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151 views32 pagesPavlakovic Vjeran Flirting With Fascism The Ustasa Legacy
Pavlakovic Vjeran Flirting With Fascism the Ustasa Legacy
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/ 32
THE SHARED HISTORY
THE SECOND WORLD WAR AND
NATIONAL QUESTION IN
EX YUGOSLAVIA
Sevilja 2008 THE SHARED HISTORY
The Second World Wart and National
Question in ex Yugoslavia
INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL JUSTICE AND RECONCILIATION - SALZBURG
CENTAR ZA ISTORUU, DEMOKRATIIU I POMIRENSE - NOVISAD
GRAFO MARKETING - NOVI SAD
Novi Sad, 2008. SADRZAJ:
IDEO
CHETNIKS - CONTROVERSIES IN HISTORIOGRAPHY . 7
Darko Gavrilovich: Two Questions about Chetniks that can be taken as
possible path for opening the controversies about the role of the
Chetniks in the Second World War from the 1941 till the 1943. . 9
‘Mile Bjelajac: Royalist Chernik Movement - interptetations in
local and international historiography . - 23
Predrag Markovic: The imagination of the WWIL, Resistance
and Collaboration in Yugoslav and Serbian Visual Media... 43
| DEO
SYNTHETIC NATIONS AND NATIONAL CONCEPTS AND
IDEAS DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR... 2... 49
Ljubita Despotovié: Koncept sintetiéke nacije kao proizvod
‘ideologije konfesionalne dominacije u HI Svetskom ratu na
prostoru Kraljevine Jugoslavje. 2. St
Matko Atila Hoare: Muslim aatonomism and |
the Partisan movement. . : eH 65
Adnan Jahic: Bosniacs and independent state of Croatia:
from hope and loyalty to bitterness and resistance... 5
DEO
REMEMBERING AND MEMORIES ON SECOND WORLD
WAR IN CONTEMPORARY HISTORIOGRAPHY AND
HISTORY SCHOOL TEXTBOOKS . Se eee +. 93
Ljubodrag Dimié: Rati istoriografija. - 95
Vjeran Pavlakovie: Flirting with Fascism The Ustaéa Legacy and
Croatian Politics in the 1990s. oe ae
Ranks Gasic: WWII in the Serbian history textbooks | |. 145
Mila Oslié: Drugi svjetsii rat na 2 podria Tae
fenomen ,fojbi". Se ete ee Pe eae esa UDC 323(497.4/.7):321.64(497.5)
Vjeran Pavlakovie, National Council for Euroasian and East
European Research
FLIRTING WITH FASCISM:
THE USTASA LEGACY AND CROATIAN
POLITICS IN THE 1990s
Abstract: The collapse of the communist system in Eastern Europe the
late 1980s created a political vacuum that was filled by resurgent nationalist
movements, which proved fatal for a multiethnic country such as Yugoslavia,
where the desire for democratic change was accompanied by independence ef
forts in the two northernmost republics, Croatia and Slovenia. The communist
fall from power ,breached the dams of memory and counter-memory, which
fundamentally changed the collective identity present in the region.” In Croatia
this was most evident ia the renewed debate over World War Two, specifically
the vilification of the communist-led, and multiethnic, Partisan resistance and
the rehabilitation of the UstaSe as legitimate Croatian patriots. This ,,flirting
with the Uscaie” (koketiranje s ustattoom) not only revolted many of Croatia's
potential international allies, but seriously damaged relations with the country's
Serb minority, haunted by memories of UstaSe atrocities against them in the
1940s and already under the influence of Slobodan Milosevic's propaganda
apparatus in Belgtade. This article examines the political context of Croatia in
the 1990s which fostered the schabilitation of the Usta’e as an expression of
Croatian nationalism at a time of democratic transition across Eastern Europe,
While debates over the Ustala movement have extended into the spheres of
education, monuments and public space, graffiti, symbols, commemorations
and public rituals, and even popular culture, this article focuses on the role of
this extreme nationalist organization in the political life of post-communist
Croatia
Keywords: World War Two, Croatia, fascist symbols, Franjo Tudjman,
radical right movements, Jasenovac, Ustaée Pavlakovic
wl was always an advocate for tolerance,” asserts Anto Djapié in the film
Konjeni za budunast (Roots for the Future), which premieced in Zagreb on 26
March 2007 as an allegedly serious documentary about 2 Croatian politician
‘Yet this biographical portrait of Djapié, the president of the Croatian Party of
Rights (HSP - Hrnatika stranka prava), was not an impartial political sketch of
Croatia's largest right-wing party and its leader, but an election-year marketing
tactic with the goal of whitewashing the HSP's unquestionably intolerant past
‘There was hardly any mention of the HSP's use of symbols and discourse as-
sociated with the pto-fascist Ustaia movement in the 1990s.’ Whereas Franjo
‘Tudjman, Croatia's first democratically lected president, epitomized hard-line
Croatian nationalism to the outside world, his Croatian Democratic Union
(HDZ, - Hreatska demokratsha zejednica) was not the most radical party to 2p-
pear after the return of a multiparty system to Croatia in 1990. However, Tud-
man's policy of national reconciliation among Croats, bitterly divided over
their World War Two past, allowed for the de facto rehabilitation of the Ustale
and the retuen of their iconography, chauvinistic chetotic, and extreme nation-
alist ideology to the political arena. The FSP publicly distanced itself from the
Ustaia movement after 2000, but, as this article shows, during Croatia's war for
independence and immediately afterwatds, the ghosts of World War Two had
reappeared in the political landscape.
