STUDIA CROATICA
Year III, Buenos Aires, 1962, No. 6
Unpunished Crimes 2
Democracy and Liberation from Communism 7
Krizanic - Strossmayer – Mandic 16
Great Britain and Draza Mihailovic 23
Fernando Konschak S.J. 32
Life and Work of Ivan Mestrovic 37
DOCUMENTS 41
Letters to the Editor 45
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REVIEW 46
Milovan Djilas: Land Without Justice 46
Jovan Djordjevic: Yugoslavia, Socialist Democracy 48
Anton Knezevic: The Croatians and Their Wars 50
Walter Letsch: Moscow, and the Politics of the Emperor in the 17th
Century, Part I, 1604–1654 51
Statesmen and public opinion in Western
democracies, driven by short-term interests, favored this state of affairs.
They felt so protected from such an eruption of barbarism and so intensely
yearned for total victory that they had become more supportive than necessary
of their Soviet ally, a dangerous vehicle for the destructive forces of
barbarism. In doing so, they contributed to the creation of the prevailing
relations, fraught with even more terrible conflicts. Instead of considering
their alliance with the Soviet Union, conditioned by the adversary's
unscrupulous policies, as a lesser evil in a ruthless war where allies are not
chosen but accepted, they treated the Soviets not only as circumstantial allies
but as potential and desirable partners in the future organization of a better
world. They failed to consider that the Soviet Union lacked traditions of
political freedom and was at the service of an ideological group that
systematically pursued the dismantling of all the values of the
free world.
Thus it happened that Western democracies gave
both material and moral support not only to their Soviet ally but also to
various communist guerrilla groups whose program, despite having adopted the
terminology of the liberal left, was to seize power, dismantle free
institutions, national independence, and even the territorial integrity of
certain countries like Poland, for whose defense these same Western democracies
ran the grave risk of a brutal war with the Third Reich. The bearers of this
new slavery were presented as "liberators" even as the communists, in
the final phase of the war and immediately afterward, openly liquidated the
democratic leaders of several European countries.
When questioned in the House of Commons about
arming Tito's guerrillas, Winston Churchill responded by defending such a
policy of immediate effect: "We will supply a rifle to every bandit who
can kill a Hun," that is, a German soldier, even though it was known at
the time that those same rifles would fire on Britain's friends. Fitzroy
Maclean, head of the British military mission at Tito's headquarters, recounts
in his book "Eastern Approaches" that when he emphasized to Churchill
that Tito and other leaders of his movement were notorious and avowed communists,
and that the system they would establish would inevitably follow the Soviet
line and was very likely to be firmly oriented towards the Soviet Union, he
received the following reply:
“Do you intend to settle in Yugoslavia after the war?”
“No, sir,” I replied.
“Neither do I,” he said. “In that case, the
less we worry about the form of government they establish, the better. They
must decide that. What interests us is which of them will cause the most harm
to the Germans.”
The communists, taking advantage of this tacit recognition of the right
to liquidate their ideological adversaries, and first and foremost those of
democratic persuasion, exterminated their opponents not only in the areas of
Central and Eastern Europe, already sacrificed as a future zone of Soviet
interest, but also in Italy and France, where they used guerrilla warfare to
give the resistance the character of a ruthless civil war and, under the
pretext of patriotism, to exercise terror in order to seize power.
If they did not achieve their objective and were gradually removed from
government positions as enemies of democracy, this must be attributed primarily
to the presence of the Allied military forces. In the part of Europe occupied
by Soviet troops, under the guise of the suicidal theory of unconditional
surrender, the communists seized power and continued the extermination of
anti-communist forces without distinction. Even in countries where the
communists failed to gain control, a political and psychological atmosphere had
been created—a consequence of the misguided attitude toward communism—in which
the crimes of communist terror went unpunished, being considered understandable
excesses of the struggle against the occupiers. Crimes against humanity weighed
solely on the defeated side.
The communists, cynically exploiting the mistakes of their adversaries
and the dismay of the civilized world at the shocking excesses of Nazism in
Germany—a country universally respected as the homeland of great thinkers—not
only concealed their crimes, which went unpunished, but also participated as
judges in the first international tribunal to prosecute crimes against
humanity. Currently viewed and considered the most dangerous enemies of
freedom, the communists, invoking their circumstantial alliance with the Allies
during the war, manage to confuse and bewilder certain sectors of public
opinion in democratic countries, accusing individuals, governments, groups, or
entire peoples of supposed revanchist aspirations and a return to nationalist
totalitarianism.
While the defeated were tried in Nuremberg and other trials held in
Europe, their communist emulators, who far surpassed them, are the object of
festivities and honors in the capitals and courts of the Christian West. Having
been appointed judges in trials for crimes similar to those they themselves
committed, the communists arrogate to themselves the right to behave in
international organizations as champions of the freedom of Afro-Asian peoples,
even of the Christian nations of South America. They criticize Western
democracies that, in turn, almost spontaneously, faithful to the ideals of
freedom and humanity, pursue the policy of
decolonization, while the Soviets and their Yugoslav epigones practice a
ruthless policy of oppression against various European and Asian peoples,
unparalleled in human history, denying them even the right to be considered
enslaved and exploited countries.
What is most worrying in all of this is the disorientation of so many
Western intellectuals, deprived, in this crisis, of moral support, having lost
faith in universal progress, the source of the liberal optimism of previous
generations. In contrast to the dialogue, debate, and systematic doubt of the
Western world, which values and seeks truth as an intrinsic
worth, regardless of political interests, communists act blindly, driven by
faith in the liberating role of the proletariat, with which they identify, and
in the dogmas of "scientific socialism." As spokespeople for the
doctrine that supposedly uncovers all the mysteries of the historical process,
inevitably leading toward a classless society, communists can exert a powerful
and suggestive influence on skeptical Westerners during this time of crisis,
when they have lost their monopoly on the achievements of our technological
civilization and, consequently, the possibility of global supremacy.
Fortunately, the heritage of Western culture embodies enduring values,
and as long as these values persist, it must be defended against
internal and external barbarians. The recovery of Western Europe, devastated
and divided by war, occurred so rapidly and unexpectedly that it is considered
miraculous. This European recovery is often valued for its economic results. In
fact, even greater progress was made in eliminating the causes of the
contemporary social crisis: national and class conflicts. Europe, on the path
toward economic and political integration, overcoming national and class
conflicts, disorients the strategists of communist world subversion, since
these phenomena do not align with the frameworks of Marxist dialectics,
conceived in the superseded phase of the industrial revolution and the national
conflicts of Western Europe.
Slowly but surely, the possibility is emerging that the politically and
socially consolidated Western world, freed from the burden of colonialism, will
take the offensive and address the issue of the responsibility of communist
leaders for so many horrific crimes against humanity.
Indeed, there are signs that the free world views with growing distaste
the anomaly of tyrants and oppressors of the worst kind continuing to play the
role of champions of freedom and human rights.
We must point to two cases that reveal the reaction of those concerned
with violated justice in the face of such duplicity. Although these events
occurred in West Germany and concern the attitude adopted by the German
authorities, they are of interest to us because they are linked to what
happened in Croatia during and after the war, and especially because they bring
to the forefront a very important principled question: should the crimes
perpetrated by communists go unpunished simply because they fought in the last
war on the side of the Allies?
The first incident concerns the so-called "Vracaric incident."
It involves a representative of a Yugoslav state-owned company who traveled to
Germany last November on business and was arrested in Munich (Bavaria) pursuant
to a 1942 German military order. He was accused of killing a German soldier as
a civilian, having ambushed him in Zagreb, then the capital of the Independent
State of Croatia. The Yugoslav government maintained that Vracaric was indeed a
civilian and, according to international conventions, could be tried in
Germany, but that he was acting as a member of the Yugoslav (communist)
resistance in territory that now forms part of the People's Republic of
Yugoslavia. Therefore, the Yugoslav communists argued, with the end of the war,
the German defeat, and the victory of the communist resistance, the previous
orders of the German military authorities were no longer legally valid.
The Bonn government, which had opportunely recognized the Yugoslav
government that emerged from the ranks of the communist guerrillas in order to
break diplomatic relations after the latter recognized the Pankow regime,
requested and obtained Vracaric's release from the Bavarian authorities. The
Bonn government simultaneously noted that this was an overzealous act by local
authorities, unrecognized by the federal government, declaring "that no
prosecution can be continued in the Federal Republic of Germany against
partisans and resistance fighters for acts committed during the war and
resistance in the last world conflagration" and that "no lists exist
of the perpetrators of such acts."
It is obvious that Bonn's stance was due less to the protests and
arguments presented by the Yugoslav communist government than to the
unfavorable comments published in the European press. The question was whether
the German government has the right to punish acts of violence committed
against German occupation forces by members of the resistance in the respective
countries.
Aside from the question of whether certain forms of communist guerrilla
warfare are politically advantageous and permissible under international law,
it is clear that the Bonn government did not want to provide communist
propaganda with tired arguments, so as not to weaken solidarity among the
Western powers—a factor of great interest to West Germany, especially given
German unification and the status of Berlin.
The self-styled Marshal Tito, the Yugoslav communist dictator, seized
this opportunity to try to counter the unfavorable impression created in the
West by his complete adherence to Soviet views during the Belgrade Conference.
This alignment with Moscow in international politics led Washington to question
further economic aid to Tito. For this reason, he extensively debated the
"Vracaric affair" in his speech delivered in Skopje, the capital of
Macedonia, on November 13th.
It is worth transcribing the entire paragraph concerning this matter, as
it reflects the extent to which Tito, while simultaneously aspiring to lead the
neutralist bloc, sympathizes with the Soviet Union in all the dire
international problems upon which the preservation of world peace depends. For
him, true democracy is only communism. He overlooks the fact that the Western
Allies and the Germans themselves had already condemned the war crimes of
Hitler's Germany. He behaves as if international conventions related to warfare
were binding only on the defeated.
“We have been criticized in the United States,” Tito said, “for having
facilitated the recognition of East Germany at the Belgrade Conference.
However, this is not a new attitude, but a well-known one. I repeat once again
that it is fortunate that East Germany exists, fortunate that there isn't only
one Germany like West Germany, where those who fought against the odious
occupiers in our country during the war are imprisoned. Not long ago, one of
our men was arrested there on business.” He then glosses over the
aforementioned principled declaration by the Bonn government and refuses to
consider the incident an administrative error. "This is about something
bigger than an individual or restricted group procedure.
It all originated in Bonn, where they were familiar with the case. Then,
the matter takes on importance; it becomes something they want to legalize in
order to collectively avenge themselves against those who defended their
countries with their blood and their lives. That's revenge! That's their
policy. Therein lies the heart of the problem, what those in the West who are
arming that same West Germany with atomic weapons and other equipment refuse to
see, without thinking about what will happen tomorrow when 'the devil is unleashed.'
Symptoms like this indicate that a spirit is emerging today, and increasingly
so, in West Germany, a spirit capable of one day endangering world peace and
provoking catastrophe. Thus, in the wake of the case I mentioned, they are
digging into legal norms to prove their right, claiming that our comrade who
shot at the German soldiers wasn't in uniform but in civilian clothes. What
kind of uniform were we wearing then? They could persecute me too, under the
same pretext." Because, like so many of our comrades, I
wasn't in uniform then.
An arrest warrant was also issued against me, with a price of 100,000
gold marks. Yes, nonsense, but the underlying issue is that both those in Bonn
and those in the West who share their views have prematurely dropped the mask.
That's just foolishness, but no one can deny the kind of spirit that arises
there. We fear such a Germany and we don't hesitate to fight it... That's why I
say it's fortunate that there is at least a part, unfortunately small, founded
on democratic principles and without revanchist tendencies... They want to
blame us for having fought against them in civilian clothes, which isn't in
accordance with their regulations... That's why I believe that our allies from
the last war are doing humanity a disservice by arming and creating a
militaristic Germany, instead of remaining consistent in the final and total
extermination of all the fascist remnants that caused so much harm to humanity
and destroyed so many lives. "human."
Tito's presentation culminates with this statement: "Therefore, we
continue to believe that our attitude toward Germany can be none other than
that of the Soviet Union. Both the Russian people and the peoples of the Soviet
Union were subjected to immense sacrifices, as were our peoples, the people of
Poland and others, and it is understandable that our views on the problem are
identical. This is our position regarding Germany, and because it coincides
with the position of the Soviet Union, we will now say that we see this problem
as the West does. You cannot expect that from us."
Although the cited text explicitly states Tito's
understanding of neutrality, we are primarily interested in his
insistence on "the definitive and total extermination of the fascist
remnants." This is the argument with which the Yugoslav regime justifies
all its misdeeds and exactions in domestic and foreign policy. All opponents of
communism can, if necessary, be labeled as "fascist remnants" and
thus outlawed. For Tito, it is an affront when members of the defeated
Wehrmacht invoke legal norms.
While the "Vracaric case" was treated as an incident by the
German authorities, nevertheless sparking discussion about important matters of
principle, the other case mentioned refers to the proceedings initiated by the
German courts against the Yugoslav consul in Munich and cannot be treated as a
mere incident.
The Yugoslav diplomat Predrag Grabovac was one of the leaders of the
communist guerrillas during the war and one of the organizers of Tito's army
after the war. At the end of last year, he was appointed consul in Munich. On
this occasion, one of the newspapers of the numerous Croatian exiles held him
responsible for the execution of Croatian and German prisoners of war during
and after the war. The matter attracted the interest of German political and
military circles who, for reasons of political opportunism, maintained official
relations with the leaders in Belgrade, knowing them to be responsible for the
expulsion and massacre of several hundred Volksdeutscher (members of the German
collectives) in the People's Republic of Serbia.
Based on the information gathered, Dr. Paul Wüllner, a deputy of the
ruling CSU party... The Christian Social Union (CSU) submitted a motion to the
Bavarian Parliament (Landtag) on November 29, 1961, requesting
the Minister of Justice to initiate proceedings against Consul Grabovac, whom
they labeled a murderer. "We must ask ourselves," the Bavarian
politician remarked, "whether we should consider any means acceptable that
prevents murderers of this kind from moving about with impunity among us and
even being held in high esteem."
Dr. Wüllner's request was granted, and the Bavarian Minister of Justice
ordered the initiation of a judicial inquiry against Grabovac, on suspicion of
"the murder of several hundred German and Croatian soldiers after the
German defeat in 1945."
This time, instead of making excuses, Bonn responded to Belgrade's
protests by stating that it was a matter for the judiciary, which is
independent. The Yugoslav government was forced to withdraw Grabovac, who left
Germany on December 8, 1961, escorted to the border by German security agents
at the request of the Yugoslav consul general, because "the press campaign
unleashed against Mr. Grabovac made his consular activities impossible and his
personal safety was no longer guaranteed."
Before leaving Germany, Grabovac tried to present his case as a plot by
Croatian exiles, a claim that convinced few given the background information
and data available to the federal government, the numerous witnesses, and
because the German courts, after the Vracaric incident, cannot act rashly. Nor
can the argument be made that the Grabovac case is a watered-down version of
the Vracaric case. These are not isolated incidents, but rather the mass
killing of German and Croatian prisoners of war, including those who
surrendered upon the signing of the armistice.
These are flagrant violations of existing international conventions and
mass murders with characteristics of genocide, which implies the responsibility
of the highest authorities of the Yugoslav communist regime. Therefore, the
Yugoslav dictator's view that this was merely "an understandable action,
the definitive and total extermination of the fascist remnants" is
untenable. No political or consular office can absolve the criminals of guilt.
Moreover,
Tito believes that even the regime in West Germany must be
"democratized," just like that of East Germany. In his opinion, the
new German army (Bundeswehr), an integral part of NATO's defensive forces,
falls into the category of "fascist remnants." German military
circles are aware of this, and that is why they published Dr. Wüllner's speech
on the front page of their newspaper, the "Deutschen Soldaten
Zeitung," calling it one of the most important political speeches of the
past year.
The German press and public opinion actively participated in the
discussions surrounding the Grabovac case. Communist practices during and after
the war were examined; political and moral arguments
were presented for and against the Grabovac trial. The issue of the tribunal's
jurisdiction in cases of transgressions committed on foreign soil was debated,
and compelling moral and political reasons were offered in support of the
argument that the crimes of communists cannot go unpunished and that sanctions
for crimes against humanity should not be limited solely to the leaders and
officials of the defeated Third Reich, simply because the communists were on
the Allied side during the second phase of the war, which they helped to ignite
(the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact).
There is no doubt that forced coexistence with communist regimes in a
divided world presents significant political and legal difficulties regarding
territorial jurisdiction. Nevertheless, the trial of
Grabovac, as well as various political and diplomatic measures taken by democratic
governments against Tito's regime, indicate that these political
difficulties are not insurmountable. Furthermore, there is precedent that
eliminates any debate about territorial jurisdiction. In the final months of
the war and after the end of hostilities, Yugoslav communists committed
numerous crimes in Austrian and Italian territory, murdering prisoners of war
and political opponents without due process.
The "foibe," mass graves, around Trieste, where the communists
dumped their victims, are infamous. Less well-known is the mass killing of
Croatian civilians and soldiers near Bleiburg, an Austrian town bordering
Yugoslavia. There began the mass murder of Croats, whose numbers and atrocity
surpass those of Katyn. While most of the crimes took place on Yugoslav
territory, numerous unmarked graves of victims of the communist massacre remain
in Austria. Croatian exiles erected a modest monument to these victims. Whether
or not a trial for these crimes begins depends solely on the political climate.
Therefore, the investigation conducted in Bavaria against the Yugoslav
consul is of great importance at a time when calls are growing to address
communist crimes against humanity. This issue is directly linked to the
liberation of peoples subjugated by communism. Until lofty declarations give
way to action, the moral prestige of Western democracies will continue to
decline in captive nations, in countries inclined toward neutrality, and
especially in Latin American countries, which are encouraged on the one hand to
combat communist infiltration, and on the other hand to allow communist crimes
against entire populations to go unpunished.
As a corollary, the anti-communist powers continue to provide military
and economic aid to the communist government of Yugoslavia, which to date
exceeds two billion dollars—more than enough to solve so many pressing problems
on the South American continent. Only if this problem is addressed
unequivocally and with the assurance that it will be handled in accordance with
ethical and legal principles can the moral authority of civilization in crisis
be recovered. This, moreover, is essential if we want to prevent the forces of
barbarism from prevailing and the communists from imposing their views on the
free world, conquering it without resorting to open warfare.
With all this in mind, although these disagreements at the summit
between the two parties are important, in our case the question arises:
"And after Cuba, what?", that is: "What to do with the exiles
after what happened in Cuba?" The way the CIA prepared the invasion of
Cuba, both politically and militarily, reveals that this American organization
fundamentally conceived of the invasion not as a continuation of the social revolution
that had emerged on the island after the overthrow of the Batista dictatorship,
but as a return to the status quo ante, which existed before Castro's
resistance and, above all, before his rise to power. It is true that the
problem of cooperation with the Cuban exiles worsened daily. Initially, the
Cuban émigré community during the first months of Castro's government was
numerically small and mostly comprised of Batista supporters.
