Ustaše
Encyclopedia
The Ustaša - Croatian Revolutionary Movement was a Croatian
fascist anti-Yugoslav
separatist movement. The ideology of the movement was a blend of fascism
, Nazism
, and Croatian nationalism
. The Ustaše supported the creation of a Greater Croatia
that would span to the River Drina
and to the border of Belgrade
. The movement emphasized the need for a racially "pure" Croatia and promoted persecution and genocide
against Serbs
, Jews
and Romani people. Fiercely nationalistic, the Ustaše were also fanatically Catholic. In the Yugoslav political context, they identified Catholicism with Croatian nationalism."Fiercely nationalistic, the Ustaše were also fanatically Catholic. In the Yugoslav political context, they identified Catholicism with Croatian nationalism..." Following Croatian nationalism
, they declared the Catholic and Muslim
faiths as religions of the Croatian people
. The Ustaše also saw the Islam of Bosniaks as a religion which "keeps true the blood of Croats."
The movement functioned as a terrorist organization before World War II
, but in April 1941, they were appointed to rule a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia
as the Independent State of Croatia
, a puppet state
of Nazi Germany
. The Ustaše were chiefly responsible for the World War II Holocaust
in Independent State of Croatia
. Around three hundred thousand were killed by the collaborationist
Ustaše government's racial policies, which condemned all Serbs
, Jews
, and Roma to death in the concentration camps, alongside Croat resistance members and political opponents.
When it was founded in 1929, the Ustaše was a nationalist organization that sought to create an independent Croatian state. When the Ustaše came to power in the Independent State of Croatia
, a state established by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany during World War II
, its military wing became the Ustaše Army . The movement collaborated with the German occupation forces in Yugoslavia in fighting an increasingly unsuccessful campaign against the resistance forces, the Yugoslav Partisans, who were recognized in late November 1943 as the military of the Allied
Yugoslav state. As German forces withdrew from Yugoslavia in 1945, the Ustaše mostly left the country, part of them remained in SFR Yugoslavia as resistance group known as Crusaders and large number of them was killed without trial by Yugoslav forces (the Partisans) after the end of war.
The word ustaša (plural: ustaše) is a variation of the word ustanik(plural:ustanici). It is derived from the verb ustati (Croatian for rise up).
Their name derives from the verb ustati which means "to rise up," hence ustaša would mean an insurgent
, or a rebel. This name did not have fascist connotations during their early years in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia as the term "ustat" was itself used in Herzegovina
to denote the insurgents from the Herzegovinian rebellion
of 1875. "Pučki-ustaša" was a military rank in the Imperial Croatian Home Guard (1868–1918). The full original name of the organization appeared in April 1931 as the Ustaša - Hrvatska revolucionarna organizacija or UHRO (Ustaša - Croatian revolutionary organization), though in 1933 it was renamed the Ustaša - Hrvatski revolucionarni pokret (Ustaša - Croatian revolutionary movement) which it kept until World War II.
. Starčević was an advocate of Croatian unity and independence and was both anti-Habsburg
and anti-Serbian. He envisioned the creation of a Greater Croatia
that would include territories inhabited by Bosniaks
, Serbs
, and Slovenes, considering Bosniaks and Serbs as Croats who had been converted to Islam
and Orthodox Christianity
while considering the Slovenes "mountain Croats". He argued that the large Serb presence in territories claimed by a Greater Croatia was the result of recent settlement, encouraged settlement by Habsburg rulers, and influx of groups like Vlachs
who took up Orthodox Christianity and identified as Serbs. Starčević declared his admiration for Bosniaks because in his view they were Croats who tactically had adopted Islam to preserve the economic and political autonomy of Bosnia and medieval Croatia under the Ottoman Empire
.
The Ustaše used Starčević's theories to promote the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina
to Croatia and recognized Croatia as having two major ethnocultural components: Catholic Croats and Muslim Croats. The Ustaše deliberately sought to represent Starčević as being connected to their views, and falsely asserted that Starčević, as a liberal
, never supported human equality or women's equality while portraying him as a racist.
The Ustaše promoted the theories of Dr. Milan Šufflay
who is believed to have claimed that Croatia had been "one of the strongest ramparts of Western civilization for many centuries" that he claimed had been lost with its union with Serbia in Yugoslavia in 1918.
The Ustaše utilized the thesis by Reverend Krunoslav Draganović
, which claimed that many Roman Catholics in southern Herzegovina had been converted to Orthodox Christianity in the 16th and 17th centuries, to justify a policy of forced conversion of Orthodox Christians in the area to Roman Catholicism.
The Ustaše was heavily influenced by Italian Fascism
and Nazism
. Ante Pavelić's position of Poglavnik
was based on the similar positions of Duce
held by Benito Mussolini
and Führer
by Adolf Hitler
. The Ustaše, like fascists, promoted a corporatist
economy. Pavelić and the Ustaše were allowed sanctuary in Italy by Mussolini after being exiled from Yugoslavia. Pavelić had been in negotiations with Fascist Italy since 1927 that included advocating a territory-for-sovereignty swap in which he would tolerate Italy annexing its claimed territory in Dalmatia in exchange for Italy supporting the sovereignty of an independent Croatia.
" would be excluded from political life. Those peoples considered "undesirables" were subjected to mass murder. The Principles called for the creation of a new economic system that would be neither capitalist
nor communist
. The Principles emphasized the importance of the Roman Catholic Church
and the patriarchial
family as means to maintain social order and morality. In power, the Ustaše banned contraception
and tightened laws against blasphemy
.
The Ustaše believed that a government must naturally be strong and authoritarian. The movement opposed parliamentary democracy for being "corrupt" and Marxism
and Bolshevism for interfering in family life and the economy and for their materialism
. The movement considered political institutions such as political parties and parliaments to be harmful and unnatural.
The Ustaše recognized both Roman Catholicism and Islam
as the national religions of the Croatian people but initially rejected Orthodox Christianity
as being incompatible with their objectives. The Ustaše in power banned the use of the expression of "Serbian Orthodox faith" and mandated the use of the expression "Greek-Eastern faith" in its place. The Ustaše persecuted "Old Catholics" who did not recognize papal infallibility
. Orthodox Christian churches were closed, destroyed, or plundered during Ustaše rule. On 2 July 1942 the Croatian Orthodox Church
was founded, and Orthodoxy thus became one of Croatia's state religions.
In economics Ustaše supported the creation of a corporatist
economy. The movement believed that natural rights existed to private property
and ownership over small-scale means of production free from state control.
The Ustaše glorified violence and weaponry, emphasizing the value of the shedding of blood to achieve goals, and combined this rhetoric with religious metaphors. Armed struggle, revenge, and terrorism were glorified by the Ustaše.
, Croatian Peasant Party
President in the Yugoslav Assembly
by radical Montenegrin politician Puniša Račić
, a youth group named the Croat Youth Movement was founded by Branimir Jelić
at the University of Zagreb
. A year later, Ante Pavelić
was invited by the 21-year-old Jelić into the organization as a junior member.} A related movement, the Domobranski Pokret, which had been the name of the legal Croatian army in Austria-Hungary
, began publication of Hrvatski Domobran, a newspaper dedicated to Croatian national matters. The Ustase sent Hrvatski Domobran to the United States
to garner support for the Ustase from Croatian Americans. The organization around the Domobran tried to engage with and radicalize moderate Croats, using Radić’s murder to stir up emotions in the country. By 1929, however, two divergent political streams had formed within Croatia: some supported the Pavelić view that only violence could secure Croatia's national interests; however, the Croatian Peasant Party, led then by Vladko Maček
, successor to Stjepan Radić, had much greater support among Croats.
Various members of the Croatian Party of Rights
contributed to the writing of the Domobran, until around Christmas 1928 when the newspaper was banned by the authorities of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. In January 1929, the King banned all national parties, and the radical wing of the Party of Rights was exiled, among them Ante Pavelić, Gustav Perčec and Branimir Jelić. This group was later joined by several other Croatian exiles. In 1931, Albert Einstein
and Heinrich Mann
drew international attention to the murders of Radić and a Croatian college professor Milan Šufflay
, in which they accused the King of complicity in a published protest. The appeal was addressed to the Paris-based Ligue des droits de l'homme (Human Rights League) and made the front page of the New York Times on May 6, 1931.
On 20 April 1929, Pavelić and others co-signed a declaration in Sofia
, Bulgaria
together with members of the Macedonia
n National Committee, asserting that they would pursue "their legal activities for the establishment of human and national rights, political freedom and complete independence for both Croatia and Macedonia". Due to this, the Court for the Preservation of the State in Belgrade
sentenced Pavelić and Perčec to death on 17 July 1929. The exiles started organizing support for their cause among the Croatian diaspora
in Europe, North and South America. In January 1932, they named their revolutionary organization "Ustaša". In November 1932, ten Ustaše led by Andrija Artuković
, supported by four local sympathisers, attacked a gendarme outpost at Brušani in the Lika
/Velebit
area. The goal of attack was to scare Yugoslav authorities. The incident has sometimes been termed the Velebit Uprising.
One of the most important actions of Ustaše was assassination of Yugoslav king Alexander I
. Organizer of assassination was Eugen Dido Kvaternik while assassin was Vlado Chernozemski
, member of IMRO. Soon after the assassination, all organizations related to the Ustaše as well as the Hrvatski Domobran, which continued as a civil organization, were banned throughout Europe. Pavelić and Kvaternik were detained in Italy from October 1934 until the end of March 1936. After March 1937, when Italy and Yugoslavia signed a pact of friendship, Ustaše and their activities were banned.
However, not only did these events fail to destroy the Ustaša organization, but it even attracted sympathizers among the Croatian youth, especially among university students. In February 1939, two of these returnees, Mile Budak
and Ivan Oršanić, became editors of the newly published magazine Hrvatski narod ("The Croatian nation"), which supported the Ustaše ideas of Croatian independence.
invaded Yugoslavia
on 6 April 1941. Vladko Maček, the leader of the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS) which was the most influential party in Croatia at the time, rejected German offers to lead the new government. On April 10 the most senior home-based Ustaša, Slavko Kvaternik
, took control of the police in Zagreb and in a radio broadcast that day proclaimed the formation of the Independent State of Croatia
(Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH). The name of the state was an attempt to capitalise on the Croat struggle for independence. Maček issued a statement that day, calling on all Croatians to co-operate with the new authorities.
Meanwhile Pavelić and several hundred Ustaše left their camps in Italy for Zagreb, where Pavelić declared new government on 16 April 1941. He accorded himself the title of "Poglavnik" — a Croatian approximation to "Führer" and translating to something like "Headman" in English. Independent State of Croatia was declared on Croatian "ethnic and historical territory" what is today Republic of Croatia
(without Istria
), Bosnia and Herzegovina
, Syrmia
and Bay of Kotor
. However, few days after declaration of independence Ustaše were forced to sign Treaty of Rome
where they surrendered part of Dalmatia and Krk
, Rab
, Korčula
, Biograd, Šibenik
, Split, Čiovo
, Šolta
, Mljet
and part of Konavle
and Bay of Kotor
in favor of Italy
. De facto control over this territory varied for the majority of the war, as the Partisans grew more successful, while the Germans and Italians increasingly exercised direct control over areas of interest. The Germans and the Italians split the NDH into two zones of influence, one in the southwest controlled by the Italians and the other in the northeast controlled by the Germans. In September 1943, after Italian capitulation, Croatia annexed whole territory which was abdicated by Italy according to Treaty of Rome
.