The collapse of the communist system in Eastern Europe the late 1980s
created a political vacuum that was filled by xesurgent nationalist movements,
which proved fatal for a multiethnic country such as Yugoslavia, where the de-
sire for democratic change was accompanied by independence efforts in the
two northeramost republics, Croatia and Slovenia. The communist fall from
power ,,breached the dams of memory and counter-memory, which fanda-
mentally changed the collective identity present in the region.”* In Croatia this
‘was most evident in the renewed debate over Wotld War ‘wo, specifically the
vilification of the communist-led, and multiethnic, Partisan resistance and the
rehabilitation of the Ustaée as legitimate Croatian patriots. This ,, flirting with
the Ustaie” (hoketianje s ustaivom) not only revolted many of Croatia's poten-
tial international allies, but seriously damaged relations with the country's Serb
minority, haunted by memories of Ustate atrocities against them in the 1940s
and already wader the influence of Slobodan Milosevie's propaganda apparatus
in Belgrade. During the Homeland War (1991-1995), as the Croats call their
"The Ustaa (pra: Ustste) movement, after the Croatian word for ,osusgent”, was formed
inthe eat 1930s by an HSP deputy, Ante Pali. This radical Cronin separatist movement
vas dedicated tothe violent destruction ofthe Yogosia sae
2 Maja Brat and Sandra Pelends, eds, Kaunspantinia hiro (Zagyeb: Golden-Macketing
2006), p14.
116 [RY ING WITH PASCISAE-THP.USTASA LEGACY AND CROATIAN POLIZICS INTHE 19%
‘war for independence, and in the immediate postwar years, Ustaia as well as
Cetnile (Serbian nationalists also dating to World War Two) imagery became
prevalent, reflecting the deterioration of Croat-Setb sclations,
Even though at times it seemed to be sliding towarcls an authoritarian
extreme nationalist stare modeled. on the Ustaia regime in the 1990s, modern
Croatia is undoubtedly democratic and founded on the antifascist values ent-
bedded among the core principles of the Eutopean Union. The UstaSa revival
was never as prevalent as Serbian wartime propaganda, or even some Western
media accounts, reported in order to cast doubt upon the legitimacy of an in-
dependent Croatia. Croatia's constitution from 1990 refers to the Partisan his-
torical legacy, not the Ustaia one. Open association with the Ustaia past has
diminished significantly as BU membership becomes more of a reality, even
though pro-fascist symbols and individual incidents have not completely dis-
appeared from Croatian society. President Stjepan Mesié, speaking at a com-
memoration on 22 April 2007 for the victims at Jasenovac, the largest concen-
tration camp operated by the Ustaée, noted that Croatia will not be a normal
country as long Ustaéa and Nazi graffiti appear in Zagreb, Ustasa leader Ante
Pavelié is celebrated as a Croatian patriot, and antifascism is criminalized.’ But
most importantly is that in the political arena, even the once most pro-Ustaia
patties such as the HSP have turned away from openly associating themselves
with that chapter of Croatia's past.
This article examines the political context of Croatia in the 1990s which
fostered the rehabilitation of the Ustate as an expression of Croatian national-
ism at a time of democratic transition across Eastern Burope. Why did Tud-
jman, a former Pastisan general, allow the resurgence of Ustaia symbols and
ideology in a Croatia seeking to become part of the democratic West? What
political parties chose to cast themselves as the inheritors of a movement that
‘was ignominiously defeated at the end of World War Two and associated with
some of the most horrific atrocities of that conflict? While debates over the
UstaSa movement have extended into the spheres of education, monuments
and public space, graffiti, symbols, commemorations and public rituals, and
even popular culture, this chapter focuses on the role of this extreme national-
ist organization in the political life of post-communist Croatia.