This group, unpopular both in Cuba and in the U.S., had no possibility
of taking any action. Then, as the Castro regime revealed its true intentions,
especially in the second half of 1960, the division among Cuban refugees
intensified, and different social and political tendencies crystallized. As
among exiles from communist countries, the problem of political, social,
economic, and national division not only aggravated and complicated the problem
of liberation but also constituted a serious obstacle for the democracies that
should be helping these exiles and their people. In the case of Cuba and its
emigrants, there were hundreds of groups, factions, movements, and juntas, all
with their respective leaders and sub-leaders, their programs and ambitions,
believing themselves unique and capable of leading the people in a liberated
Cuba. They all operated along the lines of Miami, Florida, New York, the
Caribbean islands, or many countries of the Latin American continent. In such a
situation, it was not easy for the CIA, tasked with organizing the invasion
and, if necessary, establishing democratic authorities, to find its bearings.
Anyone who has had the opportunity to collaborate with American agencies during
or after the war knows that their tendency is rather conservative, not very or
not at all revolutionary, and that the vast majority of their officials tend to
cooperate with the right, if not with the center, but never or rarely with the
anti-communist left.
In the case of Cuban exiles, the choice was between collaborating with
the right wing of the Pre-Batista movement, which was not fascist but rather
advocated political and economic conservatism, or with the center, while
overlooking the groups that were part of the Castro movement or that, as in the
case of Sánchez Arango, had a program similar to Castro's but did not join his
movement because they did not believe in Castro or those around him. They
foresaw the possibility that Castro would become a collaborator with communism
and link the island to the Soviet Union and Mao's China.
The author of these lines spoke with Arango in Cuba in February 1960 and
came away with the unequivocal impression that he was a popular leader who,
under different circumstances and with greater organization among Cuban
political circles, could have eventually given the Cuban revolution a more
constructive direction. Arango believed at the time that the Cuban revolution
had to continue, but without Castro and without the internal and foreign
communists. This was only achievable if the U.S. government had recognized
Castro's nationalization policies in its guidelines and sacrificed everything
it had lost with Castro's rise to power. The fact that this perspective
displeased the American organizers of the invasion stems from the absence of
Arango and the dynamic Manuel Ray, Castro's former Minister of Public Works who
led a perfectly organized clandestine movement in Cuba, from the Cuban National
Committee.
The "Democratic Revolutionary Front" (FRD) was chaired by Dr.
José Miró Cardona, former Cuban Prime Minister during the first six weeks of the
Castro regime, but lacked prominent collaborators. Those who were initially
disillusioned with CIA policy, as they told the American press, founded the
"People's Revolutionary Movement" (MRP), emphasizing in their
manifesto: "Fighting against the 'Fidelism-Communism' faction does not
mean fighting against the Revolution for which thousands of Cubans sacrificed
their lives, but rather liberating it from those who betrayed it." The
right wing and much of the center rose up against this position, labeling them
and their movement "Fidelism without Fidel." This deep division was
also the cause of the failure, which, even so, would not have occurred had the
American army undertaken the task of liberation. Given the current situation,
one wonders: what should have been done? The responsibility assumed by the
Washington government in the attempted invasion of Cuba implied such a
commitment that we are convinced the moral responsibility would have been
equally great had the expedition been carried out with the support of the
American army. The difference, however, is that the Soviet hierarchy and every
communist branch in every communist-ruled country would have had to modify
their views on the workings of American political and military strategy. Both
Soviet leaders and communists in general are highly sensitive to the role of
power in relation to world events. From 1917 in Russia, through the Hungarian
uprising of 1956, and up to the failed invasion of Cuba in 1961, every attempt
to remove or overthrow the communist regime in any country it held power failed
due to:
1) The division of internal social and political forces, and
2) the division among the major powers,
primarily the democratic ones.
In his new book, *Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin*, George F.
Kennan, the current U.S. ambassador to Belgrade and undoubtedly one of the most
astute experts on the Soviet Union and global communism, offers a sharp, almost
harrowing, analysis of relations between Russia and the West from Lenin,
through Stalin, and up to Khrushchev. Written in an engaging and
well-documented style, the book demonstrates not only a long and meticulous
study of the Soviet-communist problem, but also a vast political experience,
making Kennan one of the most astute American political writers. While Kennan
barely touches on the Cuban issue, he proves that the spread of communism in
the world was and continues to be the result of the deep divisions within the
West.
His book, read carefully, recounts so many events we witnessed that it
becomes clear the West never had a clear stance on how to react to the
communist takeover, first in Russia and then in other parts of the world.
First, there was the complete ignorance of Marxism and communism among Western
leaders, followed by constant disagreements regarding joint decisions aimed at
restricting and eventually destroying Soviet-communist expansion. From the
Peace Conference at the end of World War I to Tehran, Yalta, and Potsdam during
and after World War II, the West was in a state of permanent political and
ideological division. Kennan attributes this division to the nature of
democracy and particularly to the character of "coalition diplomacy."
Pluralities in democratic systems, public opinion infiltrated by the enemy of
social security in democracy, opposing analyses and conclusions, as in the case
of Cuba, regarding whether to resort to the US armed forces or only to the
voluntary guerrillas of the exiles (for example, the Kennedy administration:
Adlai Stevenson opposed a US military intervention, while Adolf Berle
and Allan Dulles advocated for it)—none of this occurs or has any place in the
operations of the communist central committees or Politburos. In democratic
countries, such phenomena not only take place but are also the subject of public
debate and journalistic reporting, whereas under the communist system, such
actions are rigorously concealed, and heads roll if there are failures or even
leaks.
Applying Kennan's criteria to the Cuban problem and the American
position on it—though he doesn't explicitly mention it in his book—a great
power like the United States should have foreseen that Batista's fall was
inevitable and that the change in the situation, in relation to current world
events, would create a vacuum that would have to be filled by some political
force. However, even certain right-wingers in Cuba and the United States
supported Castro's 26th of July Movement. How is it that neither Havana nor
Washington took communist elements into account within the Castro movement?
The New York Times, which contributed so much to Castro's popularity as
it did to Tito's during the previous war, failed to foresee the possibility
that Castro could introduce a communist regime in Cuba and, moreover, draw Cuba
into the Soviet sphere of influence, which would completely alter the balance
of power not only in the United Nations but also change the political
landscape, bringing international communism within 90 miles of American
territory. After carefully and critically reading Kennan's book, one is no
longer surprised that American diplomats failed to foresee and assume that Che
Guevara-type elements would infiltrate Castro's revolution.
These individuals, following Soviet and Maoist theories, developed the
ideal platforms for the Latin American continent, ripe for revolution, through
which guerrilla warfare transformed into a war for the political conquest of
power. Mao's thesis, according to which "political power flows from the
gunpowder of the rifle," apparently became the starting point for all
guerrilla action. Wars of liberation, in the communist interpretation, are
nothing more than levers for seizing power through guerrilla warfare. Several
years had to pass before democratic leaders realized this reality; today it is
obvious not only to President Kennedy but to the vast majority of Western
political and military leaders that in communist parlance, "war of
liberation" means one thing, and in Western political thought, another.
III
In addressing this problem, a contemporary political writer must step
back and look back at the history of the so-called National Resistance during
the last war, which we witnessed. In March of last year, the "Second
International Congress on the History of the Resistance" was held in
Milan, attended by about one hundred historians, all European except for one
American. The material from that Congress, with all the contributions of the
delegates and historians present, is of great importance for the study of the
Second World War and the role played in it not only by the guerrillas but also
by their political leader, the National Resistance.
As is well known, the National Resistance is called La Resistenza in
Italy, La Résistance in France, and The Resistance in English. It is
significant that the Congress was attended mostly by leftist representatives of
the Resistance and, naturally, by official delegates from communist countries.
The Greek representative, for example, emphasized in his speech the position of
the EAM, the leftist wing of the Greek Resistance, criticizing the
nationalist-monarchists as collaborators, first with the Germans and then with
the British embassy. The Yugoslav delegate, a certain Dusan Plenca, presented
the official and current viewpoint of the communist government in Belgrade
regarding the guerrillas, highlighting, importantly, the parallel indecisive
attitude of the Soviet Union and the Western Allies toward the actions of the
communist guerrillas and the national Resistance in Yugoslavia.
We must point this out because Tito's communist propaganda until 1948,
that is, until the Moscow-Belgrade conflict, strove to minimize the Allied
support given to Tito, while exaggerating and emphasizing Soviet support for
the communist guerrillas. Barely had the well-known revelations of Mosha
Pijade, a prominent communist theorist from Belgrade, been made public, and
Soviet aid to the "national uprising" was dismissed as a
"fiction" in Yugoslavia, only to be quickly demoted into a blatant
communist lie.
The prevailing narrative regarding the partisan resistance in Yugoslavia
tends to establish a balance, almost a neutral one, with respect to the support
provided by the Soviet Union on the one hand, and Great Britain and the United
States on the other, in accordance with Tito's current foreign policy. The aim
is to present the resistance as an action undertaken exclusively by the broad
masses of the people under the leadership of the Yugoslav Communist Party. Both
the Eastern and Western allies act slowly, remaining reserved and indecisive,
and their contribution is not insignificant. However, it is a telling fact that
both the Yugoslav Colonel Plenca and the Soviet General Boltin do not conceal
in their reports that the primary and overriding objective of the resistance
was to seize power—understood to be "democratic and popular" in
communist terms.
Nevertheless, it was Deakin, an Oxford professor and English historian,
who explicitly and clearly identified the key to the problem of the guerrillas
in their struggle to seize power. Deakin was head of the British military
mission, parachuted into Yugoslav territory in May 1943, to establish contact
with Tito's partisans. According to Deakin's report, the British conduct of the
war had not considered the problem of employing "incorrect" means
until the conflict drew in the Soviet Union.
With the Soviet Union's entry into the war, guerrilla warfare not only
took on greater significance, but the concept that guerrilla warfare implies
the conquest of power in the postwar period constituted a new element in the
nature of the war itself. It is worth noting that Deakin highlights the fact
that during the First World War and in the Desert War (Lawrence case), the
British government adhered to "orthodox military concepts," avoiding
altering the social, national, and political systems of the conquered
countries. After the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, after Clausewitz
and Lenin's theses on the political conduct of war, applied in Russia after the
October Revolution, and after the Spanish Civil War, in which the Soviet-Communist
element was involved on one side, and the fascist ideological moment on the
other, which inspired and politically directed it, British military circles
sought, at the beginning of the war, to remain within normal and customary
military practices. For the British, the war should be waged using normal
military methods, while any political interpretation, let alone a revolutionary
one, of the conduct of the war should be postponed or simply disregarded.
This lack of imagination, says Deakin, disappeared as soon as Churchill
assumed leadership of the government and the war effort. Not before, since from
May 1940 Churchill issued the necessary instructions to "coordinate all
action by means of subversion and sabotage against the enemy across the Channel."
From these decisions emerged a special agency, the well-known Special
Operations Executive (SOE), which Churchill incorporated into the Ministry of
Economic Warfare, which he cleverly called the Ministry of Ungentlemanly
Warfare. Its aim, in his own words, was "to set Europe ablaze."
For us, the less humorous and far more important aspect is that Deakin
cites, as the first action of this "ungentlemanly war," "taking
part in the confused preparations for a conspiracy against the Yugoslav
government, which at the end of March 1941 was forced to sign the Axis
Pact." This action merits the following comment from Deakin:
"Strictly speaking, this was the first political experiment, admittedly an
isolated one, of the new organization" (SOE). From the above, it can be
concluded that the coup d'état in Belgrade on 27/3/1941 and the overthrow of
the Cvetkovic-Macek government was not, as the communists maintain even at this
Congress, the exclusive work of the broad popular masses under the leadership
of the Yugoslav Communist Party, but also the first British action in the
conduct of political warfare.
Deakin then emphasizes that the political war within the military war
coincided, in fact, with the German aggression against the Soviet Union. The
military situation throughout Europe then changed radically. "The
Russians," Deakin says, "had a coherent and diametrically opposed
concept" of military and political operations. Then, and especially after
Stalin's first message to the oppressed peoples of Europe, in which he
expressly stressed that "the struggle against Germany should not be
considered as a conventional war... nor a war between two armies," the war
changed form and became a clandestine war as well.
Mikhailovich, leader of the Serbian nationalist Chetnik guerrillas,
convinced that the Allies would land in the Balkans, refused to fight until the
war was over. Deakin says that "for Mikhailovich, the political element
was of greater importance, and what interested him was the political balance in
Yugoslavia at the end of the war." Given this, the British Command in
Cairo decided to establish contact with Tito's communist guerrillas, a move
undertaken under the direction of Maclean and Deakin. "The decision,"
Deakin continues, "to strengthen ties and provide maximum support to Tito
was exclusively British, and only after lengthy discussions did the Americans
follow suit." Deakin strives to justify the support given to Tito, which,
according to him, contributed to the war's swift end. Summarizing his reference
to the guerrillas in Yugoslavia, Deakin conjectures:
"It is a debatable point, and one that would provoke great
controversy if stated categorically, regarding the effect on Yugoslavian
territory of the British abstention from establishing contact with and
providing assistance to Yugoslav forces. Such a discussion does not entirely
fit within this report, but I wish to present it as a point of controversy,
supported by irrefutable historical evidence: that British aid to Tito, in a
completely unforeseen and unexpected manner, played a decisive role in
convincing the Russians that the British had deliberately orchestrated this
entire operation for ulterior political reasons, and in arousing suspicion
among the Russians about the total loyalty of the Yugoslav partisan movement to
the cause of international communism, and thus led to the break between
Yugoslavia and the Russians in 1948."
While English Machiavellianism is sometimes more ruthless than
Machiavelli himself could ever have imagined, Deakin's assertion seems too
audacious to be considered a serious prediction of a politician's future
actions. It is hardly surprising that Churchill's "disciples,"
graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, were captivated in the mountains of Bosnia
and on the Dalmatian coast by Tito's "charm," devoid of imagination
and ideals, unsure of what to do at home, and foreseeing that the days of the
British Empire were numbered. Undecided about which path to take—towards
reformist or revolutionary Marxism—they pledged their allegiance to Tito and
his communists in a country that was, among other things, strange and
mysterious to them.
But the idea that they could already imagine deceiving even the leaders
of world communism and Stalin himself, and that they would soon sow discord
between Tito and the communist agents in his Balkan empire, seems to us more
like poetry and fantasy than a serious historian's assessment. It goes without
saying that when discussing Greece and Italy embroiled in guerrilla wars like
Yugoslavia, Deakin states that both the British government and its agents in
the Near East had no doubt whatsoever that the same thing that happened in
Yugoslavia—that is, the establishment of communist regimes—should not be
allowed to happen in those countries. Consequently, what was permitted in
Yugoslavia could not be permitted in the classic Mediterranean countries where
it was believed that British interests were in clear conflict with communist
expansion and Russian imperialism.
IV
What policy, or more precisely, what policies did the United States
pursue regarding guerrilla and national resistance movements in Europe,
including Yugoslavia, was the subject of Professor Norman Kogan's historical
review. "Any analysis of American policies," Kogan stated,
"regarding European resistance movements in the Second World War requires
a prior examination of certain fundamental historical positions that provide
the essential assumptions of those policies." The three fundamental
positions were: 1) the isolationist tradition in American diplomacy; 2) the
Wilsonian legacy of American leaders; and 3) the late entry of the United
States into the Second World War, two years and four months after the Nazi
attack on Poland.
1) The isolationist tradition of American diplomacy meant that it had
little or no experience with the complex and tangled problems of European
politics. Firstly, American diplomacy knew little or nothing about the
complicated problems of Central Europe, Southeastern Europe, the Balkans, and
the Mediterranean. For this reason, American policy sought to avoid involvement
in the complex problems of guerrilla warfare and resistance movements, refusing
to commit to any action regarding the political or social restructuring of
postwar Europe. At worst, it preferred to leave the decisive role in resolving
these issues to the British. "The main American concern was to win the war
in the shortest possible time and with the fewest casualties. As soon as a
Resistance movement could contribute to achieving that goal, we supported it.
This support was given exclusively on the basis of military assessment, without
any political criteria."
2) Both President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Secretary of State
Cordell Hull were true heirs to the Wilsonian tradition. This, in Kogan's
opinion, consisted of: a) distrust of any balance-of-power policy among the
great powers; b) adherence to the principles of self-determination of peoples,
also enshrined in the Atlantic Charter; and c) opposition to imperialism. Hence
Roosevelt's distrust of General de Gaulle and all the actions of the refugees
who, even during the war, wanted to draw up plans for the future. Roosevelt and
Hull did not allow American weapons to be used for such purposes. They strongly
opposed the raising of territorial issues during the war. In short, both
abhorred the movements of Guerrilla movements were discouraged because of the
fear that such movements would deprive people, after the war, of the right to
choose the government that best suited them. The official American opinion was
that all these problems should be resolved once the war was over.
3) Having entered the war late, the U.S. was primarily concerned with
preparing itself for military action, then making its military supplies
available to its allies, Great Britain and Russia, and only lastly considering
the problem of assisting the resistance movements. Washington, on the other
hand, only began to take an interest in the resistance movements after the
landing in Italy and when the Russians were approaching Poland.
Analyzing each of the resistance movements in Europe, Kogan observes
that the most serious problems arose in France, Italy, Yugoslavia, and Greece.
In these countries, there were "resistance movements loyal to the exiled
governments and others in conflict with them. The situation in Poland was even
more serious, as it involved two governments in exile, one sponsored by the
Soviet Union and the other by England and the United States." It is worth
noting Kogan's assertion that "the fundamental feature of American policy
toward Central Europe was to consider that region outside its sphere of
influence.
The American position was that no policy should be formulated regarding
the problems of Eastern Europe and that it would be better to leave those
matters to the British, except for problems likely to affect feelings in the
United States. One of those problems, as is well known, was the Polish
situation." According to recent data now also clarified in an official
source, contained in the documents of the Tehran Conference, published by the
State Department, the widespread opinion is reaffirmed that the main argument
put forward by Roosevelt in his deliberations with Stalin on the Polish problem
was that he did not want to lose votes in the future elections from Poles
residing in North America.
Regarding Greece and Yugoslavia, which faced similar situations, Kogan
states that the Americans generally followed British policy. Until July 1943,
Kogan notes, the British supported Mikhailovich, who was collaborating with the
Germans and Italians. In September 1943, Churchill sent Maclean to Tito's
headquarters to decide on support for his partisans. In December 1943, during
the Tehran Conference, Churchill decided to back Tito, basing this decision on
the fact that he was the only one fighting the enemy in Yugoslavia. Roosevelt
approved this decision, and from then on, relations between Tito's partisans
and the Western Allies grew increasingly close. Kogan, however, emphasizes that
the U.S. established direct contact with Tito only in the final days of the
war, following the Triestine Crisis and after Tito's forces invaded Istria and
the surrounding areas. Kogan recounts here a series of conflicts that arose
between General Alexander and Tito's partisans, noting that this time the
Americans insisted that the entire disputed area of Istria,
Trieste, and even Fiume be occupied by the Allies and placed under the Allied
Military Government (AMG). "From April 28, 1945, when the Supreme Allied
Command ordered General Alexander to occupy Venezia Giulia, until June 9, when
a formal agreement on participation was concluded, the constant in the American
position," Kogan states, "was to refrain from the use of force
against the Yugoslav communist partisans."
