polarising national relations in the crisis‑plagued
Yugoslav federation.
he revision of Second World War history in the irst half of the 1980s was a
combination of a search for a more true form of history, free of manipulation;
of regime critique attacking the communist system at its mythic roots; and of
readdressing and rewriting history from national or nationalist perspectives,
focusing on national victimisation.
hat Serbian writers were at the forefront of revising and re‑thematizing
wartime history from the national perspective was no coincidence. For one
thing, Serbs did sufer enormous losses due to nationally motivated persecu‑
tion during the war. hus, there was a history to rework, and, probably just
as important, the relatively liberal regime of censorship in Serbia compared
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155
to, for example the conservatism and strict censorship in Croatia, made the
publication of such reworkings possible.
he calls to remember the victims gradually became a national appeal, op‑
posed to what was then seen as the oicial communist endeavours to forget
for the sake of reconstruction and reconciliation. hereby, the thematization
of Second World War massacres as genocide was also directed against the
oicial communist version of history, which was regarded as propagandistic
and manipulative. he unveiling of the dark sides of Yugoslavia’s wartime and
communist history implicitly suggested that communists were hiding certain
issues, and the reinterpretations of the Chetniks further questioned oicial
communist history.
he narratives of the war presented in these mainly Serbian rewritings were
not in their content signiicantly diferent from what had been described by
communist historiography. What was new was the perspectives and thema‑
tization: Massacres and war crimes had been recounted in communist histo‑
riography as committed by enemies and traitors towards the entire Yugoslav
population or parts of it, the descriptions often aimed at demonising the Par‑
tisans’ enemies. Now the mass killing of the war was thematized as genocide,
seen from an exclusive Serbian national perspective and emphasising innocent
Serbian civilian victims.
By the mid 1980s, the concept of genocide came into far more frequent use,
particularly within Serbia. he thematization of genocide within Second World
War history was accompanied by the use of the concept of genocide and the
history of massacres as metaphoric images of contemporary conditions. As a
discursive trump, heavily loaded with historical meaning, the term ‘genocide’
was used to describe what was seen as current threats to the nation. he past
was used to explain the present, and the present was understood in a web of
historical references. hus the thematization of genocide was accompanied by
thematization of national conlicts and threats.
N ote s
1
See e.g. Pedro Ramet, ‘Yugoslavia’s Debate Over Democratization’, Survey. A Journal of
East and West Studies, 25, 1980, 3. Also Radio Free Europe Research, Background Report,
25th July 1980.
2
See e.g Susan Woodward, Balkan Tragedy, Washington: Brookings Institution, 1995,
47‑67, Lampe, Yugoslavia as History, 315‑327.
3
Sabrina Ramet, Balkan Babel. he Disintegration of Yugoslavia from the Death of Tito to
the War for Kosovo (3rd edition) Boulder: Westview Press, 1999, 5f.
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156
usable history?
4
See Branka Magaš, he Destruction of Yugoslavia, London: Verso, 1993, 15f; Ramet, Nationalism and federalism, 194f; Noel Malcolm, Kosovo. A Short History, London: Macmil‑
lan, 1998, s. 335f.
5
See Pedro Ramet, ‘Apocalypse Culture and Social Change in Yugoslavia’, in Pedro Ra‑
6
Petar Kačavenda, ‘Dvadeset pet godina Instituta za savremenu istoriju, 1958‑1983’, Isto-
7
Ibid, 211.
met, ed., Yugoslavia in the 1980s, Boulder: Westview Press, 1985.
rija XX Veka, 2, 1984, 1‑2, 212.
8
Roksandić, ‘Globalna isorija i istorijska svest’, 45.
9
Banac, ‘Historiography of the countries of Eastern Europe: Yugoslavia’, 1086.
10
Wachtel and Marković, ‘A Last Attempt at Educational Integration’, 9.
11
Marković, Ković and Milićević, ‘Developments in Serbian Historiography since 1989’,
12
Marković, Ković and Milićević, ‘Developments in Serbian Historiography since 1989’,
280; Marković, ‘Istoričari i jugoslovensto’, 159.
280.
13
See e.g. Stevan K. Pavlowitch, ‘Dedijer as a Historian of the Yugoslav Civil War’, Survey.
A Journal of East and West Studies, 28, 1984, 3, 95‑110. Also this book, chapters 4 and 6.
14
Vladimir Dedijer, Novi prilozi za biograiju Josipa Broza Tita. vol. 2, Rijeka 1981 535, 544.
15
Ibid.
16
Antun Miletić, ‘Logor Jasenovac’, in Dedijer, Novi prilozi, 555, 557.
17
Ibid, 552‑554.
18
Ibid, 532‑568; 726‑740. On Partisan executions, 717‑725.
19
See Pavlowitch, ‘Dedijer as a Historian of the Yugoslav Civil War’.
20 Ramet, ‘Apocalypse Culture and Social Change in Yugoslavia’, 11‑13. See also Dragović‑
Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 81‑83. Goli Otok and the persecution of suspected suppor‑
ters of the Cominform were also the subject of a feuilleton in the weekly news magazine
NIN,
21
22
spring 1982.
See Golding, Liberated Cinema, 159‑164.
Vojislav Koštunica and Kosta Ćavoški, Stranački pluralizan ili monizam: društveni pokreti
i politički sistem u Jugoslaviji 1944-1949, Belgrade: Institut društvenih nauka, 1983.
23
Hudelist, Tuđman: Biograija, 515‑517. See also Franjo Tudjman, ‘Reply to the indict‑
ment at the trial at the district court in Zagreb on 17.2.1981’, in Boris Katich, ed., So
speak Croatian Dissidents, Toronto: Ziral, 1982, 133f.
24 Branko Petranović, Revolucije i kontrarevolucija u Jugoslaviji (1941-1945), Belgrade: “Rad”,
1983, 139f. See also Banac, ‘Historiography of the countries of Eastern Europe: Yugosla‑
via’, 1094‑1095.
25
Veselin Đuretić, Saveznici i jugoslovenska ratna drama, Belgrade: Multiprint, 1986 (irst
published 1985). See also Tea Sindbæk, ‘he Fall and Rise of a National Hero: Inter‑
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157
pretations of Draža Mihailović and the Chetniks in Yugoslavia and Serbia since 1945’,
Journal of Contemporary European Studies, vol. 17, 2009, 1, 47‑59.
26 Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 103, Marković, ‘Istoričari i jugoslovensto’, 161‑162.
27 Fikreta Jelić‑Butić, Četnici u Hrvatskoj, 1941-1945., Zagreb: Globus, 1986, e.g. 160‑164.
28
Ibid, 6. See also Željko Krušelj, ‘Pristrana ratna drama’, Danas, 24th of November 1987,
64‑66. For a critical stance towards the representation of the Chetniks in a collection of
documents on Yugoslav history 1918‑1984, edited by Branko Petranović and Momčilo
Zečević and published in Belgrade 1985, see Anto Milušić, ‘U povodu najnovije zbirke
dokumenata o Jugoslaviji’, Časopis za Suvremenu Povijest, 18, 1986, 1, 108‑112.
29 See also Hoepken, ‘War, Memory and Education in a Fragmented Society’, 205.
30 Vuk Drašković, Nož, Belgrade: Srpska reč, 1998 (First published 1982). he book was
reprinted several times. Drašković, a provocative dissident writer in the early 1980s, was
later to become one of the leaders of the political opposition in the 1990s, deputy prime
minister under Milošević in 1999, and foreign minister in post‑Milošević Serbia.
31
Drašković, Nož, 29‑47.
32
Ibid, e.g. 28, 46.
33
Ibid, 141‑143.
34
Ibid, 25. he kulak murders are the so‑called “left deviations” in Partisan historiography.
(In 1998, in an interview with the Serbian magazine Vreme, Drašković claimed that the
main story of Nož was true and that he had heard it secretly whispered several times as a
child. Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 106, note 196).
35
Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 107. Nož is also discussed in Andrew Baruch
Wachtel, Making a Nation, Breaking a Nation. Literature and Cultural Politics in Yugoslavia, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1998, 205f.
36
Danko Popović, Knjiga o Milutinu, (14th edition, irst printed 1985) Belgrade: Niro
“Književne Novine”, 1986, 78‑79.
37
See e.g. Dušan Ičević, ‘Svako ima svoga Milutina’, Večernje Novosti, 19th September 1986,
2; Dušan Ičević, ‘Balkanizacija do – razlaza’, Večernje novosti, 20th September 1986, 2. For
discussions of Knjiga O Milutinu and other works revisiting Second World War crimes
and massacres, see also: Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 104‑108, Wachtel, Making
a nation, breaking a nation, 204‑209, 221‑223; Aleksandar Pavković, ‘he Serb National
Idea: A Revival 1986‑92’, Slavonic and East European Review, 72, 1994, 3, 452; Aleksandar
Pavković, ‘From Yugoslavism to Serbism: the Serb national idea 1986‑1996’, Nations and
Nationalism, 4, 1998, 4, 517.
38
Slobodan Šnajder, Hrvatski Faust (3rd edition, irst published 1982), Zagreb: Cekade,
1988, 144‑149, 160‑165.
39
Ibid, 180‑181.
40 Ibid, 214‑215, 223‑226, 229.
41
Ibid, 170.
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158
usable history?
42 Ibid, 218.
43
NIN,
19th December 1982. Quoted in Petar Marjanović, ‘Slobodan Šnajder: the Croatian
faust (1982)’, Scena. heatre Arts Review, 1985, 8, 226.
44 Heinz Klunker, ‘Die Taubenschlucht öfnet sich. Wie sich Vergangenheit und Gegen‑
wart Jugoslawiens in neuen Stücken darstellen’, heater Heute, 1983, 9, 20, 22.
45
Ibid, 19. See also Dalibor Foretić, ‘Nove igre oko Golub‑njače’, Danas, 14th February,
1989, 37‑38.
46 Klunker, ‘Die Taubenschlucht öfnet sich’, 20, 22.
47 Jovan Radulović, Golubnjača, Belgrade: Dereta, 2001, 184.
48 Ibid, 264‑273.
49 Ibid, 185‑189.
50
51
Foretić, ‘Nove igre oko Golubnjače’, 37‑38.
Vjekoslav Perica, Balkan Idols: Religion and Nationalism in Yugoslav States, Oxford: Ox‑
ford University Press, 2002, 148.
52
E.g. Branimir Stanojević, Alojzije Stepinac. Zločinac ili svetac, Belgrade: Nova Knjiga,
1985, 9‑14; Jakov Blažević, ‘Predgovor reprintu’, Novak, Magnum Crimen, XXIV.
53
Quoted in Perica, Balkan Idols, 149. See also Radmila Radić, ‘he Church and the Ser‑
bian Question’, in Popov, ed., he Road to War in Serbia, 255.
54
Perica, Balkan Idols, 149.
55
Ibid, 156. Radić, ‘he Church and the Serbian Question’, 260.
56
Atanasije Jevtić, Od Kosova do Jadovna. Putni zapisi Jeromanaha Atanasija Jevtića, Bel‑
grade: Prosveta, 1985 (reprinted from the original accounts in Pravoslavlje, 400, 15th
November 1983; Pravoslavlje, 404, 15th January 1984; and Pravoslavlje, 405, 1st February
1984).
57
Jevtić, Od Kosova do Jadovna, 46.
58
Ibid, 22.
59
See Jasna Dragovic, ‘Les intellectuals serbes et la ‘question’ du Kosovo, 1981‑1987’, Relations Internationales, 89, 2, 1997 and Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 115‑145.
60 ‘Apel za zaštitu srpskog življa i njegovih svetinja na Kosovu’, in R. Petković, ed., Kosovo.
Prošlost i sadašnost, Belgrade: Međunarodna politika, 1989, 340. For an example of the
use of the concept of genocide within revisionist historiography on Kosovo, see Di‑
mitrije Bogdanović, Knjiga o Kosovu, Belgrade: sanu, 1986 (irst published 1985), which
explores, among other things “the history of the Turkish‑Albanian genocide on the Serb
people during the last hundred to two hundred years” Bogdanović: Knjiga o Kosovu, 4.
61
Brana Crnčević, ‘Logor za jednog čoveka’ Duga, 10th June 1985, reprinted in Svetislav
Spasojević, Slučaj Martinović, Belgrade: Partizanska Knjiga, 1986, 317. On the case of
Martinović and the way it was covered in Yugoslav press, see also Julie A. Mertus, Kosovo. How Myths and Truths Started a War, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of Cali‑
fornia Press, 1999, 100‑121.
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62 he Martinović’ case was taken up by Serbian intellectuals as a particularly brutal
example illustrating the general conditions for Serbs in Kosovo. See ‘Zahtev za pravnim
poretkom na Kosovu’, in Aleksa Djilas, ed., Srpsko Pitanje, Belgrade: Politika, 1991, 261;
‘Memorandum of the Serbian Academy of Science and Arts’ is reprinted from sanu’s
authorised version in Srdja Trifunovska, ed., Former Yugoslavia hrough Documents,
Haag: Martinus Nijhof Publ., 1999, 33.
63
See ‘Zahtev za pravnim poretkom na Kosovu’, 261.
64 he Memorandum was only ever written in draft form. It caused signiicant discus‑
sion and was condemned by communists both in Serbia and other republics. he full
contents of it, however, became known to a wider public when the complete text of
the document was printed in both the Serbian and Croatian press in 1989. On the Me‑
morandum, see also Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 177‑189; Tea Sindbæk, ‘Det
Serbiske Videnskabsakademis Memorandum. Et dokuments omskiftelige karriere’, Den
Jyske Historiker, 97, 2002, 146‑159.
65
Aleksandar Đukanović, ‘Ponuda beznađa’, Večernje novosti, 24th September 1986, 2. See
also ‘Memorandum of the Serbian Academy of Science and Arts’, 4.
66 Aleksandar Đukanović, ‘I avnoj je “lažiran”’, Večernje Novosti, 25th September 1986, 2.
See also ‘Memorandum of the Serbian Academy of Science and Arts’, 37. On Kosovo,
see ibid, 32f.
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Genocide as a cardinal
theme, 1984‑1989
9
While in the early 1980s the history of Second World War massacres was in‑
tensely readdressed on the Yugoslav creative cultural scene, not least in Serbia,
the issue remained relatively in the background of Yugoslav historiography. In
the second half of the 1980s, however, the theme of genocide came to dominate
academic historical culture, initially mainly among Serbian historians, but
later also in Croatian historical debate, partly in reaction to what happened
in Serbia. Historians with far greater enthusiasm than ever before engaged
themselves in scrutinising the history of victims, concentration camps and
massacres of the Second World War in Yugoslavia.
his chapter shows how genocide during the 1980s became a cardinal theme
within Serbian academic historiography, and how in the late 1980s Croatian
historiography reacted to this, questioning the validity of the Serbian genocide
thematization and protesting against what were seen as blatantly anti‑Croat
arguments. he chapter argues that the historians’ genocide thematization at
the outset relected legitimate needs to re‑examine what were seen as over‑
looked or deliberately downplayed elements of history. Yet, as national tension
increased, thematizations and debates of genocide history, widely published in
Yugoslav media, became national battleields between Serbian and Croatian
historiography, thus underpinning the total polarisation of historical debate.
Politics and national tensions
By the mid 1980s, Yugoslav politics remained plagued by political, economic
and ideological crises. he political system was paralysed, as the republican
leaderships were unable to agree on strategies for solving the crises and reform‑
ing the federation.1 he decline of living standards was a matter of serious
concern and seemed further proof of the inability of socialist workers’ state
to secure even the basic needs for its own workers.2
Unrest and trouble continued in Kosovo, and numerous Serbs and Mon‑
tenegrins left the province. he situation for Serbs in Kosovo had since the
early 1980s been a cause championed by the Serbian Orthodox Church, and
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from the mid‑1980s also prominent parts of the Belgrade intelligentsia started
to protest against conditions in Kosovo.3
Until 1987, the Serbian leadership called in vain for reforms of the economy
and the political system and for a revising of the early 1970s’ constitutional ar‑
rangements, which left Serbia practically without inluence in her autonomous
provinces, Kosovo and Vojvodina.4 In 1987, however, the new president of
the League of Communists of Serbia, Slobodan Milošević, ousted the former
leadership and pushed through a new line of politics, which led the Serbian
republic to rearrange the federal structures to it its own plans, disregarding
the standpoints of the other republics. During 1988, by playing on Serbian
popular nationalism, Milošević’s new Serbian leadership pressed the autono‑
mous governments in Kosovo and Vojvodina, as well as in the republic of
Montenegro, to retire, and replaced them with supporters of the new Serbian
political line.5 By 1989, Milošević could lead the celebration of the 600th an‑
niversary of the Battle of Kosovo as head of a unitary Serbian republic under
his and his followers’ control.
he disregard of constitutional rights and the deiant nationalism of
Milošević’s leadership naturally frightened and angered the other republics.
Whereas Slovenia had already embarked on its independent and, in many ways,
equally nationalist political project, the more reactionary party leaderships of
Croatia, Bosnia and Macedonia were slower to react.
At the end of the 1980s, the political changes in the Soviet Union and the
stirrings in other socialist states further contributed to the sense of political
breakdown and the drive for reforms. Relations between Yugoslav republican
leaderships were tense, and the expressions of national agenda in both Serbia
and Slovenia inevitably inluenced national relations more generally.
It was in this atmosphere of political conlict and national distrust that
the theme of genocide came to dominate initially Serbian but later also other
historiographies in Yugoslavia during the late 1980s. he thematization of
genocide and the debates around it took place within what were then largely
national historical cultures, which had since the 1960s and 1970s gradually
developed in each republic.
he development of genocide historiography
hough the historians’ thematization of genocide took place mainly in the
second half of the 1980s, one of the cores of Serbian genocide historiography
was established already in July 1984, when the Serbian Academy of Sciences
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163
and Arts, sanu, set up a committee with the aim of “collecting material on
the genocide of the Serbian and other Yugoslav peoples in the 20th century”.6
he committee was headed by the invincible Vladimir Dedijer. In 1985, Dedi‑
jer’s committee was separated into several sub‑committees, of which the one
investigating genocide against the Serbian people proved particularly active.7
According to Dedijer himself, the work of the genocide committee was badly
needed, because the Yugoslav state, under the inluence of powerful persons
and for nationalistic reasons, had for more than 40 years totally neglected
these questions, included herein the need to establish the true number of war
victims.8 Within the framework of this committee, it was planned to publish
21 studies and source collections on cases of genocide committed mainly in
Yugoslavia.9 By 1990, 11 large volumes were published, of which there was only
one – i.e. a collection of sources on genocide against Muslims 1941‑1945 – which
did not have Serbs as the main victim group.10
Dedijer was most probably sincerely dedicated to uncovering as faithfully
as possible the history of genocide in Yugoslavia. He had worked with geno‑
cide questions as a member of the grass‑root Russel Tribunal, and in his much
disputed Novi prilozi za biograiju Josipa Broza Tita (New Contributions to the
biography of Josip Broz Tito).11 Beside his craving for sensational revelations
and conspiracy theories and his obvious anti‑Catholic views, he was driven by
an honest indignation caused by what he saw as the Yugoslav state’s constant
overlooking of the problem of genocide and the Vatican’s success in avoiding
responsibility and trial for the unfortunate role of the Catholic Church in Yugo‑
slavia and elsewhere during the Second World War. he fact that he was among
the irst researchers to thematize the mainly Serbian mass killing of Muslims
1941‑1945, shows that he was not merely promoting a Serbian national cause.
Characteristic of the publications from the genocide commission under
sanu was, obviously, their thematization of genocide as an overlooked per‑
spective within Yugoslav historiography and, as follows from the genocide
perspective, their thematization of national and, in the majority of cases,
Serbian, victimisation. Most publications were large volumes of historical
sources in the forms of reprinted documents and testimonies. his relected,
on the one hand, a rather democratic approach to historical knowledge as
something constructed by the individual reader’s interpretation of the sources.
hough the publications also held introductions and presentations, suggesting
how to interpret the sources reprinted, the reader could personally control the
particular evidence supporting the argument. he direct eye witness accounts,
on the other hand, made the source collections quite emotionally appealing,
and few attempts were made at qualifying the sources or the procedures behind
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selecting them. Furthermore, the sheer magnitude of documentary proofs
made the publications seem very convincing in a traditional positivist sense.
In efect, these massive publications from sanu’s genocide commission – and
others as well – acquired a monumental character: large in size and in their
degree of detail, they were written monuments testifying to and thematizing
Second World War genocide and Serbian victimisation.