The Ustate and Narratives of World War Two
‘Although recent Croatian political history has been dominated by the
idea of statehood -the loss of the independent medieval kingdom in 1102 and
3 Fora summaty of the speech, see Now dit Rijeka), 23 April 2007, p35 and Glas Jaowosti (Bel-
grade), 23 Apel 2007, online version at wivwrglasjavnosti coy,
7 Vjeran Pavlakovie
‘centuries of fore) it were emphasized from the begin
ning of modern political activity from the Croatian national renaissance in the
nineteenth ccatury onward - achieving independence was primarily sought
through peaceful, political means. Nevertheless, some extreme Croatian na
tionalist groups have sought, under the moet of ,,the Croatian state above
everything else,” to use violence in creating that state. ‘The most infamous of
the Croatian radical right political movements was indisputably Ante Pavelic’s
Usta’a organization, Founded in exile by Pavelié either in late 1931 or early
1932, the Ustaia solution to the Croat question was built exclusively on an
anti-Yugoslav orientation and tied to Germany's revisionist policy towards
Europe's Versailles system.‘
‘The Independent State of Croatia (NDH - Negavisns Drcva Hrnatcka)
was created on 10 April 1941, just a few days following the Axis invasion and
destruction of royal Yugoslavia. Pavelié quickly established a brutal dictator-
ship that passed racial laws against Serbs, Jews, and Roma, built a system of
concentration camps (the most notorious one being the Jasenovae complex),
and violently repressed any opposition to his regime.’ While many Croats ini.
fially welcomed the NDH as salvation from the Setb-dominated Yugoslav
state, the totalitarian methods of the UstaSa regime quickly revolted the major-
ity of the population. Even though the NDH's bordess encompassed all of
Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Srijem region, the country was recognized only by
the allies of Germany and Italy, was divided into military occupation zones by
those two powers, and had most of its Dalmatian coast and islands ceded to
Italy.
The price for the cteation of a quasi-independent state was rule by
government which had fully adopted the Nazi-fascist ideology of its two main
allies, with the consequence that both Croats and Serbs flocked to the multi-
ethnic, communist-led Partisan movement as the war dragged on, The Ustaie
stayed loyal to Hitler until the end, and while much of the leadership, including
Pavelié, were able to escape to the West after May 1945, tens of thousands of
others associated (or allegedly associated) with the regime suffered in postwar
communist massactes, death marches, or othes types of persecution, which is
symbolically commemorated as the Bleiburg massacre and the Way of the
* The date for che beginning of the Ustaie is often given as 1929, the year when Pavelié went
into exile. Fikreca Jelic-Butié argues that the Ustaée as a loose movement was founded in 1929,
but the actual organization, Ustala- brastcha revolusanarna organigacva (UHRO), was cxcated in
1931 at the earliest, See Fikreta Jelié-Butié, Ustaie # Neqanisne Drfste Hrvatska (Zagreb: SN
Liber, 1978), pp. 21-24; and Mario jareb, Usiatko donabrantkipokret edaastane do travnja 1941,
godine Zagreb: Sols knjiga, 2006), pp. 112 - 119.
5 Fora recent overview of the NDH in English, see Sabrina P, Ramet, The NDH - An Intro-
duction,” in Totaitarian Movements and Political Religions vol. 7, a4 (December 2006).
18 FLIRTING WITH PASCISME THE USTASA IEGACY AND CROATIAN POLITICS RCTHE 195
Cross.” Groats in particular were saddled with the guilt of the Ustaa crimes,
even though by the end of the war hundreds of thousands of ethoic Croats
hhad fought in the Partisan ranks. The victorious Partisans established a com:
munist dictatosship that owed everything to the successful struggle against
foreign occupiers and their domestic collaborators, and thus the narrative of
World War ‘Two became the cornerstone of the newly reunited Yugoslav state.
“The division of Croats into those who had been on the side of the Partisans
or on the side of the Ustade, the winners and losers of the war, was to have a
considetable impact on Croatia when democratic change finally swept away the
communist monopoly on power and history.
By 1989, it was clear that the commanist system that had been main-
tained by the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe was crumbling rapidly, and that
multiparty democracy was inevitably going to replace the one-party state that
had charactetized this region throughout the Cold Wat, ‘The winds of change
did not bypass Yugoslavia, which had broken free from Soviet control in 1948
but had nonetheless been ruled by communists whose legitimacy rested on the
charismatic leadership of Josip Broz Tito (1892-1980), the watchful eye of the
‘Yugoslav People's Army (INA - Jugoslavenska narodna armijq), and the myths of
the Partisan struggle dusing World Wat Two. Tito's death and the systematic
attacks on the ideology and founding myths of communist Yugoslavia (such as
Brotherhood and Unity”, the purity of the Partisans, and the denial of post-
war crimes against real and alleged collaborators) left the JNA as the only pillac
propping up the country, which would eventually be used by Milosevié in his
attempt to cazve out a Greater Serbia from the ruins of the Yugoslav state.
“The liberalization of the political arena in the late 1980s was accompa-
nied by challenges to the historical narrative monopolized by the communist
regime. Not only histotians, but journalists, emigre memoirists, and publicists
of questionable academic integrity launched into a public debate on all of the
taboo themes of communist Yugoslavia, of which World War Two, the nature
of the Ustaia regime, and the liquidation of the communists! political oppo-
nents were especially emphasized. The flurry of historical revisionism, in an
atmosphere where everything associated with the communist system was te-
jected, meant that a prior’ all communist historiography was inherently flawed
irrespective of its scholarly soundness. Suddenly the Ustaie, fascist collabora-
© The events in Bleiburg, Austria, are commemorated every vear in May, and polemics over the
numbers of victims and nature of the Partisan crimes continue to the present. Some books
with differing interpretations include juraj HrZenjak, ed., Blabarg i Krigupar 1945 (Zagreb
Savex antfetisdiich boraca Hrvatske, 2007); Josip Jaréevie, Bikaburg Jagaslavenskiporat hia
nadirvetima (Zagreb: DIS, 2005); and Matko Grgié, ed., Bhiburg: Otorent doer Zagreb: Vjes-
nik, 1990).