At the heart of this "constant" in American policy, Kogan
uncovers many reasons governing Washington's diplomatic actions. The primary
reason was to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, especially among those fighting the
common enemy. The second reason was that Truman refused to fight Tito's
guerrillas, which would tie up many American contingents in the Balkans and
Italy, contingents needed on the Pacific front, where the war with Japan
remained uncertain. The third reason was political: American public opinion
would not understand a war between allies and the need to maintain American
troops as occupying forces in friendly countries. Finally, a significant reason
was also to strain relations with Russia, since the American government was
counting on Russian intervention against Japan.
Even so, on May 8, 1945, Truman decided to strongly oppose Tito on the
issue of Trieste, and American diplomacy reacted vigorously against the
occupation of Piedmont and Venezia Giulia by France and Yugoslavia,
respectively, emphasizing that these measures undermined the restoration of
peace. Unlike American policy, which was reluctant to use force against
resistance movements, the British, and Churchill himself, did not hesitate to
resort to force if positive results were expected. Analyzing the actions of
American diplomacy in this way, Kogan concludes that Washington wished to avoid
armed conflicts between allies at all costs while simultaneously avoiding
taking a stance on the creation or formulation of a future peace before the war
ended. Without explicitly stating it, Kogan clearly demonstrates how difficult
it was for the British and Americans to establish solid foundations for a just
peace and a democratic world order, whereas the communist leaders, considering
and respecting only force, were able to structure a world in which they occupy
a position they had never dreamed of. That this is indeed the case is also
confirmed by Kennan's new book, in which all those naive, unfounded, almost
unreal attitudes and sentimental and moral reactions are correctly
characterized and defined, which Kennan rightly calls a trait not only of
Anglo-Saxon diplomacy but also of the Anglo-Saxon character.
V
But before discussing that policy, let us see what the official
viewpoint of Soviet historiography is, as expressed by its delegate at the
aforementioned Congress, General E. Boltin. At the very beginning of his
extensive written report—in the style of official Soviet historiography, where
historical truth is subordinated to political and ideological contingencies
and, therefore, not considered true—Boltin defines the character of
contemporary warfare in the following terms:
"Soviet historians believe that two types of war can be clearly
distinguished in world history: annexationist wars, that is, unjust wars, and
liberation wars, that is, just wars. If war is fought to conquer new
territories, to oppress and enslave peoples, to strengthen the external yoke,
or in the name of the domination of the exploiters, such a war is unjust. On
the other hand, if war is fought in the name of liberating the country from
enemy invasion, in the name of freedom and national independence, to free
itself from the yoke of the exploiters and colonialists, this war is just. Such a war is capable of inspiring the masses." popular
movements actively joining the armed struggle under the banner of liberation.
The just aims of the war become an inexhaustible source of the high morale of
its participants, their steadfastness, their courage, and their heroism.”
Consistent with this thesis, Boltin asserts that the Second World War
acquired the character of a just and logical war when German aggression
extended to the Soviet Union. “The Second World War,” he states verbatim,
“which erupted from the conflict of two imperialist alliances, only began to
change its character on the enemy side of Germany when the broad popular masses
initiated the anti-fascist struggle. From then on, the war gradually acquired
its just, liberating, and anti-fascist character. This character crystallized
and was defined after the Soviet Union entered the war as a result of Hitler’s
aggression.” It is important to emphasize that this viewpoint was entirely
consistent with the thesis of the Yugoslav communists, who before the
German-Soviet war defined the war as a conflict between two capitalisms and
after June 1941 interpreted it as a conflict between democracy and fascism,
beginning by organizing resistance and guerrilla warfare.
Speaking of the supposed support the Soviet Union provided to resistance
movements in Europe, in the chapter on Yugoslavia, Boltin emphasizes that the
Yugoslav partisans were among the first to organize resistance and that they
contributed significantly to the outbreak of guerrilla warfare throughout
Europe. Boltin fails to mention that Soviet diplomacy initially recognized Mikhailovich
and only later began to sponsor Tito and his guerrillas. Instead, attempting to
assert, where possible, the logic and consistency of the Soviet narrative, he
stresses that the Soviet factor was also decisive in the "liberation"
of Yugoslavia—more decisive than the current official narrative of Tito's
historiography acknowledges.
Therefore, we find it superfluous to cite propagandistic half-truths in
a work that aims to be concise and objective. French historian Professor Henri
Michel notes in his report on "The Allies and the Resistance in
Europe" that even in March 1942, the Soviet Union rejected Tito's request
to abandon Mikhailovich and support his partisans. In May 1942, the Kremlin
accepted the proposal from the Yugoslav government-in-exile, whose
Minister of War was Mikhailovich, to elevate Moscow's legation to the rank of
embassy. In August 1942, Moscow expressed its willingness to send a mission to
Mikhailovich's headquarters, which the exiled government in London refused.
Even during the autumn of 1942, Moscow did not grant Tito's requests for
assistance, but instead advised him to exercise restraint and criticized him
for the aggressive nature of the guerrilla warfare.
However, such fundamental differences arose between the viewpoints held
by the Anglo-Saxons and the Soviets that they could provide a suitable response
to the thesis of a lost war. According to Soviet criteria, any war waged by
communists or in which the Soviet Union participates is justified, logical,
just, and liberating. A war in which the Soviet Union does not participate and
which communists do not lead, either alone or in coalition with other forces,
is not only unnecessary and historically negative, but also unjust, conquering,
and imperialist. In other words, the attempt by democratic exiles to liberate
Cuba constitutes an unjust and imperialist war, while the armed crushing of the
Hungarian national revolution by Soviet tanks is a just war. Yugoslav policy
also aligns with this Soviet thesis. Faced with the choice of seeing Hungary
liberated from the communist regime, albeit under the leadership of Imre Nagy,
Yugoslav approves of the Soviet armed intervention and condemns the Hungarian
people's attempt at freedom.
VI
If we confront these two opposing theses, the Soviet-communist and the
Anglo-Saxon, analyzing certain aspects of the past war and the recent failure
of the invasion of Cuba, we come to the conclusion that the liberation of the
peoples subjected to the communist yoke cannot be achieved if the classic assumptions,
let's call them Anglo-Saxon, according to which the political and ideological
factor must be separated from the military factor, remain in force. Obviously,
we did not intend in this review to provide an exhaustive account of all the
facts and reasons that contributed to the last conflict being a catastrophic
defeat for so many peoples of Europe and Asia, especially for southeastern
Europe, and that for the same reasons the Latin American continent may also be
lost. Much, even too much, has been written on this subject.
We have limited ourselves to highlighting certain criteria expressed by
Anglo-Saxon historians at a Congress held last year. We could also refer to the
recently published documents of the Tehran Conference, which demonstrate, for
example, how lightly and irresponsibly Roosevelt discussed the fate of Eastern
Europe with Stalin. This lightheartedness, this ignorance of the problems and
realities at hand, also constitutes the central theme of Kennan's book, which
we recommend to the reader; for there one will see with what ignorance of
historical facts and with what misunderstanding of current problems Western
statesmen are resolving these problems and dictating the fate of other peoples.
It is evident that the West has been losing the battle against world communism
since 1917, that is, from its very beginnings, when it was born and seized
power in the largest European-Asian country, underdeveloped or less developed.
From 1917 onward, communists have remained in power in almost all the countries
they have subjugated, aided not only by the internal conflicts of these captive
nations, but also by the complete moral and political division within the West.
However, no matter how deeply Kennan penetrated and unraveled the West's
weaknesses in the face of communism, he was unable to perceive or tell the
whole truth. By ridiculing certain liberal intellectuals in Anglo-Saxon
countries, Kennan partly pointed out the inherent defects and dangers of
Anglo-Saxon foreign policy. But he lacked the courage to include himself and
his earlier analyses within that same Anglo-Saxon liberalism, the cause of this
Western weakness in the struggle against communism. When one studies the
evolution of diplomatic relations between Western democratic leaders and the Asian
despots of the Kremlin, one perceives that Churchill, to some extent, was aware
of the potential consequences, but Roosevelt was not. A novice in world
politics, Roosevelt perhaps gave more impetus to Stalin's excessive ambitions
than any communist movement in any country.
Roosevelt saw in Stalin his own reflection projected onto a different
terrain: Anglo-Saxon-style democracy. Disillusioned with classical capitalism,
fed up with conservatism, and disgusted with fascism, Roosevelt viewed world
communism through the lens of his New Deal. He genuinely believed that
communism was a vast movement of the masses, necessarily fair to every
underdog. In Churchill, he saw imperialism, reactionary conservatism, and the
disintegration of an outdated society. Such views inevitably led to the fatal
division within the Western bloc, creating that political and geographical
vacuum so conducive to the advance of communism. One of the fundamental
failings of Western leaders is that, lacking intelligence and political initiative,
their constant hesitation in postponing solutions, their rejection of
initiative, and their fear of using the force at their disposal embolden
communist leaders, driving them to further actions. The communist successes
recorded so far were not the result of their superintelligence or the
historical inevitability of Marxist doctrine, but of the weakness, I would say
organic, of the Western ruling class incapable of committing to radical
solutions.
When we read daily that American diplomacy, on principle, avoids the use
of force, and when we know that this is indeed American policy, it is obvious
that communist leaders can resolve any problem without resorting to force, or
rather, by employing it in their own specific way. The nature of a great power
consists of employing all the material and moral forces at its disposal. The
U.S. today possesses forces that no other power has ever had. If the Soviet
Union had these forces, it is undeniable that the entire globe would become a
Soviet fiefdom. What, then, does the U.S. lack? The answer to this question is knowing how to choose. When and at what moment to make
use of a portion of its political and material power?
The main reason for the current Soviet supremacy in the world lies in
the fact that the Soviet leaders, in more difficult circumstances and with
fewer material resources, almost always, with very few exceptions, knew how to
make the right selection in their decision-making and in the use of their
political and military force. While the US is not the kind of great power that
Spain, then Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and even Italy were in past
centuries, today it represents a force that could be used to restrict and
eventually eliminate the Soviet-communist imperialist advance across the world.
Until 1948, the US, knowing it was the only country possessing the atomic bomb,
could, by choosing the right political moment, re-establish a free world order
without risking war. Stalin halted communist expansion in Italy only because he
calculated that such expansion would provoke an American reaction and
eventually threaten world communism with total liquidation.
Here, too, was the main cause of the conflict with Tito: Tito was acting
against Stalin's plans in Trieste and Greece, exposing him to open conflict
with the US, which Stalin could not accept at that time. Currently, what can
restrain Khrushchev from insisting on his excessive demands, if nothing has
happened since the war to convince the communists that the US is even prepared
to resort to force? Could the failed action in Cuba have achieved this? How
many can perceive today the subtle distinction between the support given to the
Cuban exiles, their landing on the island aboard American ships, and the
eventual invasion of Cuba by the American military expedition? Although the
Hungarian case damaged the prestige of the Soviet Union, it is also true that
the Soviet decision to prevent the liberation of Hungary through armed
intervention strengthened the conviction, in world opinion, that Moscow is
prepared to defend the conquests of communism—or rather, its imperialist
program—by force.
The fundamental question, then, arises: Can democracy resort to force to
safeguard threatened freedom anywhere in the world? We know that this is the
crux of the current controversy in the free world. It effectively disarms
American-style democracy, which bases its democratic beliefs on almost
ethical-religious principles. From the Wilsonian era until now, the American
vision has projected itself toward a better, nobler, more humane, and more just
world, which, in fact, is being realized on the North American continent and in
certain parts of Western Europe. For the realization of that world, the use of
force would be contradictory.
The fact that democracy has not yet decided to use force against
communism, as it did against Nazi-fascism, is not due to a lack of reasons, but
rather because certain liberal circles in the free world continue to see
communism as the future social and economic wave. The communists know this, and
that is why they never cease to delude the world with their false humanism.
Terrorizing with the threat of war is one of their skillful tools, facilitating
their conquest of new positions that discourage the West, which shuns war. The
idea is to win everything without war; this path, unsuitable for the West,
which lives in economic euphoria and moral excess, can yield more positive
successes for the communists than the moral and sentimental ploys of Western
circles.
Why, for example, does communism as a movement represent a much greater
force in Italy and France than in the countries it governs, while the standard
of living in France and Italy is constantly rising and is higher than in any
communist country? This and many other reasons explain why neutralism is
spreading among liberal intellectuals in the West, and why public opinion is
becoming less and less prepared for organized opposition to communism. The
leaders of Western countries do not always think about taking the initiative or
reacting against communist imperialism in the same way that communist leaders
do. In the free world, there are no political parties with communist
discipline, nor are there organized anti-communist forces in communist
countries. The free world has done little or nothing to help these forces, to
inject them with the impetus and encouragement that communist leaders instill
in communist parties in the free world.
VII
At this point in our discussion, the question arises of the role of
exiles in the eventual liberation of their countries from communist captivity.
The Cuban failure is a clear example of how not to proceed with exiles. First
and foremost, the prevailing view in certain government offices that every
action of the émigrés must be subordinated to the interests of the great powers
is entirely erroneous. Exiles can coordinate their actions with the interests
of the great powers and with their diplomatic and military efforts, but these
powers and their organizations must never, under any circumstances, make exiles
and their movements their mere instruments. Exiles, in their struggle, bear a
moral and ideological responsibility to their respective peoples.
This responsibility does not always coincide with the aims of the great
powers. In the case of Cuba, social reform and the economic restructuring of
society do not align with the interests of certain American capital, nor are
they a common program of all Cuban political groups. When certain American
officials accept the agenda of some groups against others, they clash not only
with the émigrés but also with the interests of the people they seek to
liberate. At the very moment President Kennedy announces a broad and
progressive economic and social program to Latin American countries—the
Alliance for Progress, which could prove decisive in containing communism—its
apparatus, unbeknownst to him, is compromised by its cooperation with
right-wing and antisocial elements in the liberation of Cuba from communism,
thus jeopardizing the entire liberation effort.
Addressing this problem, and in the interest of impartiality, I want to
clarify that I am not opposed to the American agencies tasked with assisting
the exiles also cooperating, so to speak, with the most reactionary elements.
However, they must understand that their responsibility must be total and
declared. The objectives must be clear and pursued tenaciously, even if the
tactics vary.
The most tragic situation regarding the great powers is undoubtedly that
of the exiled groups from Yugoslavia. They felt discouraged and superfluous in
the face of the great powers' misguided actions when Tito's ideological
disagreement with Moscow was mishandled in the West, and especially in the
United States. Instead of bolstering the exiles' efforts at that precise
moment, the great powers, primarily the United States, did everything in their
power to remove them from the lists of anti-communist exile groups, even from
the list of "Captive Nations," with the latter's astonishing
knowledge. This historical error is also a moral one.
It reveals that the West not only lacks a firm anti-communist policy but
is also willing to cooperate with certain communist movements should they, as a
consequence of Tito's contagious example, break away from the Moscow bloc. This
so-called apparent realism brought more harm than good to the West. Applied to
the Cuban case, the logical question arises: if American capital was invested
in Tito's communism, why wasn't the same approach taken in Cuba to distance
Soviet and Chinese influence from the Western Hemisphere and discourage
internal communism? It is far more important for the United States to have a
clear position in the Caribbean than in the Adriatic, where the situation is
never clear or secure as long as communists are in power.
With that attitude, American policy effectively destroyed the political
influence of the Yugoslav exiles. In reality, there is no single unified group
of Yugoslav exiles, but rather separate groups depending on the countries that
made up Yugoslavia. The politicians who emigrated during and after the war and
who held outdated views are either already dead or dying. With them, an old
world died in the country, one that will never return. Neither before nor now
in exile have these politicians sought to resolve
Yugoslavia's fundamental problem: the national question. The great powers still
respect Yugoslav legitimacy, and even Moscow, which interferes in and stirs up
all national and international problems in old and young countries with
multinational structures, has so far refrained from airing any national
problems in Yugoslavia.
The major Western powers fear the prospect of new national problems
arising, especially in Southeast Europe and specifically in Yugoslavia. Both
official policy and liberal American public opinion consider Yugoslavia a
creation of Wilson and, therefore, remain loyal to it. Among the exiled groups
from Yugoslavia, there are, broadly speaking, these divisions: among the Serbs,
unlike their position during the First and Second World Wars, the prevailing
view is that Yugoslavia is more necessary now than ever to the Serbian nation.
The Serbs support Yugoslavia because of their exclusive and enduring interests.
On this point, both the Serbian reactionaries and the right and left agree. At
the moment when a genuine federalization of Yugoslavia would truly be feasible,
with equality for all the constituent peoples and a capital other than
Belgrade, but In some central city of the country,
Serbian politicians would mostly split and tend toward the formation of Greater
Serbia. This calculated and fictitious stance of the Serbian exiles regarding
Yugoslavia aggravates the position of the Croatian exiles without making it
impossible.
The Croatian exile groups, although disunited in the face of future
alternatives, are stronger than ever before. Croatian exile intellectuals make
their presence felt on every continent. It can be said that the Croatian exiles
have clearly, unequivocally, and unanimously raised the issue of Croatian
national self-determination and the Croatian state. Although
internal dissension exists among the Croats, as among other groups, it is not
of a national nature but rather socio-political. The difficult test for
the Croatian exiles will come when the issue of liberation from communism arises.
To whom will the foreign ministries of the great powers turn? Experience
teaches us that they will turn to the Opportunistic elements will follow the
interests and orders of the major powers, often those unfamiliar with the
issues. This is precisely what happened during the last war and is happening
now with Cuba. Therefore, what is needed is not only a united bloc of
exiles—very difficult to achieve in peacetime—but also strong groups within the
country who know what they want and are capable of taking the reins in times of
crisis.
VIII
First fascism, then communism contributed to the destruction of the old
world, and while the fascist cycle is almost over, the communist cycle remains
to be completed. From 1914 until today, my generation has sailed toward a
freedom that we may not attain. Our ideal was that humanity can only exist and
progress in freedom, and that any form of government that restricts freedom
must, sooner or later, be overthrown by the will and strength of humankind.
If humanity in the atomic age does not lose self-control and the end of
the world does not occur, I am convinced that the principle of freedom will be
the principal element that will end communism. The fate of the world, in one
direction or another, will perhaps be sealed within the next 25 or 50 years.
Two generations of free people who follow us have the opportunity to solve the
fundamental problems not only of the West and the East, but of all humanity. I
hope that in these generations, men worthy of the mission of contributing to
the liberation of the Croatian people from communism and laying the foundations
for a better life will appear in our country.