While these massive volumes of documents and accounts probably did
not themselves reach a wide Yugoslav audience, they indirectly did so through
various journals and news magazines. Feuilletons on historical subjects were a
common feature of Yugoslav news magazines such as Danas, a Zagreb based
weekly which reached a circulation of 180,000 at its peak in the late 1980s, or
NIN, a Belgrade weekly which published more than 200,000 copies during the
same period.12 Summaries and descriptions of major historical publications as
well as interviews with the authors were common in the Yugoslav media, and
often the dominant issues within academic historiography were also treated
in journalistic books. In the second half of the 1980s, the developments and
results within academic historiography were widely publicised and popularised
and thereby became parts of more popular historical culture.
During the late 1980s, the themes that were to cause the greatest interest
and disputes among historians were closely related to the Ustasha politics of
racial and national persecution; namely the history of the concentration camp
complex at Jasenovac, the role and responsibility of the Catholic Church in
the Ustasha’s persecution and massacres of Serbs, and, as a related issue, the
question of wether, and to what extent, genocide could be seen as an inherent
trait of Croat culture. In 1986, the trial in Zagreb against the former Ustasha
minister of the Interior, Andrija Artuković, extradited from the usa on Yugo‑
slav requests, also became a source and matter of studies and debate. Behind
all these revisions and debates on the history of Yugoslavia’s Second World
War massacres lay the ongoing disputes about the number of real victims of
the Yugoslav Second World War, in general, and of the Jasenovac camp in
particular.
Jasenovac
he question of the concentration camp complex Jasenovac became a nucleus
of Yugoslav genocide historiography. During the decade from 1981 to 1990,
more books and articles about Jasenovac were published than ever before or
since, and several scientiic meetings, some held in prestigious international
style, were arranged to discuss the state of research on the camp.13 One of the
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165
issues repeatedly emphasised was the need to establish the exact number, or
at least a valid estimate of the number of victims of the camp.14
A dominant argument in the calls for readdressing the history of Jasenovac
was the claim that it was overlooked or, as argued by some, even manipulated
out of nationalist considerations. According to the organiser of a round‑table
discussion in Jasenovac in 1984, Dobrila Borović, it was a well‑known fact that
both journalists and scientists wrote rather irresponsibly about Jasenovac, and
that the number of victims had evidently been manipulated, which he con‑
nected to “a stench of the presence of aggressive klero‑nationalism.”15 his was
an obvious reference to Croatian nationalism and its connection to the Catholic
Church, which was often discussed in relation to Ustasha history. Such and
anti‑Croat edge increasingly characterised the historiographic thematization
of genocide.
hrough the second half of the 1980s, the argument that the history of
Jasenovac was somehow a taboo and deliberately hidden was repeatedly stated
from the side of Serbian genocide historians. At sanu’s conference on Jasenovac,
held in November 1988, Vladimir Dedijer claimed that the Croat communist
leader, Vladimir Bakarić had personally hidden important documents.16 he
journalist covering the conference for the Belgrade weekly NIN called his report
“Genocide and silence” and suggested that Jasenovac was “for decades covered
by silence as if by the lid of a coin”.17 As shown in earlier chapters of this
book, this was deinitely not true. Numerous studies and accounts dealing with
the history of Jasenovac were printed throughout the previous decades. Yet,
earlier accounts had not addressed the issue primarily from the perspective of
nationalist and genocidal politics, an approach that was now to dominate the
history writing about the camp.
In 1986, the publication of two large volumes of documents and testimonies
about the concentration camp complex at Jasenovac enriched the discussion
with much material and new points of departure. hese volumes, titled Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac 1941.-1945. Dokumenta (he Concentration Camp
Jasenovac 1941‑1945. Documents), were edited by Antun Miletić, colonel in
the Yugoslav army and employed at the Institute of Military History in Bel‑
grade. In the preface to the irst volume, Jefto Šašić, a Yugoslav army general,
greeted the publication as a new step in the development of Yugoslav histori‑
ography, which, he claimed, had not for various reasons investigated this issue
suiciently. According to Šašić, it was particularly important that the young
generations learned of these crimes, in order to be able to recognise similar
actions. Šašić emphasised that Ustasha politics and Jasenovac as part of this
must be recognised as a particular type of crime, namely that of genocide, and
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he warned against various types of “political pragmatism” that attempted either
to decrease the number of victims to only 50,000 consisting mostly of Croats
alone, or to inlate the number, suggesting more than a million consisting of
Serb victims alone.18
Miletić’s publication was in many ways traditionally Titoist: On the lap,
it held a quote from Tito warning the Yugoslavs to guard Brotherhood and
Unity as the pupil of their eye, and in its narrative it placed the ndh and the
Ustasha crimes within the framework of the politics of the Axis occupiers.19
Yet, in pointing out the particular Ustasha cruelty and in thematizing the
numbers of victims and the perspective of genocide, this publication signii‑
cantly contributed to the growing interest in these issues.
Miletić’s source collection on Jasenovac was received with acclaim and
interest. One reviewer, Nikola Živković of the Institute of Contemporary
History in Belgrade, praised Miletić’s “enormous efort”, but he also pointed
out that “this genuine step in the investigation of the problem” led to several
questions that further investigations would have to answer, included herein
the issue of genocide and the establishment of the actual – or at least an ap‑
proximate – number of persons killed in the camp.20 According to another
reviewer, Miomir Dašić’, Miletić’s work was a much needed contribution to
the investigation of the issue of genocide in Yugoslavia during the Second
World War, which had until then been overlooked by Yugoslav academic
historiography. Miletić’s sources, stated Dašić, testiied that “the ndh devel‑
oped under the conditions and as a sign of the most terrible genocide within
the frames of the Second World War”.21 He obviously referred to the mass
killing of Serbs in the ndh, which was the main focus of the review, though
also Jews, Roma and anti‑regime Croats and Muslims were mentioned as
victims. It is diicult not to interpret Dašić’s statements as claiming that
the persecution of Serbs in the ndh was worse even than the Nazi destruc‑
tion of European Jewry, which would be quite tendentious and unfounded.
Nevertheless, this certainly testiies to a tendency to magnify the tragedy at
Jasenovac. According to Dašić, it was clear from Miletić’s documents that
the numbers of murdered men, women and children in the camp were larger
than the original estimates from 1946. Instead, Dašić claimed, the newest
investigations showed that 700,000 people were killed there.22 Yet, this num‑
ber, presented as important news, was not new at all. Nikola Nikolić’ book
Jasenovački Logor from 1948 stated a number of 600,000‑700,000 victims for
the main element of the camp alone, and standard reference works from the
1960s and 1970s, such as the Yugoslav Encyclopaedia made estimates around
700,000.23
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he historians’ growing interest in Jasenovac relected both an insistence on
investigating a problematic and traumatic historical issue that was considered
overlooked or ignored by earlier research, and a wish to disentangle this issue
from what was seen as a largely lawed and manipulated earlier history writ‑
ing. Included in this were simultaneously a moral indignation that a history
of so much violence, sufering and death had not been properly examined, a
scholarly interest in a new and complex problem, and an existential wish to
safeguard this historical memory for future generations.
he call for revision and re‑examination of the history of Jasenovac, how‑
ever, also led to new very emotional and sometimes lawed and problematic
presentations of the issue. Following the publication of Antun Miletić’s volumes
of sources on Jasenovac, the magazine of the Yugoslav socialist youth organisa‑
tion, Mladost, published a feature on the camp. he article was introduced by
the following statement from a former prisoner:
No pen will be able to describe all the horrors and the terrible atmosphere of
Jasenovac. It surpasses any human fantasy. Hell, inquisition, the most horrible
terror … the blood thirst of wild beasts, the outburst of the darkest and most
repulsive instincts, such as have not until now appeared among people.24
Mladost further claimed that Jasenovac was the most gruesome human slaugh‑
terhouse during the Second World War, the worst camp in Europe; that the
Ustasha boasted in 1942 of having murdered more Serbs than were killed
through the entire Ottoman period; and, quoting Miletić, that even Jasenovac’s
popular name “the camp of death” was unable to express just how terrible the
camp had been.25 In conclusion, Mladost called for a disregard of political
consideration in order to establish the truth about the genocide politics and
Jasenovac for the sake of future generations.
he insistence that the terrors of Jasenovac must by far exceed the crimes
committed elsewhere in Europe during the Second World War is unfounded
and sensationalist. Yet, the article in Mladost illustrates how, after the publica‑
tion of Miletić’s book, the history of Jasenovac was thematized, popularised in
shocking and emotionally evocative ways and widely published, while it was
also often suggested that the truth was unexplored or deliberately concealed.
Furthermore, Mladost linked that lack of investigation to Croat national sen‑
sibilities, thus implicitly blaming Croat nationalism.26
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he role of the Catholic Church
As in the irst years after the Second World War, one of the issues that at‑
tracted most interest from the side of historians was the Catholic Church
and its relationship with the Ustasha. In 1987, Dedijer published a collection
of sources and accounts, titled Vatikan i Jasenovac. Dokumenti. (he Vatican
and Jasenovac. Documents). he volume elaborated Dedijer’s earlier attacks
on the Catholic Church and aimed at documenting Catholic involvement in
and responsibility for Ustasha war crimes, which, claimed Dedijer, was always
silenced by the Vatican itself. According to Dedijer, the Catholic Church
blessed the construction of the ndh, while numerous priests and friars joined
the ranks of the Ustasha even in high positions, and Catholic priests and
friars participated in the onslaught on Serbs in Jasenovac and elsewhere. In
fact, claimed Dedijer, photographs proved that Catholic clergy were the main
murderers and commanders of the Ustasha camps.27
While Dedijer overestimated the active role played by the Catholic Church
in Ustasha crimes, he was certainly right that the Vatican had done very little
with regard to recognising and apologising for the Catholic involvement that
did take place. However, claiming that Ustasha crimes and Catholic involve‑
ment in them was silenced in general made little sense. Indeed, most of the
material in Vatikan i Jasenovac consisted of reprints and extracts from already
published books, such as Nikola Nikolić’ descriptions of conditions in Jase‑
novac; collections of documents published in the 1940s and early 1950s; Sima
Simić studies of forced conversion from 1958; and even bits from Dedijer’s own
wartime diaries, among them Djilas’ account of the massacre in the village of
Urije in July 1942.28 Yet, here the material was collected in a new order and
under new titles, or, we may say, within a new thematization. hus, Dedijer’s
publication drew new attention to the issue of Catholic responsibility by
republishing a large amount of material that related to it. While large parts
of the material, such as the testimony from a Herzegovinian survivor of an
Ustasha massacre, had no direct connection to the church, it did contribute
to the emphasis of the horror of the Ustasha regime, of which it was Dedijer’s
errand to thematize the Catholic co‑responsibility.
Since the question of Catholic responsibility was an old issue revisited, the
readdressing partly took the form of reprints of old books. In 1986, Viktor
Novak’s huge volume Magnum Crimen about the role of the Catholic Church
in recent Yugoslav history, and particularly during the ndh, was reprinted. he
1986 edition held a new preface and introduction, which thematized what the
editors considered the main points of the book, namely the responsibility of
the church for genocide against Serbs in the ndh, the permanent anti‑Yugoslav
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and anti‑Serbian stance of the Catholic Church, and the risk of a repetition
of history.29
he new introduction, written by Jakov Blažević, prosecutor at the trial
against Stepinac in 1948 and high ranking member of the Croatian League
of Communists, echoed these points, arguing that the reprint was necessary
because of the need for historical remembrance and clear statements that
this must never happen again, and “because the forces of darkness discussed
in this book are still alive”.30 he republication of Magnum Crimen and the
introductory warnings were at least partly provoked by the calls from the Croa‑
tian Catholic Church to have Zagreb’s wartime archbishop, Alozije Stepinac,
who was seen by communist historiography as an ally and accomplice of the
Ustasha, declared a martyr.31
By underlining the need to know and remember the crimes and the role of
the Catholic Church, and at the same time thematizing the risk of repetition,
the reprint of Magnum Crimen promoted the past as a key to understanding
the present. As was stated in the new preface, “Historia est magistra vitae”,
history is the teacher of life.32 It was thus suggested that the persecution and
mass killing of Serbs during the Second World War was to be kept in mind
when interpreting the developments in Yugoslavia. If the past was the key to
the present, renewed massacres was what Serbs could expect.
he republication of Magnum Crimen was welcomed by the Belgrade weekly
magazine NIN. According to journalist Ljiljana Bulatović, rumours claimed that
almost the complete irst print of 4000 copies of the book in 1948 was, im‑
mediately after the publication, bought and destroyed by the Catholic Church.
Furthermore, the reasons for republishing the books, argued Bulatović, were
obvious from the content of the book itself as well as from Jakov Blažević’s
new introduction, which warned against the threats from the dark forces of
clericalism.33
Magnum Crimen’s reprint was followed in 1988 by a volume of further
material on the theme, called Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo. Prilozi za Magnum
Crimen, (Barbarianism in the name of Christ. Contributions to Magnum
Crimen), authored by Dragoljub R. Živojinović, professor of history at the
University of Belgrade, and Dejan Lučić. Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo was mainly
a collection of sources, but it also held expansive comments and introductions
to each theme. Like Magnum Crimen, it thematized the responsibility of the
Catholic Church for genocide against Serbs. In a chapter titled “he partner‑
ship between Ustasha and the Catholic Church in the creation of the ndh”
it was claimed that these two parties were united in religious fanaticism, that
the Vatican’s policy, dictated through the Croatian Catholic Church, was to
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conquer territory in the Balkans for Catholicism, and that the physical instiga‑
tor of this policy was the Ustasha movement and state.34
In Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo, the concept of genocide was continuously
thematized, particularly in a chapter titled “he technology of genocide against
the Serbian people”, in which “the Ustasha genocidal machinery”, the massacres
against Serbian villages in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the concentra‑
tion camps, were described.35 Although the book also referred to crimes against
Jews and Roma, it was quite obvious from the quotes and the titles of chapters
that the main theme of the book was the Serbian victimisation of genocide com‑
mitted by both the Catholic Church and the Ustasha as Croatian chauvinists.
Like in Vatikan i Jasenovac, most of the documents reprinted or recounted
in Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo had already appeared in other studies and collec‑
tions printed in the irst decade after the war.36 What was published in these
large volumes, then, was largely the same material, but since it was reproduced
in a radically new context and, from the viewpoint of the editors and authors,
with a new understanding and a new thematization, the resulting historical
accounts and conclusions were diferent. As a result of this “rethematization”,
what were once presented as documents proving the crimes of the occupiers
and their collaborators against the Yugoslav people, were now introduced as
testimonies to genocide committed by the Catholic Church and Croatian
chauvinists, with Serbs as the most important victim group by far.37
In an interview in NIN after the publication of Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo,
Živojinović also emphasised the Catholic Church’s responsibility both for the
ideology behind the Ustasha massacres and for their practical realisation.38
he trial of Andrija Artuković
he growing interest in the massacres of the Second World War was boosted
by the trial in the Spring of 1986 of the Ustasha minister Andrija Artuković,
who after several requests from Yugoslavia was inally extradited from the USA
and brought before the public court in Zagreb. Via reports from the trial, the
crimes of the Second World War invaded the front pages of the Yugoslav media.
hroughout the Spring of 1986, Danas brought weekly synopses from the
proceedings in the courtroom as well as feature articles of related themes such
as eyewitness accounts of the horrors of the Ustasha regime, its massacres and
concentration camps.39 In connection with the Artuković trial, Danas also
printed articles on other famous war criminals, including Milan Nedić and
Draža Mihailović, thus proving faithful to the Titoist principle of balancing
war guilt among the Yugoslav nations.40
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Ill. 9.1. “he ‘forgetfulness’ of the
minister of crime”. Front page of
the Zagreb weekly Danas, 22nd
April 1986, which referred to
Artuković’s main defence strategy,
i.e. denying that he had seen, heard or remembered anything.
Milan Bulajić, Partisan veteran and long term employee of the Yugoslav for‑
eign ministry, represented sanu’s genocide commission at the trial. In 1988 he
published two massive volumes of comments and documents on Artuković
and the trial. Vladimir Dedijer, who wrote the preface to the book, emphasised
that the victims demanded their pages in contemporary history. According to
Dedijer, Bulajić, both for the sake of inding the truth and to avoid any repeti‑
tion of such crimes, claimed it a personal, generational and societal obligation
to document the history of the Ustasha genocide.41 he aim of Bulajić’ book
was thus to prove that the Ustasha policy during the Second World War was
really genocide, and that Andrija Artuković as minister of the interior in the
ndh was directly and personally responsible for this policy.
Both Bulajić and Dedijer were deeply ofended by the fact that Artuković
was only accused of – and convicted for – war crimes and not for genocide.
hey suggested that this had to do with certain chauvinist anti‑Serbian and
anti‑Slovene fractions in the Croatian League of Communists.42 hus, what
was on the one hand a fundamental drive for documenting the history of
genocide, was on the other characterised by suspicion and anti‑Croat feelings.
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Ill. 9.2. “Massacred victim of the
Ustasha genocide”. his decapitated
corpse is one of numerous photo
illustrations of mangled victims
in Bulajić’s book. Bulajić, Ustaški
zločini genocida, vol. 1, from
photo pages between page 288 and
289. Most pictures were from the
photo archive of the Military museum in Belgrade.
Needless to say, Bulajić’ book constantly thematized the Ustasha practices
as genocide, and he did not spare the reader from the horrors. A particularly
gruesome set of accounts dealt with child victims of the Ustasha politics, and
again Artuković’s part in this was emphasised.43
In an interview in NIN, Bulajić repeated his criticism of the Artuković trial,
complaining that the history and oicial memory of Ustasha crimes were not
properly investigated and suggesting that this was due to “our regime’s wish
that the wounds were suppressed into oblivion”. Replying to a question from
the journalist, Bulajić conirmed that the genocide remained a “taboo theme”,
and that this was visible from the way documents had disappeared from the
archives and from the way people avoided the issue.44 At sanu’s conference
on Jasenovac in November 1988, Bulajić repeated these points and, clearly
dissatisied with the way the history of Ustasha crimes was commemorated,
complained that the site of the camp rather than being properly marked now
resembled a golf course.45
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Given the amount of scholarly activity and publications dedicated to the
question of genocide, Bulajić’s claim that genocide was taboo seems plainly
wrong. With regard to the Jasenovac memorial, contemporary descriptions
suggest that the exhibition there was direct and brutal in its descriptions of
the crimes committed in the camp.46 It is diicult not to regard his constant
accusations and claims of a deliberate silencing of Ustasha crimes and Serbian
sufering as attempts to draw even more attention to, and even sensationalise,
these issues.
Besides echoing Bulajić’s points, NIN supplied Bulajić with a wide reaching
platform from which to spread his message. In early 1989, Bulajić’s analysis and
critique of what he saw as a lawed, manipulated and faulty trial, was published
also as a series of feature articles in the Belgrade bi‑weekly magazine, Duga.47
he example of Bulajić’s study of Andrija Artuković demonstrates certain
elements of the thematization of genocide within parts of Serbian historical
culture: one incitatment for the investigation was a fundamental human – or
in Karlsson’s terminology “moral” and “existential” – wish to remember and
do justice to the victims, and at the same time to learn from history in order
to avoid its repetition.48 his wish was further strengthened by the sense that
history had until then, and even in the case of the Artuković trial, been ma‑
nipulated by cynical oicials and nationalists.
here is no doubt that history in socialist Yugoslavia had been treated
selectively and with functional aims. A readdressing of the history of Second
World War crimes was certainly long due. But Bulajić’s accusative tone and
claims of conspiracies did not contribute to an open and constructive de‑
bate between historians and the regime, nor across republican and national
boundaries. Furthermore, Bulajić’s perspective on genocide history was unmis‑
takably focused on national aspects, both concerning the crimes and victims
and in the accusations that Croat nationalism rather than Yugoslav socialism
was behind what was seen as insuicient investigation or even silencing of
the problem.
Blaming Croatia in general for the inadequate treatment of the history of
Second World War crimes was hardly fair. As has been demonstrated in earlier
chapters of this book, throughout Yugoslavia’s socialist period Croat writers,
ilmmakers and historians were at the forefront of investigating and discuss‑
ing Ustasha history, and they often did so in works published by Croatian
printing houses or staged at theatres in Croatia.49 hough the Artuković trial
may have been clumsy, it did certainly not aim to deny Ustasha crimes, and
in connection to the trial Croatian journals massively published reports and
descriptions of crimes committed by the Ustasha.
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In any case, the reviving and constant thematization of wartime massacres
in historiography, as well as in the public sphere, was bound to raise strong
feelings both among Serbs and among other Yugoslav peoples. Furthermore,
accusations such as the suggested existence of a Croatian national lobby ma‑
nipulating history and denying the crimes of the Ustasha inevitably alienated
Croatian historians and public from Serbian genocide historiography. hough
it was far from always the case, the thematization of wartime massacres on
the part of Serbian or Belgrade based historians had at times a distinctly anti‑
Croat tone, which inevitably contributed to a national polarisation of Yugoslav
historical culture.