119) eran Pavlakovic
tors and the losers of World War Two, were being tchabilitated simply because
they had been vilified by communist scholars and politicians for nealy five
decades.
‘The debate about Croatia's recent past quickly became a political issue as
well after the Croatian communist leadership decided to allow multiparty elec-
tions at the Bleventh Party Congress held in December 1989. A number of
political parties had already been founded of restored that year, such as the
Croatian Social Liberal Party, the Croatian Peasant Party, and the aforem:
tioned HDZ, all of which noted the so-called ,,national question” as one of
the key issues in post-Titoist Yugoslavia. For MiloSevie and the Serbian leadet-
ship, any kind of Croatian nationalism or efforts to challenge the centralization
of the Yugoslav state was depicted as the , awakening of the Ustade,” and even
Croatian communists were labeled as Ustase by the Belgrade media.’ It was
Miloievié himself, however, who had first stirred the ghosts of Yugoslavia's
past and had undertaken numerous moves to undermine the constitutional and
legal framework of socialist Yugoslavia.”
In 1990 two other political parties appeared that reflected the growth of
both Croatian and Serbian nationalism. In February, the oldest Croatian politi-
cal party, the HSP (originally founded in 1861 and banned since 1929), was re-
newed by Ante Paraddik, KreSimir Pavelié, and seven others in Zagreb.’ They
chose Dobroslav Paraga, an anticommunist dissident, as the party's first presi-
dent, and openly used iconography associated with the Usta’a regime. That
same month, in Kain, located in the Dalmatian hinterland, psychiatrist Jovan
Raskovie founded the Serbian Democratic Party (SDS -Stprka demokratska
stranka), which mobilized Croatian Serbs by playing upon theix fears of a zein-
carnated Ustaia state." Although the MSP did not participate in the first de-
moctatic elections in Croatia (held in April and May 1990 and won by the
HDZ), and the SDS received few votes, theit ultsa-nationalist positions antici-
pated the radicalization of Croatian society that contributed to the violence a
year later,
vo Goldstein, Heute ponjert Zagreb: Novi liber, 2003), p. 373
* See Vjeran Pavlakovig, ,Serbie Transformed: Political Dynamics in the Milogevié Era and
‘After” in Sabrina P. Ramet and Vjeran Pavlakovié, eds, Serie sine 1989: Palit and Soy ander
Mibsuic and Afr Gate: University of Washington Press, 2005) pp. 13-54; Robert Thomas,
The Politics of Seria in te 1990 (New York: Colambin University Press, 1999); and Louis Sell,
Siohodan Milseic and the Destruction of Yegsavta (Duchara, N.C: Doke University Press, 2002)
9 Kretimie Pavelic, HSP: Od above do dobods Lageeb: HIDSP, 1998), pp. 9,23. Pavlié, who left
the HSP because of disagreements with Parags, Iter accused Parag of being a forcign ageat
‘who acted as yan Ustaia for hire,” although no substantive evidence for this allegation was
ever produced.
© Nikica Basic, SrpsAapobuna u Hroatsky, 1990-1995 (Zagreb: Golden-Matketing, 2008), pp. 49-
4
120 FLIRTING WITH FASCISHS-THE USEASA LEGACY AND CROATIAN POLITICS IN THE 19805,
Tadiman, National Reconciliation, and Croatian Serb Fears
Ie. was Tudjman's HDZ, however, which would earn the reputation, es-
pecially internationally and among Setbs, as the embodiment of extteme Croa-
tian nationalism even without the direct association with the Ustage such as
exhibited by the HSP. Nevertheless, two factors did reveal the HDZ's ambigu-
ous position on the NDH past: Firstly, Tadjman received considerable support
for the HDZ, from Croatian emigres, notably in Canada, the United States, and
‘Australia (many of whom remained sympathetic to the Ustafa regime) and en-
couraged the retuen to Croatia of individuals with ties to the Ustaie.” For ex-
ample, members of the Croatian Liberation Movement (HOP ~ Hrvatski aslo-
bodilatkipokret), founded by Pavelié and other former Ustaéa leaders in Argen-
tina in 1956, registered HOP as a political party in October 1991. Gojko
Suiak, an active member of the emigre community and Canadian businessman
who eventually served as the Croatian Minister of Defense (1991-1999), em-
bodied the hard-line faction of the HDZ.. According to Martin Spegelj, one of
Sulak's predecessors, the pro-Pavelié views of some of the emigres ,,added oil
to the fire of the Serb uprising,” as did ,the renewal of the spirit and model of
the NDH, such as when SuSak's people constantly announced the return of
Domobran and UstaSa officers from emigration.”"* Some prominent HDZ of-
ficials were quoted making racist statements about the sinall size of Serbian
brains, while SuSak himself greeted the crowd one year with a fascist salute at
the traditional Alka competition in the Dalmatian hinterland."