Jorge Krizanic
Jorge Krizanic, born in Ribnik, near Karlovac,
Croatia, in 1618, descended from an old family of military nobility. He studied
in Vienna, Bologna, and Rome, where he was a student at the College of Saint
Athanasius, affiliated with the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the
Faith. Even as a student, he was enthusiastic about the unification of the
Churches, and so in 1640 he moved from Bologna to Rome in order to dedicate
himself more fully to the problems inherent in union, which from that moment on
became the ideal of his life. After graduating, he wrote a treatise entitled
"Bibliotheca Schismaticorum," which is preserved in the library of
Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome, according to H. Iswolsky, and demonstrates
the extraordinary erudition of the young priest.
Krizanic approached the problem of unification
not only from a missionary perspective, but also from linguistic, political,
socioeconomic, and, above all, cultural ones.
His work in Rome reveals him as a dedicated
student of Croatian linguistic problems, a field he would later expand to
include Slavic philology. The first fruit of his linguistic studies was a
Croatian grammar, which he sent to his bishop in Zagreb, but which was
subsequently lost. He also sent his bishop a letter concerning the union of the
"Vlahi" (i.e., "Vlachs," the Croatian term at the time for
Orthodox Christians). However, living in Rome alongside Ukrainian Orthodox
Christians, his missionary zeal eventually extended to all the separated Slavs,
and especially to the Russians, given their greater number and power.
Ordained a priest according to the Latin rite,
rather than the Eastern rite as he had desired, he returned to Zagreb, where he
remained only briefly as a teacher and parish priest. His mind was occupied,
and his heart drawn to Russia. He had read everything he could find about
Russia: accounts by famous travelers, reports, letters, and "quaestiones
disputatae" concerning theological controversies. In Vienna and Rome, he
made contact with all the emissaries, travelers, and visitors, seeking to learn
as much as possible about Russia, so that he became aware of everything that
was happening in Moscow, both in matters of religion and in social, political,
and economic life.
His original approach to the problem of reunification was based on the
conviction that the Russians, despite their estrangement, had preserved their
faith intact, so that evangelization was not necessary, but rather
reunification with the universal Church, to which they were bound by many
common ties. He attributed the separation of the Russian Church to historical
contingencies and a lack of understanding of the true nature of the conflict.
Krizanic maintained the importance of the Eastern rite and the use of the
Slavic language in the liturgy, opposing any attempt at Latinization. Two
centuries later, the Russian philosopher and apostle of unity, Vladimir
Soloviev, would defend the same thesis.
In a report sent to the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the
Faith in 1641, the young Croatian priest elaborated on his ideas and plans,
requesting permission to travel to Russia. In his report, he asserted that the
Russians were not heretics, but merely separated by ignorance, and therefore
needed to be enlightened, educated, and introduced to Western European culture to
improve their social, economic, and political conditions. The Congregation
carefully studied Krizanic's report, appreciated his scholarly research, but
did not respond to his request to travel to Moscow.
Krizanic, in a broad but fantastical plan, envisioned the possibility of
Russia uniting all Slavic peoples and, once reunited with the universal Church,
identifying with the Western world. In this, he revealed himself as a precursor
of Pan-Slavism, albeit a Westernized one, a path he would follow until the end
of his life, despite the many disappointments, misunderstandings, and trials he
would experience in the Russia of his dreams. He was a man of vast encyclopedic
knowledge, courageous, tireless, and fiery in temperament, yet stubborn,
imaginative, and impatient. He reiterated his request, complaining of the lack
of understanding, and insisted that he be allowed to carry out his fantastic
plans.
Fervent as he was, he embarked on his first journey without waiting for
proper permission. Upon arriving in Smolensk, Russia, he made contact with the
Uniates and enthusiastically began perfecting his knowledge of the Russian
language. Shortly afterward, after stopping in Poland, he returned to Vienna to
undertake another journey with the Austrian embassy, disguised as an officer,
attached to the mission traveling via Constantinople. This gave him the
opportunity to learn firsthand about the organization of the Greek Catholic
Church.
Apparently, his first visit to Russia yielded very few results. He had
some contact with crypto-Catholics and, it seems, with Fedor Rtischev,
chamberlain to Tsar Alexis, and with the Russian Patriarch. He acquired, with
great difficulty and at a very high price, a publication of the Russian
Patriarchate, intended to combat Protestant Catholic influences in Russia,
which greatly helped him understand the prejudices of the Russian Church
regarding Catholicism.
In 1652, we find him again in Rome, at the Illyrian College (Croatian).
The Congregation regarded him with displeasure, considering his trip to Russia
an act of disobedience. Nevertheless, his reports were carefully examined, and
after five years, so agonizing for his impatience, he was officially permitted
to return to Russia, which he did in 1657. He faced no shortage of setbacks and
disappointments of all kinds. He was sent to Galicia, under the authority of a
severe and rigid Latin bishop, who did not allow him to dedicate himself to his
research. His protests ended with his imprisonment.
He sought refuge in the castle of a Uniate nobleman, and after two
months, he went to Russia, passing through Ukraine, then
embroiled in civil war between the supporters of Russia and Poland. Krizanic, a
staunch Russophile, wrote a proclamation in favor of Tsar Alexis. Arriving in
Moscow in November 1659, he presented himself to the Tsar under the assumed
name of George Bilisa, posing as the son of a merchant from Bihac (Bosnia),
thus concealing the true purpose of his journey. He offered the Tsar his
linguistic expertise, committing himself to compile a Russian history, a
dictionary, and a grammar, as well as to defend Russia's cause against the
Poles through his writings.
In this way, Krizanic obtained the position of librarian at the imperial
court. At the time, the Raskol (schism) was devastating Russia. As in the
conflict with the Ukrainian Cossacks, Krizanic resolutely sided with unity. His
position as librarian, though humble, delighted him. He believed he had reached
a post where he could fully develop his agenda. But after a year, due to a "glupo
slovo" (a careless word), as he himself put it, who exposed him as a
Catholic priest in disguise, he was banished to Tobolsk, Siberia. This was a
denunciation by someone he had trusted. He arrived in Tobolsk almost at the
same time as Avakum, one of the leading "raskolniki" (a derogatory
term for Russian leaders), but Avakum, highly suspicious and fanatical, refused
to engage with Krizanic. He had brought his extensive library with him, so he
was able to devote himself to intense intellectual activity. During the fifteen
years of his Siberian exile, Krizanic wrote his best works. He completed his
grammar and dictionary, wrote a treatise on Siberia, entered into
correspondence with Western scholars and geographers, and above all, between
1663 and 1667, wrote "Discourses on Government," commonly called
"Politics," and "On the Providence of God," works in which
he summarizes and clarifies his ideas about Russia.
Both treatises were written in the Universal Slavic language invented by
Krizanić, with occasional Latin interpolations. "Politics" deals
with the ideal government and reforms, but with consideration for the actual
situation in Russia. In the treatise "On the Providence of God," he
investigates "the causes of victory and the fact that the prosperous and
unfortunate state of the republic is a matter of choice."
In his exaltation of the future and of Russia's universal mission,
Krizanić agrees with the Russian Slavophiles, but with the difference that
he advocates a gradual rapprochement with the West, while the Russian
traditionalists want to preserve "the purity of their Orthodox faith"
from Western contamination. He gave us a surprising and accurate definition of
the Russian psyche: "Our great misfortune is our lack of moderation in the
exercise of power; we are incapable of following the mean; we have no sense of
proportion. We go to extremes and wander along the edge of precipices."
Krizanic sent his two main works to the Tsar, receiving no reply; they
were filed away. One day, H. Iswolsky tells us, the young Tsar Peter discovered
them "somewhere in the attic," as the historians say. Did the Tsar
actually study Krizanic's grand plan? At least it seems that, in some of his
reforms, he followed the path indicated by the Croatian; but to what extent?
Professor Klyuchevsky writes in this regard: "Reading Krizanic's program,
we readily exclaim: 'It's the program of Peter the Great!' with all its flaws
and contradictions, with its faith in the creative power of the ukase and in
the possibility of spreading education with the help of books translated from
German and with the closure of businesses and merchants who refused to learn
arithmetic..."
All of Krizanic's attempts, after contracting a serious illness, to
regain his freedom proved futile while Alexis Mikhailovich, Peter's father, was
in power. He promised him pardon if he renounced his Catholic faith. Krizanic
indignantly refused, and believing himself near death, wrote his will,
indicating to the Russian people the only path to salvation: union with Rome
and Western Europe. Meanwhile, Alexis died, and his successor, Peter's
half-brother, granted him amnesty but did not allow him to return to the West.
He appointed him translator in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Finally, in
1677, he managed to leave Russia. Arriving in Vienna, he entered the Dominican
Order, but shortly afterward joined the army of Jan Sobieski, King of Poland,
and returned to Vienna in 1683 with the army that helped repel and defeat the
Ottoman Turks, liberating the besieged city. Krizanic died on September 2nd in
this last great battle between Western Christians and the Turks, thus ending
his itinerant and suffering life, a life fueled by the great ideal of Christian
unity.
The widely discussed question, "What is Russia's place in the
world?" was addressed by Krizanik in its entirety: culturally, socially,
politically, and religiously. His answer can be summarized in the assertion
that Russia stands between Europe and Asia and should serve as a link between
civilizations. Two centuries later, the same concept was developed by great Russian Western thinkers, especially Peter Chaadaev
and Vladimir Soloviev. Krizanik had closely linked the union of the Churches
with the development of the Russian people. He was the first Catholic scholar
to expound on the religious ties between the two Churches.
This man of great zeal and vast culture held very bold ideas at a time
when almost no one, on either side, nurtured any hope for union. "His
erudition and the vastness of his program instilled fear in the hearts of the
uneducated and skepticism in the minds of the learned." Nevertheless, his
approach to the schism is accurate. His vision of political development and
religious destiny, his understanding of the Russian soul, remain a valuable and
useful source of study. The transformation of Russia into a powerful empire
through the adoption of Western technology is proof of Krizanic's accurate
assertions and historical perspicacity. He stood at the threshold of a new
Russian era; his Westernized Pan-Slavism was a dream. The cultural dualism of
the Slavic peoples continues to divide them into two groups belonging to
different worlds of culture and civilization.
We may disagree with many of Krizanic's attitudes, ideas, and plans, but
we cannot fail to admire his fervor, love, and dedication to his brothers and
sisters in Christ, which, in light of the current prospects for the
reconciliation of the Churches, reveal him as a brilliant champion and
precursor of unity.
Joseph George Strossmayer
Quite different from Krizanic, in his life,
position, and work, was the Bishop of Diakovo, Joseph George Strossmayer
(1815-1905), although he shared the same ideals, projects, and dedication to
bringing the Orthodox Slavs into the Western world and uniting them with the
universal Church.
Strossmayer was born in Osiek, in the Croatian
province of Slavonia. He studied at the diocesan seminary in Diakovo and in
Budapest. A graduate in philosophy and theology, he was ordained a priest in
1838. In 1847, Emperor Ferdinand appointed him chaplain to the court of Vienna
and director of the Augustianum College. Two years later, at the age of 34,
Emperor Franz Joseph appointed him bishop of the vast and wealthy diocese of
Diakovo, where he remained until his death.
A man of subtle wit, great talent, and vast
humanistic culture, a brilliant orator—admired at the Second Vatican
Council—expressing himself in Ciceronian Latin, a true patron of the arts and
tireless promoter of numerous cultural works, Strossmayer left a profound mark
on Croatia, although some of his political views—he was for decades the
inspiration and virtual leader of the National Liberal Party—remain debatable.
It cannot be denied that he was the organizer of modern Croatian cultural life.
Many of the Croatian cultural institutions of the second half of the last
century owe their existence to Strossmayer: the revitalized University of
Zagreb, the Academy of Sciences and Arts, the National Gallery of Fine Arts, to
mention only the most important. He was also a major benefactor of the Croatian
College of St. Jerome in Rome. He built
the seminary for aspirants from Bosnia, then under Turkish rule, and the
monumental neo-Romanesque cathedral in Djakovo, adorned with paintings by
renowned contemporary masters Seitz, father and son, Overbeck, etc.
Today's Croats disagree with the great bishop insofar as he was one of
the main proponents of the illusion of cultural unity among the South Slavs,
and first and foremost among the Croats and Serbs. Krizanić sought the
solution in the union of the Russians with the Western world, and Strossmayer,
with his historian friend Raki, in the union of the then relatively backward
Orthodox Serbs with the Croats of Western culture and Catholic faith. A true
humanist, he wanted to make Croatia the cultural center of gravity for all the
South Slavs, who, in his view, had been designated by Providence as
intermediaries between Eastern and Western Europe.
It was inevitable that a Catholic prelate, in seeking to bring Catholic
Croats and Orthodox Serbs closer together, would encounter the fundamental
problem: the separation of Church and State. He did not shy away from the crux
of the problem; rather, he confronted it wholeheartedly. He dedicated himself
to promoting, discussing, writing, and acting in order to achieve Christian
reconciliation, with Strossmayer serving for half a century as the principal
standard-bearer for the union of the separated Slavs.
In the Bishop's mind, civilization was to serve as a vehicle for
attracting the dissenters. The study of culture at that time was not as
profound as it is today. Western culture was easily identified with
Christianity and, even more so, it was often imagined as the only true
civilization. Such confusions are not accepted today:
The Catholic Church does not identify itself with the West and its
culture, even though the latter is inspired by the former. But at that time,
the West was at the height of its power and progress. The progressive faith in
human perfectibility permeated the minds of all contemporary society, of
thinkers, politicians, and economists. We find no difficulty, therefore, in
understanding Strossmayer, a product of his time, when he and his collaborator
Racki conceived a plan according to which all the South Slavs, and especially
those fighting for independence from Turkish rule, should be integrated into
and participate in Western civilization. By virtue of being within the sphere
of Western culture, coexisting with it and contributing to it, Croatia should
automatically become a cultural and leading center for its Slavic neighbors—a
center of culture, a religious center over time, and a political center as
well.
It should not be forgotten that Serbia, newly recognized as a kingdom,
was then effectively under the protection of Austria-Hungary; its Obrenovich
dynasty had pro-Western leanings, and there were even attempts at incorporation
into the Austrian Empire. Strossmayer's political plans, therefore, were not
without foundation. But the realization of his aims required a fundamental
condition: cultural unity. In his optimism, linked to the illusions of his
generation, he made a fatal error in judgment. He simply assumed that the
cultural unity of the South Slavs would automatically follow from the historical
juncture: the liberation of the Balkans from Turkish rule, the national
awakening, Slavic solidarity, and the benefits of modern civilization.
In contrast, reality indicated the opposite path: the Orthodox Slavs did
not opt for the West, but remained rooted in their
Byzantine-influenced cultural and political tradition, strengthened in modern
times by the influence of the Russian Empire, a powerful protector of the
Orthodox Slavs. The fact that the Serbs belonged to the Eastern Church was
decisive. The factors of historical destiny followed those of religion.
Ultimately, Strossmayer's "Slavism," a Croatian and Western-oriented
ideology, became in our century an instrument of Serbian and Russian
expansionism. Strossmayer also failed in his efforts to bring the Churches
closer together.
Nevertheless, the idea of ecclesiastical unity guided him in all his
great endeavors, in his writings, speeches, and contacts with prominent figures
of the time. He was associated with Cardinals Rampolla and Jacobini, British
Prime Minister Gladstone, Lord Acton, the Czech leader Palacký, and many
others. Bismarck himself, in his attempt to end the Kulturkampf, tried to
establish contact with Bishop Strossmayer. He maintained friendly ties with
Vladimir Soloviev, a great proponent of the union of Russia with Rome. He
encouraged the unionist movement in Bulgaria and oversaw the first edition of
the Bulgarian folk poems of the Miladinov brothers. He assisted with the new
edition of the liturgical books in Glagolitic (Old Slavic in Croatian script).
He dedicated the new cathedral in Diakovo to the concord of the Slavs and the
union of the Churches.
His concern for Christian unity was evident in his oppositional stance
at the Second Vatican Council. In his statement regarding the definition of
infallibility, he said: "...quod definitione hac de qua agimus, in
effectum deducta, gregi meo, cui praesum multa
pericula sunt crearda" (...that definition which we have adopted, in
effectum deducta, my gregi, whose precepts have created many dangers).
But, despite everything, I am inclined to believe that Strossmayer, as
evidenced by the aforementioned speech and other circumstances, was an
anti-infallibilist by conviction. However, those who sought to portray him as a
rebellious and insubordinate bishop are far from the truth. Strossmayer
exercised his episcopal right to maintain his opinion during the council, and
once infallibility was defined, he submitted, remaining filially devoted to the
Pope throughout his life.
The most resounding refutation of these mystifications lies in the fact
that he maintained close ties with the Holy See for half a century. He was a
trusted advisor to Leo XIII and carried out important missions on his behalf.
In 1881, Strossmayer brought a delegation of various Slavic peoples to Leo
XIII, with the purpose of drawing attention to the vast but unknown Slavic
world, a feat that the Pope acknowledged by having Strossmayer's figure
engraved on the commemorative medal and, with the encyclical "Grande Munus"
of September 30, 1880, extending to the whole Church the cult of the Slavic
apostles Saints Cyril and Methodius.
Testimony of Vladimir Soloviev
We are pleased to conclude this brief chapter
by quoting the words of the renowned Vladimir Soloviev on the profound impact
of Krizanic and Strossmayer's unionist work on Slavic souls yearning for unity
in Christ's flock.
Two years before his death, Soloviev published
his acclaimed work "Russia and the Universal Church" in Paris. At the
end of the "Introduction," in a "Postscript," he left us a
kind of spiritual testament, in which he professes his faith by recognizing
"as supreme judge in matters of religion the one recognized by St.
Irenaeus, St. Dionysius the Great, St. Athanasius the Great..." He goes on
to name all the great Fathers and Doctors of the Eastern Church, and especially
the Apostle Peter, who lives on in his successors and who did not hear in vain
the Lord's words: "You are Peter... Feed my sheep... my lambs."
After highlighting that the immortal spirit of
the blessed apostle in the government of his visible Church needs a social
body, first in the Greco-Roman world (Constantine's empire), and then in the
Romano-Germanic world (Charlemagne). “Then,” Soloviev continues, “from these
two temporal incarnations, the third and final incarnation is expected. The
whole world, full of strength and desires, but without a clear awareness of its
destiny, knocks on the door of universal history. What is your word, peoples of
the word? Your masses do not yet know, but powerful voices arising from among
you have already revealed it. Two centuries ago, a Croatian priest
prophetically announced it, and in our day, a bishop of the same nation has
repeatedly proclaimed it with admirable eloquence. What the representatives of the
West Slavs, the great Krizanic and the great Strossmayer, said needs only the
simple amen from the East Slavs. This amen I come to say in the name of one
hundred million Russian Christians, in the firm and complete confidence that
they will not disavow me.”
Let us hope that these two “powerful voices”
will continue to express, with greater effect than in our time, to our
dissenting brethren, that we are all “one in Christ.”
Servant of God Father Leopold Mandic
Krizanic and Strossmayer, as mentioned, had confused
the elements of the temporal plan with those of grace in their unionist plans.