, was composed of enlisted men who did not participate in Ustaše activities. The fanatical Ustaše Militia, however, organised in 1941 into five (later 15) 700-man battalions, two railway security battalions, and the elite Black Legion and Poglavnik Bodyguard Battalion (later Brigade), fought with a merciless tenacity which impressed and appalled friend and foe alike.
In May 1941 the Croatian Army was engaged in Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina. In January 1942 it forced the Partisans in Eastern Bosnia back into Montenegro, but could not prevent their subsequent advance into Western Bosnia. Clearly conventional infantry divisions were too cumbersome, and so in September 1942 four specially designed mountain brigades (1st to 4th) were formed, as well as an Ustaše Defensive Brigade, but by November 1942 the Partisans had occupied Northern Bosnia, and the Croats could only hold main towns and communications routes, abandoning the countryside.
During 1943 the Ustaše battalions were re organised into eight four-battalion brigades (1st to 8th).
By 1944 Pavelić was almost totally reliant on his Ustaše units, now 100,000 strong, formed in Brigades 1 to 20, Recruit Training Brigades 21 to 24, three divisions, two railway brigades, one defensive brigade and the new Mobile Brigade. In November 1944 the Army was put under Ustaše control, and the Army of the Independent State of Croatia
was reorganized in November 1944 to combine the units of the Ustaše and Croatian Home Guard into eighteen divisions, comprising 13 infantry, two mountain, two assault and one replacement Croatian Divisions, each with its own organic artillery and other support units. There were also several armoured units.
On 27 April 1941, a newly formed unit of the Ustaše army killed members of the largely Serbian community of Gudovac, near Bjelovar
. Eventually all who opposed and/or threatened the Ustaše were outlawed. The HSS was banned on 11 June 1941, in an attempt by the Ustaše to take their place as the primary representative of the Croatian peasantry. Vladko Maček was sent to Jasenovac concentration camp
, but later released to serve a house arrest
sentence due to his popularity among the people. Maček was later again called upon by foreigners to take a stand and oppose the Pavelić government, but refused. In early 1941, Jews and Serbs were ordered to leave certain areas of Zagreb
Pavelić first met with Adolf Hitler
on 6 June 1941. Mile Budak
, then a minister in Pavelić's government, publicly proclaimed the violent racial policy of the state on 22 July 1941. Vjekoslav "Maks" Luburić
, one of the chiefs of the secret police, started building concentration camps in the summer of the same year. Ustaše activities in villages across the Dinaric Alps
led to the Italians and the Germans expressing disquiet. As early as July 10, 1941, Wehrmacht General Edmund Glaise von Horstenau
reported the following to the German High Command, the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
(OKW):
A Gestapo report to Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler
, dated February 17, 1942, stated that:
Italian troops in the field had competing territorial claims with their Ustaše allies and had cooperated from the start with Chetnik units operating in the southern areas that they controlled. Hitler tried to insist that Mussolini should have his forces work with the Ustaše, but senior Italian commanders such as General Mario Roatta
ignored such orders.
By the end of 1942, the news about events at Jasenovac and elsewhere had also spread among the Croatian population. Writers Vladimir Nazor
and Ivan Goran Kovačić
escaped from Ustaše-held territory to join the Partisans, and were followed by others.
In 1943, the Germans suffered major losses on the Eastern Front and the Italians signed an armistice with the Allies
, leaving behind significant armaments that the Partisans used against the occupiers and the Ustaše. Fighting continued for a short while after the formal surrender of German Army Group E
on 9 May 1945, as Axis forces and many refugees attempted to escape to Austria. The Battle of Poljana
, between a mixed German and Ustaše column and a Partisan force, was the last battle of World War II on European soil. Many of those fleeing were handed over to the Yugoslavs on the Austrian border, to be subsequently either executed or sent on a "death march" back into the country, an episode known as the Bleiburg massacre
. Pavelić, however, with the help of associates among the Franciscans, managed to escape and hide in Austria and Rome, later fleeing to Argentina
.
With the defeat of the Independent State of Croatia, the movement ceased to exist. Infighting over the failure to establish a Croatian state also fragmented the surviving Ustaše. Ante Pavelić formed the Croatian Liberation Movement
which drew several of the former state's leaders. Vjekoslav Vrančić
founded a reformed Croatian Liberation Movement, and was its leader. Vjekoslav Luburić formed the Croatian National Resistance
. Blagoje Jovović, a Montenegrin Serb
Chetnik shot Ante Pavelić near Buenos Aires
, on April 9, 1957, inflicting injuries from which he later died.
that lived in Croatia, Bosnia
and Herzegovina
as their biggest obstacle. Thus, Ustaše ministers Mile Budak
, Mirko Puk, and Milovan Žanić declared in May 1941 that the goal of the new Ustaše policy was an ethnically clean Croatia. They also publicly announced the strategy to achieve their goal:
The NDH government cooperated with the Nazi Germany in the Holocaust
and exercised their own version of the genocide
against ethnic Serbs living in their borders. State policy about Serbs has been first declared in words of Miroslav Žanić minister of NDH Legislative council on 2 May 1941: "This country can only be Croatian country, and there is no method we would hesitate to use in order to make it truly Croatian and cleanse it of Serbs, who have for centuries endangered us and who will endanger us again if they are given opportunity."
The Ustaše enacted race laws
patterned after those of the Third Reich, which were aimed against Jews and Roma and Serbs
, who were collectively declared enemies of the Croatian people. Serbs, Jews, Roma and Croatian anti-fascists
, including Communist Croats and dissident Croat Byzantine Catholic priests, were interned in concentration camps, the largest of which was the Jasenovac complex
, where many were killed by Ustaše militia. The exact number of victims is not known. The number of murdered Jews is fairly reliable: around 32,000 Jews were killed during World War II on NDH territory. Gypsies (Yugoslav Roma) numbered around 40,000 fewer after the war. Of the number of Serbs who died, estimates tend to vary between 300,000 and 700,000.
The history textbooks in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
cited 700,000 as the total number of victims at Jasenovac. This was promulgated from a 1946 calculation of the demographic loss of population (the difference between the actual number of people after the war and the number that would have been, had the pre-war growth trend continued). After that, it was used by Edvard Kardelj
and Moša Pijade
in the Yugoslav war reparations
claim sent to Germany
. According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center
(citing the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust), "Ustasa terrorists killed 500,000 Serbs, expelled 250,000 and forced 250,000 to convert to Catholicism. They murdered thousands of Jews and Gypsies." The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
says:
Memorial Area, currently headed by Slavko Goldstein, keeps a list of 59,188 names of Jasenovac victims that was gathered by government officials in Belgrade in 1964. Because the gathering process was imperfect, they estimated that the list contains between 60 and 75 percent of the total victims, putting the number of killed in that complex at about 80,000–100,000. The previous head of the Memorial Area Simo Brdar estimated at least 365,000 dead at Jasenovac. The analyses of the statisticians Vladimir Žerjavić
and Bogoljub Kočović
were similar to those of the Memorial Area. In all of Yugoslavia, the estimated number of Serb deaths was 487,000 according to Kočović, and 530,000 according to Žerjavić, out of a total of 1,014,000 or 1,027,000 deaths (resp.). Žerjavić further stated that there were 197,000 Serb civilians killed in NDH (78,000 as prisoners in Jasenovac and elsewhere) as well as 125,000 Serb combatants.
The Belgrade
Museum of Holocaust compiled a list of over 77,000 names of Jasenovac victims. It was previously headed by Milan Bulajić (a controversial nationalist), who supported the claim of a total of 700,000 victims. The current administration of the Museum has further expanded the list to include a bit over 80,000 names. During the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann
, Alexander Arnon (secretary of the Jewish Community in Zagreb) testified about the treatment of Jews in Yugoslavia during the war.
Alexander Arnon's testimony included the following:
During World War II, various German
military commanders gave different figures for the number of Serbs, Jews and others killed on the territory of the Independent State of Croatia. They circulated figures of 400,000 Serbs (Alexander Lehr); 350,000 Serbs (Lothar Rendulic
); between 300,000 (Edmund Glaise von Horstenau); more than "3/4 of a million Serbs" (Hermann Neubacher) in 1943; 600,000–700,000 until March 1944 (Ernst Fick); 700,000 (Massenbach). Out of around 39,000 Jews that lived on the territory that became the Independent State of Croatia, only around 20% survived the war.
The first group of camps was formed in the spring of 1941. These included:
These six camps were closed by October 1942. The Jasenovac complex was built between August 1941 and February 1942. The first two camps, Krapje and Bročica, were closed in November 1941. The three newer camps continued to function until the end of the war:
There were also other camps in:
Numbers of prisoners:
except for Vatican
condemnation of the idea in 1990. The Ustaše represented an extreme example of "Uniatism" rather based on nationalism than on religion. They supported violent aggression or force in order to convert Serbo-Croatian
speaking Serbian Orthodox believers.
The Ustaše held the position that Eastern Orthodoxy, as a symbol of Serbian nationalism
, was their greatest foe. The Ustaše never recognized the existence of a Serb people on the territories of Croatia or Bosnia they recognized only "Croats of the Eastern faith." They also called Bosniaks "Croats of the Islamic faith," but they had a stronger ethnic dislike of Serbs.
Some former priests, mostly Franciscans, particularly in, but not limited to, Herzegovina
and Bosnia
, took part in the atrocities themselves. Miroslav Filipović
was a Franciscan friar (from the Petrićevac
monastery) who allegedly joined the Ustaša army on 7 February 1942 in a brutal massacre of 2730 Serbs of the nearby villages, including 500 children. He was allegedly subsequently dismissed from his order and defrocked, though when he was hanged for his war crimes, he wore his Franciscan robes. Filipović became Chief Guard of Jasenovac concentration camp
where he was nicknamed "Fra Sotona
", and he was given this nickname by Croats themselves.
For the duration of the war, the Vatican
kept up full diplomatic relations with the Ustaša state (granting Pavelić an audience), with its papal nuncio in the capital Zagreb
. The nuncio was briefed on the efforts of religious conversions to Roman Catholicism. After the World War II was over, the Ustaše who had managed to escape from Yugoslav territory (including Pavelić) were smuggled to South America
. It is widely alleged that this was done through rat lines which were operated by members of the organization who were Catholic priests and who had previously secured positions at the Vatican
. Members of the Illyrian College of San Girolamo
in Rome were reputedly involved in this: friars Krunoslav Draganović
, Petranović, and Dominik Mandić.