Secondly, partly as a means to obtain the widest possible support for his
party and eventual Croatian independence, Tudjman promoted the idea of
national reconciliation” among Croats, which to some degree exculpated the
UstaSe of their crimes in the course of establishing the NDH. National recon-
1 Fog the sole of emigres in Balkan polities in the 1990s, see Paul Hockenos, Homeland Calling:
Bx Pariotin andthe Bethan Wars (Ithaca, N'Y: Cornell University Press, 2003)
"2 Globus Zagseb), 1 December 1995, p. 16. In 1995, HOP began issuing its main newspaper,
Nezaiina Driewa Hreatits in Zagreb, afer decades of publication ia Buenos Ales and Chie
cago
© Martin Spegel, Scania sejnike (Zagreb: Znanje, 2001), pp. 126, 195. See also a similar ext
sigue of the Ministry of Defense under Suiale by’ Anton ‘us, ,Rat u Sloveniji i Hevatskoj do
sarsjevskog primirja,” ia Branka Maga’ and Ivo Zanié, Rat « Frets i Bord é Heregorni, 1991-
1995 (Zagxebs: Naklada Jasens i Turk, 1999), p. 89. The Domobrani Home Guards) were the
members of the regultt army of the NDE, whereas the Ustaie were the elite roops most
Joyal wo Paveli’s regime.
¥ Zagreb Race Hate Trial,” Intute for War and Peace Reporting, Balkan Ctisis Repost No. 282
21 September 2001), online at iwprnet/2p=berdes=F8c0=2484098apc stateheniber2001
121 cliation was carried out in Germany and Waly in the postwar yeats, and
Charles de Gaulle, president of France, called for national unity in 1930 by
softening his stance toward Petainists while maintaining the myth about the
nature of the Resistance."* According to a controversial biogtaphy of Tadjman
by journalist Darko Hudelist, during his visits to Nott America the founder
of the HIDZ came to an agreement with the Croatian Franciscans to accept
reconciliation as the core of his party's program." The goal was, in other
words, to unite all Croats, both Partisans and Ustasc and their children, against
the common enemy, the Serbs. For Hudelist, Tudjman's ideas about national
reconciliation originated from the writings of Vjekoslav Maks Luburié, a for-
mer Ustaia officer and commander of the notorious Jasenovac camp, who
split with Pavelié in 1955 and was influenced by the reconciliation carried out
by Francisco Franco in Spain.!” Others, including Ivan Zvonimir Citak, have
asgued that the idea of reconciliation originated during the student movement
of 1971 (known as the Croatian Spring),"
Regardless of the ideological otigias of Tudjman's reconciliation plat-
form, it was a vital element in uniting Croats across the political spectrum at a
time when the country was threatened with destruction at the hands of
Milosevié and the JNA. Historian Dugan Bilandiié noted in his memoits that
in the carly 1990s Croats formed ,,a united front for an independent and de-
mocratic Croatia..divisions into fascists and antifascists practically disap-
peared. Withoue that unity, the defense of Croatia would have been absolutely
impossible” In his reflections upon Tudjman's reconciliation policy, journal-
ist Davor Butkovié comes to a simnilar ‘conclusion:
{[Tudjman] rehabilitated a part of the Ustaa tradition, not because he
believed in it, far from that, but because he believed that by involving the
‘most hard-line faction of the Croatian emigration, it would be easier to
win the war, which proved to be perfectly correct. It cannot be expected
'S Henry Rousso, The Vity Sydvonr: History and Merooy sa France since 1944, eran. by Axthut
Goldhammes (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 191), p39.
% Darko Hudelist, Teginan: Biografs Zagreb: Prot, 2004), wx. 614, 620.
7 Ibid, pp. 684-688. in hie book attacking Hadelss biography, Ivan Bekavac argues thatthe
connection to Lubusié is an attempt to cast Tadjiman in a pro-fascist light in oxder to justify
the joint criminal encerpsise” theory in the International Csiminal Tribunal forthe foumee
‘Yogoslavia (CTY) indiciments against Croatian generals. See Ivan Belavac, Igifen Tagan
sedi, keteoorinama i maja Fadelstee, big preghrecekegpredetnike (Zagrcbs Nak,
ada Pavitié, 2007), pp 9-12.
28 Wan Zeonimir Citak, quoted in Iviea Rado, Tadjman ible: Sidon saradnia i preiilea
(CZagreb: Prof, 2005), p. 38
2 Duian Bilandié, Paget ihe: Menoarsi api, 1945-2005 (Zagreb: Peomet), 2006), pp
492.493,
122 FLIRTING WTTH FASCISM: THE USPASA .2GACY AND CROATIAN POLITICS INTHE
that anyone in the West would have an understanding for something lke
that.”