Their attempt to exploit the sense of
solidarity among Slavic peoples—to draw dissidents to the West and the
universal Church—ultimately proved counterproductive. Russians and Serbs have
also used Pan-Slavism in the opposite direction, first seeking to isolate
Catholic Slavs from the Western world and then to draw them to Orthodoxy and
Bolshevism, a result diametrically opposed to what Krizanic and Strossmayer,
promoters of a Western Slavism, had envisioned. It is therefore understandable
that the Croats felt wary of all forms of Slavism, and even the very idea of
Christian unity encountered a setback among them. Everything
experienced in this century as a consequence of the Slavic movement has had no
other effect than the mutual estrangement between the Slavic peoples of the
Catholic faith on the one hand and the Orthodox faith on the other.
Leaving aside the political aspect, it should
be emphasized that the problem of the reconciliation of the Churches must be
addressed solely on the religious plane, through the work of divine grace:
"Nisi Dominus aedificaverit domus..." While the rapprochement of the
Greeks with the West currently favors the work of unity, this may not be the
case in Russia. On the supernatural plane, the problem of unity was confronted
by the third Croatian precursor, the Servant of God, Father Leopold
Mandić, a Capuchin friar who spent most of his life in Padua.
The Italians call him Father Leopoldo of
Castelnuovo, as he was a native of Herzegnovi (Castelnuovo in Italian) in
Dalmatia, born on May 12, 1866. In 1884, he took the Capuchin Franciscan habit
in Udine and, after a year of novitiate, made his religious profession.
Ordained a priest in 1890, he served in the Croatian cities of Zadar, Kopar,
and Rijeka before settling in Padua in 1906, where he remained until his
peaceful death on July 30, 1942. He was renowned as an apostle of the
confessional and gained a reputation for holiness due to numerous conversions
and healings attributed to his intercession.
Four years after his death, the ordinary process began, concluding in 1962, and in 1968 the "positio ad introductionem
Causae" was made, and his beatification is now awaited.
Only after Father Leopold's death did it become clear that the tireless
minister of the Sacrament of Confession was above all a great apostle of unity
and that all the sacrifices of his life were offered with that intention.
In the southernmost part of Dalmatia, where Father Leopold's birthplace
is located on the shores of the magnificent Bay of Kotor, the Orthodox element
has long been descending from the Balkan mountains,
coexisting for centuries with Croatian Catholics. This element,
ecclesiastically and nationally heterogeneous, now constitutes half the
population in a traditionally Catholic region, so much so that the current
Yugoslav rulers separated this region from Croatia, annexing it to Montenegro.
In that environment, a zone of cultural intrusion, Father Leopold was born
and raised. The tender and religious soul of the boy Bogdan (Diosdado, his
given name) soon perceived the difference stemming from the separation of the
Churches, and it was there that he felt the first divine call to dedicate
himself entirely to the unity of all his countrymen. A similar case to that of
Krizanic; both had been in contact with the Vlahi from childhood; both, for
religious reasons, began to work for unity, gradually encompassing all the
dissenting Slavs.
Bogdan Mandic, from a young age, wanted to do something in this regard.
But he didn't know what he should do. Once ordained a priest, his heart longed
to dedicate his efforts to the apostolate of unity. But unlike his
predecessors, he had no worldly project. His soul burned with fervor to see his
brothers united in one Church as soon as possible, and that was enough for him.
Finally understanding that his desire would not be fulfilled, he submitted to
the will of his superiors, which was the will of God. He offered this sacrifice
to God and vowed that his prayers, mortifications, works, and above all, his
work in the confessional, would be dedicated to this goal of unity, and he
offered himself as a holocaust.
The Postulator General of the Capuchin Order, Father Bernardino of
Siena, published a treatise in Latin last year with the aim of highlighting
this lesser-known, unionist aspect of Father Leopold's apostolate. Father
Bernardino brings to our attention a detail that is only now regaining its full
significance. Father Mandic, despite having spent almost his entire life in
Padua, that is, in Italy, absolutely refused to become an Italian citizen.
During the First World War, with Italy at war with Austria-Hungary,
which at that time included the Croatian provinces, even Dalmatia, Father Leopold
preferred to be confined within Italy rather than renounce his Croatian
nationality. "He remained in Italy," says Father Bernardino,
"but by his blood he always felt Croatian." He wished to remain
united to his country of origin even through these formal ties, to demonstrate
that one can belong to the Croatian national family, to the Slavic-speaking
world, and at the same time be a faithful son of the Roman Catholic Church.
To his Capuchin brothers in Italy, this seemed at the time a certain
"pervicacia et obstinatio," as the same author states, and only now,
when the question of union occupies the center of contemporary affairs, does
Father Leopold's persistence in not renouncing his national identity appear as
a work of Providence. Thus, one of his lineage, his
brother, became a model and a glory, destined to become tomorrow, God willing,
the patron saint of religious unity among the Slavs. The Croatian and Slovenian
episcopates have expressed this sentiment in their "Litterae
Postulatoriae" to the Supreme Pontiff, requesting the introduction of his
"Cause."
In the case of the Capuchin friar Leopold, who always felt Croatian,
connected by his native language to Eastern Europe, it was not a matter of
Slavicism or nationalist exclusivism, nor of racist deviation, but simply of
the Christian virtue of "pietas," inspired by supernatural motives,
in order to remain united in some way with the dissenting Slavs, to speak to
them heart to heart, to embrace them as brothers, and thus draw them more easily
to union in Christ. Undoubtedly, his apostolate would have lost much of its
power of attraction had he renounced his nationality.
A profound sorrow filled his soul for the Eastern Schism, for the wound
in the Mystical Body of Christ. He never ceased weeping, praying, and groaning,
renewing his vows and sacrifices, so that the Eastern peoples, whom he called
"my people, my people, my brothers," might return to the bosom of the
Common Mother. In a brief prayer to the Virgin, so beloved among Eastern Christians,
he wrote: "I, Brother Leopold, to fulfill your mission among the Eastern
peoples, promise... to work for the eternal salvation of that people. You see
the conditions of my life, the sorrows that oppress me: deign, I pray, to take
my cause into your hands." Of the many similar notes, we quote the one he
made a year before his death: "The whole purpose of my life must be this
divine act: that I may contribute, in my own way, so that one day, according to
the order of divine Wisdom that arranges all things, fortiter et suaviter, the
Eastern dissidents may return to Catholic unity."
He was not concerned with ecclesiological matters or the historical
circumstances that, for a millennium, had prevented a solution to the problem
of unity. He sensed that the moment of grace was approaching and that divine
designs would be fulfilled in history.
His life, filled with pain that tormented his frail and small body, and
his apostolate in the confessional proved that God accepted his sacrificial
offering. Only priests know the cost of spending twelve, even fifteen, hours a
day in the confessional. And Father Mandic endured this work for forty years,
without complaining of heat or cold, despite the great pains that afflicted him
in his stomach, pains that turned out to stem from cancer. But his constant
sacrifice was not being able to return to his hometown and dedicate himself
directly to his life's mission.
When he was informed on one occasion that his superiors had just
transferred him to Rijeka, his heart rejoiced, and he immediately went to the
church to give thanks to God. But his joy was short-lived. At the urging of the
Bishop of Padua, now Cardinal Dalla Costa, to allow him to remain in Padua,
where he was already highly regarded for his confessional ministry, his superiors
reversed their decision. Father Leopold submitted: "...my ministry will be
my guiding light in the meantime," he noted on September 10, 1935. He saw
the means that would lead to the union of the Churches in the intercession of
Christ the High Priest, primarily in the sacrifice of the Holy Mass, and in the
intercession of the Mother of God. He also desired that this apostolate be
"to the mind of the Seraphic Father Francis... and according to the
principles of the Blessed Father Ignatius of Loyola," while he professed a
particular devotion to St. Josaphat Kuncevicz, the martyr of the union between
the Slavs.
Alongside the two Croatian forerunners of the union, men of vast culture
and renowned public service, and many others, stands a humble Capuchin friar
who, unlike other forerunners, is a reclusive soul who prays and suffers in
union with Christ, and thus possesses a transcendent efficacy. While his
predecessors may be criticized for their political actions, the Servant of God,
Father Leopold, while affirming his origins and his national love, is
completely detached from all temporal contingencies. He trusts and believes
that the "great deed" of union will be accomplished by supernatural
means, and, once this is achieved, many causes of friction and enmity between
Eastern and Western Europe will disappear. What did not prosper through
Pan-Slavism, God will bring to fruition through the mystical substitution of
merits, through the supernatural solidarity of prayers and sacrifices.
The work, therefore, carried out by these three Croatians and their followers is magnificent. Three men, driven by their genius
and initiative, embarked on the same ideal path, distant and arduous, when
there was no room left for a flicker of human hope. They undertook it with their
whole soul, heart, and mind, with a personal commitment that their
contemporaries neither attained nor could even imagine. All three were priests,
and all, at heart, were driven by divine love, which moves heaven and earth.
Father Leopold chose the most difficult path, and therefore the most fitting
and correct, for it was, first and foremost, an event of such transcendence
that no cultural, social, or political activity could bring it about without
the presence of the "digitus Dei" (God's hand).
If, God willing, the "Great Deed" begins to materialize,
Krizanic and Strossmayer will regain their rightful place, while Father Leopold
Mandic, should he one day be canonized, as we confidently hope, will be
proclaimed the Patron of the Union of Eastern Christians. Quod
Deus faxit.
Although the Yugoslav government-in-exile, based in London, knew it
could not decisively influence events in the country, and particularly the
relations between the Chetniks and the Partisans, its president, General Dusan
Simovic, was determined to achieve a kind of cooperation between the two
factions, thus preventing the internal struggles that were escalating into
civil war. He clearly understood that future British aid to Draza Mihailovic
depended on this. He hoped to influence the Partisans through Moscow, with the
support of the British, who, as will be seen below, were acting in this way.
The Serbian ministers, who held a majority in General Simovic's
government, were not pleased with this course of action. In their view, a new
situation was emerging in Yugoslavia that had to be seized to realize Serbian
national and political goals, namely, to reestablish Serbia's dominant position
in the restored Yugoslavia and the Balkans.
All Serbian exiles, including the Serbian members of the government,
considered it their mission to carry out the national program by exploiting the
moral and political capital recovered, after the crushing political and
military defeat of 1941, by the actions of Draza Mihailovic, the principal
symbol of the resistance in the country. As a consequence of the perceived
betrayal by the Croats, they longed to obtain, even during the war, assurances
from the Allies that, once hostilities ended, the political leadership of the
Balkans would be entrusted to the Serbs, given their status as loyal friends
and comrades-in-arms.
For this reason, General Simovic's attempts were in direct opposition to
the views of the Serbian ministers in his government, who argued that all moral
and material support should be given exclusively to Mihailovic. Simovic desired
a compromise with the Serbian leftist, communist, and pro-communist forces.
This difference of opinion led to a cabinet crisis, with Simovic presiding. On
January 12, 1942, King Peter II appointed a new government under the presidency
of Slobodan Jovanovic, in which Draza Mihailovic, previously promoted to the
rank of general, assumed the portfolio of Minister of the Army and Navy.
With Mihailovic's appointment, several objectives were sought
simultaneously. It was necessary to demonstrate to the Allies that Yugoslavia,
both politically and militarily, was still fighting against the Axis powers;
They then wanted to grant the Chetnik guerrillas the status of a Yugoslav army,
to facilitate, on the one hand, their position against the enemy in accordance
with international conventions, and on the other, to ensure their supremacy
over the partisan guerrillas. However, the most important aspect of this
appointment was that General Draza Mihailovic, a minister in the royal
government recognized by the Allies, could now, with full state authority,
represent King Peter and the government-in-exile within the country, thus filling
the vacuum created by the dismemberment of the state and the collapse of all
its institutions.
Most of those serving in the government, by assigning this role to
General Mihailovic, secretly hoped that, by investing him with ministerial
authority, he could, when victory came, legitimately assume power on behalf of
the government-in-exile, which enjoyed diplomatic recognition from the Allies.
This would eliminate and neutralize the rebel forces that emerged after the
collapse of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in April 1941, forces that favored a new
order. At the same time, General Mihailovic's assumption of power would ensure
the continuity of the previous order and regime. In short, the Serbian exiles
wanted to regain control of postwar Yugoslavia through Mihailovic and his
resistance movement.
The role assigned to General Mihailovic could only be fulfilled if his
reputation among the Allies were impeccable and beyond reproach. Therefore,
Serbian circles did everything in their power to prevent Allied public opinion
from learning about the true and highly complex relationships prevailing in the
country. Consequently, the official propaganda of the exiled government
routinely denied any reports of collaboration between Mihailovic's Chetniks and
Nedic's supporters or with the Italian occupation troops. When they could no
longer conceal it, they argued that Nedic was not a true Quisling, but rather a
kind of Serbian Pétain, who, through his technical expertise and cooperation
with the invaders, was protecting the Serbian people from German reprisals.
Furthermore, they argued that there is a difference between collaboration with
the Italians, which can be tolerated, and collaboration with the Germans, which
is reprehensible.
During 1942, General Mihailovic's main task was to recruit and organize
his forces for combat at the time of the Allied landings in the Balkans,
whether in Thessaloniki or on the Croatian coast of the Adriatic. This tactic,
advised by the exiled government in London, required avoiding engagements with
the Germans and Italians in order to preserve his troops for the decisive
moment.
In contrast to this tactic of waiting for Chetniks, the partisans obeyed
instructions from Moscow, according to which an implacable fight against the
Germans should be waged in the widest possible sectors, regardless of the
sacrifices and reprisals this would entail for combatants and the civilian
population. The Soviet government, therefore, wanted, in the interest of its
own military operations, to create a kind of second front behind the German
front that would hinder German military actions in Russia.
This disagreement in the interpretation of the role of the guerrilla and
the tactics of the underground struggle further deepened the contrasts between
the Chetniks and the Partisans, raising political problems that dominated the
Yugoslav scene during the war.
Simultaneously with the reorganization of the Chetnik movement, the
primary purpose of the guerrilla warfare—the fight against the Axis powers—was
abandoned. Mihailovic, aware of his true role, devoted himself to combating
internal adversaries: the partisans and the Independent State of Croatia,
serious contenders for power once the war ended.
This focused program and the expansion of the conflict led to rapprochement
among Serbian nationalist forces, which, over the course of the war, resulted
in more or less open collaboration between the forces of Draza Mihailovic—a
minister in an allied government—and other Serbian nationalist groups fighting
against the communists in Serbia under the command and protection of the
occupiers.
By the autumn of 1941, several Serbian groups were already openly
collaborating. Not only with the Germans in Serbia, but also with the Italians
in Montenegro, Herzegovina, and Dalmatia, the Chetniks of Draza Mihailovic and
the units of Milan Nedic collaborated during the winter of 1941-42. There is no
evidence that Mihailovic approved of such cooperation, but it is important to
note that he could not prevent it. As minister and official representative of
the Royal Government, he did not stop the various Chetnik leaders in Montenegro
and Croatia, who nominally recognized his authority, from openly cooperating
with the enemy (Italian troops), since he was politically and morally
responsible to the Allies for their collaborationist actions.
Due to the consolidation and increasingly powerful communist character
of the partisans (Tito's guerrillas), the concentration of Serbian nationalist
forces was also becoming more pronounced. This situation must have aroused
suspicion among the Allies regarding the integrity of General Mihailovic's
conduct. Official circles and Allied public opinion were unable to grasp the
opportunistic combinations, driven by circumstances, national and ideological
conflicts, and especially by General Mihailovic's actions, which were based on
propaganda fictions that prevented an objective assessment of what was actually
happening in the territory in question and its underlying causes.
At that time, Allied public opinion was aware of only two fronts: the
Allied and the enemy, showing little understanding of the communist threat or
local details. Therefore, it was not to be expected that Draza Mihailovic's
role would be viewed through the lens of a complex and multifaceted war, in
which the problem of resisting the Axis forces would be of secondary importance
compared to the struggle for power after the war. The Western Allies neither
understood nor could accept Balkan arguments, where tactics often overshadow
principles and arguments have a different meaning and application than in the
West. In this different conception of what is allowed and what is not, we can
look for the tragedy of Draza Mihailovic.
***
The Soviets, particularly interested in achieving some relief on their
front through the Balkan guerrillas during the early stages of the war, were
dissatisfied with Draza Mihailovic's passive stance. Throughout 1942, they
repeatedly demanded a radical change in the Chetniks' behavior. When these
protests proved ineffective, the Soviet government began to publicize documents
concerning the cooperation of certain Mihailovic groups with German and Italian
troops, ultimately leveling an open accusation against Mihailovic himself,
imputing collaboration with the Germans.
The British had sent a military mission to General Mihailovic's
headquarters as early as the autumn of 1941 and were therefore well aware of
the situation in Yugoslavia. Their sympathies lay with the Chetniks. They
successfully exploited Mihailovic's rebel movement for propaganda purposes and
initially did not oppose his delaying tactics. The Soviet attitude, however,
led the Foreign Office to begin criticizing Draza Mihailovic's actions from the
summer of 1942 onward, unwilling to further strain already awkward relations
with the Kremlin over this minor matter. Due to the profound changes taking
place in the country, dissatisfied with the actions of the Yugoslav
government-in-exile, and above all, eager not to disrupt inter-Allied
relations, Her Majesty's Government, at the end of 1942, began to modify its
favorable stance toward General Draza Mihailovic.
The first warning in this regard was conveyed to Yugoslav officials in
London on December 22, during a visit by the Undersecretary of the Foreign
Ministry of the Yugoslav government-in-exile to his British counterpart, Sir
Orme Sargent. He told him: "...that the communists are much more active
than Draza Mihailovic and are the only ones fighting in Yugoslavia; that
Mihailovic stopped fighting last October, which makes it difficult to counter
Soviet propaganda against General Mihailovic."
Because it was the first time a high-ranking British official had
criticized General Mihailovic, Serbian official circles were unpleasantly
surprised. Their displeasure grew when they learned of the conversation held on
December 29, 1942, between Major Zivan Knezevic, head of the military cabinet
of the Yugoslav president, and Major Peter Boughey, a British expert on
military affairs in Yugoslavia. Major Boughey declared to Knezevic, among other
things, "that Draza, Mihailovic was a Quisling just like Nedic, since
Nedic collaborated with the Germans and Mihailovic with the Italians... General
Mihailovic's detachments are not fighting now, and it matters to us British
that the fighting begins now, not in two or four months. When the Allied troops
land in the Balkans, it will matter very little to us whether Nedic, Antonescu,
or General Mihailovic join us. By then it will all be too late..."
Such public displays of the modified British attitude toward General
Mihailovic shook the self-confidence of the Yugoslav government-in-exile. Its
majority, from 1942 onward, based its policy exclusively on the Chetnik
movement and General Mihailovic. Such a policy provoked conflicts within the
cabinet and among the exiles, forcing Prime Minister S. Jovanovic to reshuffle
his government in January 1943 to prepare it for the tasks ahead. However, he
did not wish to proceed with the reshuffle until the dispute with General
Mihailovic was resolved and the doubts surrounding his conduct were dispelled,
as his continued tenure as Minister of War depended on this. Therefore, Prime
Minister Jovanovic, through George Rendell, the British ambassador to the
Yugoslav Court, decided to clarify Draza Mihailovic's situation and ascertain
the Foreign Office's position regarding him.