Croatian reactions and genocide discussions in the press
While many Serbian historians were revising, questioning and thematizing the
darkest sides of Yugoslavia’s contemporary history, the Croatian historians’ envi‑
ronment seemed quiet and subdued. Since the harsh suppression of the Croatian
national mass movement of the early 1970s, the political climate in Croatia had
remained utterly conservative. Relecting this, the scene of contemporary his‑
tory adhered strictly to Titoist patterns, avoiding national issues. Yet, faced with
Serbian genocide thematization, debaters and historians initially welcomed the
discussions. By the end of the 1980s, however, Croat historians turned against
the nationalist edge of the Serbian genocide debates, which were then met with
progressively more scepticism, resentment and even anger. Vladimir Dedijer,
one of the main proponents of the thematization of genocide, was criticised as
a writer of unfounded and manipulative history, and his work as head of sanu’s
genocide commission was seen as a service to the rising Serbian nationalism.50
History debates became increasingly sharp and uncompromising, relect‑
ing the tense national relations in Yugoslavia in the second half of the 1980s.
Leading Croat historians pointed out that history seemed to become ever more
subordinated to political agenda and polemics. According to Ljubo Boban,
professor of history at the University of Zagreb, controversies were an essential
characteristic of the historiography of the late 1980s.51 Boban suggested that
even academic historiography was politicised to such a degree that it became
questionable if it was history at all.52 Ivo Goldstein, historian at the University
of Zagreb, argued that the increasing public interest in history in late 1980s was
accompanied by a growth of unscientiic, unfounded and polemical history
writing, the bitterest disputes of which concerned the numbers of war victims
in general and in Jasenovac in particular.53
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he genocide history debates in Croatian press largely reacted to the themes
addressed in the Serbian genocide‑centred historiography: the concentration
camp complex at Jasenovac as a main focus of genocide thematization; the role
of the Catholic Church and the wartime Bishop of Zagreb, Alojzije Stepinac,
in Ustasha massacres and terror politics; the trial against Artuković; and, woven
into it all, the question of the numbers of victims. Yet, from a Croat point
of view, the debates included another aspect, namely the sense of an often
vague and implicit, but at times more overt suggestion from the perspective
of parts of Serbian historiography, that Croat national culture and ideology
were inherently genocidal.
he remaining part of this chapter will examine how Croatian historians
and public debaters reacted to each of these themes as they were posed by
Serbian historians, or, more to the point, as they were perceived in Croatia.
A genocidal trait of Croat culture?
In September 1986, Književne novine, the newspaper of the Serbian writ‑
ers’ association, published an article titled ‘O genezi genocida nad Srbima u
ndh’ (‘On the genesis of the genocide of the Serbs in the ndh’), authored by
Vasilije Krestić, professor at the University of Belgrade and member of the
history department of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. In the article,
Krestić argued that deeper causes of the massacres and persecution of Serbs
in Croatia could be traced through several centuries of Croatian history, that
the idea of genocide had fully matured in Croatian bourgeois society before
the First World War, and that it was deeply rooted in the consciousness of
many generations.54
Krestić’ thesis was strongly criticised in the Yugoslav and not least Croa‑
tian media. In a comment, which was repeated on tv Zagreb and in Danas,
Predrag Vitaz of TV Belgrade equalled Krestić’s type of scientiic dialogue to
“sinking into the wild whirlpool of dark nationalistic passions, which are fed
by hatred and intolerance …”.55 In Komunist, the organ of the Yugoslav League
of Communists’ Central Committee, Krestić was accused of nationalism and
of renouncing his professional dignity.56
Nevertheless, the sense that Croats were accused of a certain genocidal trait
remained in the debate. In January 1988, a journalist in the Croatian magazine
Danas commented angrily on an interview given by Vuk Drašković to Glas
Crkve, the journal of the Serbian episcopate of Šabac and Valjevo. According
to the Danas journalist, Drašković had argued that Western philosophy and
civilisation, including Catholicism, was what the world had encountered in
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Auschwitz and Mauthausen and what the Serbs had met in Jasenovac and
Jadovno, at Kozara, in Lika and Hercegovina. he following quote was re‑
printed from the interview: “… hese ‘arians’, these supermen of the thousand
years of Croatian culture, we will remember them forever and as long as we
exist”.57 In the view of Danas’ journalist, Drašković thereby linked Western
and Croatian culture with Nazi crimes and the crimes of the Ustasha.
he idea that Croat national culture held an inherently genocidal tendency
was further linked to the role of the Catholic Church. At Christmas 1988, the
Croatian Cardinal Franjo Kuharić rejected and criticised the thesis of a “geno‑
cidal nature” of the Croat nation and the Catholic Church. He was quoted in
Danas, whose journalist similarly criticised the existence of this idea.58 Another
Danas journalist saw the national protests by Serbs in Croatian Krajina in the
Spring of 1989 as connected to “academic” elaborations on ‘genocidal trait’ as
a constant Croatian characteristic.59
According to the Croat historian Ljubo Boban, “well known voices” saw in
Catholicism “the genocidal instinct of the Croat nation, because it is Catholic”.
hese accusations, according to Boban, were not necessarily aimed at explain‑
ing the past, but also at confrontation in the present.60 Boban seems to suggest
that the claim that Croatian nationalism, because of its link to Catholicism,
was dangerous and genocidal served also as useful discursive ammunition in
the political disputes between Yugoslavia’s republics. Boban and Milan Bulajić
sharply and lengthily disputed this in various Yugoslav media, Bulajić claiming
that Boban defended the Vatican, and Boban arguing that Bulajić manipulated
his sources to prove the genocidal nature of the Catholic faith.61
Needless to say, the statements from Krestić, Drašković and Bulajić provoked
anger in the Croatian public, and the polemics about the genocidal tendency of
Croatian culture contributed to an increasingly ofensive, stern and rigid climate
of debates among Yugoslav historians of Croat or Serb observation.
Jasenovac and the “Jasenovac myth”
he readdressing of the history of Jasenovac was initially welcomed in the
Croatian media. Miletić’s publication of sources on the camp was welcomed by
Danas journalist Željko Krušelj as until now “…the most complete testimony
of the horrors of this Ustasha ‘factory of death’…”.62 According to Krušelj, a
shocking and relatively new contribution to the history of Jasenovac was the
numerous descriptions of bestial and bizarre types of torture used in the camp.
If a few corrections were made, Krušelj continued, the nations and nationalities
of Yugoslavia would owe Miletić special gratitude.63
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Also the scientiic meeting about Jasenovac and genocide held by sanu’s
genocide committee in Belgrade in November 1988 was appreciated. he
aim of the meeting, according to a Željko Krušelj’s report in Danas, was to
work against “the strategy of oblivion” by investigating closely and in great
detail the events, the victims and the perpetrators, also in order to point out
the responsible parties. he participating historians generally agreed that the
Vatican and the Catholic Church bore its part of the responsibility, both for
events during the war and for trying to avoid a proper scrutinising of the
past. Krušelj welcomed this discussion, arguing that it was both possible and
necessary for the wounds of Jasenovac to be peacefully closed.64
Yet, faced with the continuous thematization of the numbers of victims of
Jasenovac as well as the rise of political nationalism with Milošević in Serbia,
Croatian reactions to Serbian historiography sharpened. he discussions of
Jasenovac were increasingly seen as politicised and nationalist. In a letter to the
editor of Danas, three survivors of the Ustasha camps Jasenovac, Stara Gradiška
and Lepoglava welcomed further serious investigations into the history of the
camps, but at the same time they expressed discomfort and bitterness about
the way the discussions on Jasenovac concentrated on the number of victims
and the attempts to separate camp victims into groups according to national
or religious ailiation. he three survivors argued in the best Titoist spirit that
all camp victims fought together against fascism regardless of national adher‑
ence.65
Also the attacks on Croatian nationalism were met with anger. In April
1988, Željko Krušelj in a column in Danas reacted angrily to what he saw as
false accusations from Dedijer and a journalist of the Serbian weekly NIN, who
both claimed that Croatian archives withheld and refused to grant researchers
access to material on Jasenovac. Krušelj also condemned Dedijer’s suggestions
that Jasenovac was a taboo theme.66
By 1989, it was suggested in the Croatian media that the Serbian thema‑
tization of Jasenovac had transformed the history of the camp into a sort
of myth. he Croat journalist and author of a study on the Ustasha camps,
Mirko Peršen, who had himself been a prisoner in Jasenovac, argued that it
was time for “dissolving the Jasenovac myth.”67 In Peršen’s view, the myth of
Jasenovac was a product of decades of politically motivated abuse of history
by the communist regime, and it was now upheld by Bulajić and others who
insisted on far larger numbers of victims even though they had no proof of
such numbers.
According to Željko Krušelj, who interviewed the author for Danas, “Peršen
had refuted the ‘Jasenovac myth’ as a proposition for the ‘genocidal essence’ of
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the Croat nation …”, and he had at the same time demonstrated the absurdity
of the politicisation of the issue, which clearly relected the current relations
among the Yugoslav nations.68 To Krušelj, the high number of Jasenovac victims
suggested particularly by the Serbian side was clearly connected to discursive
attacks on Croat nationality.
he comparison of the history of Jasenovac to myth‑making was also sug‑
gested by the well‑known dissident historian, former general and soon to be
independent Croatia’s irst president, Franjo Tuđman. His 1989 book, Bespuća
povijesne zbiljnosti. Rasprave o povijesti i ilozoiji zlosilja (he wilderness of
historical truth. Discussions on history and philosophy of evil‑doing), mostly
a personal summary of the numerous historical disputes he had been involved
in, dedicated several chapters to the discussion of Jasenovac and the number
of Yugoslav war victims. In an attempt to disentangle what he saw as “the
creation of the myth of Jasenovac”, Tuđman argued that sources from the
wartime did not in particular emphasise the camp at Jasenovac.69 Instead,
he claimed, Jasenovac had achieved its special status during the last decades.
Tuđman criticised the works and claims of Vladimir Dedijer, Antun Miletić and
the ictional writer Vuk Drašković, and he repudiated various Serbian authors,
among them the historian Velimir Terzić and the novelist Vojislav Lubarda,
for claiming that more than a million Serbs were murdered in Jasenovac. his
constant growth of numbers, according to Tuđman, aimed at proving a certain
historical guilt of the Croats.70
While he recognised that Jasenovac had been an inhumane place, the
proper number of persons killed in the camp, according to Tuđman, was far
from these Serbian suggestions: “… the truth is that the camp was organised
as a ‘work camp’ … the prisoners were exhausted all the time and tormented
by incredibly hard and unhygienic conditions at work, and besides they were
tortured and killed for the smallest single disobediences, particularly the ex‑
hausted and old, and at times, usually during a declaration of punishment for
a killed Ustasha or for an attempted escape, they were bestially killed also in
smaller or larger groups (from ten and even up to a hundred persons). In this
way, deinitely some (probably 3‑4) tens of thousands of prisoners perished in
the Jasenovac camp – mostly Gypsies, then Jews and Serbs, and also Croats.”71
In his discussions of Jasenovac and the Ustasha persecution of Serbs, Jews,
Roma and regime opponents, Tuđman came close to trivialising the question
of genocide, arguing that “inal solutions” and genocidal politics have been
practiced always and by countless cultures, regimes and movements.72
Tuđman’s strident revisionism, his persistent efort to minimise the number
of victims of Jasenovac, and his estimate that 30,000 to 40,000 persons were
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killed in Jasenovac, which was among the lowest calculations ever in Yugoslav
historical culture, were bound to stir up strong feelings. Furthermore, his com‑
parison of the history of Jasenovac to a myth, which could even be compared
to arguments in nationalist Croat émigré circles that several hundred thousand
Croat refugees were killed by the Partisans at the end of the war, were bound
to trouble national relations further, both among the Yugoslav republics, and
among Serbs and Croats in Croatia.73
he Catholic Church
Whereas the increased interest and research in Jasenovac was initially welcomed
in Croatian debate, publications on the role of the Croatian Catholic Church in
the politics of the ndh were generally regarded as sensationalist and manipula‑
tive. Apparently, attacks on the Catholic Church in the eyes of the Croatian
media and debaters also came close to attacks on Croatian nationality as such.
he republication in 1986 of Viktor Novak’s Magnum Crimen was re‑
ceived with signiicant resentment. In a comment in Danas, journalist Nenad
Ivanković argued that Novak’s book sacriiced scientiic articulation and
objectivity for “pamphletism” and emotional appeal and that it equated Ca‑
tholicism with clericalism and clero‑fascism. Novak’s book nevertheless had
its great qualities, claimed Ivanković, but reprinting it without recognising
and commenting on its limitations, one‑sidedness and mistakes was close
to committing another “Crimen”.74 Ivanković was further angered by what
he saw as deliberate manipulation of the book as part of a political play: he
criticised in particular the editor’s preface to the reprint for stating that the
Catholic Church was still the spiritual leader in the creation of a Catholic
state of Croatia, a disintegrative force and an instigator of genocide against
other peoples in Yugoslavia.75
While Ivanković was right that Novak’s book is one‑sided in its tendency
to equalise clericalism with the Catholic Church and thus to denounce Ca‑
tholicism in general, his critique of the newly written introductory remarks
are much more to the point. he introduction was highly accusing and its
threatening predictions of returns of the crimes of the past seemed to echo
claims of an inherently genocidal nature in Croatian society. By tying it to
the present in this way, Novak’s highly emotional account, characterised by
the atmosphere of the immediate post‑war years and the clear memory of the
sufering under the Ustasha regime, was obviously used for political purposes
in the present. It served to condemn the Croatian Catholic Church and thus
also the Croatian national ideology associated with it.
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Also Dedijer’s Vatikan i Jasenovac was received with dismay by Ivanković. In
a comment in Danas, he admitted that the book reached the public at a time
when public interest in these issues was signiicantly growing, but, complained
Ivanković, this was mainly because historiography was constantly coming closer
to relecting the political agenda. Ivanković claimed that Dedijer’s book was
manipulative and steered by its own agenda. Instead of addressing its subject
openly it was driven by the thesis that the Vatikan and the Catholic Church
were closely involved in Ustasha politics and the genocide of the Serbs. Fur‑
thermore, argued Ivanković, the documents presented in the volume were
selected according to this thesis, and thus documents mentioning the numer‑
ous Catholic priests and friars who supported or participated in the Partisan
movement were not included in the collection.76 he bi‑weekly magazine of
the Croatian Catholic Church, Glas Koncila, bluntly claimed that Dedijer
falsiied history.77
In a review titled “Barbarianism in the name of Science”, history profes‑
sor Ljubo Boban iercely condemned Živojinović and Lučić’ Varvarstvo u ime
Hristovo, criticising the authors’ argument about continuity in Catholic and
Croat politics since the beginning of the twentieth century. According to
Boban, Živojinović and Lučić even claimed that the politics of Yugoslavia’s
revolutionary movement constituted genocide towards Serbs, thus also sug‑
gesting a continuous threat against Serbs from the Croat communism side.
According to Boban, the use of sources in Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo was lawed
and manipulative.78
he Artuković trial
Bulajić’ study of the trial against Andrija Artuković was far from welcomed in
Croatia. It was the subject of a short polemic in which the lawyer Vlado Rajić
criticised Bulajić for not deciding in his book whether he acted as historian,
legal expert or veteran Partisan ighter. According to Rajić, Bulajić constantly
manipulated facts in order to prove that the district court of Zagreb was abused,
thus insinuating that the Ustasha movement and its crimes were to be rehabili‑
tated in Croatia.79 Željko Olujić, the lawyer who acted as Artuković’ defendant
at the trial, echoed Rajić’ points, arguing in addition that Bulajić constantly
inlated the number of victims. “Is this not”, Olujić asked, “the habitual method
of insinuation, with which the Croatian nation has been gagged already for
decades, blaming them also for the greatest crime (crimen maximum)”.80 Also
Glas Koncila criticised Bulajić, arguing that his work was lawed, his thesis false
and that he aimed at promoting a guilt complex in the Croat people.81
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Bulajić, for his part, insisted that his aim was to criticise the insuicient
and faulty work of the Zagreb court and the failure to include the crime of
genocide in Artuković’ verdict, and that he was not blaming the genocide on
the entire Croatian nation. Yet Bulajić also suggested that Olujić aimed at
rehabilitating Artuković.82
he parties of this polemic thus remained sternly opposed to one another:
Rajić and Olujić reacted strongly to what they saw as Bulajić’s – and Vladimir
Dedijer’s – manipulation and inlation of the history of the Ustasha massacres
with the aim of throwing further blame and guilt on Croatia, whereas Bulajić
condemned what he saw as Croat unwillingness to even recognise the crimes
as genocide. he polemic was unavoidably national in character, with Rajić
and Olujić answering to what they perceived as an attack on the Croatian na‑
tion and Bulajić attacking the “Zagreb court” and suggesting that there was
an alignment between Rajić, Olujić and the Croatian Catholic Church.
Numbers of victims
Behind most of these polemics lay the still unclear question of the number
of Yugoslav victims of the Second World War in general, and the number of
victims of the camp system at Jasenovac speciically. As was clear from the
character and tone of the discussions of these issues, they were both sensitive
and inlammable. Some Croat historians regarded the numbers referred in
Serbian books as highly inlated and, as political and national relations dete‑
riorated, came to regard the Serbian insistence on increasing the numbers as a
question of nationalist politicisation of history. From the Serbian side, on the
other hand, the unwillingness on the part of some Croat historians to accept
these numbers, and the suggestions of very low numbers from certain parts
of the Croat historians’ environment, were seen as relecting even a general
refusal to recognise the genocide at all.
hat this conlict of views could reach as signiicant a scale as it did was
mainly due to the loss of integrity and trust in the research conducted in the
communist period. he disappearance of any common elements of consensus
left the ield of history totally open for new interpretations and proposals.
hough several attempts had been made at reaching a more precise calculation
of the number of persons killed during the Second World War in Yugoslavia,
the igure of 1,706,000, which was ixed immediately after the war, had re‑
mained the oicial estimate throughout the Titoist period.83
In 1985, however, this estimate was attacked from several sides: Various
emigré sources argued that the number of 1,706,000 was signiicantly inlated
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and that the number of real losses, that is, persons killed during the war, was
probably around one million.84 In the meantime, sanu’s genocide commis‑
sion held a scientiic discussion of the methodological problems in relation
to establishing the number of human losses during the First and the Second
World Wars. At the discussion, it was emphasised that earlier attempts at reach‑
ing a more precise calculation had remained incomplete, partly for political
reasons. One speaker argued that judging from demographic estimates, the
number of victims was signiicantly lower than the oicial estimate, probably
between 1,100,000 and 1,150,000.85 Since this was covered in the daily press,
it was clear also outside the narrow historians’ environments that the number
of war victims was now a matter of uncertainty and dispute.
hrough the second half of the 1980s, the number of victims of the Second
World War was to cause a signiicant and heated debate. Inlated numbers
of victims, such as suggestions from Croatian emigré circles that 1,500,000
Croats were killed by the Partisans at the end of the war, or from some Serbian
authors that at least one million Serbs alone were killed at Jasenovac, were seen
as a source of tension and cooling of the relations among Yugoslav nations.86
According to Zagreb historian Ivo Goldstein, war victims in general and the
victims of Jasenovac in particular were the subjects of the bitterest disputes
within the “newly composed historiography” of the late 1980s.87
In 1989, the number was continuously debated, when the Croat engineer
and retired employee of the United Nations, Vladimir Žerjavić published his
survey of Yugoslav Second World War victims, Gubici stanovništva Jugoslavije
u Drugom svjetskom ratu (Yugoslav population losses in the Second World
War). he investigation was based mainly on demographic material. he re‑
sult, 1,027,000 real war victims, was signiicantly lower than the oicial igures
stated in Yugoslav historiography of the communist days. Yet, it was close to
the 1,014.000 calculated by Serbian émigré statistician Bogoljub Kočović in
1985.88 Žerjavić mentioned an example of a quite inlated number of Serbian
victims cited in the press as one of his original incitements for starting the
investigation.89
In the debates of the numbers of victims, the question of the number of
victims of the Ustasha concentration camp system at Jasenovac constituted
an individual theme. As the site of historical commemoration since 1967 and
the subject of massive scientiic interest throughout the 1980s, the camp had
become a symbol of the Ustasha massacres of Serbs. By the late 1980s, in line
with the revaluations of the numbers of victims in general, Croat historians
started to question what they saw as consistent exaggerations of the number
of victims of the camp.