The Ustaše regime had sent large amounts of gold that it had plundered from Serbian and Jewish property owners during World War II into Swiss bank accounts.Of a total of 350 million Swiss Franc
s, about 150 million was seized by British troops
; however, the remaining 200 million (ca. 47 million dollars) reached the Vatican. In October 1946 the American intelligence agency SSU alleged that these funds are still held in the Vatican Bank
. This issue is the theme of a recent class action suit against the Vatican Bank and others. See Alperin v. Vatican Bank. Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac
, Archbishop
of Zagreb
during World War II, was accused of supporting the Ustaše, and of exonerating those in the clergy who collaborated with the Ustaše and were hence complicit in forced conversions. On the other hand, he himself helped Jewish, Serb and Roma/Sinti victims of the Ustaša terror at the same time. Once, while celebrating mass in Zagreb's cathedral, he reportedly said:
However, Archbishop Stepinac also said this on 28 March 1941, noting Yugoslavia's early attempts to unite Croatians and Serbs:
In 1998, Stepinac was beatified
by Pope John Paul II
. On 22 June 2003, John Paul II visited Banja Luka
. During the visit, he held a mass
at the aforementioned Petrićevac
monastery. This caused public uproar due to the connection of the Petrićevac monastery with the crimes of former friar Filipović. At the same location, the pope also proclaimed the beatification
of the Catholic layman Ivan Merz (1896–1928) who was the founder of the "Association of Croatian Eagles" in 1923, which many Serb nationalists and communists view as the precursor to the Ustaše.
Roman Catholic apologists defend the Pope's actions by claiming that the convent at Petricevac was one of the places that went up in flames causing the death of 80-year-old Friar Alojzije Atlija. Further, that the war had produced "a total exodus of the Catholic population from this region"; that the few who remained were "predominantly elderly"; and that the church in Bosnia then risked "total extinction" due to the war. Therefore, supporters state that the focus on the anti-Croatian tragedy presently occurring is more important than focusing on one of 60 years ago.
(meaning "head") Ante Pavelic. Pavelic was appointed the office as Head of State of Croatia after Adolf Hitler
had accepted Benito Mussolini
's proposal of Pavelic, on April 10, 1941.
The Croatian Home Guard
was the armed forces of Croatia, it subsequently merged into the Croatian Armed Forces.
s. This symbol can easily be spraypainted
. A slight variation of it includes a small plus inserted at the top, symbolizing a cross. In on-line communication it is sometimes written as =U=. As with fascists in other countries, the Ustasha merely superimposed their political symbols (mainly the letter "U") on already existent national symbols. Their hat insignia was the shield of Coat of Arms of Croatia
surrounded or embossed with the U.
The flag of the Independent State of Croatia
was a red-white-blue horizontal tricolor with the shield of the Coat of Arms or Croatia in the middle and the U in the upper left. Its currency was the kuna
. The checkered Coat of Arms of the old NDH starts with a white field in the corner, and that of today's Croatia starts with a red field in the corner. Some possible explanations are that the white field symbolizes the Croatian nationality, as opposed to the red field which symbolizes the Croatian state; or that the white field is used on the so-called war flag.
The Ustaše greeting was "Za dom - spremni!":
This was used instead of the Nazi greeting Heil Hitler by the Ustaše. While the greeting is invented in the 19th century by Croatian ban
Josip Jelačić
, today it is nominally associated with Ustasha sympathisers by Serbs or non-Ustasha conservatives associated with the Croatian Party of Rights
.
However, some Croats see it as a patriotic salute, because it was used long before the Ustase regime and it emphasized the fact of defending your country, your home.
In Internet communication, it is sometimes abbreviated as ZDS.
or generally to defame political opponents. When Slobodan Milošević
was at the end of his rule, the protesters called him "Ustaša".
Croats
Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...
fascist anti-Yugoslav
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
separatist movement. The ideology of the movement was a blend of fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
, Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
, and Croatian nationalism
Croatian nationalism
Croatian nationalism is the nationalism of Croats or of Croatian culture. It arose in the 19th century in response to Magyarization of Croat territories under Hungarian rule, especially under the influence of Ante Starčević and Eugen Kvaternik,...
. The Ustaše supported the creation of a Greater Croatia
Greater Croatia
Greater Croatia is a term applied to certain currents within Croatian nationalism. In one sense, it refers to the territorial scope of the Croatian people, emphasising the ethnicity of those Croats living outside Croatia...
that would span to the River Drina
Drina
The Drina is a 346 kilometer long river, which forms most of the border between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia. It is the longest tributary of the Sava River and the longest karst river in the Dinaric Alps which belongs to the Danube river watershed...
and to the border of Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
. The movement emphasized the need for a racially "pure" Croatia and promoted persecution and genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
against Serbs
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
, Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
and Romani people. Fiercely nationalistic, the Ustaše were also fanatically Catholic. In the Yugoslav political context, they identified Catholicism with Croatian nationalism."Fiercely nationalistic, the Ustaše were also fanatically Catholic. In the Yugoslav political context, they identified Catholicism with Croatian nationalism..." Following Croatian nationalism
Croatian nationalism
Croatian nationalism is the nationalism of Croats or of Croatian culture. It arose in the 19th century in response to Magyarization of Croat territories under Hungarian rule, especially under the influence of Ante Starčević and Eugen Kvaternik,...
, they declared the Catholic and Muslim
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
faiths as religions of the Croatian people
Croats
Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...
. The Ustaše also saw the Islam of Bosniaks as a religion which "keeps true the blood of Croats."
The movement functioned as a terrorist organization before World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, but in April 1941, they were appointed to rule a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a state stretching from the Western Balkans to Central Europe which existed during the often-tumultuous interwar era of 1918–1941...
as the Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
, a puppet state
Puppet state
A puppet state is a nominal sovereign of a state who is de facto controlled by a foreign power. The term refers to a government controlled by the government of another country like a puppeteer controls the strings of a marionette...
of Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
. The Ustaše were chiefly responsible for the World War II Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
in Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
. Around three hundred thousand were killed by the collaborationist
Collaborationism
Collaborationism is cooperation with enemy forces against one's country. Legally, it may be considered as a form of treason. Collaborationism may be associated with criminal deeds in the service of the occupying power, which may include complicity with the occupying power in murder, persecutions,...
Ustaše government's racial policies, which condemned all Serbs
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
, Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
, and Roma to death in the concentration camps, alongside Croat resistance members and political opponents.
When it was founded in 1929, the Ustaše was a nationalist organization that sought to create an independent Croatian state. When the Ustaše came to power in the Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
, a state established by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, its military wing became the Ustaše Army . The movement collaborated with the German occupation forces in Yugoslavia in fighting an increasingly unsuccessful campaign against the resistance forces, the Yugoslav Partisans, who were recognized in late November 1943 as the military of the Allied
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
Yugoslav state. As German forces withdrew from Yugoslavia in 1945, the Ustaše mostly left the country, part of them remained in SFR Yugoslavia as resistance group known as Crusaders and large number of them was killed without trial by Yugoslav forces (the Partisans) after the end of war.
Name
Everyone called to military service in Croatia from 1868 to 1918 were registered as pučki-ustaše (german: Landsturm) hence the name ustašeThe word ustaša (plural: ustaše) is a variation of the word ustanik(plural:ustanici). It is derived from the verb ustati (Croatian for rise up).
Their name derives from the verb ustati which means "to rise up," hence ustaša would mean an insurgent
Insurgency
An insurgency is an armed rebellion against a constituted authority when those taking part in the rebellion are not recognized as belligerents...
, or a rebel. This name did not have fascist connotations during their early years in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia as the term "ustat" was itself used in Herzegovina
Herzegovina
Herzegovina is the southern region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. While there is no official border distinguishing it from the Bosnian region, it is generally accepted that the borders of the region are Croatia to the west, Montenegro to the south, the canton boundaries of the Herzegovina-Neretva...
to denote the insurgents from the Herzegovinian rebellion
Herzegovinian rebellion
The Herzegovina Uprising of 1875-1878 was an uprising led by Christians, firstly in Herzegovina and then in Bosnia. It is the most significant of the rebellions against Ottoman rule in Herzegovina...
of 1875. "Pučki-ustaša" was a military rank in the Imperial Croatian Home Guard (1868–1918). The full original name of the organization appeared in April 1931 as the Ustaša - Hrvatska revolucionarna organizacija or UHRO (Ustaša - Croatian revolutionary organization), though in 1933 it was renamed the Ustaša - Hrvatski revolucionarni pokret (Ustaša - Croatian revolutionary movement) which it kept until World War II.
Ideological roots
One of the major ideological influences of the Croatian nationalism of the Ustaše was 19th century Croatian activist Ante StarčevićAnte Starcevic
Ante Starčević , was a Croatian politician and writer whose activities and works laid the foundations for the modern Croatian state.His works are base for Croatian nationalism, he is often referred to as Father of the Fatherland by Croats.-Life:...
. Starčević was an advocate of Croatian unity and independence and was both anti-Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...
and anti-Serbian. He envisioned the creation of a Greater Croatia
Greater Croatia
Greater Croatia is a term applied to certain currents within Croatian nationalism. In one sense, it refers to the territorial scope of the Croatian people, emphasising the ethnicity of those Croats living outside Croatia...
that would include territories inhabited by Bosniaks
Bosniaks
The Bosniaks or Bosniacs are a South Slavic ethnic group, living mainly in Bosnia and Herzegovina, with a smaller minority also present in other lands of the Balkan Peninsula especially in Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia...
, Serbs
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
, and Slovenes, considering Bosniaks and Serbs as Croats who had been converted to Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
and Orthodox Christianity
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...
while considering the Slovenes "mountain Croats". He argued that the large Serb presence in territories claimed by a Greater Croatia was the result of recent settlement, encouraged settlement by Habsburg rulers, and influx of groups like Vlachs
Vlachs
Vlach is a blanket term covering several modern Latin peoples descending from the Latinised population in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe. English variations on the name include: Walla, Wlachs, Wallachs, Vlahs, Olahs or Ulahs...
who took up Orthodox Christianity and identified as Serbs. Starčević declared his admiration for Bosniaks because in his view they were Croats who tactically had adopted Islam to preserve the economic and political autonomy of Bosnia and medieval Croatia under the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
.
The Ustaše used Starčević's theories to promote the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia and Herzegovina , sometimes called Bosnia-Herzegovina or simply Bosnia, is a country in Southern Europe, on the Balkan Peninsula. Bordered by Croatia to the north, west and south, Serbia to the east, and Montenegro to the southeast, Bosnia and Herzegovina is almost landlocked, except for the...
to Croatia and recognized Croatia as having two major ethnocultural components: Catholic Croats and Muslim Croats. The Ustaše deliberately sought to represent Starčević as being connected to their views, and falsely asserted that Starčević, as a liberal
Liberalism
Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...
, never supported human equality or women's equality while portraying him as a racist.
The Ustaše promoted the theories of Dr. Milan Šufflay
Milan Šufflay
Milan pl. Šufflay was a Croatian historian and politician. He was one of the founders of albanology and the author of the first Croatian science fiction novel.-Life:...
who is believed to have claimed that Croatia had been "one of the strongest ramparts of Western civilization for many centuries" that he claimed had been lost with its union with Serbia in Yugoslavia in 1918.
The Ustaše utilized the thesis by Reverend Krunoslav Draganović
Krunoslav Draganovic
Krunoslav Stjepan Draganović was a Croatian Roman Catholic priest and historian who is accused as being one of the main organisers of the ratlines which aided the escape of Nazi war criminals from Europe after World War II.-Biography:Draganović was from Travnik...