According to Professor Jovanovic's official record, he met with
Ambassador Rendell on December 31, 1942. On this occasion, he referred to the
well-known statements made by Sargent and Boughey and informed him of his
intention to reshuffle the cabinet. Rendell replied that he should investigate
further, as he did not determine the Foreign Office's stance. They arranged a
meeting for the following day, which did indeed take place. On this occasion,
Rendell emphasized that "the Foreign Office's attitude toward General
Mihailovic had not changed in the slightest. The British government would
continue to support Mihailovic, and Colonel S. W. Bailey was recently sent to
Yugoslav territory precisely to further strengthen the ties between the British
and General Mihailovic."
Simultaneously with this effort, President Jovanovic also sounded out
Washington's perspective on the same issue. The White House's response was
favorable. Jovanovic therefore reshuffled his government on January 2, 1943,
becoming president of the new administration. The number of ministries was
reduced, as, with two exceptions, all its members were leaders of exiled
political parties, with the exception of two Croats: Dr. Juraj Krnjevic, vice
president of the government, and Jure Sutej, minister of finance, who were considered Croatian representatives in the government.
The second exception was Draza Mihailovic, who nominally retained the
portfolios of the army and navy. Slobodan Jovanovic wielded almost all the
power, since in addition to his previous roles as prime minister, minister of
the interior, and acting minister of the army and
navy, he had also assumed the foreign affairs portfolio.
***
The British government closely followed all developments among the
Yugoslav émigrés and hoped that, following the cabinet's reconstitution,
relations would normalize, allowing the government to address future relations
between the peoples of Yugoslavia and its democratic order. These issues were
becoming increasingly pressing and of paramount importance for the future of
all the countries of Central and Eastern Europe.
Nevertheless, it soon became clear that Slobodan Jovanovic's second
cabinet did not differ from the first in terms of political conceptions and
procedures. Furthermore, given the military plans, the British government could
not wait for the normalization of relations among the Yugoslav émigrés and
decided to intervene to clarify the role of Draza Mihailovic and his links with
the Soviet-backed partisans. The aim was to influence the reconciliation of the
members of the exiled Yugoslav government and make it a useful instrument for
the planned Allied operations in the Balkans.
At the same time, the British government sought to ascertain the
intentions and position of the Soviet Union and, if possible, to get the
partisans, through Moscow's mediation, to recognize the authority of the
Yugoslav government-in-exile, which was in turn recognized by the Soviets, and
therefore, its representative on the ground, General Draza Mihailovic. The
direction of these efforts can be inferred from Her Majesty's Government's
memorandum of March 9, 1943, addressed to the Soviet Government. This document
consists of 11 points. After clarifying that conflicts
between the two resistance groups were becoming increasingly apparent,
Her Majesty's Government deemed it necessary to coordinate these actions
and, to that end, "wished to align its policy with respect to Yugoslavia
with the policy of the Soviet Union." It then noted that as early as
November 1941, Sir Stafford Cripps had pointed out how damaging this division
was and how necessary it was for the communist elements "to place
themselves in military affairs at the disposal of General Mihailovic as the
national leader." The same issue was also discussed with the Soviet
ambassador in London, Maisky, but without any result. Moscow was then asked to
influence Tito's partisans in its radio broadcasts to encourage them to
cooperate with Mihailovic. Maisky responded negatively in July 1942, arguing
that General Mihailovic was linked to Nedic and therefore could not be trusted.
The British government, in its note of May 28, 1942, informed Maisky
that, according to the information available to it, General Mihailovic had
indeed informed his government that he maintained ties with Nedic, stating that
many of the latter's officers were loyal to him. In the opinion of Her
Majesty's Government, there was no evidence to distrust Mihailovic, and
therefore the Soviet government could and should make a concerted effort to
ensure that the Chetniks and the partisans fought together against the enemy. Maisky never replied to this note.
The memorandum then emphasizes that the situation had recently
deteriorated considerably and that "the overall result is Mihailovic's
limited activity in recent months, as he seems to wish to consolidate his
position so that he can establish an orderly government, at least in Serbia,
once the Axis tide recedes." Her Majesty's Government supports Mihailovic,
believing that his organization could prevent anarchy in the country after the
war, and because he is a minister in the Yugoslav government, the British
support him as much as they can. The situation is also serious because one
group of guerrillas is supported by the British and a rival group by the
Soviets.
When advised by the British to cease fighting the partisans, Mihailovic
simply replied that he was the one under attack. Meanwhile, Her Majesty's
Government observed with concern that the Soviet press and radio have been
attacking Mihailovic, and therefore appealed to the Soviet Government to seek a
reconciliation of their respective views on the Yugoslav question, especially
as war loomed over the Balkans.
To this end, the public attacks should cease, and if the Soviet
Government were willing to offer its good offices to the Partisans, Her
Majesty's Government would then request the Yugoslav Government to "go
halfway to meet the Partisans." The British Government was prepared to
assist all elements, regardless of nationality or ideology, in order to unite
their war efforts. However, given the technical difficulties of establishing
contact with the Partisans, it requested the Soviet Government to facilitate
such contacts, inform the Partisans that the British would assist them, and
send a military delegation. The British government would provide technical
assistance, even for sending Soviet agents to the partisans, if the Soviet
government so desired.
The Soviet government did not reply to this British memorandum. I.
Zemski comments on this in the cited issue of International Affairs: "The
Soviet government did not agree with the British proposals, believing it
impossible to impose such a form of collaboration on Marshal Tito, and maintained
the justified view that Mihailovic and his Chetniks could not be considered
resistance forces."
Upon realizing that the Soviets intended to exploit Mihailovic's stance
and the internal conflicts within Yugoslavia, the British resolved to intervene
decisively. The pretext for British intervention was provided by Mihailovic
himself. At a meeting of his supporters in Serbia on February 28, 1943,
Mihailovic delivered a speech in which he attacked Her Majesty's Government, in
the presence of Colonel Bailey, head of the British mission at his
headquarters, for not providing sufficient support to the Chetnik movement.
Colonel Bailey reported this to his superiors, and on March 29, 1943, the
Foreign Office sent Note No. R 2538/2G to the President of
the Yugoslav Government, Slobodan Jovanovic. The note was signed by
Prime Minister Churchill, acting as Foreign Secretary, as Anthony Eden was in
Washington at the time.
The note is transcribed below. In the English version:
"I have the honor to bring to your attention that His Majesty's
Government is seriously alarmed by the recent course of Yugoslav affairs and
increasingly concerned about the future unless steps are taken to bring about
greater unity not only among the various elements of resistance within the country
and among Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, but also within Yugoslav circles abroad.
I am fully aware of how difficult it is now, under the present circumstances,
to achieve a lasting solution to the various problems that constitute the
Serbian-Croatian-Slovenian problem. Nor is it my wish to address this
particular aspect of Yugoslav affairs in this note, except to say, with due
consideration, that, as far as I can judge, the divergence of views and
opinions is deepening, and that this seems to make it difficult for His
Excellency's Government to resolve even minor matters.
However, it is the situation within Yugoslavia that I wish to discuss in
this note." Note. The reports received by Her Majesty's Government from
its liaison officer to General Mihailovic and from other sources leave no doubt
that there is no unity whatsoever between the various elements of the
resistance, and that a veritable civil war is raging between the forces of
General Mihailovic and the Chetniks on the one hand, and other resistance units
on the other, and that in this struggle General Mihailovic himself has become
linked, directly or indirectly, with the Italian occupation army. These
reports, some of which Her Majesty's Government was hitherto unwilling to
believe, were confirmed by General Mihailovic in his speech delivered at a
local meeting on February 28, which was reported by Colonel Bailey, who was
present.
In that speech, General Mihailovic said that the Serbs are now left
without any friends and that the British, with a view to their own strategic
interests, are pushing them into operations without the slightest intention of
helping them now or in the future, and that the British are now fighting in
Yugoslavia to the bitter end. Serbian. He went on to
say that the British were striving to buy Serbian blood at the price of paltry
supplies of arms, but that he would never be a partner in such a shameful
trade, so characteristic of traditional British perfidy.
Far from being guests, the King and government of Yugoslavia are in fact
prisoners of the British. They were forgotten and confined by Her Majesty's
Government, which shamelessly injured Yugoslav sovereignty when it negotiated
directly with the Soviet government concerning internal Yugoslav problems. BBS,
with thrilling cynicism, ceased to support the sacrosanct Serbian cause. The
Allies' eagerness for deception was satisfied by the untimely, hypocritical,
and anti-Yugoslav action of the partisans, but the Allies must know that,
whatever they do and despite all their threats, they will not be able to
dissuade the Serbs from their solemn and sacred duty to exterminate the
partisans.
While the Italians If they are his main and sufficient source of benefit
and general assistance, the Allies will be unable to change his attitude toward
them. His enemies are the partisans, Ustaše, Muslims, and Croats. Once he
settles accounts with them, he will turn against the Italians and Germans. In
the end, he said that there was no longer any need to maintain contact with the
Western democracies, whose sole objective was to win the war at the expense of
others.
"You know that Her Majesty's Government's policy has always been to
give General Mihailovic its full support in the fight against the Axis and to
send him all possible material assistance. For two years we pursued this policy
to the fullest extent of our capabilities, and that is why we are all the more
dismayed by General Mihailovic's reaction. I believe that words spoken in a
state of emotion may not represent a balanced opinion, and that General
Mihailovic may be temporarily disappointed by the limited assistance Her
Majesty's Government has recently been able to send him, unfortunately for
reasons beyond its control.
You will understand that Her Majesty's Government cannot overlook this
incident, nor can it accept, without explanation and prior protest, a policy
that is entirely contrary to its own. It could never justify to the British
public or to its Allies its additional support for a movement whose leader does
not hesitate to declare publicly that his enemies are his allies—whether
temporary or permanent, it matters little—and that his enemies are not the
Germans and Italians, invaders of his country, but his fellow Yugoslav
citizens." And, first and foremost, the men who are
currently fighting and sacrificing their lives to liberate their country from
foreign oppression.
"I do not believe that this policy, endorsed by the Yugoslav
government, in any way reflects its views. However, since General Mihailovic is
a minister in His Excellency's Government, I consider it my duty to bring to
his attention the views I recently expressed and to propose to the Yugoslav
government that it immediately take the necessary steps to fully and accurately
inform General Mihailovic of its views on these matters. Instructions will be
sent to him to pursue a course of action more in line with the attitudes of the
Yugoslav government and His Majesty's Government." You, I am sure, will
understand that if General Mihailovic is unwilling to modify his policy with
respect to both the Italians and his fellow Yugoslavs, Her Majesty's Government
will inevitably have to review its current policy of supporting General
Mihailovic to the exclusion of other responsible movements in Yugoslavia."
Sir George Rendel, British Ambassador to the Yugoslav Government,
delivered the aforementioned note to Prime Minister Jovanovic on April 30,
1943, who then summarized the conversation in an official memorandum. From this
memorandum, it can be deduced that, faced with Churchill's firm stance,
Jovanovic tried to downplay the significance of Mihailovic's actions, claiming
it was "a mere faux pas in a speech," and expressed his suspicion
that, under the pretext of censuring General Mihailovic, there was an attempt
to "strike a blow against the government by gathering everything that
could be imputed to it."
He tried to deflect the discussion from specific, but secondary,
problems by attempting to neutralize British reproaches by complaining about
his own conduct. He alleged that the British had recalled to London certain
officers they favored who had mutinied in early 1942 against the replacement of
senior officers following the formation of Jovanovic's second government. These
rebel officers, along with General Simovic, hung like the sword of Damocles
over Jovanovic's government, representing a potential British alternative to
governing Yugoslavia. Rendell insisted that Churchill had been surprised by the
hostile tone General Mihailovic used against Great Britain, while simultaneously
describing the Italians as his only allies.
Prime Minister Jovanovic's maneuver was ineffective, and the case of
Draza Mihailovic remained at the top of the British-Yugoslav agenda.
Sir George Rendell delivered the note, which we have just summarized, to
President Jovanovic on April 30th, arranging a new meeting for the following
day. At this meeting, Jovanovic informed the British ambassador about the
drafts of the reply to Churchill's note and the telegram to be sent to
Mihailovic on the matter. The minutes of this meeting indicate that Rendell was
generally satisfied with the draft of the note, but objected to the text of the
telegram. The following day, Note SPDVK 33 was delivered to Rendell, along with
the draft of the telegram to Mihailovic, requesting that the British government
make its observations known as soon as possible. On this occasion, Rendell
stated that Jovanovic had been informed at the Foreign Office that further
assistance would be provided to General Mihailovic only on the condition that
he cease collaborating with the Italians and attacking
his own countrymen.
Following these discussions, the Foreign Office sent Yugoslav Prime
Minister Note Y.P. 63, dated April 3, proposing some changes to the telegram to
General Mihailovic and demanding that it be emphasized "that Her Majesty's
Government cannot understand how you could have said that the Italians are your
only source of help," and that "it is extremely concerned by your
statement that you consider the Partisans, Ustaše, Muslims, and Croats as your
principal enemies and that you will turn against the Germans and Italians after
settling accounts with the former." The Foreign Office proposed that
Mihailovic should be made clearly clear that Her Majesty's Government might
re-examine its policy toward him and support another opposing movement.El
primer ministro Jovanovic aceptó las sugestiones británicas y despachó a
Mihailovic el cablegrama D.V.K. Nº 40, cuyos párrafos especiales traducimos del inglés:
"The British Foreign Office has in its possession the text of the
speech you delivered at a local rally on February 28th of this year. In that
speech, there is an entire paragraph filled with attacks on the British
government, which drew its particular attention, especially the part where you said
that the Italians are your only source of help. The British Government took
this statement seriously and lodged its strongest protest. Furthermore, the
British Government is very concerned that you consider the Partisans, Ustaše,
Muslims, and Croats as your main enemies and that you will turn against the
Italians and Germans only after you have settled accounts with the former. The
British Government cannot endorse the view that the main enemies of Yugoslavia,
even more than the Germans and Italians, are its own children, and among them
particularly those who are fighting against the Germans and Italians..."
"We understand that there were times when you could not avoid
encounters with the Partisans, but that cannot justify your collaboration with
the Italians against them. However beneficial Italian aid might seem in the
current circumstances, it would be repaid..." "at
a very high price if it were to jeopardize the much more important and useful
aid that Great Britain is providing us..."
"Bringing the above to your attention, I am writing to you in my
capacity as President of the Yugoslav Government so that, in accordance with
the British officers attached to your headquarters, you will adopt a stance
toward the Italians and partisans that will not make them subject to reproach
from either the British or the Yugoslav Government."
After the negotiations with the Foreign Office were concluded and a
telegram was dispatched to General Mihailovic, President Jovanovic replied to
Prime Minister Churchill's note with his own, SPVK 67, dated April 6, 1943. A
copy of the text of the telegram addressed to General Mihailovic was attached
to this note. Jovanovic shared Churchill's opinion that the Germans and
Italians were the principal enemies and that it would be beneficial to unify
all the resistance groups. He acknowledged the internal conflicts within the
Yugoslav government, but emphasized the unanimous agreement on the necessity of
continuing the fight against the Axis powers.
Thus, the incident was brought to a close, though it created unease and
led to a tense and strained atmosphere in subsequent relations between the
British and General Mihailovic, which, in turn, inevitably affected relations
between the British and Yugoslav governments.
***
Meanwhile, in the spring of 1943, the British were preparing for a
possible invasion of the Balkans, apparently considering several options. One
operation was planned along the eastern Adriatic coast, that is, through
Croatia, and another through Thessaloniki, as in the First World War. A third
alternative combined both operations simultaneously in the aforementioned
territories.
In connection with these preparations, the British government sent a
note to the Yugoslav government on May 7, 1943, informing them that "the
British Military Command is primarily interested in the contribution that the
resistance movements in the occupied countries can make, within their
capabilities, to the conduct of the war." If Mihailovic fulfilled certain
political conditions, he would be sent substantial support for the operation
"in the closest and most continuous cooperation" with the British War
Command. Among the political conditions required was "that all
collaboration with the Italians and General Nedic must end now and forever...
Extraordinary efforts must be made to cooperate against the Axis with other
guerrilla groups in Croatia and Slovenia, and under no circumstances should any
action be taken against the Croats and Slovenes unless they are openly
collaborating with the Axis..."
Based on this note, President Jovanovic drafted a telegram for General
Mihailovic, which he had previously sent to Foreign Minister Anthony Eden as
note SPVK 99, dated May 11, 1943. Minor amendments to the text of Jovanovic's
draft were accepted by the Foreign Office. By telegram No. 1597 of June 11,
1943, General Mihailovic replied to President Jovanovic that he had only
received his telegram No. 306, dated May 12, on May 28, 1943. He reiterated
that he only fights against the communists when they attack him. He is willing
to cooperate with the British Command in the Near East, but he received orders
from the British, through Colonel Bailey, which he cannot accept as grounds for
any discussion. By telegram No. 1958, Mihailovic informed the Yugoslav
government in London on the same day about the content of these orders. We
translate the essential parts from the English below:
"What follows constitutes a detailed operational decision. Its
immediate implementation is required. This decision was taken after a thorough
examination of all available reports and the general instructions of the Chief
of the General Staff of the British Armed Forces. Its execution is extremely
urgent. The decisive factors are as follows: In view of the possible Allied
offensive, Mihailovic must immediately reorganize his forces.
"General Mihailovic does not command a significant fighting force
west of Kopaonik (Mountain in Serbia). His units in Montenegro, Herzegovina,
and Bosnia are either annihilated or collaborating closely with the Axis; It is difficult to assert that his units exist in Croatia,
Slovenia, and Slavonia. He is ordered to concentrate his forces in Serbia,
where he will receive ample support. Separately, the actions of Mihailovic's
commanders in the territory of the Independent State of Croatia are discussed.
The Supreme Command demanded that British radio be used to denounce as traitors
all quislings fighting alongside the Italians, including Major Stanisic,
General Djukanovic, and Mr. Jevdjevic, operational commanders of General
Mihailovic's movement.
In informing President Jovanovic about these orders, General Mihailovic
expressed his opinion on the matter: “The content of the preceding orders
completely contradicts the information from the British Government, which was
forwarded to me through the President of the Yugoslav Government under No. 306
of May 12, 1943. Moreover, these orders from the British Supreme Command in the
Near East are inconsistent with the Constitution of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
and with Yugoslav military regulations. Therefore, I personally cannot respond
to the British Supreme Command in the Near East, as I believe I am not
authorized to do so.” For the reasons stated, I am transmitting these orders to
the Royal Yugoslav Government with the request that the Government and the
Supreme Commander, His Majesty the King, decide on the matter.”