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In an interview in Danas in April 1988, Ljubo Boban stated that the
issue of Jasenovac was indeed inevitably emotional. Yet, he argued that the
sentimental and emotional dimension was currently overemphasised and he
warned against the dangers of this, stating that any exploitation of a crime
was in itself a crime. Jasenovac was now an open issue of research and should
be treated as such, claimed Boban. Pointing out the major gap between vari‑
ous estimates, he further argued that the exact number of victims could not
be established.90
In the following dispute, which continued in Danas and also spread to
other Yugoslav journals and magazines, including the Serbian bi‑weekly Duga,
Boban’s statements were severely criticised and compared to Franjo Tudjman’s
attempts earlier in the 1980s at revising the number.91 One Belgrade professor,
Ratislav Petrović, in a series of comments pointed to German sources which
allegedly conirmed that more than 700,000 Serbs were killed in the ndh, and
to a survey of mass graves in Jasenovac which would suggest that more than
500,000 victims were buried in the area. Petrović further rebuked Danas for
allowing Boban to accuse his colleagues of “cofee shop mentalities”, charlatan‑
ism and speculation. he issue of Jasenovac and war victims, stated Petrović,
was too tragic for that.92
In an interview in May 1989, Boban repeated that the precise number
could not be established. He further quoted the demographic calculations
of Žerjavić and of the émigré Serb Bogoljub Kočović, which estimated the
number of all Serb victims at 530,000 and 487,000 respectively, and Žerjavić’s
calculation that about 216,000 victims of all Yugoslav nations were killed in
camps throughout Yugoslavia, obviously precluding the possibility that several
hundred thousand Serbs were killed in Jasenovac alone.93
Milan Bulajić was deeply ofended by Žerjavić’s – and Boban’s – sugges‑
tions. Obviously insinuating that Žerjavić’ calculations were based on selective
use of sources, Bulajić wondered why Žerjavić and others did not take into
account the demographic calculations made in the 1950s and 1960s, which
were made when the data from the war was still fresh, and which suggested
victim numbers up to several millions. According to Bulajić, the main problem
was that the Yugoslav state had never established an exact number. He disap‑
proved of what he called “the number game” and proposed that material and
information on names and belonging of the victims were collected in order
to establish a well founded number.94
he disputes were mostly held in distinctly cold and hostile tones. In a
reply to the Bulajić statements in Danas and elsewhere, Žerjavić repudiated
Bulajić’s accusations that he was working to support Tuđman and the Croat
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cardinal Kuharić, and closed the discussion by arguing that the level of the
debate was unacceptable.95
he disputes between Serbian and Croatian historians about Second World
War history and the Ustasha massacres became totally polarised. he state‑
ments showed no respect for the opposite side in the polemics, even though
a fundamental problem was shared by both parties: the existing research was
considered lawed and politically determined, and it was therefore regarded
as untrue by both sides. While Serbian and Croatian historians could agree
on the fundamental need to revise history, however, the proposed corrections
were sharply difering, in fact often mutually exclusive.
N ote s
1
Steven L. Burg, ‘Political Structures’, in Dennison Rusinow, ed., Yugoslavia. A Fractured
Federalism, Washington D.C.: Wilson Center Press, 1988, 11‑17.
2
Lampe, Yugoslavia as History, 322f.
3
See Dragović, ‘Les intellectuels Serbes’; Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 115‑132.
4
Ramet, Balkan Babel, 14‑15.
5
Laura Silber and Allan Little, he Death of Yugoslavia, 2nd edition, London: Penguin,
1996, 37‑47, 58‑69; Slavoljub Đukić, Između slave i anateme. Politička biograija Slobodana Miloševića, Belgrade: Filip Višnjić, 1994, 84‑116.
6
Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti, Godišnjak za 1984, Beograd, 1985, 188, 179.
7
Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti, Godišnjak za 1985, Beograd, 1986, 226, 232.
8
Vladimir Dedijer in the introduction to Dedijer and Miletić, Proterivanje Srba sa
Ognjišta, 8.
9
Ibid.
10
Dedijer and Miletić, Genocid nad muslimanima 1941-1945. Zbornik dokumenata i
svjedočenja, Sarajevo: Svjetlost 1990. Other published volumes included Antun Miletić,
Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac 1941-1945, dokumenta, volume 1‑3, Beograd: Narodna
Knjiga, 1986‑1987; Dedijer, Vatikan i Jasenovac, 1987; Bulajić, Ustaški zločini genocida;
Dedijer and Miletić, Proterivanje Srba sa Ognjišta.
11
See this book, chapters 6 and 8.
12
Jasmina Kuzmanović, ‘Media: he Extension of Politics by Other Means’, in Sabrina
Petra Ramet and Ljubiša S. Adamovich, eds., Beyond Yugoslavia. Politics, Economics, and
Culture in a Shattered Community, Boulder: Westview Press, 1995, 85.
13
On the number of publications, see Mirković, Objavljeni izvori i literatura o
Jasenovačkim Logorima, 297, 323. For reports on scientiic meetings, see e.g. Borović, ed.,
Jasenovac 1984., 1985; Jelka Smreka, ed., Okrugli stol “Jasenovac 1986” 14. i 15. 11. 1986,
Spomen‑područje Jasenovac, 1989. In 1986 several international guests were present, and
the meeting was greeted by both the president of the Croatian republic, Ante Marković
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185
and by the president of the Yugoslav veterans’ association, Draga Mitrović. In November
1988, sanu’s genocide commission also arranged a scientiic meeting in Belgrade about
Jasenovac. See Milo Gligorijević, ‘Genocid i ćutanje’, NIN, 27th November 1988, 26‑28
and Željko Krušelj, ‘Jasenovac bez tabua’, Danas, 29th November 1988, 35‑37.
14
See e.g. Antun Miletić, ‘Pet pitanja, pet odgovora o koncentracionom logoru Jasenovac’,
Smreka, ed., Okrugli stol “Jasenovac 1986”, 157‑158, Jefto Šašić, ‘Izvori o genocidu i borbi
protiv falsiikatora žrtve koncentracionog logora Jasenovac’, in ibid, 137‑144.
15
Dobrila Borović, ‘Zašto okrugli stol o “Jasenovcu”?’, in Borović, ed., Jasenovac 1984., 7.
16
Quoted in Gligorijević, ‘Genocid i ćutanje’, 28.
17
Ibid, 26.
18
Jefto Šašić, ‘predgovor’, in Miletić, Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac, 7, 13‑14.
19
Miletić, Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac, 15f. Šašić, ‘predgovor’, in Ibid, 8. Miletić had
already cooperated with Vladimir Dedijer in the writing of the famous Novi Prilozi in
1980. His volumes of documents on Jasenovac were connected to the work of sanu’s
genocide committee. See Dedijer and Miletić, Proterivanje Srba sa Ognjišta, 10.
20 Nikola Živković, ‘Antun Miletić, Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac, 1941‑1945’, Vojnoistorijski Glasnik, 37, 1986, 1, 333‑335.
21
Miomir Dašić, ‘Antun Miletić, Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac 1941-1945’, Jugoslovenski
Istorijski Časopis, 21, 1986, 1‑4, 238.
22
23
Ibid, 240.
Nikolić, Jasenovački Logor, 434; Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol 4, Zagreb, 1960, 467. See
also this book, chapter 7.
24 ‘Dosije Mladosti: Tato, Jezus i Marija! Konc‑logor Jasenovac’, Mladost, 8th to 21st Decem‑
ber 1986, 26.
25
Ibid, 26, 28.
26 Ibid, 28. Mladost referred to a polemic involving the Serbian historian Vasilije Krestić,
who had claimed in an article that the genocide of Serbs in the ndh had deep roots in
Croatian culture. his is discussed further in the following pages of this book.
27 Dedijer, Vatikan i Jasenovac, 38‑41, 10 also 385f.
28
he works cited included Tajni dokumenti o odnosima Vatikana i ustaške “ndh” (see also
this book, chapter 5); Joža Horvat and Zdenko Štambuk, eds., Dokumenti o protivnarodnom radu i zločinima jednog dijela katoličkog klera, Zagreb, 1946; Nikolić, Jasenovački
Logor Smrti, 190‑192. (Jasenovački Logor Smrti is a new and expanded version of Nikolić’
Jasenovački Logor from 1948, see this book, chapter 4); Simić, Prekrštavanje Srba ze vreme
drugog svetskog rata. (see also this book, chapter 5). On Djilas’ account in Dedijer’s diary,
see this book chapter 4.
29 Slobodan Filimonović, ‘Napomene izdavača uz drugo izdanje’, Novak, Magnum Crimen,
V.
30 Blažević, ‘Predgovor reprintu’ in Novak, Magnum Crimen, XVII.
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usable history?
31
Ibid, xxiv. Also Perica, Balkan Idols, 148; Stanojević, Alojzije Stepinac, 9‑14.
32
Blažević, ‘Predgovor reprintu’ in Novak, Magnum Crimen, xxiv.
33
Ljiljana Bulatović, ‘Veliki greh’, NIN, 9th March 1986, 35‑37.
34
Dragoljub R. Živojinović and Dejan Lučić, Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo. Prilozi za Magnum
Crimen, Belgrade: Nova Knjiga, 1988, 539f, 553. Živojinović was dean of the philosophical
faculty in Belgrade since 1985. See Ko je ko u Srbiji, Novi Sad: Bibliofon, 1991, 551.
35
Živojinović and Lučić, Varvarstvo u ime Hristovo, 629f, 632.
36
E.g. Tajni dokumenti o odnosima Vatikana i ustaške “ndh”; Horvat and Štambuk, eds.,
Dokumenti o protivnarodnom rad.
37
Other reprints testifying to the increased interest in and re‑addressing of the cri‑
mes of Second World War history, not only from Serbian side, include Sima Simić,
Prekrštavanje Srba za vreme drugog svetskog rata, (2nd edition, irst published in 1958),
Belgrade: Kultura 1990 (see also this book, chapter 5) and Peršen, Ustaški Logori, a revi‑
sed and expanded edition of Peršen’s study from 1966, published in Zagreb, 1990 (On
the irst version, see this book, chapter 7).
38
Luka Mičeta, ‘Novi prilozi za istoriju beščasća’, NIN, 1st January 1989, 41‑42.
39
See e.g. Danas, February‑May 1986, and also the journalistic account in Branimir
Stanojević, Ustaški minister smrti: anatomija zločina Andrije Artukovića, Belgrade: Nova
Knjiga, 1986.
40 E.g., Aleksandar Vojinović, ‘Povratak generala Nedića u klompama’, Danas, 8th April
1986, 73‑75; Aleksandar Vojinović, ‘Osude u Topčideru’, Danas, 29th April 1986, 73‑75.
41
Vladimir Dedijer, ‘Predgovor’, in Bulajić, Ustaški zločini genocida, vol. 1, 32.
42 Ibid, 9‑10, and Bulajić, Ustaški zločini genocida, vol. 1, 20.
43
Bulajić, Ustaški zločini genocida, vol. 2, 247f, 281f.
44 Milan Nikolić, ‘Istorija, zločini, sudbine’, NIN, 17th July 1988, 26‑27.
45
Gligorijević, ‘Genocid i ćutanje’, 26.
46 See e.g. Jugoslavija. Spomenici revoluciji, 143; Kojović, ‘Stalna postavka Memorijalnog
Muzeja “Koncentracioni Logor Jasenovac; also this book chapter 7.
47 Milan Bulajić, ‘Zagrebački proces ustaškom ministru Andriji Artukoviću’, Duga, 21st
January‑3rd February 1989, 83‑87; Duga, 4th‑18th February 1989, 85‑89; Duga, 18th February
to 3rd March 1989, 83‑87; Duga 4 ‑17th March 1989, 81‑86.
48 See Karlsson, ‘he Holocaust as a problem of historical culture’, 40‑43, and Karlsson,
Historia som Vapen, 57‑61. See also the introduction to this book.
49 Among the most important examples are Fikreta Jelić‑Butić’ study Ustaše i Nezavisna
Država Hrvatska, 1941-1945.; Slobodan Šnajder’s drama Hrvatski Faust; and Lordan
Zafranović’ ilm Okupacija u 26 slika. See this book, chapters 6, 7 and 8.
50
Ivo Goldstein, ‘Novokomponirana historiograija’, Danas, 5th September 1989, 44‑45.
Željko Krušelj, ‘Biograf bez distanze’, Danas, 22nd August 1989, 18‑19.
1228_usable_history_3k.indd 186
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chapter 9
51
187
Željko Krušelj, ‘Bijeg iz paukove mreže. Intervju: Ljubo Boban’, Danas, 9th May 1989,
11.
52
Željko Krušelj, ‘Istina ne trpi kompromise. Razgovori: Ljubo Boban’, Danas, 26th April
1988, 36.
53
Goldstein, ‘Novokomponirana historiograija’, 44.
54
Vasilije Krestić, ‘O genezi genocida nad srbima u ndh’, Književne novine, 716, 15th Sep‑
55
‘Divlji vrtlog strašti’, Danas, 30 September 1986, 6.
56
Quoted in ‘Izbor ne osuda’, Danas, 7th October 1986, 8.
57
Nenad Ivanković, ‘Zazivanje oluje’, Danas, 26th January 1988, 16.
58
Marinko Čulić, ‘Tko sije mržnju’, Danas, 3rd January 1989, 29. See also Glas Koncila, 1st
tember 1986, 1, 4‑5. Also quoted in Dragović‑Soso, Saviours of the Nation, 112.
January 1989, 5.
59
Milan Jajčinović, ‘Vježbe iz događanja naroda’, Danas, 7th March 1989, 22.
60 Krušelj, ‘Bijeg iz paukove mreže’, 12.
61
See also Ljubo Boban, Kontroverze iz povijesti Jugoslavije 3, Zagreb: Školska knjiga, 1990,
299‑314.
62 Željko Krušelj, ‘Pakao u ravnici’, Danas, 6th May 1986, 29.
63
Ibid, 30.
64 Krušelj, ‘Jasenovac bez tabua’, 35‑37.
65
Josip Vidan, Dragan Roller and Sime Klaić, ‘Nepotrebna diskusija’, Danas, 12th July
1988, 5.
66 Željko Krušelj, ‘Zašto je zloupotrebljen Miletić’, Danas, 12th April 1988, 42‑43.
67 Željko Krušelj, ‘Rasplitanje Jasenovačkog mita. Sugorvornici: Mirko Peršen’, Danas, 7
November 1989, 24.
68 Ibid, 22.
69 Franjo Tudjman, Bespuća povijesne zbiljnosti. Rasprava o povijesti i ilozoiji zlosilja. Za‑
greb: Nakladni Zavod Matice Hrvatske, (2nd edition), 1989, 89‑90. Bespuća could be
translated more precisely into “roadless area”.
70 Ibid, 94f, 98. See also 10‑17.
71
Ibid, 316.
72 Ibid, 166. See also Ivo Goldstein and Slavko Goldstein, ‘Revisionism in Croatia: he
Case of Franjo Tuđman’, East European Jewish Afairs, 32, 2002, 1, 56f; Robert M. Hay‑
den, ‘Balancing Discussion of Jasenovac and the Manipulation of History’, East European Politics and Societies, 6, 1992, 2, 208f.
73
For the comparison between the “myths” of Jasenovac and Bleiburg, see Tudjman,
Bespuća povijesne zbiljnosti, 101f.
74 Nenad Ivanković, ‘Igre s poviješću’, Danas, 25th March 1986, 23.
75
Ibid, 24.
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188
usable history?
76 Nenad Ivanković’, ‘Dedijerove generalizacije odozdo’, Danas, 17th November 1987, 42‑43.
77 Glas Koncila, 29th January 1989, 10.
78 Ljubo Boban, ‘Barbarstvo u ime nauke’, Danas, 14th February 1989, 32‑33.
79 Vlado Rajić, ‘Ne/prešućeni genocid’, Danas, 10th November 1989, 26‑27.
80 Željko Olujić, ‘Zlonamjerni galimatijas’, Danas, 21st February 1989, 32.
81
Glas Koncila, 1st January 1989, 5.
82
Milan Bulajić, ‘O zločinu bez kazne’, Danas, 24th January 1989, 30‑31.
83
Žerjavić, Opsesije i Megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleiburga, 33‑36; Bogosavljević, ‘he
unresolved Genocide’, 152‑155.
84 Serbian émigré statistician Bogoljub Kočović published a demographic calculation, ac‑
cording to which Yugoslav wartime losses were around 1,014,000 persons. See Kočović,
Žrtve drugog svetskog rata u Jugoslaviji, 130. Shortly afterwards, Vladeta Vučković, a
professor of mathematics at the University of South Bend, USA, claimed in a London
based émigré magazine that he had participated in the calculation of the number of
victims in 1947. According to Vučković, the number of approximately 1,700,000 was
actually an estimate of the demographic losses, meaning that the number of real losses
would have been signiicantly lower, probably close to Kočović’s estimate. Vučković,
‘Žrtve rata’, 2‑3.
85
Quoted in S. Stojanović, ‘Tačniji broj žrtava’, Večernje Novosti, 22nd June 1985, 8.
86 Željko Krušelj, ‘Osporavanje najvećih brojki’, Danas, 11th April 1989, 44.
87 Goldstein, ‘Novokomponirana historiograija’, 44.
88
Kočović, Žrtve drugog svetskog rata u Jugoslaviji, 130.
89 Krušelj, ‘Osporavanje največih brojki’, 44‑46.
90 Krušelj, ‘Istina ne trpi kompromise’, 37.
91
See Ratislav Petrović, ‘Izvori nisu u kavani’, Danas, 28th June 1988, 30. See also Ljubo
Boban, Kontroverze iz povijesti Jugoslavije 2, Zagreb: Školska Knjiga, 1989, 347‑385.
92 Petrović, ‘Izvori nisu u kavani’, 31; Ratislav Petrović, ‘Tko štedi štedimliju’, Danas, 31st
May, 1988, 28‑29; Ratislav Petrović, ‘Dokazi za zaključak’, Danas, 14th June, 1988, 29‑30.
93
Krušelj, ‘Bijeg iz paukove mreže, 13. See also Goldstein, ‘Novokomponirana historiogra‑
ija’, 44
94 Milan Bulajić, ‘Pitanje odgovornosti’, Danas, 1st August 1989, 29‑30.
95
Vladimir Žerjavić, ‘Ni igre ni licitiranje – o Bulajićevoj taktici politizacije žrtava rata’
Danas, 15th August 1989, 30‑31.
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National conlicts and national
historical cultures, 1990‑2002
10
When in January 1990 the Slovenian and Croatian Communist Parties walked
out of the last general assembly of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, the
league fell apart, thereby leaving the way open for a fundamental political re‑
constellation in all of Yugoslavia. While formal political institutions remained,
the Yugoslav republics soon moved in their separate ways. Elections were held
in all republics during 1990, in most cases bringing new nationalist parties
into power. During 1991 and early 1992, independent national republics were
declared in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia. he
break up of the Yugoslav federation, however, was to be accompanied by mas‑
sive warfare and excessive war crimes. he states that emerged from this violent
dissolution all paid a high price – some, however, much more than others.
Frequently through this process of destroying one state and establishing
new ones, the history of the Second World War and its massacres was drawn
upon and linked to the ongoing conlict. he events of the present were
mirrored in and understood through crimes and warfare of the past. Claims
of historical repetition in the form of renewed ethnic conlict and genocide
were common from several sides. And as the past was also perceived through
the present, the history of the Second World War was in various ways re‑
interpreted and rewritten to it needs and dictates of the new political and
social conditions.
his chapter points out some of the main tendencies of thematizing and
re‑presenting the history of Second World War massacres during and after
the break up of Yugoslavia and the establishment of new states. It shows how
the history of the massacres was fundamentally reinterpreted and rewritten to
serve new ideological demands, and how references to this history were used
politically and ideologically in order to convince possible allies or mobilise
support.
he chapter focuses on the new national historical cultures of Croatia and
Serbia and, to a lesser extent, the Muslim community in Bosnia and Herzego‑
vina. Far from being able to examine all aspects of the complex developments
in the various thematization of genocide, which was by then widespread and
frequent, it sketches main trends and emphasises illustrative examples.