, which claimed that many Roman Catholics in southern Herzegovina had been converted to Orthodox Christianity in the 16th and 17th centuries, to justify a policy of forced conversion of Orthodox Christians in the area to Roman Catholicism.
The Ustaše was heavily influenced by Italian Fascism
Italian Fascism
Italian Fascism also known as Fascism with a capital "F" refers to the original fascist ideology in Italy. This ideology is associated with the National Fascist Party which under Benito Mussolini ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, the Republican Fascist Party which ruled the Italian...
and Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. Ante Pavelić's position of Poglavnik
Poglavnik
Poglavnik was the title used by Ante Pavelić, leader of World War II Croatian fascist movement Ustaše and of the Independent State of Croatia between 1941 and 1945.-Etymology and usage:...
was based on the similar positions of Duce
Duce
Duce is an Italian title, derived from the Latin word dux, and cognate with duke. National Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini was identified by Fascists as Il Duce of the movement and became a reference to the dictator position of Head of Government and Duce of Fascism of Italy was established...
held by Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
and Führer
Führer
Führer , alternatively spelled Fuehrer in both English and German when the umlaut is not available, is a German title meaning leader or guide now most associated with Adolf Hitler, who modelled it on Benito Mussolini's title il Duce, as well as with Georg von Schönerer, whose followers also...
by Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
. The Ustaše, like fascists, promoted a corporatist
Corporatism
Corporatism, also known as corporativism, is a system of economic, political, or social organization that involves association of the people of society into corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labor, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common...
economy. Pavelić and the Ustaše were allowed sanctuary in Italy by Mussolini after being exiled from Yugoslavia. Pavelić had been in negotiations with Fascist Italy since 1927 that included advocating a territory-for-sovereignty swap in which he would tolerate Italy annexing its claimed territory in Dalmatia in exchange for Italy supporting the sovereignty of an independent Croatia.
Political programme and main agendas
In 1933, the Ustaše presented "The Seventeen Principles" that formed the official ideology of the movement. The Principles stated the uniqueness of the Croatian nation, promoted collective rights over individual rights, and declared that people who were not Croat by "bloodHeredity
Heredity is the passing of traits to offspring . This is the process by which an offspring cell or organism acquires or becomes predisposed to the characteristics of its parent cell or organism. Through heredity, variations exhibited by individuals can accumulate and cause some species to evolve...
" would be excluded from political life. Those peoples considered "undesirables" were subjected to mass murder. The Principles called for the creation of a new economic system that would be neither capitalist
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
nor communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
. The Principles emphasized the importance of the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
and the patriarchial
Patriarchy
Patriarchy is a social system in which the role of the male as the primary authority figure is central to social organization, and where fathers hold authority over women, children, and property. It implies the institutions of male rule and privilege, and entails female subordination...
family as means to maintain social order and morality. In power, the Ustaše banned contraception
Contraception
Contraception is the prevention of the fusion of gametes during or after sexual activity. The term contraception is a contraction of contra, which means against, and the word conception, meaning fertilization...
and tightened laws against blasphemy
Blasphemy
Blasphemy is irreverence towards religious or holy persons or things. Some countries have laws to punish blasphemy, while others have laws to give recourse to those who are offended by blasphemy...
.
The Ustaše believed that a government must naturally be strong and authoritarian. The movement opposed parliamentary democracy for being "corrupt" and Marxism
Marxism
Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...
and Bolshevism for interfering in family life and the economy and for their materialism
Materialism
In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance...
. The movement considered political institutions such as political parties and parliaments to be harmful and unnatural.
The Ustaše recognized both Roman Catholicism and Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
as the national religions of the Croatian people but initially rejected Orthodox Christianity
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...
as being incompatible with their objectives. The Ustaše in power banned the use of the expression of "Serbian Orthodox faith" and mandated the use of the expression "Greek-Eastern faith" in its place. The Ustaše persecuted "Old Catholics" who did not recognize papal infallibility
Papal infallibility
Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church which states that, by action of the Holy Spirit, the Pope is preserved from even the possibility of error when in his official capacity he solemnly declares or promulgates to the universal Church a dogmatic teaching on faith or morals...
. Orthodox Christian churches were closed, destroyed, or plundered during Ustaše rule. On 2 July 1942 the Croatian Orthodox Church
Croatian Orthodox Church
The Croatian Orthodox Church was a religious body created during World War II by the Ustasha regime in the Independent State of Croatia .The reason for formation of this church was that Orthodox Christian Churches are state-based...
was founded, and Orthodoxy thus became one of Croatia's state religions.
In economics Ustaše supported the creation of a corporatist
Corporatism
Corporatism, also known as corporativism, is a system of economic, political, or social organization that involves association of the people of society into corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labor, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common...
economy. The movement believed that natural rights existed to private property
Private property
Private property is the right of persons and firms to obtain, own, control, employ, dispose of, and bequeath land, capital, and other forms of property. Private property is distinguishable from public property, which refers to assets owned by a state, community or government rather than by...
and ownership over small-scale means of production free from state control.
The Ustaše glorified violence and weaponry, emphasizing the value of the shedding of blood to achieve goals, and combined this rhetoric with religious metaphors. Armed struggle, revenge, and terrorism were glorified by the Ustaše.
Before World War II
In October 1928, after the assassination of leading Croatian politician Stjepan RadićStjepan Radic
Stjepan Radić was a Croatian politician and the founder of the Croatian Peasant Party in 1905. Radić is credited with galvanizing the peasantry of Croatia into a viable political force...
, Croatian Peasant Party
Croatian Peasant Party
The Croatian Peasant Party is a center and socially conservative political party in Croatia.-Austria-Hungary:The Croatian People's Peasant Party was formed on December 22, 1904 by Antun Radić along with his brother Stjepan Radić. The party contested elections for the first time in the Kingdom of...
President in the Yugoslav Assembly
Skupština
Skupština is a Serbian and Croatian word for assembly, referring to Parliament. As such, it is used in the name of the following assemblies:* National Assembly of Serbia* Parliament of Montenegro* Parliament of Serbia and Montenegro...
by radical Montenegrin politician Puniša Račić
Puniša Racic
Puniša Račić was a Montenegrin Serb politician, a member of the Yugoslav Parliament from the People's Radical Party, who assassinated Pavle Radić and Đuro Basariček, Croatian Peasant Party representatives, mortally wounded Stjepan Radić, leader of Croatian Peasant Party at the time and wounded...
, a youth group named the Croat Youth Movement was founded by Branimir Jelić
Branimir Jelić
Branimir "Branko" Jelić was a Croatian nationalist exile and doctor of medicine.-Political Activities in Croatia:...
at the University of Zagreb
University of Zagreb
The University of Zagreb is the biggest Croatian university and the oldest continuously operating university in the area covering Central Europe south of Vienna and all of Southeastern Europe...
. A year later, Ante Pavelić
Ante Pavelic
Ante Pavelić was a Croatian fascist leader, revolutionary, and politician. He ruled as Poglavnik or head, of the Independent State of Croatia , a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany in Axis-occupied Yugoslavia...
was invited by the 21-year-old Jelić into the organization as a junior member.} A related movement, the Domobranski Pokret, which had been the name of the legal Croatian army in Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
, began publication of Hrvatski Domobran, a newspaper dedicated to Croatian national matters. The Ustase sent Hrvatski Domobran to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to garner support for the Ustase from Croatian Americans. The organization around the Domobran tried to engage with and radicalize moderate Croats, using Radić’s murder to stir up emotions in the country. By 1929, however, two divergent political streams had formed within Croatia: some supported the Pavelić view that only violence could secure Croatia's national interests; however, the Croatian Peasant Party, led then by Vladko Maček
Vladko Macek
Vladko Maček was a Croatian politician active within the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in the first half of the 20th century. He led the Croatian Peasant Party following the assassination of Stjepan Radić, and all through World War II.- Early life :Maček was born to a Slovene-Czech family in the village...
, successor to Stjepan Radić, had much greater support among Croats.
Various members of the Croatian Party of Rights
Party of Rights (1861–1929)
The Party of Rights or Party of the Right was an influential Croatian political party in the 19th and 20th centuries. The right or rights in the party's name refer to the idea of Croatian national and ethnic rights that were the central topic of the party's existence, as the first name was Stranka...
contributed to the writing of the Domobran, until around Christmas 1928 when the newspaper was banned by the authorities of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. In January 1929, the King banned all national parties, and the radical wing of the Party of Rights was exiled, among them Ante Pavelić, Gustav Perčec and Branimir Jelić. This group was later joined by several other Croatian exiles. In 1931, Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...
and Heinrich Mann
Heinrich Mann
Luiz Heinrich Mann was a German novelist who wrote works with strong social themes. His attacks on the authoritarian and increasingly militaristic nature of pre-World War II German society led to his exile in 1933.-Life and work:Born in Lübeck as the oldest child of Thomas Johann Heinrich Mann...
drew international attention to the murders of Radić and a Croatian college professor Milan Šufflay
Milan Šufflay
Milan pl. Šufflay was a Croatian historian and politician. He was one of the founders of albanology and the author of the first Croatian science fiction novel.-Life:...
, in which they accused the King of complicity in a published protest. The appeal was addressed to the Paris-based Ligue des droits de l'homme (Human Rights League) and made the front page of the New York Times on May 6, 1931.
On 20 April 1929, Pavelić and others co-signed a declaration in Sofia
Sofia
Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...
, Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
together with members of the Macedonia
Macedonians (Bulgarians)
Macedonians or Macedonian Bulgarians , sometimes also referred to as Macedono-Bulgarians or Macedo-Bulgarians is a regional, ethnographic group of ethnic Bulgarians, inhabiting or originating from Macedonia...
n National Committee, asserting that they would pursue "their legal activities for the establishment of human and national rights, political freedom and complete independence for both Croatia and Macedonia". Due to this, the Court for the Preservation of the State in Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
sentenced Pavelić and Perčec to death on 17 July 1929. The exiles started organizing support for their cause among the Croatian diaspora
Croatian diaspora
Croatian diaspora refers to the Croatian communities that have formed outside Croatia.Estimates on its size are only approximate because of incomplete statistical records and naturalization, but estimates suggest that the Croatian diaspora numbers between a third and a half of the total number of...
in Europe, North and South America. In January 1932, they named their revolutionary organization "Ustaša". In November 1932, ten Ustaše led by Andrija Artuković
Andrija Artukovic
Andrija Artuković was a Croatian politician and a member of the Ustaše movement. Artuković was convicted of war crimes committed against minorities in the Independent State of Croatia during World War II...
, supported by four local sympathisers, attacked a gendarme outpost at Brušani in the Lika
Lika
Lika is a mountainous region in central Croatia, roughly bound by the Velebit mountain from the southwest and the Plješevica mountain from the northeast. On the north-west end Lika is bounded by Ogulin-Plaški basin, and on the south-east by the Malovan pass...