Josip Manolié, one of Tudjman's closest advisors, described how recom
ciliation was directed specifically at the pro-UstaSa emigres:
“The Croatian leadership needed to tell those who had lost World War
Two that they had no reason to be angry at the generation of Croats
who had grown up in Tito's Yugoslavia, because that generation was not
responsible for their emigration from Croatia, This was not a me for
grieving over the past.”
Even Stjepan Mesié, who was clected president in 2000 and consistently
worked to return antifascist values t0 Croatia, was shown to have cast the
NDH ia 2 positive light during a fundraising speech to the Croatian diaspora
jin Australia in the carly 1990s. Addsessing the issue in a televised speech im-
mediately after footage of his controversial comments became public, Mesi¢
reminded viewers of the wattime context and the need to gain the support of
Croats abroad, but nonetheless deemed it an ,,erroncous and mistaken tactical
concession of flirting with Ustaia views."
Tadjman, however, sew no problem in the fact that the whitewashing of
Ustaa crimes was a byproduct of his reconciliation policy. Although he had
fought on the side of the Partisans in World War Two and admitted that Croat
antifascists had likewise fought for Croatian rights, Tudjman nonetheless pro-
mmoted the view that ,everyone who had been in the government of the NDH
‘yas for Croatia, out of purc Croatian feelings,” among whom ,,there was a
Small number of political and ideological fascists or Nazis’”* Thus Tudjman,
‘cho in the early 1990s did not explicitly condemn the Ustaée - whose ideology
‘was firmly rooted in authoritarianism, violence, intolerance to other ethnic
groups (nately Serbs), and eventually tenets of fascism and Nazism to ingrat-
ate themselves with their international benefactors - created an atmosphere
ihere it was encoutaged to celebrate the Pavelié regime solely because it had
fought for a Croatian state.
“Tudjman's preoccupation with the idea of reconciling Croatia's divisions
from World Wat wo culminated in plans to transfer the remains of Ustaie, 2s
well as those killed duting the Homeland War, to the memorial complex at
Jasenovae, the former death camp where some 80,000-100,000 Serbs, Jews,
% Davor Butkovig, quoted in Radof, Tigi ible, p. 46.
3 Nou de (15 January 2007), p. 5.
2 Naw fa (11 December 2006), p. 5, Mesi¢ issued a direct apology for his comments in 2 large
interview printed in Feral Tribes (pli), 15 December 2006, pp. 46.
2 Interview with Eranjo Tudjman reprinted in Novi ke 23 April 1996), p. 21
123 oars
Roma, and antifascist Croats had been killed by the Ustae” This plan for
Jasenovac was first made public in 1992, and then repeated by Tudjmaa at the
Second HDZ Party Convention (15-16 October 1993) and the State of the
Nation Address on 15 January 1996." According to him, ,,Jasenovac could be.
come a place for all vietims of war, which would warn the Croatian people
that in the past they were divided and brought into an internecine conflict,
warn them to not repeat it, and to teconcile the dead just as we reconciled the
living, their children, and their grandchildren?” Tadjman noted Spanish dict,
tor Francisco Franco's massive monument to the dead froin both sides of the
Spanish Civil War in the Valley of the Fallen (Walle de os Caidos) could serve as
4 model for the new Jasenovae, although similar memotials mixing the bones
of the dead exist in other countries, such as in the New Guardhouse (Newe Wa-
ele) in Berlin.” His plans for reconciliation of the dead also included Croatian
historical figures who were buried abroad, such as Ante Pavelié (Spaia), Josip
Broz Tito Gerbia), and interwar leader Vladko Maéek (United States), ll of
whom he wanted reburied in Croatian soil; only Magek’s body was actually re-
turned to Zagreb in 1996.
This vision of the Jasenovac memorial complex, as with other positions
held by Tudjman on the NDH, omitted the fact that the majority of vietims at
the camp were Setbs, who were singled out for liquidation simply because of
their nationality. The proposed transformation of Jasenovac was shelved after
an avalanche of protests from Croatian antifascist groups,” Croatia's Jewish
community,” Walter Reich, the director of the US Holocaust Memorial Mu
seum,” and fifty-two United States congressmen.” According to Mate Granié's
¥ The number of victims at jasenovac has long been one of the most heated controversies
sbout World War Twa, Most scholars, based on the wotk of two demographers (Vladimir Zen,
jnvié and Bogoljub Kotovic) working independently accept the number ts be ia the 80,000 to
100,000 vietims range. See Natala Mataaie, The Jascaovac Concentration Camp" in Te
Bente Ritay, ed jeer Monon! Ste Gaseaovac: Spomen podtutje Jasenovae, 2104), pp
47-48, Tadiman himself had questioned the number of viesims, suggesting a dene there fel
been only 4,000, Iacerview with Tudjman, reprinted in Now lt (23 Apel 1996), p21. On the
cgther extreme, Serbian propaganda exaggerated the number to 700,000, or even 1,000,000
Secbs allegedly Kled at Jasenovn, a figure that some Serbian meta conti to use to this day.