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usable history?
he establishment of the Croatian national state
Croatia held its irst multiparty elections since the Second World War in April
and May 1990. he elections were won by he Croatian Democratic Union
(Hrvatska demokratska zajednica, hdz), headed by ex‑general, historian and
former dissident Franjo Tuđman. Winning 41.5% of the votes cast, Tuđman’s
nationalist party, due to the election system, secured absolute majority in
parliament.1 he state formation project promoted by the hdz was one of
utterly Croatian nationalist orientation, redeining the republic of Croatia as
a state foremost for the Croatian nation.2
he relationship between the cultivation of Croatian nationalism and the
history of the last instance of some form of Croatian statehood, the wartime
Independent State of Croatia, ndh, was often blurry. While the hdz admin‑
istration never formally rehabilitated the ndh, it never properly condemned
it either, and often statements from the hdz or Tuđman spread doubts about
their attitude towards the Fascist wartime state.3 At an hdz congress in Febru‑
ary 1990, Tuđman declared that the ndh was not simply a creation of fascist
criminals; it also expressed the historic aspirations of the Croatian people for
an independent state.4
he ghost of ndh surfaced also in connection to the lag and state insignia
adopted for independent Croatia in May 1990. he red and white chessboard
probably originated in the 11th century and had been associated with Croatia
since the 15th century. It had also been part of the coat of arms of the Croa‑
tian socialist republic, while the red‑white‑blue lag of socialist Croatia was
adorned by a ive‑pointed star. However, when the new authorities removed
the star from the Croatian lag and replaced it with a chessboard with a white
square in the upper left corner, many were reminded of the ndh symbols
and lag, even though the Ustasha had added a U on the chessboard.5 he
constitution of December 1990 changed the coat of arms so that the top left
corner was now red, thus attempting to signal a distance from the wartime
fascist statehood.6
In 1990, Zagreb’s city council, in agreement with Tuđman, renamed the
“Square of the Victims of Fascism” as the “Square of Great Croats” thus sym‑
bolising the defeat of the struggle against fascism in the face of the rise of
Croatian national heroes.7
hdz’s nationalist discourse and unclear relationship with the Ustasha
past inevitably worried Serbs in Croatia. heir fear was increased by politi‑
cal changes and reforms directly aimed at limiting the Serbs’ status in the
new state. he new constitution meant that Serbs were degraded from a
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191
constitutional nation of the Croatian Socialist Republic to a national minority
in independent Croatia. he hdz administration also dismissed numerous
Serbs from posts in police and public administrations with the aim to curb
Serbian inluence and overrepresentation. During the Summer of 1990, Serbs
in Krajina repeatedly protested and a Belgrade supported Serbian national
council was established, defying the Croat authorities and working for Serbian
autonomy.8
Enmity and fear increased between Croats and Serbs, both in and outside
Croatia. Second World War references were widely used to describe the situa‑
tion and to denote political and national enemies. From 1989, Croatian media
had increasingly reported on the presence of Chetnik symbols and ideology
among the Serbs in Krajina.9 In the Summer of 1991, Croatian television re‑
ferred to the jna as the “Serbian Chetnik army”, but later the preferred expres‑
sion, in accordance with the regulations set by the leadership of Croatian tv,
became “Serbo‑communist army of occupation”.10
After Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence in June 1991,
war broke out in the former Yugoslavia. In Slovenia, the Yugoslav Peoples’
Army (Jugoslovenska narodna armija, jna) fought a short, half‑hearted and
unsuccessful war against the newly established Slovene defence. On the 18th
July, the attempt to prevent Slovene independence was abandoned and Slo‑
venia was left to its own devices. In Croatia, however, armed conlict was
to last considerably longer and cost signiicantly more lives. With the aim
to “cleanse” regions of citizens of unwanted ethnicity, numerous war crimes
were committed against civilians, mostly by Serbian but also by Croatian
forces.
In the Summer of 1991, jna moved in to support the self‑declared Serbian
autonomous areas in Krajina. In August, Croatian defence units blocked jna
garrisons in Vukovar. jna bombed the town from a distance, while Serbian
paramilitary groups entered into close combat, at the same time committing
war crimes against Croat civilians. On the 19th November, Vukovar was taken
by the jna and Serbian paramilitaries, new war crimes were committed, and
jna went on to attack other Croat towns. From late 1991 the military situa‑
tion in Croatia was locked with approximately one‑third of the territory of
the Croatian republic under some sort of Serbian control. his situation was
to remain relatively stable until Croat ofensives re‑conquered Slavonia and
Krajina in the Spring and Summer of 1995. As Belgrade abandoned its support
for the Croatian Serbs, most of them led before the advancing Croat forces,
leaving the Croats to rebuild and construct their national state.
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usable history?
he Bleiburg tragedy and the thematization of genocide in
Croatia
he take over of power by the nationalist HDZ party, the disintegration of
the Yugoslav federation and the constantly deteriorating relationship with
Serbs both in Croatia and in Serbia itself were relected in Croatian revisions
of Second World War history. Croatian historical culture of the 1990s was
characterised by an abrupt recasting of history, a nearly total turn of main
narratives and a redeining of good and bad. History was to be written in new
categories, and in a new, national, framework of understanding. Yet, many of
the methods applied were the same as under communism.
In 1990 a new thematization of genocide entered the Croatian public sphere.
he so‑called Bleiburg Tragedy, that is, the large scale massacres committed at
the end of the war by the Partisan army against captured war enemies, were
exposed and investigated. hese massacres and their victims, mainly members
of the Ustasha militia and Croatian home guard forces, but arguably also some
civilian refugees, constituted a last truly silenced issue of wartime history. he
fall of Croatia’s conservative communist leadership inally facilitated the ad‑
dressing of these crimes. In connection to this new historical theme, the mass
graves of liquidated anti‑Partisan forces were opened and the discoveries widely
broadcast in the Croatian media.
he question of Partisan massacres after the end of the war was one of the
few truly untouchable subjects of Yugoslav history, having remained outside
public discourse throughout the communist period, and only discussed in
émigré publications and, from the late 1980s, in British books and debates.11
In 1990, the Croatian news magazine Start contributed to the opening of this
subject by publishing witness testimonies from the events at the Austrian bor‑
der at the end of the war. Start also published a small book, Otvoreni dossier
Bleiburg (Open dossier of Bleiburg), which thematized Bleiburg as a historical
problem. Claiming that Second World War history was taken prisoner and
used in nationalist and political propaganda, the dossier’s editor, Marko Grčić,
stated that, though understandable, it was in no way excusable that the ques‑
tion of the prisoners killed at the end of the war was never investigated in
Yugoslavia. According to Grčić it was morally necessary to ask:
can we, in the widest ethical perspective, silently pass by the fact that the commu‑
nist movement itself, ighting against fratricide, after the war stained its hands with
blood in massacres that were, according to numerous witness accounts from both
sides, too massive to be ascribed to simple retaliation, actions of a people craving
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193
for revenge; they were too widely founded, too diligently planned, making it a
logic assumption that they were ordered by the supreme party leadership.12
At stake was the heroic history of Partisan moral superiority during the Na‑
tional War of Liberation. he thematization of the Partisans’ massacres of
their defeated enemies – real and suspected – destroyed the narrative of the
righteous Partisans. But at the same time, a new group of victims moved into
focus, namely Croats, both as captured and murdered anti‑Partisan armed
forces and as civilians. While the call for investigation of these massacres was
driven by existential and moral needs to re‑examine the past and recognise the
sufering of the victims, the thematization of them also opened a new perspec‑
tive of Croat national victimisation in connection to the Second World War.13
his was, furthermore, accompanied by a sense of deeply unfair treatment of
the Croatian nationality in Yugoslavia’s communist historiography, as these
Croat victims, unlike the Serbian victims of the Ustasha, were truly silenced.
Ill. 10.1. he excavators in the
Jazovka pit, standing on a heap
of bones. Photo by Nikola Šolić.
From Žanko and Šolić, Jazovka.
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usable history?
As part of the thematization of Croat victimisation by Partisans, the bones
of the victims themselves became an issue.14 In June 1990, the Zagreb newspaper
Vjesnik took part in an expedition into the deep natural pit Jazovka, near Sošice
west of Zagreb. According to testimonies from witnesses, Jazovka was used
as mass grave for groups of Ustasha and Domobran (Croatian home‑guard)
soldiers as well as suspected civilian assistants, killed by the Partisans shortly
after the war.
In the booklet Jazovka, published by two Vjesnik journalists after the ex‑
pedition, it was described how the excavators found piles of sculls and bones,
some tied with wire, but also crutches, indicating that wounded prisoners were
also executed at the pit.15 he book also held photos from the cave and from
the reburial of the excavated, and testimonies from witnesses were included.
An account of the crime, from a boy aged ten at the time, described how Par‑
tisans arrived in May 1945, captured all men and held them prisoners for two
months, until in July and August columns of more than 100 tied prisoners,
teenage boys among them, were liquidated and thrown in the pit.16
As opposed to hitherto written historiography of the war, which was now
fast eroding, the sheer materialization of these bones and sculls seemed simple
hard proof of hidden violence. he victims were visibly and physically present
as undeniable testimonies to the crimes of the Partisans, until recently the
righteous, blameless heroes. Furthermore, the bones testiied to the blank spots
of a communist historiography that appeared increasingly directed against the
Croatian nation.
In the journalists’ account, Jazovka was connected to the overall theme
of the Bleiburg tragedy, suggesting that the pit was just one of the numer‑
ous “little Bleiburgs” that resulted from the massive persecution of suspected
supporters of the Partisans’ defeated opponents. It was claimed that after the
war all of Zagreb was characterised by an atmosphere of fear, and that the
following silence surrounding the numerous executions left a large part of the
Croat population traumatized for generations..17
he mass liquidations at Jazovka and elsewhere were ascribed to a com‑
munist strategy of annihilating all war opponents including family and rela‑
tives, thus implying that the Partisans and their leaders were responsible for
systematic, politically and strategically motivated, war crimes in the summer
of 1945.18 Yet, the liquidation of anti‑Partisan soldiers at Jazovka and elsewhere
was thematized mainly as a crime against the Croatian nation, thereby trans‑
forming the politically motivated war crimes into national victimisation.
In the newspaper of the Croatian Catholic Church, Glas Koncila, Partisan
massacres of Croats and mass graves with Croatian victims were repeatedly
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195
discussed during 1990, and witnesses and relatives described the liquidations.19
he mass grave at Jazovka was explicitly used as a counter‑argument defying
Serbian claims of victimisation. According to an editorial comment in Glas
Koncila on the 8th July 1990, it was claimed in Belgrade that numerous pits
existed illed with orthodox victims, while in Croatia it was known that Sošice
pit contained at least one thousand square meters of deposited and crushed
human bones.20
In some cases, the commemoration of Croat victims of Partisan reprisals
after the war tended to function as a counter‑victimisation to what Serbs
had sufered at the hands of the Ustasha, establishing some kind of histori‑
cal symmetry of victimisation. his was sensed already in 1990, when several
columns and letters to the editor in Danas warned against this parallelisation,
emphasising that the victims of the Partisans were not primarily innocent
civilians, but former war enemies, and that the Partisans had not introduced
racial laws or developed death industries such as the Ustasha.21 Also Croatian
academic historians noted and warned against the tendency.22
Nevertheless, Bleiburg remained a central theme in parts of Croatian his‑
torical culture. In 1995, an international symposium commemorating Bleiburg
was held in Zagreb, housed by the Croatian parliament. One of the aims of
Ill. 10.2. he mass grave of a nation? he Croatian lag descending into the Jazovka cave, at the
commemoration ceremony in July 1990. Photo by Nikola Šolić. From Žanko and Šolić, Jazovka.
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usable history?
the symposium, according to the editor of the publication which appeared
afterwards, was to “reveal at least a fragment of the truth about the Greater
Serbian‑communist genocide against the Croats …”.23 Several contributions at
the symposium practically reversed the narrative of the Second World War as it
had looked in communist historiography. Instead of emphasising crimes com‑
mitted by occupiers, Ustasha and other collaborators, conference participants
outlined a history of a Croatian nation victimised by communist Partisans,
often equalised with Serbs.24 According to one speaker, the crimes of Bleiburg
were committed to fulil Greater Serbian plans, which prevailed among the
communists, to biologically destroy the Croatian people.25 hus, the crimes
of communists and of Serbs were seen as one unitary project. On the other
hand, it was emphasised that many of the Croatian victims of these crimes
were innocent civilians, or their complicity in Ustasha crimes and warfare was
largely ignored.
One speaker explicitly paralleled crimes committed by the Ustasha and by
the Chetniks, arguing that whereas Ustasha crimes were always emphasised in
order to support malicious claims against the Croatian nation, Chetnik geno‑
cidal crimes against Croats and Muslims were taboo in Socialist Yugoslavia.26
While it is true that the treatment of the Chetniks in communist historiography
focused mainly on their cooperation with the occupiers and their war against
the Partisans, Chetnik crimes against civilians, including Muslims and Croats,
had certainly not been silenced. Such crimes were described at the trial against
Draža Mhailović in 1946; in the memoirs of Partisan leaders and regularly, if
supericially, in historical writing since.27
At the 1995 Bleiburg Symposium, the past presented as a history of genocide
against Croats was also used to deine and explain the situation in the 1990s:
several contributions claimed that Chetnik crimes of the war were repeated in
the early 1990s in Croatia and Bosnia, and one speaker suggested that Croatia
would have sufered an even greater tragedy than Bleiburg if she had lost the
“Homeland War” of the 1990s.28
hough not all speakers at this symposium adhered to this line of historical
reinterpretations, some speakers clearly reconigured history into an exclusively
Croatian national narrative, emphasising Croat victimisation at the hands of
Serbs.
hese presentations promoted an image of a threatening Serbian enemy
both in connection with the Second World War and in contemporary national
conlict. he violent past was explicitly linked to the events of the present, and
the two historical periods were understood in the light of one another. Here
history was used to create a coherent national, heroic and tragic genealogy,
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197
and to mobilise the Croatian population as a nation against a historical and
national enemy, represented as a combination of Serbs and communism.
In comparison with the interest in Bleiburg and Croatian victimisation,
the history of the Ustasha and Jasenovac was less carefully attended to. After
the outbreak of war in Croatia, the Jasenovac museum was emptied and the
buildings and memorial area damaged.29 In 1995 President Tuđman proposed
to turn the memorial at Jasenovac into a monument for all Croat victims of
the Second World War in addition to the non‑Croat victims of the Ustasha.30
his proposal, which would ultimately mean that victims and perpetrators of
Ustasha crimes were to be commemorated together for the sake of reconciling
the Croatian nation, is rather illustrative of the President’s lack of sensitivity
towards the victims and their relatives and, more generally, towards Croatia’s
problematic history.
Towards a Croatian national history
War had its share of responsibility for the way Second World War history
was addressed in Croatia. At the end of the war in 1995, Croatia, as a newly
declared and costly defended national state, still faced the task of deining and
rewriting its national historical narrative.
hough historical culture in the independent Croatian state set out to
remove the communist dictates from historical narratives, history writing was
largely subordinated to the new political projects of Croatian state and na‑
tion building. Books published relected this: Often the Ustasha’s persecution
and mass slaughter of Serbs were included only very supericially. Croatian
victimisation at the hands of Chetniks or Partisans and the Bleiburg tragedy
were described rather more empathically than the Serbian sufering under the
Ustasha regime.31
he political and ideological use of history in independent Croatia was
particularly visible in the newly written history schoolbooks. Ivo Goldstein,
historian at the University of Zagreb, argued in May 2000 that Croatia’s post‑
Yugoslav government, like all the regimes that had ruled Croatia through
the twentieth century, viewed history as a handmaiden of politics. Goldstein
claimed that the hdz government had created mythology out of older history
and political propaganda out of modern history.32 he new history was utterly
Croato‑centric, focusing on the regions and republic of Croatia and never on
the Yugoslav community. he common Yugoslav past was largely removed, and
while the Second World War was still signiicant, Ustasha crimes were now
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198
usable history?
downplayed, whereas Croat victimisation was emphasised. his was clearly
politically programmed: in the early 1990s, two textbooks written by academic
historians were criticised and later redrawn, because of what was considered
exaggerated criticism of the ndh.33
History textbooks used in Croatia in the late 1990s and the irst years of
the 21st century usually described crimes committed by the Ustasha regime
very briely under euphemistic headlines such as “Ustasha dictatorship” or
“he organisation of rule”.34 he persecution and mass killing of Serbs was
very supericially referred to and Serbs were never pointed out as victims of
genocide.35 In one textbook, it was stated that the Ustasha committed “geno‑
cidal crimes against Jews and Gypsies. hey also conducted terror against a
part of the Serbs …”.36 It appears as if it was more acceptable or legitimate
to recognise the genocidal character of the crimes against minorities than to
recognise the mass murder of Serbs as such. he reason for this is probably
that the Serbs constituted a very recent and dangerous enemy, both politically
and militarily, and faced with this threat it was too problematic to admit that
Serbs might in fact have had a cause to defend and a reason to fear Croatian
nationalism. In this case, the Croatian textbook remained loyal to the needs
of current Croatian nationalism rather than to a faithful representation of
the past. he Crimes of the Ustasha were not totally silenced, but they were
radically backgrounded. Generally, there were few attempts to take issue with
the dark sides of Croatia’s national history.37
he war crimes of Chetniks and Partisans and the Bleiburg tragedy on
the other hand were foregrounded and thematized. hese crimes were in the
headlines and described in far more detail than those of the Ustasha.38 Fur‑
thermore, it was suggested that Chetnik crimes had been silenced throughout
the communist period, whereas Ustasha crimes had been emphasised.39 hus,
Croatian national victimisation was emphasised, both with regard to war crimes
and to the historical culture of communist Yugoslavia, which was presented
as anti‑Croat.
he war in Croatia 1991‑1995, often referred to as the “Homeland War”
(“Domovinski rat”), naturally took a prominent position in Croatian text‑
books. Whereas descriptions of Ustasha crimes in the Second World War
were often scarce, the accounts of war crimes committed by the Yugoslav
army and Serbian paramilitary forces in the 1990s were quite explicit. Some
of these books directly compared the wars of the 1990s to Croatian sufering
during the Second World War, as in the statement: “he martyred Vukovar is
the symbol of the aggressor’s bestiality and Croatian sufering – ‘the Croatian
Bleiburg of the homeland war’…”40
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he concept of genocide, which was hardly ever used in connection to
Ustasha politics, was applied to the practices of the jna and the Serbian para‑
militaries in Croatia. As was claimed in one book:
It is hard both to imagine and describe the Chetnik crimes. hey plundered, burnt,
razed, raped even girls and old women – for strategic reasons, tortured, killed,
massacred, drove in concentration camps … he barbaric destruction and ethnic
cleansing are visible examples of the aggressor’s genocide, culture‑cide, eco‑cide,
memo‑cide …41
he concept of genocide was applied here with the aim of strongly thematizing
the victimisation of the Croatian nation.
In the worst of examples, post‑communist Croatian historical culture lacked
a proper critical examination of the darkest sides of Croatian national history,
and at the same time it was characterised by a very emotional approach to
national victimisation, framed within the concept and perspective of genocide.
Newer textbooks, though, seem more balanced on these issues, as well as when
it comes to the propagandistic uses of wartime denotations such as Ustasha
and Chetniks during the war in Croatia.42
he lack of transition in Serbia
In many ways during the 1990s, Serbia experienced less of a transition than
most other former Yugoslav states. In the Summer of 1990, Serbian president
and communist leader, Slobodan Milošević, changed the name of his party
from the League of Communists of Serbia to the Socialist Party of Serbia, SPS.
he SPS inherited the material basis of both the League of Communists and
of communist mass organisations. In the elections in December 1990, SPS
won 46% of votes cast, which, due to the election system, gave an absolute
majority in Parliament, and Milošević was elected president.43
hrough the 1990s, Milošević’s regime demonstrated a strange ability to
stay in power in spite of numerous misfortunes, including lost wars, deteriorat‑
ing living standards and international isolation. According to sociologist Eric
Gordy, Milošević’s rule is best described as “nationalist authoritarian”, mobilis‑
ing support by using nationalist symbols and agenda, and applying numerous
anti‑democratic means. Rather than aiming for complete control of society,
Milošević’s regime stayed in power by “eliminating alternatives”; controlling
the main media, intimidating and, if necessary, physically eliminating oppo‑
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nents.44 Furthermore, the regime was founded on an alliance with economic
and criminal elites, and, most importantly, it was willing to use force against
its own population, as was seen several times through the 1990s.45 During
Milošević’s reign Serbian society was increasingly militarized; particularly the
police and secret police expanded considerably.46
hough Serbia was not oicially involved in the wars of Yugoslav succession,
Serbia supported the jna and the Bosnian Serb Army with elite and paramili‑
tary forces. Serbian public life through the 1990s was largely subordinated to
warfare and nationalist agenda. Historical culture as well was deeply afected
by these public and political trends.
he theme of genocide in Serbia
he developments, which in the late 1980s had characterised Serbian historiog‑
raphy of the Second World War, continued into the next decade. he Ustasha
massacres and Serbian national victimisation remained dominant themes far into
the 1990s.47 Besides general academic interest in the subject, the theme of geno‑
cide was very visible in the Serbian public sphere and media in the early 1990s.48
In the beginning of the 1990s, Serbia’s most read daily newspaper Politika, which had been under government control since the late 1980s, brought
numerous articles about the Second World War, Jasenovac and the Ustasha
regime. Articles about the protests among Krajina’s Serbs warned against cur‑
rent Croatian “Ustashism” and the risk of genocide.49 During the escalation
of the conlict and armed clashes in Croatia in 1991, Serbian and Montenegrin
television used Second World War expressions for the Croat military, among
them “Ustasha forces” or “Tudjman’s black legions”, obviously referring to the
infamous Ustasha black legion under Jure Francetić, which committed some
of the cruellest massacres against Serbs in 1941‑1942.50
he Serbian Orthodox Church, which in the second half of the 1980s had
established itself as champion of the Serb national cause, continued its focus
on Serbian national sufering. he church newspaper, Pravoslavlje, repeatedly
referred to the Second World War. In 1990‑1991 a series of commemorations
of the Second World War were held, and the annual liturgies in Jasenovac were
the largest ever.51 Commemoration ceremonies also accompanied exhumations
of mass graves containing victims of the Ustasha and reburials of these victims
in Bosnia‑Herzegovina and Croatia.