/Velebit
Velebit
Velebit is the largest though not the highest mountain range in Croatia. Its highest peak is the Vaganski vrh at 1757 m.The range forms a part of the Dinaric Alps and is located along the Adriatic coast, separating it from Lika in the interior...
area. The goal of attack was to scare Yugoslav authorities. The incident has sometimes been termed the Velebit Uprising.
One of the most important actions of Ustaše was assassination of Yugoslav king Alexander I
Alexander I of Yugoslavia
Alexander I , also known as Alexander the Unifier was the first king of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia as well as the last king of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes .-Childhood:...
. Organizer of assassination was Eugen Dido Kvaternik while assassin was Vlado Chernozemski
Vlado Chernozemski
Vlado Chernozemski , born Velichko Dimitrov Kerin , was a Bulgarian revolutionary.Chernozemski also entered the region of Vardar Macedonia with IMRO bands and participated in more than 15 battles with the Serbian police....
, member of IMRO. Soon after the assassination, all organizations related to the Ustaše as well as the Hrvatski Domobran, which continued as a civil organization, were banned throughout Europe. Pavelić and Kvaternik were detained in Italy from October 1934 until the end of March 1936. After March 1937, when Italy and Yugoslavia signed a pact of friendship, Ustaše and their activities were banned.
However, not only did these events fail to destroy the Ustaša organization, but it even attracted sympathizers among the Croatian youth, especially among university students. In February 1939, two of these returnees, Mile Budak
Mile Budak
Mile Budak was a Croatian Ustaše and writer, best known as one of the chief ideologists of the Croatian clerofascist Ustaše movement, which ruled the Independent State of Croatia, or NDH, from 1941-45 and waged a genocidal campaign against its Serb, Roma and Jewish minorities, and against Croatian...
and Ivan Oršanić, became editors of the newly published magazine Hrvatski narod ("The Croatian nation"), which supported the Ustaše ideas of Croatian independence.
World War II
The Axis PowersAxis Powers
The Axis powers , also known as the Axis alliance, Axis nations, Axis countries, or just the Axis, was an alignment of great powers during the mid-20th century that fought World War II against the Allies. It began in 1936 with treaties of friendship between Germany and Italy and between Germany and...
invaded Yugoslavia
Invasion of Yugoslavia
The Invasion of Yugoslavia , also known as the April War , was the Axis Powers' attack on the Kingdom of Yugoslavia which began on 6 April 1941 during World War II...
on 6 April 1941. Vladko Maček, the leader of the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS) which was the most influential party in Croatia at the time, rejected German offers to lead the new government. On April 10 the most senior home-based Ustaša, Slavko Kvaternik
Slavko Kvaternik
Slavko Kvaternik was a Croatian military commander and a collaborator with Nazi Germany. He was noted for military service in World War I, later as a deputy leader and founding member of the Croatian Ustaša movement in the 1930s who then became one of the leaders of the "Independent State of...
, took control of the police in Zagreb and in a radio broadcast that day proclaimed the formation of the Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
(Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH). The name of the state was an attempt to capitalise on the Croat struggle for independence. Maček issued a statement that day, calling on all Croatians to co-operate with the new authorities.
Meanwhile Pavelić and several hundred Ustaše left their camps in Italy for Zagreb, where Pavelić declared new government on 16 April 1941. He accorded himself the title of "Poglavnik" — a Croatian approximation to "Führer" and translating to something like "Headman" in English. Independent State of Croatia was declared on Croatian "ethnic and historical territory" what is today Republic of Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
(without Istria
Istria
Istria , formerly Histria , is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner...
), Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia and Herzegovina , sometimes called Bosnia-Herzegovina or simply Bosnia, is a country in Southern Europe, on the Balkan Peninsula. Bordered by Croatia to the north, west and south, Serbia to the east, and Montenegro to the southeast, Bosnia and Herzegovina is almost landlocked, except for the...
, Syrmia
Syrmia
Syrmia is a fertile region of the Pannonian Plain in Europe, between the Danube and Sava rivers. It is divided between Serbia in the east and Croatia in the west....
and Bay of Kotor
Bay of Kotor
The Bay of Kotor in south-western Montenegro is a winding bay on the Adriatic Sea. The bay, sometimes called Europe's southernmost fjord, is in fact a submerged river canyon of the disintegrated Bokelj River which used to run from the high mountain plateaus of Mount Orjen...
. However, few days after declaration of independence Ustaše were forced to sign Treaty of Rome
Treaty of Rome
The Treaty of Rome, officially the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, was an international agreement that led to the founding of the European Economic Community on 1 January 1958. It was signed on 25 March 1957 by Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany...
where they surrendered part of Dalmatia and Krk
Krk
Krk is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, located near Rijeka in the Bay of Kvarner and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....
, Rab
Rab
Rab is an island in Croatia and a town of the same name located just off the northern Croatian coast in the Adriatic Sea.The island is long, has an area of and 9,480 inhabitants . The highest peak is Kamenjak at 408 meters...
, Korčula
Korcula
Korčula is an island in the Adriatic Sea, in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County of Croatia. The island has an area of ; long and on average wide — and lies just off the Dalmatian coast. Its 16,182 inhabitants make it the second most populous Adriatic island after Krk...
, Biograd, Šibenik
Šibenik
Šibenik is a historic town in Croatia, with population of 51,553 . It is located in central Dalmatia where the river Krka flows into the Adriatic Sea...
, Split, Čiovo
Ciovo
Čiovo is a small island located off the Adriatic coast in Croatia with an area of 28.8 km2 , population of 6,071 inhabitants and its highest peak is 218 m ....
, Šolta
Šolta
Šolta is an island in Croatia. It is situated in the Adriatic Sea in the central Dalmatian archipelago, west of the island of Brač, south of Split and east of the Drvenik islands . Its area is 58.98 km2 and it has a population of 1,675 .The highest peak of Šolta is the summit Vela Straža...
, Mljet
Mljet
Mljet is the most southerly and easterly of the larger Adriatic islands of the Dalmatia region of Croatia. The National Park includes the western part of the island, Veliko jezero, Malo jezero, Soline Bay and a sea belt 500 m wide from the most prominent cape of Mljet covering an area of...
and part of Konavle
Konavle
Konavle is a small region and municipality located southeast of Dubrovnik, Croatia.It is administratively part of the Dubrovnik-Neretva County and forms a municipality with its center at Gruda with a total population of 8,250 people split in 32 villages, in which 96.5% are Croats...
and Bay of Kotor
Bay of Kotor
The Bay of Kotor in south-western Montenegro is a winding bay on the Adriatic Sea. The bay, sometimes called Europe's southernmost fjord, is in fact a submerged river canyon of the disintegrated Bokelj River which used to run from the high mountain plateaus of Mount Orjen...
in favor of Italy
Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...
. De facto control over this territory varied for the majority of the war, as the Partisans grew more successful, while the Germans and Italians increasingly exercised direct control over areas of interest. The Germans and the Italians split the NDH into two zones of influence, one in the southwest controlled by the Italians and the other in the northeast controlled by the Germans. In September 1943, after Italian capitulation, Croatia annexed whole territory which was abdicated by Italy according to Treaty of Rome
Treaty of Rome
The Treaty of Rome, officially the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, was an international agreement that led to the founding of the European Economic Community on 1 January 1958. It was signed on 25 March 1957 by Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany...
.
Ustaše militia
The regular army of the NDH, the Home Guard (Domobrani)Croatian Home Guard
Croatian Home Guard or also, known as the "Homeland Defenders," was the name used for the armed forces of the Independent State of Croatia which existed during World War II.- Formation :...
, was composed of enlisted men who did not participate in Ustaše activities. The fanatical Ustaše Militia, however, organised in 1941 into five (later 15) 700-man battalions, two railway security battalions, and the elite Black Legion and Poglavnik Bodyguard Battalion (later Brigade), fought with a merciless tenacity which impressed and appalled friend and foe alike.
In May 1941 the Croatian Army was engaged in Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina. In January 1942 it forced the Partisans in Eastern Bosnia back into Montenegro, but could not prevent their subsequent advance into Western Bosnia. Clearly conventional infantry divisions were too cumbersome, and so in September 1942 four specially designed mountain brigades (1st to 4th) were formed, as well as an Ustaše Defensive Brigade, but by November 1942 the Partisans had occupied Northern Bosnia, and the Croats could only hold main towns and communications routes, abandoning the countryside.
During 1943 the Ustaše battalions were re organised into eight four-battalion brigades (1st to 8th).
By 1944 Pavelić was almost totally reliant on his Ustaše units, now 100,000 strong, formed in Brigades 1 to 20, Recruit Training Brigades 21 to 24, three divisions, two railway brigades, one defensive brigade and the new Mobile Brigade. In November 1944 the Army was put under Ustaše control, and the Army of the Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
was reorganized in November 1944 to combine the units of the Ustaše and Croatian Home Guard into eighteen divisions, comprising 13 infantry, two mountain, two assault and one replacement Croatian Divisions, each with its own organic artillery and other support units. There were also several armoured units.
On 27 April 1941, a newly formed unit of the Ustaše army killed members of the largely Serbian community of Gudovac, near Bjelovar
Bjelovar
Bjelovar is a city in central Croatia. It is the administrative centre of Bjelovar-Bilogora County. During the 2001 census, there were 41,869 inhabitants, 90.51% which are Croats....
. Eventually all who opposed and/or threatened the Ustaše were outlawed. The HSS was banned on 11 June 1941, in an attempt by the Ustaše to take their place as the primary representative of the Croatian peasantry. Vladko Maček was sent to Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp was the largest extermination camp in the Independent State of Croatia and occupied Yugoslavia during World War II...
, but later released to serve a house arrest
House arrest
In justice and law, house arrest is a measure by which a person is confined by the authorities to his or her residence. Travel is usually restricted, if allowed at all...
sentence due to his popularity among the people. Maček was later again called upon by foreigners to take a stand and oppose the Pavelić government, but refused. In early 1941, Jews and Serbs were ordered to leave certain areas of Zagreb
Pavelić first met with Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
on 6 June 1941. Mile Budak
Mile Budak
Mile Budak was a Croatian Ustaše and writer, best known as one of the chief ideologists of the Croatian clerofascist Ustaše movement, which ruled the Independent State of Croatia, or NDH, from 1941-45 and waged a genocidal campaign against its Serb, Roma and Jewish minorities, and against Croatian...
, then a minister in Pavelić's government, publicly proclaimed the violent racial policy of the state on 22 July 1941. Vjekoslav "Maks" Luburić
Maks Luburic
Vjekoslav "Maks" Luburić was a Croatian Ustaše, a war criminal, and the commander of the Jasenovac concentration camp.- Biography :...
, one of the chiefs of the secret police, started building concentration camps in the summer of the same year. Ustaše activities in villages across the Dinaric Alps
Dinaric Alps
The Dinaric Alps or Dinarides form a mountain chain in Southern Europe, spanning areas of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Kosovo, Albania and Montenegro....
led to the Italians and the Germans expressing disquiet. As early as July 10, 1941, Wehrmacht General Edmund Glaise von Horstenau
Edmund Glaise-Horstenau
Edmund Glaise-Horstenau was an Austrian officer in the Bundesheer, last Vice-Chancellor of Austria before the 1938 Anschluss, and general in the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War.- Life :Born in Braunau am Inn the son of an officer, Glaise-Horstenau attended the Theresian Military...
reported the following to the German High Command, the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
The Oberkommando der Wehrmacht was part of the command structure of the armed forces of Nazi Germany during World War II.- Genesis :...