See Glajeminti 23 Api! 2007, online version at werwasjavaosticoyu,
% See Ujenik Zagre), 27 May 1992, no page summber Veni 24 November 1993), no page
‘umber; and Fina! Tribe (22 January 1990), p. 5
% Interview with Tudjman, cepsined in Now de (23 April 1996), p. 21. While Tadjinan env
sioned Croatian war dead from various sides to be buried at Jasenbvac in separate graves, op.
ponents of the dea accused him of ,mixing the bones of the dead.”
"Ibid, p 22.
2 Vane 22 April 1996), p.1.
2» Feral Tribune 22 Jaruary 1990), p. 5
Walet Reich, A Plan That's Bad to the Bone.” Wall Siretlowmal (3 April 1996), p. At
124
“4 LIVING WITT EASCISM: THB USTASA LEGACY AND CROATIAN POLIEICS IN THE 19305
‘memoirs, even Vice President Al Gore emphasized the political damage that
would result from the Jasenovac plan, which finally convinced Tudjman to
abandon it.” The memorial complex at Jasenovac continued to spark contro-
versies even after Tudjman's death in 1999, as Croatia sought to confront the
darkest chapters of its past, pay respects to the victims of the NDH, and rec-
‘ognize the contribution of the antifascist movement to modern-day Croatia,
without becoming subjected to political manipulation.
Whereas the policy of national reconciliation could help ethnic Croats
heal the bitter wounds of the ideological divide from World War Two, Croa-
tix's Sezbs saw something far more ominous in the HDZ's thetoric of tecon-
ciliation. In the article , What Serbs Fear,” SDS leader RaSkovié emphasized
that ,,for the Serb people, the publicly proclaimed national reconciliation cre-
ates the sense that the UstaSe have been forgiven,” and that the ,Ustaia core”
of the HDZ was increasing Serb paranoia of a return of the NDH.” Since a
significant number of pro-Ustaia emigres had supported the reconciliation
platform as a way to reverse the defeat of 1945, Tudjman’s embrace of na-
tional reconciliation to the degree that it was one of the centerpieces of the
HDZ. ideology was interpreted by them as a green light for the rehabilitation
of the Ustage rather than , forgetting the past” as Lubutié had advocated in his
writings. Furthermore, Tudjman's entire concept of reconciliation was an at-
tempt to reconcile two diametrically opposed ideologies, and not an effort to
reconcile living individuals, most importantly Serbs and Croats who were in-
creasingly divided over the renewed debate on the traumatic past.
Ir was Tudjman's comments about the NDH is a speech at the Firse
General Convention of the HDZ (24-25 February 1990) which played into the
hands of MiloSevié, who sought to manipulate the Croatian Serbs’ collective
memory of the UstaSe for his own political agenda. His most controversial
statement was that ,,the NDH was not just a ‘quisling creation’ and a ‘fascist
crime, but an expression of the historical yearnings of the Croatian people for
their own independent state.” For Slavko Goldstein, a respected Zagreb pub-
licist, this speech was one of Tudjman's greatest mistakes, because for Serbs in
Croatia the NDH could only be a criminal fascist state, and therefore any rela
tivization of that fact could bring into question the future of Serbs in a Croatia
led by the HDZ.™ Even though in the same speech Tudjman commented on
> Pamarane (Zagreb), 3 Jane 1996, pp. 58-58.
3 Mate Granié, Vavjrkapottibe: [ge kulzapelitbe Zagreb: Algotitan, 2005), pp. 143-144.
2 Interview with Jovan Ratkovig, in Danas (Zagreb), 29 May 1990, p. 14.
Slavko Goldstein, ,,Pomirenj)” Enacms Zagreb), No. 2 (fune 1993). p15
5 Text of the speech reprinted in Andjelko Miladovié (ed), Polite strnke x Republi Hr
kaj (Osijek, Zageeb, and Split Pan Liber, 1997), p. 40.
3 Slavko Goldstein, 1941. Godine kyja se srata (Zageeb: Novi liber, 2007), pp. 372-373.
125 |
‘Vjeran Pavlakovie
the positive contributions of Croatian communists and antifascists, the media,
especially in Belgrade, focused exclusively on the portions about the NDH.”
Pro-Uistaga comments by other hardline HDZ members reinforced the per
ception that the Croatian government elected in the spring of 1990 was ac~
tively revising the historical narrative of World War Two with the goal of le-
gitimizing the Pavelié regime,
‘Tudjman's apparent rehabilitation of the NDH, compounded with the
actual increase of ppro-Ustaia imagery in Croatia,* provided plenty of material
for MiloSevié's propaganda apparatus, which sought to portray the HDZ. gov-
emnment as the natural descendant of Pavelie’s regime. Belgrade television
aired speeches of ‘Tadjman and Pavelié one after the other,” while Politika and
Politika expres, Belgrade newspapers which were read extensively in the regions
‘of Croatia with Serb majorities, cattied extensive articles about Ustaa atroci-
ties, Croatian national symbols, and the Jasenovac concentration camp, often
placed next to articles about Tudjman and the HDZ."° Miloievie's tactics in
manipulating the collective memory among Croatian Serbs was quite obvious.