Exhumations and reburials were widely covered in Serbian press and live
52
tv. hese physical remains of murdered humans made the history of the
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Ustasha massacres and their victims very present in Serbian public discourse in
the early 1990s. As opposed to a written history that was regularly dismissed as
lawed and also signiicantly revised since the 1980s, excavated bones appeared
an indisputable evidence of victimisation. hese remains of victims were exclu‑
sively commemorated in ethnic terms and thus contributed to the thorough
nationalisation of victims and of Second World War history in general.
As war broke out in Croatia in 1991, the theme of Second World War
genocide was increasingly intertwined with the current conlict and the condi‑
tions of Serbs in Croatia. While the crimes of the 1940s were backgrounded
by ongoing events, they were still regularly referred to as a framework for
understanding the present.
Even from top political circles, the representation of the ongoing conlict in
Croatia was explicitly linked to Ustasha history. In January 1992, in a memo‑
randum addressed to the United Nations and other international organisations,
the Yugoslav government appealed to international society to prevent what was
described as the second genocide within 50 years against the Serbian people in
Croatia.53 In this memorandum, the Yugoslav government also reminded the
international community of the crimes committed in Jasenovac in the 1940s,
Ill. 10.3. Piles of bones and sculls exhumed from a pit at Prebilovci, Herzegovina, 1991. From the
museum catalogue Croatia. Jasenovac. Ustasha system of death camps.55
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and called for protection of the monument and memorial of the camp, which
was being damaged, allegedly by Croatian paramilitary forces.54
he intermingling of the Second World War with the ongoing crisis was
visible also in cases when academic historiography engaged in public life. In
1992 and 1993, the Genocide commission of the Serbian Academy of Sciences
and Arts held meetings aimed at informing the public about war crimes and
genocide in 1991‑1992 and “the system of lies about the crime of genocide”.56
Whereas the main themes of these meetings were the events of the 1990s, Sec‑
ond World War history was regularly referred to as a comparison, background
or precedent.57
In 1992, in connection to discussions in the Serbian Parliament about
what was referred to as the “renewed genocide against the Serbian people in
the neo‑Ustasha Croat Republic” and the downplaying and negation of the
genocide of Second World War, it was decided to establish a “Museum of the
victims of genocide” in Serbia.58 he museum, which began its work in 1995,
did not have its own permanent exhibition. Functioning mainly as a research
and information institution, it collected data on the victims of the Second
World War, published various studies and reports and supported museum
exhibitions elsewhere.
Among the museum’s productions were exhibition catalogues about the
Ustasha massacres and concentration camps. he catalogue Hrvatska. Jasenovac.
Sistem ustaških logora smrti/Croatia. Jasenovac. he system of Ustasha death camps
was written in both Serbian and English for exhibitions in Belgrade and New
York in 1997.59 Both Milan Bulajić, who as director of the museum of the vic‑
tims of genocide wrote the preface, and the author of the catalogue, Mladenko
Kumović, repeatedly compared the practices of the Ustasha and Jasenovac to
the Jewish Holocaust, arguing that what took place in the Ustasha camps was
in many ways just as bad, or worse even, than procedures in the Nazi death
camps.60 hough the catalogue held little new information, it followed the
pattern of Serbian genocide historiography, thematizating primarily Serbian
victimisation through lots of horrible details, personal accounts and very high
numbers of victims.
he example of the museum catalogue illustrates the way parts of Serbian
historical culture represented Jasenovac and the Ustasha mass killing, both
internally in Serbia and outwards to an international public. By thematizing
the Ustasha and Jasenovac as equivalent to the Jewish Holocaust, Bulajić and
Kumović drew on established historical references, in fact a dominant issue,
or, one could say, a cardinal theme of European historical culture.61 he aims
of this presentation were several: the exhibition and catalogue aimed at point‑
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203
ing both national and international attention to the camp of Jasenovac, which
was according to the authors deliberately downplayed in Yugoslavia and little
known internationally.62 he museum catalogue further argued that genocide
was now repeated in Croatia, and it appealed to the International community
to protect the memorial at Jasenovac against harassments from Croatian mili‑
tary and Franjo Tuđman’s revisionism.63 Serbs were thus presented as primary
and historically unrecognised victims of both the Second World War and the
war in Croatia in the 1990s.
he massive use of history under the Milošević regime provoked various
reactions in the Serbian public sphere. In 1991 Andrej Mitrović, professor
of contemporary history at the University of Belgrade, published a book in
which he warned against the efects of what he called ‘parahistory’. According
to Mitrović, this unfounded, sensationalist and manipulative way of com‑
municating history could endanger society’s critical approach to and trust in
history as a discipline and make it vulnerable to conspiracy theories and myth
production.64
Serbia’s marginalized network of ngos, protesting against the repressive
Milošević regime and its use of nationalism to mobilise support for the wars
in Croatia and Bosnia, also criticised what was seen as abuse of the past. he
Belgrade Circle, a group of anti‑regime intellectuals, published a journal in
which chief editor Obrad Savić claimed in 1994 that the nationalistic discourse
that dominated the public realm drew its energy from the power of myths and
epic narrations. He also criticised Dobrica Ćosić, author of popular historical
novels, for his celebration of Serbia’s history of sufering. According to Savić,
Ćosić was “the voice of a people who jealously nurture and almost narcissisti‑
cally guard their sufering”.65
In 1997 the Serbian patriarch and 60 public igures, including leaders of
the political opposition, signed a declaration against genocide towards the
Serbian people. he declaration reminded the world of the horrible suferings
and injustice to which the Serbs had been subjected during the First and the
Second World Wars as well as in the wars of the 1990s.66 Obrad Savić severely
criticised the declaration for suggesting that Serbs were innocent victims in
the 1990s, and he sarcastically questioned a plan to establish a St. Sava tribunal
to investigate the question of genocide against Serbs, at which, according to
Savić “Serb mystagogues … can immediately publicize the exalted vision of
Serb sufering”.67
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Teaching Serbian war history
he Serbian history schoolbooks of the 1990s and early 21st century relected
the tendencies within the oicial Serbian historical culture of this period, i.e.
to foreground Serbian national victimisation, while omitting or downplaying
crimes committed by Serbs in order to create a positive national narrative.
he history textbooks of the 1990s, clearly the result of a state‑controlled
political project, were soon subject to severe criticism from Serbian academic
historians.68
In the schoolbooks, the Ustasha percecution and mass killing of Serbs in
the ndh constituted a main issue and thematized in chapter headlines such as
“ndh and its politics of genocide” or “Genocide in the ndh and Kosmet”.69
Ustasha genocidal practices were described in considerable detail, focusing on
Serb national sufering, while other victims of the Ustasha were mentioned
only very briely. he role of the Catholic Church was particularly emphasised.
In some of these Serbian textbooks, the history of the Ustasha massacres
was explicitly paralleled to the conlicts in the 1990s. In the words of a high
school textbook from 1994:
Comparing the events from the period of the war … with the events from 1991 in
the same areas, they irresistibly give us the thought that actors, as well as crimes
and instigators are the same.70
his textbook was reprinted numerous times and used throughout the 1990s
and in the early 21st century. In its fourth revised edition printed in 2003, the
formulation of this sentence is slightly softened, now claiming that the crimes
were similar, while some actors and instigators were the same in the 1940s and
in the 1990s.71 he efect of the statement in both cases, however, is to point
to repetitive Serbian victimisation and the threat of genocide as a regular ele‑
ment of Serbian‑Croat relations.
hough the Partisan war was still a main subject of these textbooks, it was
now also seen as directed against the Chetniks, that is, as a civil war, dividing
the Serbian people. A new, hitherto unmentioned subject in Serbian school‑
book literature was the descriptions of the Partisan persecution and killing of
war opponents and suspected class enemies during the so‑called “left devia‑
tions” in early 1942.72 However, these Partisan war crimes were in no way as
foregrounded as in Croatian history schoolbooks, and the massacres against
mainly Croatian pro‑Axis forces at the end of the war, the so called Bleiburg‑
tragedy, were not mentioned at all.
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he Chetniks and Draža Mihailović were largely rehabilitated. he textbooks
no longer presented them as national traitors, but rather as ighters of a just cause,
which brought them into civil war against the communist Partisans. he Chet‑
niks were no longer described as criminals, and their massacres against Muslims
in Bosnia and Herzegovina were not mentioned.73 In this way, the Chetniks were
included in a positive national narrative of Serbian history, in which the Serbian
political struggle and warfare were included, Serbian sufering and victimisation
thematised, and crimes committed by Serbian forces largely omitted.
he Bosnian war
In Bosnia, the elections of December 1990 split democratic power among the
parties of each of Bosnia’s main national groups: the Muslim sda (Stranka
demokratske akcije, Party of Democratic Action), headed by the soon‑to‑be
Bosnian president, Alija Izetbegović; a Bosnian sister‑party of the Croatian
hdz (Hrvatska demokratska zajednica, Croatian Democratic Union); and the
Serbian sds (Srpska demokratska stranka, Serbian Democratic Party), headed
by Radovan Karadžić. In most parties, extreme nationalist wings soon pre‑
vailed over more moderate fractions, leading to an increase in the nationalist
radicalisation of Bosnian politics.74
Following a referendum boycotted by Serbs, on the 3rd March 1992, Bosnia
declared its independence in spite of Serbian protests. By April 1992, each
national unit mobilised militarily, and a separate Croat region was set up in
Herzegovina. he jna – soon to be replaced by a newly constructed Bosnian
Serb Army based on the Bosnian Serb units of the jna – initiated a war in
cooperation with Serbian paramilitary forces that was to be characterised by
ethnic cleansing and large scale war crimes against civilians. From May 1992,
Sarajevo was under siege and heavily bombed.
hough Serbs were generally responsible for most crimes, while Muslims
sufered most, all national sides of the conlict committed massive war crimes,
among which internment of enemies and civilians in concentration camps,
mass rape and mass execution.75 Internationally sponsored peace plans to divide
Bosnia and Herzegovina into cantons governed by local ethnic majorities sent
all parties into wars of ethnic cleansing. Muslim enclaves in Eastern Bosnia,
among them Srebrenica, came under siege by Serbian forces, whereas Muslim
gangs harassed Serbian villages.
In July 1995 the Bosnian Serb army invaded Srebrenica and captured around
8000 persons, primarily men and young boys, who were then murdered in the
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largest single massacre during the war.76 Following the Srebrenica massacre and
the Serbian bombing of civilians at the Markale market square in Sarajevo in
August, nato inally intervened, bombing Serbian positions from the air. he
end of the war in Bosnia was formally conirmed by the Dayton agreement of
November 1995, which deined Bosnia and Herzegovina as an asymmetrical
federation of two entities, the Bosnian Serb republic, Republika Srpska, and
the Muslim‑Croat federation.77
he war and the Dayton peace agreement cemented the Nationalist divi‑
sion of the former multiethnic Bosnian society. Post‑1995 Bosnian politics
was characterised by the struggle to construct a viable state out of a war‑torn,
ethnically divided and often externally governed Dayton Bosnia. During the
war and the years after it, Bosnia’s Croat and Serb regions often identiied
themselves with the Croatian and Serbian national states, rather than with
multiethnic Bosnia. Yet, to Muslims, or Bosniaks as they were now called, the
Bosnian state was their country of identiication. In the years after Dayton,
Bosniak history writing engaged in the project of writing a Muslim Bosnian
national history, parallel to the general nationalisation of history in the former
Yugoslav areas.
Bosnian historical culture and the theme of genocide
he national conlicts deined the agenda for approaches to the history of war
crimes and massacres of the Second World War. In multiethnic Bosnia, which
was the scene of some of the worst massacres during the Second World War,
and which was now torn between Serbian, Croatian and Muslim nationalism,
Second World War history became highly disputed and politicised.
In the 1990s, Second World War victims were increasingly commemorated
within exclusivist ethnic frameworks. Illustrative of the lack of interethnic un‑
derstanding in the politics of commemoration was a meeting in Foča in August
1990, arranged by the Muslim party sda to commemorate Muslim victims
of the “Serb genocide”, committed by Chetniks. Flowers were thrown in the
Drina as a symbol of reconciliation. he numerous Serbs killed in this area
by the Ustasha, however, were totally left out of the ceremony. Serb political
representatives were invited, but none attended the meeting.78
he contested character of Second World War history was visible also from
the widespread destruction of communist monuments to the victims of Fas‑
cism, symbolising the rejection of the oicial communist commemoration of
the war. As monuments mainly named victims of Serb Partisan orientation,
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groups of Muslims and Croats now concretely refused the material presence
of this version of the past.79
In early 1992, when the parliament of Bosnia and Herzegovina negotiated
the republic’s possible future independence, the history of Second World War
massacres was invested with very real political meaning. Serb representatives
used this history to deny the right of the majority of Bosnia’s citizens to deine
the future of the state. Emphasising the numerous victims and immense suf‑
fering borne by the Serbian population in Bosnia, both in the Partisan struggle
and due to the Ustasha’s murderous politics, Slobodan Bijelić from Bosanska
Dubica stated: “Peoples whose members committed genocide cannot outvote,
not even by referendum, the people against whom the genocide was commit‑
ted. …”80 hus, the theme of genocide in the past was also used indirectly to
legitimate Serbian claims to Bosnia.
Towards a Bosniak national history
Faced with a sharpening national conlict both in and outside the republic
and ierce disputes of genocide history in Serbia and Croatia, Bosniak histo‑
riography increasingly thematized the issue of genocide by focusing on the
question of the Chetnik massacres of Muslims. Other nations’ victimisation
was backgrounded in comparison.
While the Chetnik persecution and massacres of Muslims were described
in various types of communist narratives of the Second World War, the theme
of genocide against Muslims had not been singled out in research before the
1990s. One of the irst books addressing this question was in fact published
by sanu’s genocide commission and authored by Vladimir Dedijer and Antun
Miletić, two main representatives of Serbian genocide historiography.81 From
the early 1990s, Bosnian Muslim victims of war crimes in the Second World
War became a theme among Bosniak historians. In 1991 a conference was held
dedicated to the question of genocide against Muslims in Yugoslavia,82 and
in the new Bosniak national histories that were written in the late 1990s and
early 21st century, the Chetnik massacres of Muslims was a main theme.
he main protagonist of these new histories, obviously, was the Bosnian
Muslim community through the centuries. In these histories, accounts of the
Second World War focused on Muslim victimisation. It was argued that the
ndh, even though oicially courting the Bosnian Muslims as allies and the
purest of Croats, in fact committed a type of genocide by their forcible as‑
similation of the Muslims. Muslims were thus presented as victims rather than
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allies of the Ustasha.83 At the same time, eforts were invested in underlining
that most Muslims already in 1941 distanced themselves from the Ustasha re‑
gime; authors cited various protests from Muslim intellectuals and prominent
igures in society. It was claimed that Croatian Ustasha units attacked Serbian
villages dressed up in fez and used Muslim names to encourage Serbian hatred
towards innocent Muslims, and even the establishment of the speciic Muslim
“Handžar ss division” was presented as a way of avoiding cooperation with
the Ustasha.84
he persecution of Serbs, Jews and Roma in the ndh was mentioned and
described supericially; yet the main theme in the accounts of Second World
War was genocide against Muslims, primarily committed by the Chetniks.
Under chapter headlines such as ‘he Chetnik genocide against Bosniaks’ or
‘he genocide of the Ravna Gora Chetnik Movement – the river Drina the
greatest Muslim grave’, Chetnik massacres and war crimes against Bosnian
Muslims were thematized and described in comparably more detail than other
war crimes’ policies.85
Bosniak history schoolbooks repeated this tendency of distancing Bosnian
Muslims from the main perpetrators of crime, and at the same time emphasis‑
ing Muslim victimisation. he text books used in the early 21st century pointed
out that Muslims were victims of the Ustasha’s politics of denationalisation,
and that Muslims quickly distanced themselves from the Ustasha.86
Interestingly, the Bosnian Muslim history textbooks, unlike Serbian and
Croatian schoolbooks from this period, presented a positive image of the com‑
munists and the Partisan movement, emphasising the Partisan ight against
national intolerance and “fratricidal war”, while ignoring Partisan war crimes
or the Bleiburg massacres at the end of the war.87 his perspective on Titoist
communism probably relects that the establishment and peaceful existence
of a Bosnian multinational republic as well as the recognition of a Muslim
national community within it are intimately linked to Titoist communism.
he widespread interest in the Chetnik massacres of Muslims in Bosnia and
Herzegovina during the Second World War was characterised by two essential
features: Firstly, it was argued by some that the crimes against Muslims were
deliberately silenced, or tabooed, quite in line with the claims about silenced
crimes in both Serbian and Croatian historical culture in the preceding decade.
Secondly, the thematization of Chetnik massacres was closely linked to the per‑
ception that these war crimes were repeated in the 1990s. Numerous accounts
and studies situated the Chetnik massacres in 1942‑1943 within a perspective
of renewed or continued victimhood of the Muslims, which culminated in
the genocide of the 1990s.88
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As has been shown in earlier chapters of this thesis, Chetnik crimes against
Muslims were not hidden. hey were included in the trial against Draža
Mihailović and other Chetnik leaders in 1946, and they were described in
various memorial accounts of the war. Yet, the criticism was fair to the extent
that Bosnian Muslim victims of the Second World War only became an issue
of academic research in the 1990s. What is maybe more important, though,
is the way the past was used as a direct explanatory key to understand the
present. What was suggested was a clear continuity of Muslim victimisation
and Serbian aggression.
his pattern of understanding left out the complexity of Yugoslavia’s Second
World War, in which Serbs as a nation were more victimised than they were
perpetrators. he establishment of Bosnian Muslim national history, however,
did not by then leave room for such complexities. While this perspective was
surely promoted by the truly endangered and victimised situation of Bosnian
Muslims in both the Second World War and the war of the 1990s, it also
served to legitimise Bosniak claims to a proper independent Bosnian state and
to create a national narrative of righteous Bosniak victims.
he breakdown of communist historiography left a void behind it that
was illed with reinterpretations and new narratives according to nationalist
agenda. he general assumption that communist history had been selective and
manipulative, that crimes and victimhood of one’s own nation was deliberately
and strategically silenced meant, furthermore, that historiography was deprived
of trust and integrity.89 In many cases, history was left as a lexible instrument
of the politics and ideologies in power.
Within the national historical cultures of the 1990s, the accounts of Second
World War massacres were clearly subordinated to the writing of national his‑
tories. What had once been histories of a class based and all‑Yugoslav patriotic
struggle were now strongly invested with ethnic perspectives and interpretations.
he new national histories were often as selective and one‑sided as had been the
case under communism. Crimes committed by members of the historians’ own
nation were downplayed and relativized, and the nation was distanced from war
crimes. On the other hand, the sufering and victimisation of the historians’ na‑
tion were thematized. In these ways, the re‑thematizations and selective history
writing of post‑Yugoslav national histories served attempts to create national
‘usable pasts’ out of Yugoslavia’s problematic and complex history.90
he national recasting of history created incredible distances and con‑
tradictions between the ways the Second World War and its massacres were
accounted in the diferent new national historical cultures. Furthermore, the
widespread perception of historical continuity and repetition obviously left
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the former fellow Yugoslavs with very strong enemy images of one another.
Understanding other Yugoslavs through the framework of the Second World
War inevitably sharpened national enmity.
By 2002, historical cultures in the former Yugoslav areas in many ways still
needed to redeine and retell their common history in a way faithful to the
academic ideal of investigating the past also for its own sake, with the aim of
gaining as much knowledge as possible about the past of the human species.
In order to make history usable as more than a tool of political and ideological
propaganda, historians of the former Yugoslav areas still had to re‑establish
history as a trustworthy academic and educational subject, and as spectacles
through which human beings can perceive their being in complexities of time
and space, and, in the best of cases, gain enough knowledge to avoid repeti‑
tions of past mistakes.