(OKW):
A Gestapo report to Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
, dated February 17, 1942, stated that:
Italian troops in the field had competing territorial claims with their Ustaše allies and had cooperated from the start with Chetnik units operating in the southern areas that they controlled. Hitler tried to insist that Mussolini should have his forces work with the Ustaše, but senior Italian commanders such as General Mario Roatta
Mario Roatta
Mario Roatta was an Italian general, Mussolini's Chief-of-Staff, and head of the military secret service.-SIM:From 1934 to 1936, Roatta headed up the Italian Military Intelligence Service .-Spain:...
ignored such orders.
Vladimir Nazor
Vladimir Nazor was the first head of state of modern Croatia. A member of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia , he led the Croatian World War II wartime assembly, the ZAVNOH, and later served as the President of the Presidium of the People's Assembly of PR Croatia - the head of state of the People's...
and Ivan Goran Kovačić
Ivan Goran Kovacic
Ivan Goran Kovačić was a prominent Croatian poet and writer of the 20th century.-Early life and background:He was born in Lukovdol , a town in Gorski Kotar, to Croatian father Ivan and Jewish mother Ruža . His middle name Goran stems from that...
escaped from Ustaše-held territory to join the Partisans, and were followed by others.
In 1943, the Germans suffered major losses on the Eastern Front and the Italians signed an armistice with the Allies
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
, leaving behind significant armaments that the Partisans used against the occupiers and the Ustaše. Fighting continued for a short while after the formal surrender of German Army Group E
Army Group E
Army Group E was a German Army Group active during World War II.Army Group E was created on 1 January 1943 from the 12th Army...
on 9 May 1945, as Axis forces and many refugees attempted to escape to Austria. The Battle of Poljana
Battle of Poljana
The Battle of Poljana was a battle of World War II in Europe. It started at Poljana, near the village of Prevalje in Yugoslavia , and was the culmination of a series of engagements between the Yugoslav Partisans and a large retreating Axis column, numbering in excess of 30,000 men...
, between a mixed German and Ustaše column and a Partisan force, was the last battle of World War II on European soil. Many of those fleeing were handed over to the Yugoslavs on the Austrian border, to be subsequently either executed or sent on a "death march" back into the country, an episode known as the Bleiburg massacre
Bleiburg massacre
The Bleiburg massacre, which also encompasses Operation Keelhaul is a term encompassing events that took place during mid-May 1945 near the Carinthian town of Bleiburg, itself some four kilometres from the Austrian-Slovenian border....
. Pavelić, however, with the help of associates among the Franciscans, managed to escape and hide in Austria and Rome, later fleeing to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
.
After the war
After World War II, the remaining Ustaše went underground or fled to countries such as Canada, Australia, Germany and South America, with the assistance of Roman Catholic churches and their grassroots supporters Some of them persisted in their crusade against Yugoslavia.With the defeat of the Independent State of Croatia, the movement ceased to exist. Infighting over the failure to establish a Croatian state also fragmented the surviving Ustaše. Ante Pavelić formed the Croatian Liberation Movement
Croatian Liberation Movement
The Croatian Liberation Movement is a right-wing party originally formed by Croatian emigrants and headed by former leaders of the Axis allied Independent State of Croatia in 1956.It was headed by Ante Pavelić, former leader of the NDH...
which drew several of the former state's leaders. Vjekoslav Vrančić
Vjekoslav Vrancic
Vjekoslav Vrančić was a member of the Croatian World War II Ustaše regime. As the undersecretary for the interior, he was responsible for the concentration camps set up in Croatia and the repressive acts of the police....
founded a reformed Croatian Liberation Movement, and was its leader. Vjekoslav Luburić formed the Croatian National Resistance
Croatian National Resistance
The Croatian National Resistance was a terrorist Croatian Ustaše emigrant organization which sought to destroy Yugoslavia and to establish an independent Croatia, according to the vision of Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić and ideology of Mile Budak...
. Blagoje Jovović, a Montenegrin Serb
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
Chetnik shot Ante Pavelić near Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, on April 9, 1957, inflicting injuries from which he later died.
Racial persecution
The Ustaše aimed to create an ethnically "pure" Croatia, and saw the SerbsSerbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
that lived in Croatia, Bosnia
Bosnia (region)
Bosnia is a eponomous region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It lies mainly in the Dinaric Alps, ranging to the southern borders of the Pannonian plain, with the rivers Sava and Drina marking its northern and eastern borders. The other eponomous region, the southern, other half of the country is...
and Herzegovina
Herzegovina
Herzegovina is the southern region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. While there is no official border distinguishing it from the Bosnian region, it is generally accepted that the borders of the region are Croatia to the west, Montenegro to the south, the canton boundaries of the Herzegovina-Neretva...
as their biggest obstacle. Thus, Ustaše ministers Mile Budak
Mile Budak
Mile Budak was a Croatian Ustaše and writer, best known as one of the chief ideologists of the Croatian clerofascist Ustaše movement, which ruled the Independent State of Croatia, or NDH, from 1941-45 and waged a genocidal campaign against its Serb, Roma and Jewish minorities, and against Croatian...
, Mirko Puk, and Milovan Žanić declared in May 1941 that the goal of the new Ustaše policy was an ethnically clean Croatia. They also publicly announced the strategy to achieve their goal:
- One third of the Serbs were to be killed.
- One third of the Serbs were to be expelled (ethnically cleansed).
- One third of the Serbs were to be forcibly converted to Catholicism.
The NDH government cooperated with the Nazi Germany in the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
and exercised their own version of the genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
against ethnic Serbs living in their borders. State policy about Serbs has been first declared in words of Miroslav Žanić minister of NDH Legislative council on 2 May 1941: "This country can only be Croatian country, and there is no method we would hesitate to use in order to make it truly Croatian and cleanse it of Serbs, who have for centuries endangered us and who will endanger us again if they are given opportunity."
The Ustaše enacted race laws
Nuremberg Laws
The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 were antisemitic laws in Nazi Germany introduced at the annual Nuremberg Rally of the Nazi Party. After the takeover of power in 1933 by Hitler, Nazism became an official ideology incorporating scientific racism and antisemitism...
patterned after those of the Third Reich, which were aimed against Jews and Roma and Serbs
Serbs
The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...
, who were collectively declared enemies of the Croatian people. Serbs, Jews, Roma and Croatian anti-fascists
Anti-fascism
Anti-fascism is the opposition to fascist ideologies, groups and individuals, such as that of the resistance movements during World War II. The related term antifa derives from Antifaschismus, which is German for anti-fascism; it refers to individuals and groups on the left of the political...
, including Communist Croats and dissident Croat Byzantine Catholic priests, were interned in concentration camps, the largest of which was the Jasenovac complex
Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp was the largest extermination camp in the Independent State of Croatia and occupied Yugoslavia during World War II...
, where many were killed by Ustaše militia. The exact number of victims is not known. The number of murdered Jews is fairly reliable: around 32,000 Jews were killed during World War II on NDH territory. Gypsies (Yugoslav Roma) numbered around 40,000 fewer after the war. Of the number of Serbs who died, estimates tend to vary between 300,000 and 700,000.
The history textbooks in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the Yugoslav state that existed from the abolition of the Yugoslav monarchy until it was dissolved in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars. It was a socialist state and a federation made up of six socialist republics: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,...
cited 700,000 as the total number of victims at Jasenovac. This was promulgated from a 1946 calculation of the demographic loss of population (the difference between the actual number of people after the war and the number that would have been, had the pre-war growth trend continued). After that, it was used by Edvard Kardelj
Edvard Kardelj
Edvard Kardelj also known under the pseudonyms Sperans and Krištof was a Yugoslav communist political leader, economist, partisan, publicist, and full member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts...
and Moša Pijade
Moša Pijade
Moša Pijade , nicknamed Čiča Janko was a prominent Yugoslavian/Serbian Communist of Sephardic Jewish origin, a close collaborator of Josip Broz Tito, former President of Yugoslavia, and full member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.In his youth, Pijade was a...
in the Yugoslav war reparations
War reparations
War reparations are payments intended to cover damage or injury during a war. Generally, the term war reparations refers to money or goods changing hands, rather than such property transfers as the annexation of land.- History :...
claim sent to Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center
Simon Wiesenthal Center
The Simon Wiesenthal Center , with headquarters in Los Angeles, California, was established in 1977 and named for Simon Wiesenthal, the Nazi hunter. According to its mission statement, it is "an international Jewish human rights organization dedicated to repairing the world one step at a time...
(citing the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust), "Ustasa terrorists killed 500,000 Serbs, expelled 250,000 and forced 250,000 to convert to Catholicism. They murdered thousands of Jews and Gypsies." The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust. Adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the USHMM provides for the documentation, study, and interpretation of Holocaust history...
says:
Due to differing views and lack of documentation, estimates for the number of Serbian victims in Croatia range widely, from 25,000 to more than one million. The estimated number of Serbs killed in Jasenovac ranges from 25,000 to 700,000. The most reliable figures place the number of Serbs killed by the Ustaša between 330,000 and 390,000, with 45,000 to 52,000 Serbs murdered in Jasenovac.The Jasenovac
Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp was the largest extermination camp in the Independent State of Croatia and occupied Yugoslavia during World War II...
Memorial Area, currently headed by Slavko Goldstein, keeps a list of 59,188 names of Jasenovac victims that was gathered by government officials in Belgrade in 1964. Because the gathering process was imperfect, they estimated that the list contains between 60 and 75 percent of the total victims, putting the number of killed in that complex at about 80,000–100,000. The previous head of the Memorial Area Simo Brdar estimated at least 365,000 dead at Jasenovac. The analyses of the statisticians Vladimir Žerjavić
Vladimir Žerjavic
Vladimir Žerjavić was a Croatian economist and a United Nations expert. He published a series of historical articles and books during the 1980s and 1990s in which he argued that the scope of the Holocaust in World War II-era territory of Yugoslavia was intentionally exaggerated...
and Bogoljub Kočović
Bogoljub Kocovic
Bogoljub Kočović is a Bosnian jurist and statistician, Yugoslav by ethnic affiliation.Kočović was born in Sarajevo; his father was a Serb and mother French by origin. He obtained a MA in economy at the Roosevelt University in Chicago, and a Ph. D. in law in Paris...
were similar to those of the Memorial Area. In all of Yugoslavia, the estimated number of Serb deaths was 487,000 according to Kočović, and 530,000 according to Žerjavić, out of a total of 1,014,000 or 1,027,000 deaths (resp.). Žerjavić further stated that there were 197,000 Serb civilians killed in NDH (78,000 as prisoners in Jasenovac and elsewhere) as well as 125,000 Serb combatants.
The Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
Museum of Holocaust compiled a list of over 77,000 names of Jasenovac victims. It was previously headed by Milan Bulajić (a controversial nationalist), who supported the claim of a total of 700,000 victims. The current administration of the Museum has further expanded the list to include a bit over 80,000 names. During the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann
Adolf Eichmann
Adolf Otto Eichmann was a German Nazi and SS-Obersturmbannführer and one of the major organizers of the Holocaust...