Mihailovic then denounces as intolerable offenses the claims that his
army is practically nonexistent outside of Serbia. He complains of these to the
Royal Yugoslav Government. He rejects the order to “withdraw into exile” his
units in Serbia, which, according to that order, “should hand over the
remaining territory to the communists under the command of the criminal Josip
Broz, known as Tito.” “Only the Royal Yugoslav Government can decide who is a
quisling and who should be attacked by radio.” In such matters, foreigners
should not interfere in the internal affairs of their ally Yugoslavia, the only
one that sacrificed a million lives for freedom in this war.
***
The British government's displeasure with General Mihailovic's conduct
and Churchill's demand that the Yugoslav government modify its policy forced
President Jovanovic and the other Serbian ministers to take steps that would
please the British while simultaneously saving the Chetnik leader's precarious
position, since the entire policy of the Serbian exiles rested on his prestige.
The ministers knew they could only save Mihailovic by remaining in their
ministerial posts; and to maintain their positions, they had to satisfy, at
least in part, the British demands regarding a course correction. Faced with
the choice between Mihailovic or a revision of the
political line, the Serbian politicians opted to abandon their hegemonic
program, replacing it with a program based on the equality of Serbs. Croats and Slovenes.
Opting for this tactical compromise, Prime Minister Jovanovic presented
a draft political declaration to the cabinet in June 1943, written in the
spirit of a policy of equality. Initially approved by the government, it
nevertheless collapsed because Dr. Juraj Krnjevic, a prominent Croatian member,
had expressed doubts about President Jovanovic's ability to implement the
proposed program. This marked the culmination of the crisis of the
"political" governments. Another attempt was made to form a
"political" government under the presidency of Misa Trifunovic,
representative of the Serbian Radical Party, but it fell after only a few
weeks.
It became clear that the disagreements between the Serbian hegemonic
group and other ministers with federalist leanings were insurmountable, to the
point that the exiled government was unable to develop a work program for the
country's recovery after the war.
Subsequently, a "technical" government was formed, headed by
Dr. Bozidar Puric, in which General Mihailovic retained his nominal post as
Minister of the Army and Navy. This government formulated its program in
accordance with the political course inaugurated on January 6, 1929, when King
Alexander had abrogated the Constitution and decreed the theory of the supposed
national unity of Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes. Puric's cabinet also failed to
consolidate its position with the British, as it relied exclusively on
Mihailovic's resistance movement. The favorable course of the war in the
Mediterranean, with the possibility of an invasion of the Balkans via the
Croatian Adriatic coast, and the fact that the communist-led "national
liberation movement" could serve as a useful ally, contributed to the
British government's realization of the unpleasant truth that events in
Yugoslav territory would take a course contrary to its wishes and designs.
Britain's subsequent stance toward General Draza Mihailovic and his
movement is clearly inferred from the memoirs of Prime Minister Winston
Churchill. In his book "The Noose Is Tight," Churchill writes that
the British General Staff in the Near East, "which supported the system of
agents and liaison officers with Mihailovic's supporters," considering him
"the official representative of the resistance against the Germans and of
the Yugoslav government," in May 1943 "took a new course,"
"resolving to send (to Yugoslavia) small groups of British officers and
representatives without full powers for the purpose of establishing links with
the Yugoslav partisans, despite their mortal enmity with the Chetniks and the
fact that Tito, as a communist, was fighting not only against the German troops
but also against the Serbian monarchy and Mihailovic."
The shift in British policy toward Mihailovic was decisive for both him
and the entire Yugoslavia, as from that moment on, the partisans received
Allied aid for their fight against the Axis powers, and shipments to the
Chetniks were suspended. Despite Britain's clear and defined new political
course, Mihailovic did not change his behavior, nor did the Yugoslav
government, now based in Cairo. The Serbian ministers, who held the majority,
stubbornly adhered to their policy of hegemony, thus widening the rift between
the British on one side, and General Mihailovic and the Yugoslav government on
the other, which sooner or later was bound to have disastrous consequences.
Mihailovic's fate was sealed at the Tehran meeting between Roosevelt,
Stalin, and Churchill, held on December 1, 1943. Under the pressure of the
general war situation and the conflicts in Yugoslavia, it was agreed that
henceforth, in the interest of inter-Allied relations and the continuation of
the war, aid would be provided exclusively to Tito's partisans. Prime Minister
Winston Churchill had the unenviable task of communicating the Tehran agreement
to the Yugoslav political representatives in exile. During his stop in Cairo,
he met with King Peter and Dr. Bozidar Puric, then the Yugoslav Prime Minister,
demanding the immediate dismissal of General Mihailovic, since, as he noted in
his memoirs, "the King's only hope of returning to the country was to
secure, with our (British) mediation and without delay, some provisional
agreement with Tito, and that before the partisans further consolidated their
power in the country."
King Peter and President Puric, consistent with their Great Serbian
conception of Yugoslav politics, refused to abandon Mihailovic and his
movement, ignoring Churchill's advice. A few months later, a government crisis
erupted, and under British pressure, the mandate to form a new government was
entrusted to the former Ban of Croatia, Dr. Ivan Subasic. Hoping to find a
compromise between the exiled Yugoslav government and the "national
liberation movement," he negotiated an agreement with Tito.
With the Tehran Agreement, Tito's partisans were recognized as the de
facto Allied army, while General Mihailovic and his movement were definitively
abandoned. Thus, their ultimate tragedy was only a matter of time. The fact
that, at the end of hostilities in their territories, there was only one army
recognized by the Allies, the so-called Liberation Army, controlled and led by
the communists, proved decisive for the postwar fate of the peoples of
Yugoslavia.
Although fate did not lead Father Ratkaj to
California, his compatriot, Fernando Konschak, a member of the Jesuit order,
did, and there he became a distinguished missionary. Fernando Konschak was born
on December 3, 1703, in Varazdin, a few kilometers from Ratkaj's birthplace,
both hailing from the Croatian region of Zagorje. It is interesting to note
that three great Croatian missionaries who served in the New World were born
near Zagreb, the third being Father Joseph Kundek. His hometown of Zagorje, densely
populated, is a region of rolling green hills, vineyards, and small farms,
adorned with castles belonging to ancient noble families, ruined old towns, and
churches and chapels perched atop nearly every hilltop.
Konschak's father, an army officer, came from
the minor nobility. After primary school, Fernando enrolled in the Jesuit college in Varazdin. At the age of 16, in October 1719, he
was accepted as a novice in the Society of Jesus in Trenchin, Slovakia. By 1720
he was a rhetorician, and in 1723 he was ordained a priest in Graz, Austria. He
was first assigned as a teacher to the Jesuit college
in Zagreb in 1726 and later transferred to Budapest. Teaching classical
subjects—humanities studies—he published a book of poems, Nagadia versibus
latinis, in 1726. At this stage of his life, he resolved to become a missionary
among the Native Americans. He waited a full year in Cádiz for passage and in
1730 embarked for America.
From 1730 to 1732 he lived in Veracruz, from
where he sent an important letter to his provincial superior in Vienna. In
1697, Father Juan María Salvatierra established the first permanent Spanish
settlement and Jesuit mission in California at Loreto. However, the key figure
in the founding of a chain of Jesuit missions in Baja California was Father
Francisco Kino. He was with Ratkaj's group when more than 20 Jesuit
missionaries were shipwrecked in the port of Cádiz and arrived in Mexico eight
months after Ratkaj. He founded several missions in northern Mexico, Arizona,
and Baja California. Like many of his followers, he was not only a missionary
but also an explorer, astronomer, cartographer, mission builder, rancher, and
defender of the frontier. At the time, all Spanish geographers firmly believed
that Baja California was an island. In 1702, Kino explored the territory
northward and confirmed its peninsular status.
In his visionary plans for the conquest of
California, he intended to provide Baja California with a route around the Gulf
to connect the missions and settlements in Sonora and elsewhere with those in
California. Proving that California is a peninsula was of paramount importance
for further expansion into Baja and Alta California. Father Kino died in 1711.
After his death, the misconception that California is an island persisted, so
Father Juan de Ugarte undertook a new exploration and in 1721 confirmed once
again that California is not an island but a peninsula.
In the early decades of the 18th century, there was a great shortage of
missionaries. Then came a religious awakening. A group
of German, Bohemian, and Spanish volunteer missionaries came to fill this void.
They came despite the fact that some of their predecessors had been killed by
the indigenous people. Each of the martyrs was replaced by new, enthusiastic
missionaries. In early 1733, Father Sistiaga, Ugarte's successor, returned to
his mission with a new missionary, recently arrived from Europe, Reverend
Konschak. The old missions of Kino were restored, and new ones were founded.
Not even a new indigenous uprising in 1734, which resulted in the murder of two
more Jesuits, could halt this process.
To avoid unnecessary confusion regarding Konschak's surname, it is worth
remembering that, according to the prevailing custom in the Spanish colonies in
America, the surnames of European missionaries were adapted to the phonetic and
morphological forms of the Castilian language. Because of this practice, it is
sometimes difficult to determine the nationality of these architects of
civilization and progress. J. Bryan Clinch argues that Kino's true surname was
Kühn. The same occurred with Konscak's Croatian surname (to maintain phonetic
equivalence, we spell it Konschak in this work), which underwent several
modifications. Perhaps no foreign surname was spelled with as many variations
as his. The authors Krmpotic, Dunne, Bancroft, and Decorme addressed how the
surname Konschak should be correctly spelled.
Krmpotic mentions variations such as Consago, Konsak, Conssag, and
Konshak. Bankcroft adds Konsag and Konschak, the first being a Spanish
derivation and the second Germanic. Dunne cites the surnames Konscak (as in its
original Croatian), Konsag, Consago, and Consag. In Decorme's Mexican work,
Konzag, Conzag, and Konschak appear. In the "Noticia de la
California," which we will discuss later, the Croatian missionary's name
is written as Consag and Gonsag, and in some works it appears as Gonzago.
Consag is the form most authors use, and this is based on good reason: the
missionary himself signed his name that way, as can be seen in the Book of
Marriages and Deaths of Santa Rosalía Mulege. However, the form González, as
some Croatian and American authors erroneously claim in their articles about
Konschak, appears in none of the writings.
When he began his missionary work, the San Ignacio outpost was the
northernmost mission. For years, Konschak lived as a typical missionary and
colonist. Besides the spiritual work of educating the indigenous people,
guiding the catechumens, and teaching them various trades, Konschak had to
fulfill numerous administrative tasks for his mission settlement.
He also dedicated himself to scientific pursuits, especially
geographical explorations, and quite successfully so. In this sense, the year
1746 is very important in his life and also holds historical significance for
California. Father Kino had already confirmed that Baja California is not an
island, as previously believed, but a peninsula. However, the official Spanish
opinion regarding the insular nature of California continued to prevail. To
provide conclusive proof of this and establish a land route to the mainland,
Father Cristoval de Escobar, at the request of the royal ministry, sent
Konschak on an exploratory voyage to re-examine the Gulf, reach the north as
far as the Colorado River, and provide irrefutable proof of California's
peninsular formation.
Accompanied by soldiers and Native Americans from the Jesuit missions,
Konchak departed Loreto on June 9, 1746. His arduous journey along the Gulf
Coast to the Colorado River lasted until July 25. He charted the mouth of the
Colorado River at the Gulf, thereby proving that California is connected to the
mainland and not separated by the ocean, as had been stubbornly maintained.
Upon returning to the mission outpost of San Ignacio, Fernando Konchak
summarized his feat in a letter to Father Visitor Baltasar (dated San Ignacio,
October 31, 1746). He drew a good map that reflected the peninsular character
of California and titled it: "Shloo of California,
and its eastern coast newly discovered and recorded from Cape Virgenes to its
terminus, which is the Colorado River, in the year 1747 by Father Ferdinando
Cansag of the Company of Jesus, Missionary in California."
The Jesuit authorities sent his diary and map to Madrid, where royal
advisors tried to refute it. Juan de Ulloa used all his imagination to deny the
validity of Konschak's report, but ultimately failed. It was Konschak, then,
who dealt the final blow to the theory that California is an island. Later, by
royal decree, the new geographical fact that California "is not an island
but mainland" was officially confirmed, bordering New Mexico to the north.
H. H. Bancroft describes Konschak's 1746 exploration as the most
significant event of that period, while another scholar of that era emphasizes
that the conclusive proof provided by Konschak regarding the peninsular nature
of California contributed to the development of important land routes and,
consequently, to the conquest of that entire important territory. Jacobo
Sedelmayr, a contemporary of the Croatian missionary who worked in the Primeria
region, wrote a letter in 1747 to his rector, José de Echeverría, from which we
transcribe the following paragraph:
"Father Fernando (Konschak) provided us with the desired
information that California is a peninsula. Although Father Eusebio Francisco
Kino saw it and constantly affirmed the same thing, because Father Agustín de
Campos contradicted him, the matter remained in doubt, which is now
resolved."
The map that Father Konschak prepared and submitted to the authorities
served as the basis for all other maps and charts of the Gulf of California
shores well into the 20th century. A copy of this map is held in the British
Museum and another in the Archives of Spain.
Konschak's 1746 diary was first published in Teatro Americano in Mexico
City. It was reprinted in abridged form in the well-known publication
Apostólicos Afanes, which was published anonymously in Barcelona in 1754. Then,
in 1887, it appeared in the Mexican edition Historia de Nayarit, Sonora, Sinaloa,
y ambas Californias, whose author was Father José Ortega. In the introduction
to the new Mexican edition of 1944, Juan B. Iguinis
proved that of the three books of Afanes, only the first was written by Ortega.
The following two volumes, which deal with the explorations of Kino, Keller,
Sedelmayr, and Konschak, were written by the Jesuit Visitor and Provincial Juan
Antonio Baltasar. Francisco Zevallos, after Konschak's death, maintained in his
work *Vida del P. Fernando Konschak* that Konschak had
written *Apostólicos Afanes*, an assertion that Bancroft, who read Zevallos's
manuscript in Mexico City, refuted.
In the first and most important work on California, *Noticia de
California*, compiled by Miguel Venegas, a learned Jesuit missionary working in
Mexico and California, Konschak's diary and map were published in 1767 with
their lengthy titles.
In an interesting note written by the editor, Father Venegas, added to
the end of Konschak's diary, the historical importance of his exploration is
highlighted, definitively proving the fact "that California is a
peninsula, joined to the continent of America."
Two years after his celebrated exploration, in 1748, Father Konschak was
appointed visitor of all the mission stations in California. The history of
this period tells us that there were then 10 to 15 Jesuit missions in
California. Konschak, superior of these missions, brimming with vigor and new
ambitions, dedicated himself to exploring the region, hoping to find suitable
locations for new mission settlements.
According to Father Dunn, in one of his laudatory reports, Konschak was
very active from his arrival in San Ignacio and that "his Croatian energy
would not have allowed him to rest or even work any less rapidly." In just
a few years, he baptized 548 Cochimí. During 1740, he extended "an even
wider ring to the north," explored the terrain, examined the prevailing
conditions, and discovered vital water springs without which no mission could
be founded in the Californian desert.
By 1751, he had instructed 448 more Native Americans with whom he hoped
to found a new mission. Another California historian, even before Bancroft,
Bolton, and Dunne, paid tribute to the Croatian priest, praising his
intelligent pursuit of plans related to the further colonization and conquest
of Baja California. The missionary, now visitor of all the Jesuit missions in
California, diligently compiled all information concerning the geography,
orographic features, races, and tribes.
In 1748, Father Konschak wrote a document entitled "The Life and
Works of Father Antonio Tempis." It is, in fact, a long letter, dated in
San Ignacio, October 1, 1748, and addressed to his superiors in the order in
Mexico. Following the custom of that time of writing a report on the life and
works of deceased missionaries, Konschak wrote a report on the life and works
of Father Tempis, a Bohemian native of Olmutz, who died in Santiago,
California, on July 6, 1746. This report was written after Konschak's death by
his provincial, Father Francisco Zevallos.
With the purpose of finding suitable locations for new mission posts,
Father Konschak undertook another long expedition in 1751. He left San Ignacio
on May 22, accompanied by Captain Fernando Rivera, some soldiers, and about one
hundred indigenous neophytes. They traveled through the Sierra Nevada and the
arid valleys of the Pacific coast until they reached a point at 30 degrees
latitude. Konschak befriended many Native Americans and baptized some dying
children, but he found no suitable place in those dry regions to establish a
new mission. The expedition returned on July 8 to the ranchería of Piedad near
San Ignacio. In Dunne's opinion, the enduring mystery surrounding California
spurred this second great Jesuit exploration.
In 1752, Konschak began construction of a new mission, located 29 miles
from San Ignacio at 28° 3' north latitude and 113° 5' west longitude. It was
named Santa Gertrudis. When the German Jesuit, Father Jorge Retz, took charge,
there were more than 600 neophytes instructed and baptized by Father Konschak.
According to North, this mission began as early as 1751, and Decorme
confirms this assessment by citing the first baptismal record as dated July 16,
1751. Thinking about the future of the missions and trusting that one day all
of California would be baptized, including all the tribes he had encountered on
his last expedition, Konschak was nevertheless alarmed by some serious issues
for which he hoped to find a solution.
"It is a pity that the conquest of this very poor and needy
peninsula must be interrupted due to the lack of provisions necessary to
support the evangelical ministers. The resources provided by the piety of the
gentlemen and ladies, eager to save so many souls, have been entirely employed
in the missions already established and maintained to this day. May Our Lady of
Loreto, patroness of California, move the hearts of the devout so that, with
their wealth, they may supply the provisions denied them by this barren and
rugged region."
The success and prosperity of Santa Gertrudis spurred Father Konschak to
seek other locations to establish a chain of missions toward San Diego. In
1753, he undertook a new exploration of the peninsula's western coast as far
south as 31° latitude. He was well received by the natives and brought numerous
Indians to Santa Gertrudis.
Repeatedly, he and Father Retz ventured deep into the wilderness,
exploring in all directions for water and arable land. On these frequent
journeys of 200 or 300 miles, he was often in danger of dying of thirst.
Endless stretches of sand and mountains were traversed by Konschak and Retz
with very little success. In 1753, they found an alkaline spring 200 miles from
Santa Gertrudis, but it was too far to establish a mission post without an
intermediate station. Five years passed before another water source was
discovered 90 miles from Santa Gertrudis, at a place called Adac by the
natives. As tireless as Konschak was, he wanted to establish a mission there
under the name of Saint Francis Borgia, and the necessary endowment was provided
by Maria de Borja, later Duchess of Gandia. However, Konschak was unable to
complete his final undertaking, as he died on September 10, 1759. This mission
was founded three years later by Father Retz.
Great was the work accomplished in California by this distinguished and
selfless missionary. Although he was 55 years old when
he died, Konschak was a veteran of many years in the missions. He spent 39
years in the Society of Jesus, and of these, 29 as a
missionary in America. In San Ignacio, which is still preserved in all its
beauty as a relic of those glorious times when the priests colonized the
peninsula, he had spent 22 years. In addition to founding new missions, he
cooperated in the establishment of the mining town of San Antonio Real in 1748.
It is remarkable, notes one author, that Konschak and other missionaries were
able to endure the routine of desert life for so many years. Such a lifestyle
undoubtedly hastened his premature death at the age of 56.