N ote s
1
Woodward, Balkan Tragedy, 119.
2
Robert M. Hayden, ‘Constitutional Nationalism in the Formerly Yugoslav Republics’,
Slavic Review, 51, 1992, 4, 657f.
3
For an analysis of Tuđman’s statements about, amongst others, history and the ndh,
see Gordana Uzelak, ‘Franjo Tudjman’s nationalist ideology’, East European Quarterly,
31, 1997, 4, 449‑473. See also Jill Irvine, ‘Ultranationalist ideology and state‑building in
Croatia, 1990‑1996’, Problems of Post-Communism, 1997, 4, 30‑44.
4
Quoted e.g. in Mark Biondich, ‘We were defending the state’, in John R. Lampe and
Mark Mazower, eds., Ideologies and National Identities. he Case of Twentieth-Century
Southeastern Europe, Budapest: ceu Press, 2004, 70. See also Goldstein and Goldstein,
‘Revisionism in Croatia’, 63; Silber and Little, he Death of Yugoslavia, 86; Ivo Gold‑
stein, ‘he use of history. Croatian historiography and politics’, Helsinki Monitor, 1994,
special issue, 93.
5
See Maja Brkljačić and Holm Sundhaussen, ‘Symbolwandel und symbolischer Wan‑
del. Kroatiens “Erinnerungskultur”’, Osteuropa, 53, 2003, 7, 933‑948. For a critique of
Brkljačić and Sundhaussen, emphasising the widespread uses of the chessboard before
and after the Ustasha, see Dunja Bonacci‑Skenderović and Mario Jareb, ‘Hrvatski na‑
cionalni simboli između negativnih stereotipa i istine’, Časopis za suvremenu povijest, 36,
2004, 2, 731‑760.
6
Dijana Pleština, ‘Democracy and Nationalism in Croatia: he First hree Years’, in
Sabrina Petra Ramet and Ljubiša S. Adamovich, eds., Beyond Yugoslavia. Politics, Economics, and Culture in a Shattered Community, Boulder: Westview Press, 1995, 132.
7
Biondich, ‘We were defending the state’, 71. (he name “Square of the Victims of Fa‑
scism” was restored in 1999).
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8
Ramet, Balkan Babel, 56‑57.
9
Fahrudin Radonić, ‘Sveti Sava dopisuje memorandum’, Danas, 27th June 1989, 25‑26;
211
Marinko Čulić, ‘Kokarde opet sjaje’, Danas, 18th July, 1989, 7‑10; Jasna Babić, ‘Nova
srpska država’, Danas, 10th October 1989, 21. On Serbian nationalist mobilisation with
regard to Krajina, see Marinko Čulić, ‘Ispod krsta i hrasta’, Danas, 11th July 1989, 20;
Milan Jajčinović, ‘Neoprostive hrvatske greške’, Danas, 19th September 1989, 12‑13; Milan
Bečejić, ‘Miting u Francuskoj 7’, Danas, 5th September 1989, 24; Jajčinović, ‘Vježbe iz
događanja naroda’, 20‑22.
10
Quoted in Kuzmanović, ‘Media: he Extension of Politics by Other Means’, 95; See also
Sandra Bašić, ‘he media landscape’ in Marjan Malešić, ed., he role of mass media in
the Serbian-Croatian conlict, Stockholm: SPF rapport, 1993, 34‑35.
11
he British discussion of the question began with the historian Nikola Tolstoy’s book
he Minister and the Massacres, London: Century Hutchinson, 1986, which claimed that
the British minister at the allied command of the Mediterranean, Harold Macmillan,
was responsible for the return of the anti‑Partisan forces to Yugoslavia. See also Darko
Bekić, ‘Verzija Cowgillova Isvještaja’, in Marko Grčić, ed., Otvoreni dossier Bleiburg, (2nd
edition), Zagreb: Start, 1990, 27‑68.
12
13
Grčić, Otvoreni dossier Bleiburg, 9.
In Slovenia, a similar mass grave resulting from Partisan massacres after the war was
discovered. he Slovenian leadership proposed it be used to promote Slovenian natio‑
nal reconciliation between various sides in the Yugoslav civil war during Second World
War. See Zoran Medved, ‘Nedodirljivi arhivi OZNe’, Danas, 10th July 1990, 18‑19; Jelena
Lovrić, ‘Rat oko pomirenja’, Danas, 17th July 1990, 7‑9.
14
See also Hayden, ‘Recounting the Dead’, 174‑175; Denich, ‘Dismembering Yugoslavia’,
15
Želimir Žanko and Nikola Šolić, Jazovka, Zagreb: Vjesnik, posebno izdanje, 1990, 18f.
16
Ibid, 22f.
17
Ibid, 13, 32.
18
Ibid, 49.
19
E.g. Glas koncila, 2 September 1990, 6; Glas koncila, 23rd September 1990, front page.
378‑379.
On 15th July 1990 a woman described how her father, allegedly singularly because of his
critical attitude towards communism, was killed and thrown in the Jazovka pit. Glas
koncila, 15th July 1990, 6‑7. On the 16th September, a man recounted how he survived a
Partisan massacre of several thousands of innocent Croats. Glas Koncila, 16th September
1990, 6‑7.
20 Glas Koncila, 8th July 1990, 2.
21
See Danko Plevnik, ‘Jame i pomirenja’, Danas, 10th July 1990, 21; Duško Ćirić, ‘Heroji i
zločinci’, Danas, 31st July 1990, 4.
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212
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22
E.g. Mirjana Gross, ‘Wie denkt man kroatische Geschichte? Geschichtsschreibung als
Identitätsstiftung’, Österreichische Osthefte, 35, 1993, 1, 94; Mihael Sobolevski, ‘Između
Jasenovca i Bleiburga’, Erasmus – časopis za kulturu demokratije, 1993, 4, 42‑47. See also
Žerjavić, Opsesije i Megalomanije oko Jasenovca i Bleiburga, 11, 77f.
23
Anđelko Mijatović, ‘Proslov / Prologue’, in Anđelko Mijatović, ed., Bleiburg 1945.-1995.
Zagreb: Hrvatska Matica Iseljenika, 1997, 6.
24 E.g. Nedeljko Mihanović, ‘Welcome address’, in ibid, 167.
25
Kazimir Kartalinić, ‘he end of the independent state of Croatia’, in ibid, 201.
26 Zdravko Dizdar, ‘Chetnik genocidal crimes against Croatians and Muslims’, in ibid, 180.
27 E.g. Izdajnik i ratni zločinac Draža Mihailović pred sudom, 54‑59; Dedijer, Dnevnik. Prva
Knjiga, 78‑90; Marjanović and Morača, Naš oslobodilački rat i narodno revolucija, 63‑55;
89‑91. See this book, chapters 3,4 and 5.
28
Dizdar, ‘Chetnik genocidal crimes’, 192, and Mihanović, ‘Welcome address’, 168.
29 According to a Serbian appeal to the international community, the Jasenovac memorial
was vandalised by Croat paramilitary forces. See ‘Memorandum of the government of
Yugoslavia on the crime of genocide in Croatia and the vandalising of the memorial at
Jasenovac’, Belgrade, 31st January 1992, 78. Reprinted as ‘Memorandum Vlade Jugoslavije
o zločinu genocida u Hrvatskoj i skrnavljenju Spomen‑područja Jasenovac, 31.januar
1992’, in Milan Bulajić and Radovan Samardžić, eds., Ratni zločini i zločini genocida
1991-1992., Belgrade, Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti, 1993, 117‑124. See also the
report by historian and employee at the museum at Jasenovac, Jovan Mirković, ‘Skrnavl‑
jenju Spomen‑područja Jasenovac i pitanje njegove dalje zaštite’ in ibid, 125‑136. Accor‑
ding to Croatian reports, on the other hand, the museum was damaged by shelling, and
the contents taken to Republika Srpska. See e.g. the report ‘Spomen Područje Jasenovac
u Vrijeme Domovinskog Rata’ on the website of the memorial area at Jasenovac: [http://
www.jusp‑jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=5092].
30 Biondich, ‘“We were defending the state”’, 70.
31
E.g. in a well‑received new comprehensive history of the Ustasha state: Hrvoje
Matković, Povijest Nezavišne države Hrvatske, Zagreb: Nakladna Pavičić, 2002 (2nd ex‑
panded edition, irst published 1994), 180‑182, 238‑241; hough more balanced, the same
pattern is recognisable also in a new comprehensive modern history of Croatia, written
by the director of the Institute of contemporary history: Dušan Bilandžić, Hrvatska Moderna Povijest, Zagreb: Golden Marketing, 1999, 124‑125, 186f.
32
Ivo Goldstein, ‘O udžbenicima povijest u Hrvatskoj’, in Hans Georg Fleck and Igor
Graovac, eds., Dijalog povjesničara – Istoričara 3, Zagreb: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung,
2001, 15f.
33
Hoepken, ‘War, memory and education’, 221‑222.
34
Suzana Leček, Magdalena Najbar‑Agičić, Damir Agičić, Tvrtko Jakovina, Povijest 4.
Udžbenik za četvrti razred (opće) gimnazije, Zagreb: Proil, 2004 (6th edition, adopted
1228_usable_history_3k.indd 212
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213
for use in Croatian gymnasia by the Ministry of Education and Sport, July 1999) 167f;
Hrvoje Matković and Franko Mirošević’ Povijest 4. Za četvrti razred gimnazije, Zagreb:
Školska knjiga, 2001, 158f. See also Wolfgang Höpken, ‘Der Zweite Weltkrig in den
jugoslawischen und post‑jugoslawischen Schulbüchern’, in Höpken, ed., Öl ins Feuer?,
173f.
35
Ivan Vujčić, Povijest. Hrvatska i Svijet u XX. stoljeću. Udženik za četvrti razred gimnazije,
Zagreb: Birotehnika, 1998, 143; Matković and Mirošević’ Povijest 4, 159; A bit more de‑
tail in Leček et al., Povijest 4, 167‑168.
36
Ivo Perić, Povijest za IV razred gimnazije, Zagreb: Alfa, 2003 (3rd edition, irst published
1997, adopted for use in Croatian gymnasia by the Ministry of Education and Sport,
March 1997), 151.
37
38
See also Biondich, ‘We were defending the state’, 73.
Vujčić, Povijest Hrvatska i Svijet u XX. stoljeću, 175‑176, 179‑180, witness account from
Chetnik crimes, 180; Perić, Povijest za IV razred gimnazije, 176‑177, 180‑181, witness ac‑
count from Partisan crimes, 182; Matković and Mirošević’ Povijest 4, 195, 197‑198; Leček
et al., Povijest 4, 206, 210.
39
E.g. Vujčić, Povijest. Hrvatska i Svijet u XX. stoljeću, 179. Also Zdravko Dizdar and Mi‑
hael Sobolevski, Prešućivani četnički zločini u Hrvatskoj i u Bosni i Hercegovini 1941.-1945.
Zagreb: Dom i svijet, 1999, 21.
40 Vujčić, Povijest. Hrvatska i Svijet u XX. stoljeću, 229.
41
Perić, Povijest za IV razred gimnazije, 237; Vujčić, Povijest. Hrvatska i Svijet u XX.
stoljeću, 228. More recent books, such as Leček et al., Povijest 4, seem more balanced on
these issues, as well as when it comes to the propagandistic uses of wartime denotations
such as Ustasha and Chetniks during the war in Croatia. See Leček et al., Povijest 4,
272f.
42 Leček et al., Povijest 4, 206, 272f.
43
Nicholas J. Miller, ‘A failed transition: the case of Serbia’ in Karen Dawisha, and Bruce
Parrot, eds., Politics, power and the struggle for democracy in South-East Europe, Cam‑
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997, 160.
44 Eric Gordy, he Culture of Power in Serbia. Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University
Press, 1999, 8, 21f.
45
Vjeran Pavlaković, ‘Serbia transformed? Political dynamics in the Milošević era and af‑
ter’, in Sabrina Ramet and Vjeran Pavlaković, eds., Serbia since 1989, Seattle: University
of Washington Press, 2007, 22.
46 Ibid, 23; Robert homas, Serbia under Milošević. Politics in the 1990s, London: Hurst,
1999, 161f.
47 On the scientiic activities dedicated to the genocide against Serbs in the ndh, see e.g.
the report on the work at the Institute of Contemporary History in Belgrade in the
irst half of the 1990s: ‘Rad Instituta za savremenu istoriju u periodu od 1991. do 1995.
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godine’, Istorija 20. veka, 1995, 2, 171‑175, and reports from other scientiic meetings on
the subject such as ‘Genocid nad Srbima u Drugom svetskom ratu’ held 23rd to 25th Oc‑
tober 1991, in Istorija 20. veka, 1991, 1‑2, 224‑227 and ‘Jasenovac – sistem ustaških logora
smrti’, held 23rd April 1996, in Istorija 20. veka, 1998, 2, 211‑212. Furthermore, numerous
books were published. Regarding publications on Jasenovac in the decade 1991‑2000,
which apart from the 1980s was the most productive, see Mirković, Objavljeni izvori i
literatura o Jasenovačkim Logorima, 297, 323.
48 On Serbian intellectuals’ attitude to the theme of genocide, see also Hoepken, ‘War,
memory and education’, 210f.
49 Mark hompson, Forging War. he media in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia-Hercegovina,
London: Article 19, International Centre Against Censorship, 1994, 71f.
50
Quoted in Kuzmanović, ‘Media: he Extension of Politics by Other Means’, 95. See also
Milan Milošević, ‘he Media Wars’ in Jasminka Udovički and James Ridgeway, Burn
this house. he Making and Unmaking of Yugoslavia, Durham: Duke University Press,
1997, 112f; Agneza Božić‑Roberson, ‘Words before the War: Milošević’s use of Mass
Media and Rhetoric to Provoke Ethnopolitical Conlict in Former Yugoslsavia’, East
European Quarterly, 38, 2005, 4, 404. For a discussion of Serbian enemy images with
regard to the Ustasha past, see Ivo Banac, ‘he fearful asymmetry of war. he causes and
consequences of Yugoslavia’s demise’, Daedalus, 121, 1992, 2, 141‑174.
51
Perica, Balkan Idols, 156f; Radić, ‘he Church and the Serbian Question’, 260.
52
Hayden, 178‑179; Also Katherine Verdery, he political life of dead bodies: Reburial and
postsocialist change, New York: Columbia University Press, 1999, 100f and Milošević,
‘he Media Wars’, 111f.
53
‘Memorandum of the government of Yugoslavia on the crime of genocide in Croatia
54
Ibid, 5‑8.
55
Mladenko Kumović, Hrvatska. Jasenovac. Sistem ustaških logora smrti/Croatia. Jasenovac.
and the vandalising of the memorial at Jasenovac’, 1.
he system of Ustasha death camps, Belgrade: Muzej žrtava genocida, 1997.
56
Bulajić and Samardžić, eds., Ratni zločini i zločini genocida 1991-1992.; Milan Bulajić
and Radovan Samardžić, eds., Sistem neistina o zločinima genocida 1991-1993. godine,
Belgrade, Srpska Akademija Nauka i Umetnosti, 1994. After Vladimir Dedijer’s death in
1990, Radovan Samardžić took over the chairmanship of the genocide committee.
57
E.g. Radomir Bulatović’s article on the similarities in the conduction of Genocide
against the Serbs in the Second World War and during the years 1991‑1992: ‘Sličnosti
o provođenju genocida nad Srbima u Drugom Svjetskom Ratu i tokom 1991‑1992. go‑
dine’, in Bulajić and Samardžić, eds., Sistem neistina o zločinima genocida, 111‑120. On
the perception of repeated genocide, see also Sreten Jakovljević, ‘Novi genocid nad srp‑
skim narodom u konjičkom kraju’, in Bulajić and Samardžić, eds., Ratni zločini i zločini
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215
genocida, 225‑252; Luka Popovac, ‘Ponovni zločin genocid u Donjoj Neretvi 1991‑1992.’,
in Bulajić and Samardžić, eds., Ratni zločini i zločini genocida, 253‑260.
58
‘Drugo vanredno zasedanje 16. juli 1992. godine (jedanaesti dan radova)’ in Milan
Bulajić, ed. Deset Godina Muzeja Žrtava Genocida, Belgrade: 2003, 481f.. See also Jovan
Mirković, ‘Izdanja Muzeja Žrtava Genocida i građa o ljudskim gubicima u izdanjima
Muzeja’, in Hans Georg Fleck and Igor Graovac, eds., Dijalog povjesničara / istoričara 7,
Zagreb: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, 2003, 573‑59.
59
Kumović, Hrvatska. Jasenovac. See also Mirković, ‘Izdanja Muzeja Žrtava Genocida’, 581.
60 Kumović, Hrvatska. Jasenovac, 3, 6‑8, 10‑11.
61
On the status of the Holocaust in European historical culture, see Karlsson, ‘he Ho‑
locaust as a Problem of Historical Culture’, 15. For a discussion of the invoking of the
Holocaust, see MacDonald, Balkan holocausts?, particularly p. 256f.
62 Kumović, Hrvatska. Jasenovac, 14‑15, 3.
63
Ibid, 15.
64 Andrej Mitrović, Razgovor sa Klio. O istoriji, istorijskoj svesti i istorioraiji, Sarajevo: Svjet‑
lost, 1991, especially 131‑135.
65
Obrad Savic, ‘Speed Memories’, Belgrade Circle Journal, 1, 1994. Also Obrad Savic and
Mirko Gaspari, ‘Why the Belgrade Circle Journal’ Belgrade Circle Journal, 0, 1994. Avai‑
lable on the web at[ http://www.usm.maine.edu/~bcj/] On the Belgrade Circle, see also
Obrad Savić, ‘Parallel Worlds: NGOs and the Civic Society’, Belgrade Circle Journal,
3‑4, 1995 / 1‑2, 1996. Available on the web at[ http://www.usm.maine.edu/~bcj/]. Re‑
printed in Obrad Savić, ed., he Politics of Human Rights, London: Verso, 335‑345.
66 ‘Apel svetu da zaštiti Srbe’, Blic, 22nd April 1997, 3.
67 Obrad Savic, ‘Speed Memories III’, Belgrade Circle Journal, 3‑4, 1995 / 1‑2, 1996. Avai‑
lable on the web at [ http://www.usm.maine.edu/~bcj/]. Reprinted in Savić, ed., he
Politics of Human Rights, 346‑348.
68 A critical analysis of Serbia’s new textbooks produced in the early 1990s was published in
1994: Vesna Pešić and Ružica Rosandić, Ratništvo, patriotizam, patrijarhalnost, Belgrade:
Centar za antiratnu akciju, 1994. See also Dubravka Stojanović, ‘Konstrukcija prošlosti –
slučaj srpskih udžbenika istorije’, in Hans‑Georg Fleck and Igor Graovac. eds., Dijalog
povjesničara / istoričara 4, Zagreb: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, 2001, 31‑44.
69 Nikola Gačeša, Dušan Živković and Ljubica Radović, Istorija 3/4 za III razred gimnazije
prirodno-matematičkog smera i IV razred gimnazije opšteg i društveno-jezičkog smera. (3rd
edition), Belgrade: Zavod za udžbenike i nastavna sredstva, 1994, 169f; Nikola Gačeša,
Dušan Živković and Ljubica Radović, Istorija 2 za II razred četvorogodišnjih stručnih
škola, (14th reworked edition), Belgrade: Zavod za udžbenike i nastavna sredstva, 2003,
169f; Kosta Nikolić, Nikola Žutić, Momčilo Pavlović, Zorica Špajijer, Istorija 3/4 za III
razred gimnazije prirodno-matematičkog smera i IV razred gimnazije opšteg i društveno-
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usable history?
jezičkog smera, Belgrade: Zavod za udžbenike i nastavna sredstva, 2002, 180f. See also
Höpken, ‘History Education and Yugoslav (Dis‑)Integration’, 118f.
70 Gačeša et al., Istorija 3/4, 173. See also 265.
71
Gačeša et al., Istorija 2, 173.
72 Gačeša et al., Istorija 3/4, 203‑205; Gačeša et al., Istorija 2, 192‑193; Nikolić et al. Istorija
3/4, 186f
73
Gačeša et al., Istorija 3/4, 1994, 192‑193; Gačeša et al., Istorija 2, 185‑186; Nikolić et al.
Istorija 3/4, 166‑167.
74 Steven L. Burg, ‘Bosnia Herzegovina: A case of failed transition’, in Karen Dawisha and
Bruce Parrot, eds., Politics, power, and the struggle for democracy in South-East Europe,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997, 133f.
75
Martin Mennecke and Eric Markusen, ‘Genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, in Totten
et al., eds., Century of Genocide, 415‑430.