, Alexander Arnon (secretary of the Jewish Community in Zagreb) testified about the treatment of Jews in Yugoslavia during the war.
Alexander Arnon's testimony included the following:
During World War II, various German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
military commanders gave different figures for the number of Serbs, Jews and others killed on the territory of the Independent State of Croatia. They circulated figures of 400,000 Serbs (Alexander Lehr); 350,000 Serbs (Lothar Rendulic
Lothar Rendulic
Generaloberst Lothar Rendulic was an Austro-Hungarian and Austrian Army officer of Croatian origin who served as a German general during World War II. He commanded the 14. Infanterie-Division, 52. Infanterie-Division, XXXV Armeekorps, 2. Panzer-Armee, 20...
); between 300,000 (Edmund Glaise von Horstenau); more than "3/4 of a million Serbs" (Hermann Neubacher) in 1943; 600,000–700,000 until March 1944 (Ernst Fick); 700,000 (Massenbach). Out of around 39,000 Jews that lived on the territory that became the Independent State of Croatia, only around 20% survived the war.
Concentration camps
- DanicaDanicaDanica may refer to:* Denmark, whose Latin name is "Danica"* Danica , a personification of the Morning Star in Slavic mythology* Danica , people with the given name Danica...
near KoprivnicaKoprivnicaKoprivnica is a city in northern Croatia. It is the capital of the Koprivnica-Križevci county. In 2011 the city administrative area had a total population of 30,872, with 23,896 in the city itself.-Population:... - PagPag (town)Pag is the largest town on the island of Pag, with a population of 3,121 , located at . Whole municipality has a population of 5,100.-History:...
- JadovnoJadovno concentration campJadovno concentration camp was founded and controlled by Croatian Ustaše in 1941 and was used as the place where the victims were taken away to be executed...
near GospićGospicGospić is a town in the mountainous and sparsely populated region of Lika, Croatia. It is the administrative centre of Lika-Senj county. Gospić is located near the Lika River in the middle of a karst field.... - KruščicaKrušcicaKruščica is a village in Serbia. It is situated in the Bela Crkva municipality, in the South Banat District, Vojvodina province. The village has a Serb ethnic majority and its population numbering 989 people .-See also:...
near VitezVitezVitez is a town and municipality in central Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is administratively part of the Central Bosnia Canton of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.-Name:...
and TravnikTravnikTravnik is a city and municipality in central Bosnia and Herzegovina, 90 km west of Sarajevo. It is the capital of the Central Bosnia Canton, and is located in the Travnik Municipality. Travnik today has some 27,000 residents, with a metro population that is probably close to 70,000 people...
in Bosnia - Đakovo
- Loborgrad in ZagorjeZagorjeHrvatsko Zagorje is a region in northern Croatia.Zagorje may also refer to:*Zagorje ob Savi, a town and a municipality in Slovenia*NK Zagorje, a Slovenian football club-See also:...
- Tenja near OsijekOsijekOsijek is the fourth largest city in Croatia with a population of 83,496 in 2011. It is the largest city and the economic and cultural centre of the eastern Croatian region of Slavonia, as well as the administrative centre of Osijek-Baranja county...
These six camps were closed by October 1942. The Jasenovac complex was built between August 1941 and February 1942. The first two camps, Krapje and Bročica, were closed in November 1941. The three newer camps continued to function until the end of the war:
- Ciglana (Jasenovac III)
- KozaraKozaraKozara is a mountain in western Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the Bosanska Krajina region. It is bounded by the rivers Sava - north, Vrbas - east, Sana - south and Una - west...
(Jasenovac IV) - Stara GradiškaStara Gradiška concentration campStara Gradiška was the most notorious concentration and extermination camp in Croatia during World War II, mainly due to the crimes which were committed against women and children. The camp was specially constructed for women and children of Serb, Jew, and Romani ethnicity...
(Jasenovac V)
There were also other camps in:
- GospićGospicGospić is a town in the mountainous and sparsely populated region of Lika, Croatia. It is the administrative centre of Lika-Senj county. Gospić is located near the Lika River in the middle of a karst field....
- JastrebarskoJastrebarsko- Antiquity :In 1865, remnants of a Roman settlement were uncovered in Repišće, Klinča Sela, a village in Jastrebarsko metropolitan area. Further archeological investigation in the late 20th century classified them as a villa rustica and a necropolis consisting of six tumuli, both dating to...
between ZagrebZagrebZagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
and KarlovacKarlovacKarlovac is a city and municipality in central Croatia. The city proper has a population of 49,082, while the municipality has a population of 59,395 inhabitants .Karlovac is the administrative centre of Karlovac County...
— Jastrebarsko Children's Concentration Camp - KerestinecKerestinecKerestinec is a settlement west of Zagreb, in the Sveta Nedelja, Zagreb County, infamous for events in Croatian history. It has 1,199 inhabitants living on an area of . The name of Kerestinec comes from Hungarian word kereszt which stands for "cross".According to historical sources, there was a...
near Zagreb - LepoglavaLepoglavaLepoglava is a town in Varaždin County, northern Croatia, located southwest of Varaždin, west of Ivanec and northeast of Krapina.A total of 8,271 people in the municipality lives in the following settlements:* Bednjica, population 214...
near VaraždinVaraždinVaraždin is a city in north Croatia, north of Zagreb on the highway A4. The total population is 47,055, with 38,746 on of the city settlement itself . The centre of Varaždin county is located near the Drava river, at...
Numbers of prisoners:
- from 80,000–100,000 around 300,000–350,000 up to 700,000 in Jasenovac
- around 35,000 in Gospić
- around 8,500 in Pag
- around 3,000 in Đakovo
- 1,018 in Jastrebarsko
- around 1,000 in Lepoglava.
Connections with the Catholic Church
The Ustaše policies against Eastern Orthodoxy are incorrectly associated with "Uniatism" in some Eastern Orthodox circles. This term has not been used by the Roman Catholic ChurchRoman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
except for Vatican
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
condemnation of the idea in 1990. The Ustaše represented an extreme example of "Uniatism" rather based on nationalism than on religion. They supported violent aggression or force in order to convert Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian language
Serbo-Croatian or Serbo-Croat, less commonly Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian , is a South Slavic language with multiple standards and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro...
speaking Serbian Orthodox believers.
The Ustaše held the position that Eastern Orthodoxy, as a symbol of Serbian nationalism
Serbian nationalism
Serbian nationalism refers to the ethnic nationalism of Serbs. Originally arising in the context of the general rise of nationalism in the Balkans under Ottoman rule, under the influence of Serbian linguist Vuk Stefanović Karadžić and Ilija Garašanin....
, was their greatest foe. The Ustaše never recognized the existence of a Serb people on the territories of Croatia or Bosnia they recognized only "Croats of the Eastern faith." They also called Bosniaks "Croats of the Islamic faith," but they had a stronger ethnic dislike of Serbs.
Some former priests, mostly Franciscans, particularly in, but not limited to, Herzegovina
Herzegovina
Herzegovina is the southern region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. While there is no official border distinguishing it from the Bosnian region, it is generally accepted that the borders of the region are Croatia to the west, Montenegro to the south, the canton boundaries of the Herzegovina-Neretva...
and Bosnia
Bosnia (region)
Bosnia is a eponomous region of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It lies mainly in the Dinaric Alps, ranging to the southern borders of the Pannonian plain, with the rivers Sava and Drina marking its northern and eastern borders. The other eponomous region, the southern, other half of the country is...
, took part in the atrocities themselves. Miroslav Filipović
Miroslav Filipovic
Miroslav Filipović was a Croatian Ustaše and Roman Catholic friar who was convicted of war crimes by both a German military court and a Yugoslav civil court and hanged in Belgrade.-Early life:Filipović's date of birth was 5 June 1915, but little else about his early years has been...
was a Franciscan friar (from the Petrićevac
Petricevac
Petrićevac is a part of the city of Banja Luka in Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Today, there are about 25,000 inhabitants in Petrićevac.The place is the location of a Catholic church of Saint Anthony and a Franciscan monastery in the 20th century...
monastery) who allegedly joined the Ustaša army on 7 February 1942 in a brutal massacre of 2730 Serbs of the nearby villages, including 500 children. He was allegedly subsequently dismissed from his order and defrocked, though when he was hanged for his war crimes, he wore his Franciscan robes. Filipović became Chief Guard of Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp was the largest extermination camp in the Independent State of Croatia and occupied Yugoslavia during World War II...
where he was nicknamed "Fra Sotona
Satan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
", and he was given this nickname by Croats themselves.
For the duration of the war, the Vatican
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
kept up full diplomatic relations with the Ustaša state (granting Pavelić an audience), with its papal nuncio in the capital Zagreb
Zagreb
Zagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
. The nuncio was briefed on the efforts of religious conversions to Roman Catholicism. After the World War II was over, the Ustaše who had managed to escape from Yugoslav territory (including Pavelić) were smuggled to South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
. It is widely alleged that this was done through rat lines which were operated by members of the organization who were Catholic priests and who had previously secured positions at the Vatican
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
. Members of the Illyrian College of San Girolamo
Pontifical Croatian College of St. Jerome
The Pontifical Croatian College of St. Jerome, in Italian the Pontificio Collegio Croato Di San Girolamo a Roma, is a Roman Catholic college, church and a society in the city of Rome intended for the schooling of Croatian clerics. It is named after Saint Jerome...
in Rome were reputedly involved in this: friars Krunoslav Draganović
Krunoslav Draganovic
Krunoslav Stjepan Draganović was a Croatian Roman Catholic priest and historian who is accused as being one of the main organisers of the ratlines which aided the escape of Nazi war criminals from Europe after World War II.-Biography:Draganović was from Travnik...
, Petranović, and Dominik Mandić.
The Ustaše regime had sent large amounts of gold that it had plundered from Serbian and Jewish property owners during World War II into Swiss bank accounts.Of a total of 350 million Swiss Franc
Swiss franc
The franc is the currency and legal tender of Switzerland and Liechtenstein; it is also legal tender in the Italian exclave Campione d'Italia. Although not formally legal tender in the German exclave Büsingen , it is in wide daily use there...
s, about 150 million was seized by British troops
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
; however, the remaining 200 million (ca. 47 million dollars) reached the Vatican. In October 1946 the American intelligence agency SSU alleged that these funds are still held in the Vatican Bank
Vatican Bank
The Institute for Works of Religion , commonly known as the Vatican Bank, is a privately held institute located inside Vatican City run by a professional bank CEO who reports directly to a committee of cardinals, and ultimately to the Pope...
. This issue is the theme of a recent class action suit against the Vatican Bank and others. See Alperin v. Vatican Bank. Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac
Aloysius Stepinac
Aloysius Viktor Stepinac , also known as Blessed Aloysius Stepinac, was a Croatian Catholic cardinal and Archbishop of Zagreb from 1937 to 1960. In 1998 he was declared a martyr and beatified by Pope John Paul II....