An article in the influential Zagreb weekly Danas warned
the continuous media uproar, particularly from Belgrade, seeks to por-
‘tay everything happening in Croatia as a reflection of ,,the spirit of the
‘Munich beer hall” and ,,the arrival of fascists” Every exaltation of some
Croatian rabble-rouser is welcomed support for that effort. The conse-
quences are fear and uncertainty among the Scrb inhabitants in Croatia."
Despite evidence that even individual eases of Ustaia resurgence was
contributing to the destabilization of Serb-Croat relations, Tudjman refused to
explicitly denounce the crimes committed in the name of the NDH.
Serbian intelligence agents in Croatia were also assigned to carry out at-
tacks and disinformation campaigns to discredit the aew HDZ, government.
‘The counterintelligence service (KOS) of the Yugoslav People's Army de-
sttoyed Jewish graves in Zagreb's Mirogoj Cemetery in order that ,the Croa-
tian authorities would be represented and shown as being pro-fascist,” while
2 Bais, Srpska pobuaa w Haste, p. 58,
% Reporter Ines Sabalié noted how objects with Ustaéa symbols were being openly sold on
Zageeb's main square with no reaction from the authotities, which she evaluated as being a
very bad move on the part of Croatia from a propaganda perspective.” Nedidina Dalmagi
Gols), 23 june 1991, pp. 89.
® Florence Hartmann, Milaenié: Diagonala ludiaba, waas, by Hivalenka Carrara d'Angely (Rijcka:
Adamié, 2002), p. 165.
‘ Mati Thomson, Forging Wars The Media in Seba, Croatic, and Borla-Hergeosina (Avon: Article
19, 1994), p71.
* Danas (12 June 1990), p. 7,
126 Suet lune sae NE -¥ AND CRONTIAN POLIFICS IN THE 19908
plans to launch terrorist attacks against the synagogue in Zagreb were pre-
vented when the agents were discovered and had to flee to Belgrade,* Defa-
mation of the Croatian government's image was accompanied by the well-
documented arming of Serb rebels from JNA weapon depots, likewise organ
ized by MiloSevié and his associates."
Decisions by the new Croatian government regatding new ot restored
national symbols both antagonized Croatia's Serbs and seemed to confirm the
hysterical rhetosic in the Serbian media. First and foremost was the use of the
traditional saboonica (chessboard) coat-of-arms as the dominant national sym
bol. Even though Serbs associated the Jahoimica exclusively with the Usta’e, it
‘was a historical Croatian heraldic symbol that remained in use through the so-
Gialist period, albeit crowned with a red star" Already convinced that Tudjman
was intent on reviving the NDH to solve Croatia's ,Setb question,” in the
summer of 1990 Serb police officers in the Krajina region led by Milan Martié
refused to ,,wear Ustaia insignia on their uniforms,” ie. Jabovwica badges, pre-
cipitating the Krajina's rebellion against Zagreb."
Other symbolic steps taken by the new government included reintroduc-
ing the World War Two-era Aue as the currency, using official vocabulary that
evoked the Ustaia regime, and the renaming of streets and squares, most no-
tably the Square of the Victims of Fascism (Ing rtava faligma) in September
1990. Concurrently, Croatia's antifascist movement was vilified in the press
and in new textbooks, while some three thousand monuments, statues, and
‘Testimony of former invlligence agent Mustafa Candi at the tial of Slobodan Milofevié
(11 November 2002) about ,Opetation Labrador”, wanscepe available at wwwun.org/icty/
franseS4/021111EDhhem, p. 12,736. Candie also described how ,Operation Opera” used doc-
tored footage of Croatian politicians and images of alleged Serbian victims to convince view-
ers of Setbiaa television thatthe HZ, government was fascist
+ See the indictment of Franko Simacovié enki” and Joviea Seani8ié (7-03-69), online ver
sion at www.un.orp/iety/indictment/engish/sta-28i051220e htm. See also the documentary
on the histoty of Serbian paramiltaies operating in Croatia, Jfinica (Veeme, 2006).
“ Marjan Grakalig, Hraatsi rb Grbav broatskib semafe Zagreb: Nakladni zavod matice hrvat-
ske, 1990), pp. 35-36, According to Marcus Tanner, the union with the Habsburg Empire in
1527 was the first time the Joloonica was used as the emblem of Croatia, Marcus Tanne, Graz
tA Nation Forged in War (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 1997), p35. For use of the
Jeboonieain socialist Yugoslavia, see Reana Senjkovié, The Use, Interpretation, and Symboliza-
tion of the National” in Ehrolgia Earapoes, Vol. 25 (1995), p78, f0.2.
© Laura Silber and Alan Litle, Yagulaia: Death of « Nation (London: Penguin, 1995), p. 98, See
also tanscripts from the tial of Milon Maré (95-11), notably the testimonies of Lazar
‘Macura and Ratko Ligina in August and September 2005, wwweun.org/icty/cases-