76 According to the conviction of Radoslav Krstić at the International Criminal Tribunal
for the Former Yugoslavia, icty, the massacre at Srebrenica was an act of genocide. See
e.g. Mennecke and Markusen, ‘Genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, 425.
77 For a comprehensive overview of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, see Steven Burg
and Paul Shoup, he War in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Ethnic Conlict and International Intervention, Armonk, New York: m.e. Sharpe, 1999.
78 he meeting is described in Duijzings, History and Reminders in East Bosnia, Chapter 5,
Section 1, 6.
79 Mart Bax, ‘Mass Graves, stagnating identiication, and violence: A case study in the
local sources of “the war” in Bosnia‑Hercegovina’ Anthropological Quarterly, 70, 1997, 1;
Duijzings, History and Reminders in East Bosnia, Chapter 4, Section 1, note 1.
80 Quoted in Husnija Kamberović, ‘Upotreba historijskih mitova: Drugi svjetski rat i
Balkanski ratovi koncem 20 stoljeća’, unpublished opening speech at the conference
‘Upotreba historijskih mitova: Drugi svjetski rat i Balkanski ratovi koncem 20 stoljeća’,
Institut za Istoriju, Sarajevo, 10th‑11th May, 2005, 4.
81
Dedijer and Miletić, Genocid nad muslimanima 1941-1945. See also Milorad Radusinović’
review ‘Vlamir Dedijer i Antun Miletić, Genocid nad muslimanima’, in Istorija 20. veka,
1991, 1‑2, 232‑233; Ger Duijzings, ‘Commemorating Srebrenica: Histories of Violence
and the Politic of Memory in Eastern Bosnia’, in Xavier Bougarel, Elissa Helms and Ger
Duijzings, eds., he New Bosnian Mosaic. Identities, Memories and Moral Claims in a
Post-War Society, Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007, 149.
82
Duijzings, ‘Commemorating Srebrenica’, 149‑150; see also Rasim Hurem and Seka
Brkljača, ‘Historiografska literatura o Bosni i Hercegovini u Drugom svjetskom ratu
obavljena nakon 1980. godine u zemlji i inostranstvu’, Prilozi, 29, 2000, 143.
83
Imamović, Historija Bošnjaka, 531, and also Mehmedalija Bojić, Historija Bosne i
Bošnjaka, Sarajevo: tkd Šahinpašić, 2001, 187. Imamović is a renowned professor of ju‑
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217
ridical and state history and the faculty of Law, University of Sarajevo. By 2001, 20,000
copies of his book had been sold. See ‘Intervju Dana’, Dani, 2nd March 2001, at http://
www.bhdani.com/arhiva/195/intervju.shtml. Bojić was a Partisan army veteran, former
oicer and military diplomat.
84 Imamović, Historija Bošnjaka, 535, 541; Bojić, Historija Bosne i Bošnjaka, 189f.
85
Imamović, Historija Bošnjaka, 537f; Bojić, Historija Bosna i Bošnjaka, 205f.
86 Zijad Šehić and Indira Kučuk‑Sorguč, Historija 4. Udžbenik za četvrti razred gimnazije,
Sarajevo: Sarajevo Publishing, 2004, 120‑121. See also Zijad Šehić and Zvjezdana Marčić‑
Matošović, Historija 8. Udžbenik za osmi razred osnovne škole, Sarajevo: Sarajevo Pub‑
lishing, 2004, 95.
87 Šehić and Kučuk‑Sorguč, Historija 4, 123f; Šehić and Marčić‑Matošović, Historija 8,
96f.
88
E.g. Šemso Tucaković, Srpski zločini nad Bošnjacima-Muslimanima 1941.-1945., Sarajevo:
El Kalem, 1995, especially p. 174. See also Faruk Muftić, Foča. Ponovljeni zločin i hronologija zločina 1941/1945 – 1992/1995. godina, Sarajevo: Des, 2001, 180‑182; For accounts ar‑
guing for continuation of Serbian crimes against Muslims, see also Imamović, Historija
Bošnjaka, 571; Ibrahim Pašić, Od Hajduka do četnika (stradanje i genocid nad glasinačkim
Bošnjacima od najstarijih vremnena do 1994. godina), Sarajevo: Ljiljan Bemust, 2000, 19,
passim. he idea of repeated crimes of genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnia was also
the theme of the already mentioned Bosnian/French ilm Remake, which cross‑clipped
between an Ustasha prison in the 1940s and a Chetnik detention in the 1990s and bet‑
ween killing in the Ustasha camp of Jasenovac and in a Chetnik concentration camp
near Sarajevo. See the introduction of this thesis.
89 he loss of trust in historiography still seemed to characterize Serbian historical culture
in the early 21st century. See Predrag J. Marković and Nataša Milićević, ‘Serbian histo‑
riography in the time of transition. A struggle for legitimacy’, Istorija 20 veka, 2007, 1,
145‑146.
90 I borrow this phrase from Robert G. Moeller, ‘War Stories: he Search for a Usable Past
in the Federal Republic of Germany’, he American Historical Review, vol. 101, 1996, 4.
On Germany’s search for a usable past, see also Omer Bartev, ‘Germany’s Unforgettable
War: he Twisted Road from Berlin to Moscow and Back’, Diplomatic History, vol. 25,
2001, 2.
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Conclusion
he devastating occupation and war for liberation, the internal civil war and
the mass killings and war crimes that characterised Yugoslavia’s Second World
War left the country ruined and deeply divided. How were Yugoslav histo‑
rians and politicians to manage this history of mutual massacres among the
Yugoslav peoples?
he strategy deployed by Yugoslav politicians and historians in the Titoist
period was one of thematizing the common struggle of the Yugoslav peoples
and downplaying internal bloodshed. his did not mean that massacres and
war crimes were silenced, but that these issues were described as external of
the Yugoslav peoples, instigated and arranged by the occupying fascist powers
and realised by pro‑fascist Yugoslav bourgeoisie and collaborators. hus, the
Yugoslav ethnic and political conlicts that were an essential element of the
war were largely overlooked. While this made sense within a class based history
of Yugoslav communists and patriotic peoples, it nevertheless left out decisive
aspects, which had also been essential to the agents and parties during the war.
his way of writing history, obviously, left voids in the oicial narrative of the
war. And since the nature of history writing is also to retell history, exploring
and illing such voids, exactly these elements were to be addressed later on.
To what extent, then, was the issue of the victims of massacres taboo? As
this book has shown, Second World War massacres were indeed present in
Titoist historical culture. Detailed and poignant accounts of massacres and
war crimes were included in the major show trials at the end of the war, and
crimes and massacres were represented in numerous ways, very directly and
emotionally, and at times almost on individual levels in more popular represen‑
tations of history, such as poetry, novels and memoirs. he accounts, however,
were always in accordance with the major narrative framework of the war. he
truly hidden crimes were those that countered that heroic narrative, i.e. the
massacres committed by Partisans at the end of the war and, to a lesser extent,
in 1941‑1942.
he writing of all 20th century history, and the Partisans’ National Libera‑
tion Struggle in particular, was profoundly subordinated to politics. In the
irst post‑war decades, most history of the war was written by Partisan veterans
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and high‑ranking communists. It adhered, needless to say, to the narrative
promoted by the communist top at the end of the war. National perspectives
on history were carefully downplayed, and historical discussions of national
issues remained sensitive throughout the Titoist period. Historians were criti‑
cised, corrected and at times removed from the public eye if their views were
regarded as destabilising for the national equilibrium, as was most famously
the case with Franjo Tuđman.
From the 1970s, however, the ethnic tensions and political conlicts that
were among the main causes for the internal Yugoslav massacres committed
during the Second World War – but which had remained largely backgrounded
in the patriotic all‑Yugoslav accounts of the irst post‑war decades – were
gradually written into wartime historiography. Detailed academic studies of
the ndh and its policies of persecution and mass murder were published,
not least from the side of Zagreb‑based historians. he word genocide, or
genocid in Serbo‑Croat, which had been known since 1948 as a term denoting
international war crimes but rarely used in a Yugoslav context, was now used
to describe Second World War crimes in Yugoslavia, both those committed
by occupiers and by Yugoslavs. his tendency was accompanied by a growing
interest in wartime massacres within spheres of popular culture such as songs
and ilms.
he incitement for addressing wartime massacres and the question of geno‑
cide became greater as the distance in time grew; survivors and witnesses were
disappearing; and the Second World War was becoming history rather than the
immediate past. he readdressing of wartime history was facilitated by a gradual
loosening of the tight mythological narrative of the Partisan war, initiated from
the very political top, when Tito in 1972 admitted that the National Liberation
struggle was also a civil war between communists and anti‑communists, who
were often widely supported by the people. At the same time, hitherto written
historiography of the Partisan war was criticised by academic historians for
its blank spots and unscientiic standards. Yet, the rewriting of history clearly
had its limits, as was visible from the severe critique of Rasim Hurem’s study
of the crisis and violent class war politics of the Partisan movement.
During the 1960s and 1970s, Yugoslav historiography was both profession‑
alized and ethno‑nationalized. New generations of Yugoslav historians were
educated at universities and trained in academic methodological standards.
At the same time, the historians’ environment was signiicantly enlarged, and,
parallel to the federalization of the Yugoslav state, each republic established its
own institutions of researching and teaching history. his facilitated a gradual
development of republican, and thus often national, historians’ environments,
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conclusion
221
leading to national historical cultures within a general Yugoslav historical
culture.
During the 1980s Yugoslav, not least Serbian, historians with far greater
enthusiasm than earlier engaged in scrutinising questions of victims, concentra‑
tion camps, massacres, and genocide of the Second World War in Yugoslavia.
Genocide was thematized, initially mainly within Serbian historiography and
popular representations of history, but later in other places as well. In the
late 1980s, Croatian historical culture, which had remained largely faithful
to communist dogma until then, reacted to Serbian genocide thematization,
at the outset by questioning its validity and later by thematizing national
counter‑narratives. Among the main causes for the Croatian counterreaction
to Serbian genocide history were undoubtly Slobodan Milošević’s Serbian
nationalist rhetoric and unconstitutional tampering with Yugoslavia’s political
system and power balances.
After the breakdown of the socialist Yugoslav federation, the national his‑
torical cultures of independent post‑Yugoslav states in many cases emphasised
and elaborated the theme of their national victimisation of genocide. At the
same time, crimes that could be ascribed to members of the historians’ own
nation was signiicantly downplayed or ignored. Dominated by the wish for
usable national histories, Second World War history was often as selective and
ideologically invested as had been the case under Titoist communism.
he thematization of genocide in the 1980s and 1990s was characterised by
a number of features: irstly, it contained important elements of critique of the
communists and the Yugoslav system, and of the unravelling of communist
mythical narratives. he early part of this thematization process must be situ‑
ated within the broader tendency of a revision of history and political values
in the irst half of the 1980s. he growing interest in genocide history in Yugo‑
slavia was accompanied by a gradual implosion of established historiography.
In the early 1980s it became clear that certain elements of 20th century history
had been signiicantly doctored during the communist period in order to suit
political and ideological needs. he public realisation that Yugoslav Stalinism,
which included the concentration camp system at Goli Otok and elsewhere,
had been far from humane; and the point that the relationship between Chet‑
niks and Partisans was probably less clear and evident than had been hitherto
stated, contributed to the undermining of communist historiography. Later,
particularly in Croatia, the rediscovery of crimes committed by the Partisans
at the end of the war had the same efect.
Secondly, the refocusing on the massacres and atrocities of the Second
World War took a clearly national perspective. In the thematization of geno‑
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222
usable history?
cide, the very focus on victims of particular nationalities rather than just victims
was outspoken. he national aspect was less relevant in the case of the Partisans’
crimes, which were directed primarily against political enemies. But since the
focusing on these crimes occurred in the nationally polarised political context
of the early 1990s, and since many of the victims were soldiers ighting on the
Ustasha side, this could not possibly be seen as a shared sufering of Serbs and
Croats. Instead, Croatian historical culture would increasingly regard these
victims as Croatian and the Partisan perpetrators as representatives of Serbian
suppressors. It thus became a competing national victim history.
hirdly, most cases of genocide thematization argued that the crimes in
question were overlooked or deliberately silenced. While founded on moral in‑
dignation and common human wishes to remember, this argument also draws
on the sensational efects of breaking taboos, or claiming to do so. Yet, while
elements of Second World War history were indeed silenced in communist
Yugoslavia, Partisan war crimes being the most obvious example, it is diicult
to argue that the crimes of the Ustasha, Chetnik, and other anti‑Partisan forces
were ever ignored or silenced. However, compared to the heroic narrative of the
Partisan war these crimes were not a main theme of Titoist historical culture.
Furthermore, they were not thematized as genocide before the 1970s. hus,
to a certain extent, the issue of victims and genocide was indeed disregarded
by Yugoslav academic historiography before the 1970s.
Fourthly, the thematization of genocide was in some cases characterised
by what we may call myth‑making in the forms of one‑sided histories around
a simple narrative matrix. Included herein are attempts to reach the largest
possible number of victims, at times even reaching the very improbable, and
suggestions of continued national victimisation and permanent threats of
genocide from other Yugoslav nations.
here were several causes of the thematization of genocide that began in
Serbia in the 1980s. One must be sought in the broader political framework
of economic, political, and ideological crisis in Yugoslavia in the 1980s. While
issues of the theme of genocide were becoming objects of growing scholarly
interest already in the 1970s, the focus on internal massacres and genocide it‑
ted well into the broader ‘iconoclastic’ intellectual culture of the early 1980s.
Furthermore, the crisis of Yugoslav communism also led to de‑legitimization of
Partisan history which left more space for other histories. A second cause, which
is also linked to the breaking down of Partisan history, is the disintegration
of a common Yugoslav historians’ culture and the establishment of national
research environments, focusing more on national history, and thus also on
the national aspects of the war. A third cause, or maybe rather a precondition,
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conclusion
223
is the fact that it was at all possible to work with these issues. his was not
a smooth development. Some publications, particularly ictional ones, were
banned, and others received severe criticism from the political side. However,
mainly in the second half of the 1980s a lot was published. he considerable
intellectual and artistic freedom of Serbia in the early 1980s, as well as the na‑
tionalist political turn in that republic from 1987, facilitated both the revision
of history and the national approach to it.
Yet, more international or, if you will, universal aspects of genocide history
are also at play here. As has been argued earlier in this book, it seems a com‑
mon international tendency that holocaust and genocide was not thematized
as such during the irst decades after the Second World War. Focus was on
the war on a larger scale, on geopolitical developments, and on the sufering
of states under German occupation. hus, genocide and holocaust research
are relatively new in the rest of the world as well. hey developed, together
with the theme of genocide, in the 1970s, and have lourished since the 1980s.
Yugoslav, initially Serbian, thematization of genocide is not that diferent from
a common international thematization of genocide, holocaust and ethnic and
civilian victims. In fact it may well have been inspired from abroad: Yugoslav
historical culture was not isolated from international trends, and particularly
not so from the 1960s onwards. Furthermore, several of the most vocal pro‑
moters of Serbian genocide history were well aware of – or even participating
in – genocide discussions and research outside Yugoslavia.
What made Yugoslav genocide history particularly problematic were the
speciic circumstances surrounding the thematization of genocide in that
country. Because Yugoslavia was a state system of delicate national balancing,
these issues, once they were widely addressed and evoked, were bound to stir
strong feelings and inluence national relations. he sharp historical polem‑
ics surrounding the thematization of genocide served to further polarise the
national historical cultures. Furthermore, the thematization of genocide ran
parallel and eventually converged with rising national and nationalist politics
in the republics.
hat the theme of genocide became a powerful source of discursive ar‑
mament for nationalists was essentially a consequence of the political devel‑
opments surrounding historiography: the thematization of genocide meant
something quite diferent at the beginning of the 1980s than at the end of the
1980s. At the beginning of the decade it should be associated with a revision
of communist history, a turn to genocide history not very unlike international
tendencies, and a legitimate wish to explore ethnic and national aspects of
Yugoslav history, which were hitherto only supericially investigated. At the
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usable history?
end of the decade, however, the thematization of genocide was much closer
to nationalist politics and nationalist mobilisation.
his, however, should not necessarily be blamed on Yugoslav genocide
historians, who were not – at least not generally – working for a nationalist
propaganda project. Fundamentally, they wanted to draw attention to an
important and problematic aspect of Yugoslav history that had not been em‑
phasised in the Partisan history of the previous decades.
Historical addressing and thematization of the history of the massacres
of Yugoslavia’s Second World War was bound to stir strong emotions and
inluence relations among Yugoslavia’s nations. Was Yugoslavia’s history then
‘unmasterable’ in the famous phrase used by Charles Maier to characterise
Germany’s struggles with its past? Or perhaps Yugoslavia’s history was in fact
mastered to mutilation through the excessive and crude use that was made of
it irst by communists and later by nationalists.
From 1945 to 2002 the history of Yugoslavia’s Second World War mas‑
sacres was used in numerous ways, serving various needs and interests. In
most cases, more than one type – or many types – of “use”, in the sense of
Karlsson’s terminology, were combined in the communication of the history
of the massacres.
In the Titoist period, the history of these issues, though subordinated to
the selective master narrative of heroic Partisan ighting, was used politically
and ideologically to emphasise the inhumanity of the Partisan’s opponents and
thus underline the greatness of the Partisan victory. It thereby contributed to
legitimising communist rule and justifying the reconstruction of a Yugoslav
state based on common Yugoslav patriotism. At the same time, however, the
addressing of wartime massacres, particularly within memoirs and popular
culture, constituted moral and existential uses, based on fundamental needs
to remember and confront the past.
As Yugoslavia’s communist regime faced crises and disintegration, the public
realization of the communists’ selective and utterly instrumental use of history
discredited established historiography as lawed and manipulated. hus, the
trustworthiness of Yugoslav historiography was fundamentally shattered already
in the last decade of communism. Yugoslav historical culture was therefore
characterised by a vacuum of legitimacy, in spite of the numerous examples
of high quality academic research and publications.
he ideological and historiographical void allowed dominant parts of ini‑
tially Serbian, but later other national historical cultures also, to revise the
history of Yugoslav Second World War massacres from overtly national and
often purely emotional and sensation‑seeking approaches. he history of the
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conclusion
225
massacres was often explicitly linked to the present and used as a mirror in
which the current situation was relected. It thus served as a way of under‑
standing the present, supplying people, as it were, with an idea about what to
expect of the world around them. he widespread thematization of national
victimisation as unrecognised, unreconciled and unrevenged, obviously con‑
tributed to national polarisation and enmity.
In the 1980s, the thematization of genocide relected both existential and
moral uses, based on indignation and focused on the wish and need to inves‑
tigate the deliberately overlooked or insuiciently investigated dark parts of
history. But at the same time, the thematization of genocide in Second World
War history was used politically and ideologically; initially to challenge and
revise communist historiography, and thereby the communist system itself,
and later to promote a version of history focused on national victimisation,
and thereby to mobilise national senses of identity and loyalty, at times in
ierce opposition to other nations.
In the 1990s, new ways of communicating Second World War history, the‑
matizing genocide and victimisation of the nations of the new post‑Yugoslav
states, served to revise and de‑legitimise the history of a common Yugoslav
past. he new exclusively national histories were used politically, ideologically
and existentially, both to explain the breakdown of the Yugoslav order and
the warfare that followed it, to legitimise the establishment of the new states,
and to grant a sense of naturalness and identity to the new states and their
citizens.
However, while the thematization of genocide was unquestionably used for
national mobilization in the late 1980s and 1990s, it was not a main cause of
the wars in the 1990s. Yugoslavia was destroyed by the lack of consensus on
how to reform the state, and by the fact that political projects were founded
on national rather than common or civil interests. Within an atmosphere of
national antagonisms, the debates about how to interpret and write the history
of Second World War massacres became tense and inlamed. hus Yugoslavia’s
dramatic political developments in the late 1980s and its destruction in warfare
in the 1990s inluenced history writing and historical culture far more than
the other way around.
his does not, however, liberate historians from responsibility. Much of
the Second World War history written and presented in Yugoslavia between
1945 and 2002 served political and ideological demands by explaining and
naturalising political constructions and power structures. Historians and other
presenters of history at times gave rather selective accounts and accepted half‑
truths and claims not quite substantiated at the cost of recognising historical
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226
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complexities and contradictions. In doing so, they certainly contributed to
simpliied understandings of history that were vulnerable to manipulative uses.
Some actively set out with an agenda to raise public attention on the issue
of genocide from a perspective of exclusive national victimisation, narrow‑
ing the understanding of history and framing it to inform and inluence the
understanding of the present. In this way, they legitimised and strengthened
oppressive regimes, and, at least in the Serbian case, supported politics of
criminal warfare.
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