, Archbishop
Archbishop
An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...
of Zagreb
Zagreb
Zagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
during World War II, was accused of supporting the Ustaše, and of exonerating those in the clergy who collaborated with the Ustaše and were hence complicit in forced conversions. On the other hand, he himself helped Jewish, Serb and Roma/Sinti victims of the Ustaša terror at the same time. Once, while celebrating mass in Zagreb's cathedral, he reportedly said:
katolička crkva ne priznaje podjele na gospodujuće i robujuće rase. Svaki narod, svaka rasa i svaka religija ima jednako pravo dignuti ruke prema nebu i reći oče naš, koji jesi na nebesima.... Neka se srame oni, koji su dušu čovječju, hram Božji, pretvorili u spilju razbojničku!(Croatian) — The Catholic Church does not recognize divisions into "master" and "slave" races. Every nation, every race and every religion has an equal right to lift their hands to Heaven and pray: "Our Father who art in heaven..." May those be ashamed who have made the human soul, which is God's temple, into a cave of thieves.
However, Archbishop Stepinac also said this on 28 March 1941, noting Yugoslavia's early attempts to unite Croatians and Serbs:
All in all, Croats and Serbs are of two worlds, northpole and southpole, never will they be able to get together unless by a miracle of God. The schism (between the Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodoxy) is the greatest curse in Europe, almost greater than ProtestantismProtestantismProtestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
. Here there is no moral, no principles, no truth, no justice, no honesty.
In 1998, Stepinac was beatified
Beatification
Beatification is a recognition accorded by the Catholic Church of a dead person's entrance into Heaven and capacity to intercede on behalf of individuals who pray in his or her name . Beatification is the third of the four steps in the canonization process...
by Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II
Blessed Pope John Paul II , born Karol Józef Wojtyła , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church and Sovereign of Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death on 2 April 2005, at of age. His was the second-longest documented pontificate, which lasted ; only Pope Pius IX ...
. On 22 June 2003, John Paul II visited Banja Luka
Banja Luka
-History:The name "Banja Luka" was first mentioned in a document dated February 6, 1494, but Banja Luka's history dates back to ancient times. There is a substantial evidence of the Roman presence in the region during the first few centuries A.D., including an old fort "Kastel" in the centre of...
. During the visit, he held a mass
Mass
Mass can be defined as a quantitive measure of the resistance an object has to change in its velocity.In physics, mass commonly refers to any of the following three properties of matter, which have been shown experimentally to be equivalent:...
at the aforementioned Petrićevac
Petricevac
Petrićevac is a part of the city of Banja Luka in Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Today, there are about 25,000 inhabitants in Petrićevac.The place is the location of a Catholic church of Saint Anthony and a Franciscan monastery in the 20th century...
monastery. This caused public uproar due to the connection of the Petrićevac monastery with the crimes of former friar Filipović. At the same location, the pope also proclaimed the beatification
Beatification
Beatification is a recognition accorded by the Catholic Church of a dead person's entrance into Heaven and capacity to intercede on behalf of individuals who pray in his or her name . Beatification is the third of the four steps in the canonization process...
of the Catholic layman Ivan Merz (1896–1928) who was the founder of the "Association of Croatian Eagles" in 1923, which many Serb nationalists and communists view as the precursor to the Ustaše.
Roman Catholic apologists defend the Pope's actions by claiming that the convent at Petricevac was one of the places that went up in flames causing the death of 80-year-old Friar Alojzije Atlija. Further, that the war had produced "a total exodus of the Catholic population from this region"; that the few who remained were "predominantly elderly"; and that the church in Bosnia then risked "total extinction" due to the war. Therefore, supporters state that the focus on the anti-Croatian tragedy presently occurring is more important than focusing on one of 60 years ago.
Structure
At the top of the command was the PoglavnikPoglavnik
Poglavnik was the title used by Ante Pavelić, leader of World War II Croatian fascist movement Ustaše and of the Independent State of Croatia between 1941 and 1945.-Etymology and usage:...
(meaning "head") Ante Pavelic. Pavelic was appointed the office as Head of State of Croatia after Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
had accepted Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
's proposal of Pavelic, on April 10, 1941.
The Croatian Home Guard
Croatian Home Guard
Croatian Home Guard or also, known as the "Homeland Defenders," was the name used for the armed forces of the Independent State of Croatia which existed during World War II.- Formation :...
was the armed forces of Croatia, it subsequently merged into the Croatian Armed Forces.
Symbols
The symbol of the Ustaše is a wide capital letter "U" with pronounced serifSerif
In typography, serifs are semi-structural details on the ends of some of the strokes that make up letters and symbols. A typeface with serifs is called a serif typeface . A typeface without serifs is called sans serif or sans-serif, from the French sans, meaning “without”...
s. This symbol can easily be spraypainted
Graffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
. A slight variation of it includes a small plus inserted at the top, symbolizing a cross. In on-line communication it is sometimes written as =U=. As with fascists in other countries, the Ustasha merely superimposed their political symbols (mainly the letter "U") on already existent national symbols. Their hat insignia was the shield of Coat of Arms of Croatia
Coat of arms of Croatia
The coat of arms of Croatia consists of one main shield and five smaller shields which form a crown over the main shield. The main coat of arms is a checkerboard that consists of 13 red and 12 silver fields. It's commonly known as šahovnica or grb...
surrounded or embossed with the U.
The flag of the Independent State of Croatia
Independent State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was a World War II puppet state of Nazi Germany, established on a part of Axis-occupied Yugoslavia. The NDH was founded on 10 April 1941, after the invasion of Yugoslavia by the Axis powers. All of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to NDH, together with some parts...
was a red-white-blue horizontal tricolor with the shield of the Coat of Arms or Croatia in the middle and the U in the upper left. Its currency was the kuna
Independent State of Croatia kuna
The kuna was the currency of the Independent State of Croatia in the period between 1941 and 1945 during World War II. The word "kuna" means "marten" in Croatian and the same word is used for the current Croatian kuna currency. This kuna was subdivided into 100 banica...
. The checkered Coat of Arms of the old NDH starts with a white field in the corner, and that of today's Croatia starts with a red field in the corner. Some possible explanations are that the white field symbolizes the Croatian nationality, as opposed to the red field which symbolizes the Croatian state; or that the white field is used on the so-called war flag.
The Ustaše greeting was "Za dom - spremni!":
- Salute: Za dom! For home(land)!
- Reply: Spremni! (We are) ready!
This was used instead of the Nazi greeting Heil Hitler by the Ustaše. While the greeting is invented in the 19th century by Croatian ban
Ban (title)
Ban was a title used in several states in central and south-eastern Europe between the 7th century and the 20th century.-Etymology:The word ban has entered the English language probably as a borrowing from South Slavic ban, meaning "lord, master; ruler". The Slavic word is probably borrowed from...
Josip Jelačić
Josip Jelacic
Count Josip Jelačić of Bužim was the Ban of Croatia between 23 March 1848 and 19 May 1859...
, today it is nominally associated with Ustasha sympathisers by Serbs or non-Ustasha conservatives associated with the Croatian Party of Rights
Croatian Party of Rights
The Croatian Party of Rights is a right-wing political party in Croatia. The "right" in the party's name refer to the idea of Croatian national and ethnic rights that the party has vowed to protect since its founding in the 19th century...
.
However, some Croats see it as a patriotic salute, because it was used long before the Ustase regime and it emphasized the fact of defending your country, your home.
In Internet communication, it is sometimes abbreviated as ZDS.
Modern usage of term "Ustaša"
After World War II, the Ustaša movement was split into several organizations and there is presently no political or paramilitary movement that claims its legacy as their "successor". The term "ustaše" is today used as (derogatory) term for Croatian ultranationalism. The term "ustaše" is sometimes used among Serbs to describe SerbophobiaSerbophobia
Anti-Serb sentiment is a generic term used to describe a sentiment of hostility or hatred towards Serbs, Serbia or Serbian Orthodoxy...
or generally to defame political opponents. When Slobodan Milošević
Slobodan Milošević
Slobodan Milošević was President of Serbia and Yugoslavia. He served as the President of Socialist Republic of Serbia and Republic of Serbia from 1989 until 1997 in three terms and as President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1997 to 2000...
was at the end of his rule, the protesters called him "Ustaša".
See also
- WW2 Yugoslav front
- Massacres of Poles in VolhyniaMassacres of Poles in VolhyniaThe Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were part of an ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army West in the Nazi occupied regions of the Eastern Galicia , and UPA North in Volhynia , beginning in March 1943 and lasting until the end of...
Sources
- Aarons, MarkMark AaronsMark Aarons is an Australian journalist and author. He was a political adviser to NSW Premier Bob Carr.Aarons was born in Newcastle, New South Wales but was brought up in Sydney. He was educated at Fairfield Boys High School and North Sydney Boys High School.He is the son of the late Laurie...
and Loftus, JohnJohn LoftusJohn Joseph Loftus is an American author, former US government prosecutor and former Army intelligence officer. He is a president of The Intelligence Summit and, although he is not Jewish, a president of the Florida Holocaust Museum. Loftus also serves on the Board of Advisers to Public...
: Unholy Trinity: How the Vatican's Nazi Networks Betrayed Western Intelligence to the Soviets. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992. 372 pages. ISBN 0-312-07111-6. - Hermann Neubacher: Sonderauftrag Suedost 1940–1945, Bericht eines fliegendes Diplomaten, 2. durchgesehene Auflage, Goettingen, 1956.
- Ladislaus Hory and Martin Broszat. Der Kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 1941–1945. Stuttgart, 1964.
- Thomas, N., K. Mikulan, and C. Pavelic. Axis Forces in Yugoslavia 1941–45. London: Osprey, 1995. ISBN 1-85532-473-3.
- Lituchy, Barry M. Jasenovac and the Holocaust in Yugoslavia. New York: Jasenovac Research Institute, 2006. ISBN 0975343203.
- Srdja Trifkovic: Ustaša: Croatian Separatism and European Politics 1929–1945 Lord Byron Foundation for Balkan Studies, London, 1998.
- Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Israel Gutman editor-in-chief, Vol. 4, Ustase entry. Macmillan, 1990.
- Sabrina P. Ramet. The three Yugoslavias: state-building and legitimation, 1918–2005. Bloomington, Indiana, USA: Indiana University Press, 2006.
- Aleksa Djilas. The contested country: Yugoslav unity and communist revolution, 1919–1953. Harvard University Press, 1991.
External links
- Holocaust era in Croatia: Jasenovac 1941–1945, an on-line museum by the United States Holocaust Memorial MuseumUnited States Holocaust Memorial MuseumThe United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust. Adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the USHMM provides for the documentation, study, and interpretation of Holocaust history...
- Jasenovac Research Institute — "a non-profit human rights organization and research institute committed to establishing the truth about the Holocaust in Yugoslavia."
- Axis History Factbook - Ustaša
- Fund For Genocide Research, Jasenovac death camp
- Eichmann Trial, Tel Aviv 1961
- Tied up in the Rat Lines from the Haaretz, 17/01/2006
- Lawsuit against the Vatican Bank and Franciscans for return of the Ustasha Treasury by Holocaust victims
- Croatian Axis Forces in WWII