Another author calls him "the tireless Consag," emphasizing
his "exemplary virtues and apostolic labors," for which
"Consag's name deserves to be included among the most illustrious in
California."
Bancroft was the first among renowned non-American historians to
recognize Konschak's multifaceted work and paid him due tribute, calling him a
great missionary, explorer, and colonizer. Bolton honors him as one of the
European missionaries who played a distinguished role in "the
transplantation of Christian culture to the American West." In the Mexican
work of G. Decorme, S.J., Konschak is described as a great missionary, "a
great apostle," "the most prominent figure" in the last period
of Jesuit missionary activities in California.
Father P. M. Dunne, S.J., in his work Black Robes in Lower California, pays
great tribute to the "famous Consag" of California. He emphasizes, as
he does in other works, that Konschak was Croatian and that he should be
considered among the greatest explorers of California.
A recent French work distinguishes Konschak—his name is cited in three
forms: Konsag, Consag, and Gonzago—as the successor to the great Eusebio Kino
in the exploration of California. Indeed, according to this assessment,
Konschak was the first to systematically explore California, and his map was
the first scientific map of California.
Beyond the activities we have discussed in the preceding paragraphs,
Konschak was a linguist. He knew several indigenous dialects, which facilitated
his contact with the natives he loved so much. His native language was Croatian,
but as an 18th-century priest and intellectual, he had a thorough knowledge of
Latin. Furthermore, he spoke and wrote German, Spanish, and French. A great
expert in mathematics, he was equally versed in geography and geology, and also
possessed extensive knowledge of the construction of mines, roads, and dams.
First and foremost, of course, he was a missionary, and we can attest that he
baptized—according to the records—at least 996 Native Americans. As Dunne
mentions, in the northern part of the Gulf of California there are rock
formations—Consag Rocks—that still bear the explorer's name.
His fellow countryman, Bishop Martin Davorin Krmpotic, published the
first and only English version of Konschak's Life, written by the provincial,
Father Francisco Zevallos, after the Croatian explorer's death. Zevallos
(spelled Ceballos in some Mexican sources) speaks highly of the missionary. He
states that "Father Fernando was Croatian by birth. He was born in the
city of Varaždin in Croatia." Then, after a detailed biographical sketch,
he emphasizes that Konschak spoke the indigenous language as well as the
natives. "With remarkable regularity, he combined admirable veneration and
devotion by offering daily that tremendous sacrifice (the Holy Mass) to God.
Despite their insensitivity, the Indians were moved by Father Konsag's
celebration of Mass. He incessantly desired to catechize and baptize, 'and if
possible, convert all of California.' He proceeded in a superb manner to
attract the Indians and win them to the Faith of Christ. With resolve, he
undertook works that seemed impossible to accomplish. He made journeys fraught
with danger. Nothing could discourage him; 'judging that what he undertook
would be for the greater glory of God, he did it fearlessly.' His death deeply
impressed the Indians, who came from afar, sobbing and weeping aloud, to see
their beloved father. Long after his death, the Indians would come to his grave
in San Ignacio and pray.
Adamic, in his book A Nation of Nations, p. 235, states It is a mistake to claim that the Spanish changed the name
Konschak to González; he does not appear as González in any document. Roucek
writes in his *Our Racial and National Minorities* (p. 246) that Konschak was
known as González, which contradicts the truth. Furthermore, his assertion that
Konschak made the first known geographical map of Baja California is a blatant
denial of historical facts, since Kino was the first to map Baja California.
Bonifacio Soric was the only one to publish Konschak's original map in his
*Centennial*, as preserved in the photostatic
reproduction at the Library of Congress in Washington.
In 1959, the bicentennial of Father Konschak's death was commemorated.
The author of this modest work on the life and missionary work of this
extraordinary man would like to pay him the tribute he deserves. At the same
time, it should be emphasized that Father Konschak's work is part of the
contribution that Croatian immigrants contributed to the colonization and
progress of the Americas. Konschak, to some extent, continued Ratkaj's work,
although it is unknown whether he was aware of his compatriot's life and
missionary work.
In summarizing Father Konschak's life and missionary work, it would be
superfluous to repeat that he was the one who mapped out what would later
become the Camino Real, since without his splendid organization and maps, Father Serra y Portolá would not have been able to
undertake his great work so soon. The beginning of the state of California
would have been delayed.
During this period, he executed several sculptures, more than 25 large
pieces including portraits, saints, religious themes, nude figures, and
original compositions. The largest work exhibited at the Secession Salon in
1904 was a plaster model entitled At the Fountain of Life, depicting several
intertwined, nude symbolic figures: Love, Youth, and Old Age, all thirsting for
the water of Life.
The Zagreb municipality acquired this composition in 1910 and placed it
in the square in front of the National Theatre. For Carl Wittgenstein,
Mestrovic executed another version: At the Spring of Life, with universal
symbolism, and with the money he earned, he traveled to Italy and then to
France. From the same period date several compositions of daring and original
content: Timor Dei, a sculpture of an enormous bare foot with tense muscles and
convulsing toes; A relief symbolizing the old legend
surrounding the Skadar Building, with a woman impaled by fate on the city
walls; the monument to the Croatian Romantic poet Luka Botic, erected in Split.
The following decade, or the second period of Mestrovic's art (1904-1914),
inspired by the national and epic motifs of the South Slavs, is characterized
by its grandeur, its pathetic, vigorous, and passionate forms. This cycle is
also often called the Kosovo cycle, the realization of which was Mestrovic's
youthful dream, born from folk poetry. His plan was to erect a
"temple," a mausoleum, in commemoration of the Battle of Kosovo
(1389), in which many Christian fighters perished against the Ottoman
conquerors. The legends and folk poetry he heard as a child inspired an epic
style, devoid of religious content. It also coincided with the Balkan Wars, a
prelude to the First World War.
Mestrovic's project to erect a national shrine had several precedents,
from antiquity and the Roman Pantheon to the neoclassical Pantheon in Paris and
the Vaihalla near Regensburg in Germany. Rodin himself addressed patriotic
themes, such as in The Citizens of Calais. Moreover, this first architectural
and sculptural ensemble by Mestrovic was destined to fail, as was his youthful
dream of uniting the South Slavic peoples, so disparate and antagonistic from a
political, cultural, historical, and religious standpoint. Besides lacking
unity and harmony, the construction of the pantheon was stubbornly resisted by
the Byzantine-minded Serbs, who repudiated and abhorred statuary in general in
churches and, moreover, many of the classical, Gothic, and Renaissance elements
contained in the project, not to mention the very concept, which was alien to
them, rooted in Catholicism and Western traditions.
Mestrovic exhibited in Paris in 1905 at the Salon d'Automne, and his
works aroused particular interest from the elderly Rodin. From that time on, a
close friendship and mutual admiration united them. His first major exhibition
took place at the Vienna Secession, comprising more than fifty sculptures of
varying sizes, mostly related to his project for the Kosovo temple. Art critics
and historians such as Arthur Roessler and Joseph Strzygowski praised the
vigor, originality, and technical mastery of the figures and materials,
particularly highlighting the artistic and symbolic value of Widows, Memories,
and Widow with Child.
The same exhibition was held a year later in Zagreb, the capital of
Croatia. Portraits of his parents, a complete expression of the authentic
peasant type—plain, simple, suffering, and kind—also date from this period. The
following year, Mestrovic exhibited the same group at the International
Exhibition in Rome, which brought him worldwide fame and awarded him first
prize. This period of Mestrovic's art is characterized by vigorous expression,
grandeur, monumentality, and heroic patriotic themes drawn from the history and
epics of both Croatia and other South Slavic peoples.
During the First World War, he lived in exile in Italy, France, and England,
alternating his sculptural work with political activity. He undertook less
ambitious projects, including several religious themes: crucifixes, Pietàs,
Saint John the Baptist, and busts of Leonardo Bistolfi and the elderly Rodin.
In 1915, he exhibited at the Albert Museum in London and in several other
cities in the United Kingdom. British critics highlighted the powerful élan,
dynamic forms, and architectural adaptability of his sculptures.
In addition to numerous portraits and busts created during the war,
Mestrovic began to increasingly focus on religious themes, moving from national
and local motifs to universal subjects, expressing the intrinsically human
ideals of freedom, justice, charity, and kindness. Along with his superb
relief, Archers of Domagoj (a medieval Croatian prince), he carved an elongated
wooden crucifix and created the first panel of his cycle of the Life and
Passion of Christ, which he would complete after the Second World War. The
devastation, tragedies, and suffering caused by the war find their profound
expression in the Pietàs and Virgins with Child.
His statuary of a national character runs parallel to biblical and
evangelical motifs and figures: Prophets and various Moseses, symbols of the
moral authority of the law. His style enters a new phase, imbuing his movements
with elongated forms and designs reminiscent of archaic Byzantine art. A
heart-rending pain and the contortion of faces and figures give his new
creations a spiritual and sublimated expression unknown in his earlier, more
realistic and naturalistic works. With the end of the First World War,
Mestrovic's creative maturity begins.
With feverish zeal, he dedicates himself to the realization of his
projects. Monuments and statues of the heroes and illustrious figures of
Croatian history emerge. First and foremost, the monumental votive chapel of
Our Lady of the Rosary stands out. Our Lady of the Angels—the Racic family
mausoleum—is built on the small peninsula, nestled among cypress trees and
overlooking the Adriatic Sea. This church, designed and built by Mestrovic,
contains several of his sculptures and bas-reliefs, in a new style
characterized by greater purification and spirituality. In 1919, he held a
major exhibition at the Petit Palais in Paris.
Then, in 1924–1925, he organized exhibitions in New York (Brooklyn
Museum), Chicago (Art Institute), Detroit, Buffalo, and other North American
cities. On this occasion, the city of Chicago commissioned him to create two
equestrian statues of Native Americans for Grand Park. The following year, he
executed the monument to Gregory, the medieval Croatian bishop of Nin, which he
gifted to the city of Split. At the same time, Mestrovic directed the Academy
of Fine Arts in Zagreb, injecting new energy into the institution and elevating
its prestige. Under his guidance and direction, several talented young artists
were developing their skills.
In 1930, in addition to the powerfully expressive equestrian statue of
Simón Bolívar, he designed and built his magnificent residence in Split, a
combination of various styles that harmonize with the enchanting seaside
landscape and the stark mountains in the background. He furnished his mansion
with numerous sculptures and paintings, which he later donated, along with his
Zagreb gallery, to the Croatian people. His glory and renown reached their
zenith. The sculptor imbued his compositions with greater synthesis and
restraint, fully realized in the impressive marble sculpture Croatian History.
In 1933, the French government organized a solo exhibition of
Mestrovic's works at the Jeu de Paume. The same exhibition was subsequently
presented in Prague, Berlin, Munich, Vienna, and Graz. In the following years,
he designed and executed the Monument to the Unknown Soldier, erected on Avala
Hill, not far from Belgrade. In Otavice, to honor the memory of his parents, he
built the Chapel of Saint Redeemer, adorning it with exquisite statues and
superb reliefs and bas-reliefs.
He participated in the restoration of the old Church of St. Mark,
located in the old part of Zagreb. For the high altar, he created a large,
elongated, and stylized Crucifix, and for the side altars, the Virgin and Child
and the Pietà, all bronze statues. In stone, he sculpted the figure of St.
Mark, patron saint of the church, "The Redeemer at the Tomb,"
"The Carol," and a triptych depicting the Annunciation, the Nativity,
and the Presentation of the Child Jesus in the Temple.
Around the same time as this work, Mestrovic designed a memorial church
dedicated to Our Lady in Biskupija, a modest village near his birthplace. The
church was built in memory of the medieval Croatian king Zvonimir and very
close to the site of an eleventh-century Catholic church
built in the Croatian medieval style. This small church resembles the style of
old Croatian basilicas.
Mestrovic adorned the church with several statues, including a marble
Virgin and Child (the Virgin dressed as a peasant woman from the region) and a
figure of Christ the King placed above the portal. The church was desecrated and
damaged, and the sculptures destroyed, during the last war by Serbian
nationalist guerrillas under Draza Mihailovic, who, in their hatred and
anti-Catholic and anti-Croatian proselytizing, did not hesitate to destroy the
works of the sculptor, who had glorified and popularized so many outstanding
figures and episodes in Serbian national history.
During this period, Mestrovic, among other commissions, designed and
created the monument to the Romanian statesman Ion Bratianu, erected in
Bucharest. For the same city, he made two large equestrian statues in bronze,
one of King Carol I and the other of King Ferdinand I. When the Russians
occupied Bucharest in 1944, they dismantled both statues. Two years before the
outbreak of World War II, Mestrovic decided to return to Split and complete the
cycle of bas-reliefs with Gospel themes, begun during World War I.
To provide a suitable space and setting for these works, Mestrovic
rebuilt a chapel in an ancient, primitive style on a small promontory, along
with a cloister, using stones he found there from the partially ruined chapel
and cloister dating back to the 12th century. Once the architectural structure
was complete, Mestrovic placed the completed wooden bas-reliefs in the chapel,
adding statues of Christ, the Virgin Mary, the Evangelists, and the central
figure of Saint John of the Apocalypse. In addition to these, Mestrovic
designed several other architectural structures, including the Fine Arts
Pavilion in Zagreb and the Votive Church of Christ the King, built to
commemorate the millennium of the founding of the Croatian kingdom.
In 1942, he was given a dignified representation in the Pavilion of the
Independent State of Croatia at the Venice Biennale. He then moved to Rome,
where he executed a bust of Pope Pius XII, several pieces for the Croatian
Institute of St. Jerome in Rome, a large-scale Pietà, and the expressive and
monumental relief Stigmata of St. Francis for the church of Santa Maria
Mediatrice. Shortly afterward, he moved to Switzerland, where he resided for
three years, partly in Lausanne and partly in Geneva. After the war, despite
the depressing nostalgia and Tito's flattering calls to return to his country
and continue his work, he refused to go back to his homeland, enslaved,
deprived of national freedom and human rights.
The unspeakable suffering and tragedies unleashed by the Second World
War, which he experienced firsthand, constituted the starting point of a new
style, a new vision and approach in Mestrovic's work, fully reflected in the
solo exhibition of his sculptures held in 1947 at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York. It was the first time in the annals of the Metropolitan Museum
that a sculptor was honored with a living exhibition. The figure of Job,
twisted and torn by pain, was no longer a poetic expression of the sculptor but
a testament to the many tragedies and horrors of war.
The religious character of his art became increasingly pronounced, more
spiritualized; more stripped of the anecdotal and episodic; it became a pure symbol,
an embodied message of human and Christian values. From this period, several
studies of the Evangelists, the statue of Saint Francis, the sorrowful Pietà,
and above all, the Women at the Foot of the Cross are notable.
In 1947, Mestrovic was appointed Professor of Fine Arts at Syracuse
University, New York, and from 1955 until his death, he held the same
professorship at the University of Notre Dame, South
Bend.
One of the distinctive features of Mestrovic's portraits is his emphasis
on expressive character. Hence his interest in prominent figures, both biblical
and historical, national, and universal; hence also his numerous studies of
Saint Jerome, his compatriot and Patriarch of the Church; the figure of Pope
Sixtus V, reformer and builder, who completed St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, of
Croatian descent and patron of the Croatian hospice in Rome; and several
portraits of his close friend, the great and righteous Cardinal Louis Stepinac.
The previous muscular tension gives way to spiritual ecstasy (Mary
Magdalene at the foot of the Cross). Instead of the contorted forms of his
primitive Widows from the Kosovo cycle, we find exquisite movement in Psyche
and Persephone Supplicant. The classical figure of Venus takes on a less pagan
and sensual interpretation.
The list of works Mestrovic produced in the United States is impressive.
It includes the project for the enormous monument dedicated to the Jews,
victims of racial persecution; numerous statues for American churches,
institutes, and schools; as well as several portraits, busts, and the gigantic
and magnificent Pietà. He also executed the monuments of Mila Gojsalic, Andrija
Kacic Miosic, Saint John the Baptist, Saint Anthony, and others that he gifted
to the Croatian people. He also created the monument to the Montenegrin poet
Petar Njegos and to Father López de Mendoza, who in 1565 celebrated the first
Mass in what is now the United States. These monuments, the work and gift of
this great son of Croatia, will remain for centuries as a testament to, and an
inspiration for, the spirit of freedom that lies dormant and vigilant behind
the iron curtain of silence imposed by the communists.
After the many uncertain paths taken by experimental art in our century,
and after the recent consecration of abstract art, the powerful figure of
Mestrovic stands like a leafy, ancient tree, rich in fruit and firmly rooted.
Although many may see him as a survivor of "a world dreamed up in the
classical manner," no one who appreciates sculptural values
will deny his historical importance and greatness. Mestrovic
never attempted to distance himself from the past for the mere sake of a
fashionable contemporary conception. There is a clear affinity between pre-classical
and classical sculpture in Mestrovic's vast artistic repertoire and
"mythology." However, if the past is revived in the present through
his extensive statuary, many elements of the future are also present, to such
an extent that his early works had an avant-garde character.
Mestrovic's masterpieces, especially his religious themes, possess a
timeless quality and are not dependent on any one style or artistic expression.
More than the art of the classical periods, he was drawn to the archaic art of
the Assyrians, Egyptians, Crete, and Mycenaeans, the early Hellenic art before
the time of Pericles, and the Romanesque and Gothic art of the Middle Ages, due
to their universal character and their religious, ethical, and Higher-order
social forces, with the impulse that elevates humankind toward God. As their
worldview expands, individual aspirations and sufferings are expressed in epic
terms, becoming perennial and monumental, stripped of all incidental and
literary elements. In the newest cycle of this giant, on par with Michelangelo
and Rodin, refined expression, spiritualized matter, and lyrical elevation are
manifested to the highest degree.
A Case of Extermination of the Muslim Population in Yugoslavia
In the article "On the Nationality of the
Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina" in Issue No. 3-4, Year II of our
journal, Professor Dinko A. Tomasic refers (pp. 178-9) to the case of the
horrific extermination of the Muslim population of Pavino Polje and Sehovic by
Orthodox fanatics, described by the Montenegrin politician and writer Milovan Djilas
in his book "Land Without Justice" (Editorial Sudamericana, Buenos
Aires, 1959). For documentary purposes, we transcribe a few pages from this
book.
On pp. 91-93, Djilas refers to the atrocities
committed in regions with Muslim populations, where power, after the defeat of
Austria-Hungary in 1918, fell into the hands of the Montenegrins.
"It was as if a tremendous fury, a great
fire, had suddenly swept through the entire region. Everyone rose up—young and
old, women and even children—to plunder the Muslims in Sandzak. Even men who
were not easily strayed, who had led lives of righteousness and austerity, lost
their heads. Many felt not the desire to gain, but merely the fear of being
left behind, of not allowing someone else to keep something they themselves
could seize. Everyone knew that this kind of theft was a sin, but everyone
persisted as if afraid of losing something great and fatal. It was like a mass
migration or a religious frenzy.
Even those who opposed the pillaging and tried
to persuade others not to give in to the looting, gave
in to it themselves, for nothing could be done to stop or guide the events. Men
came from other regions, from all over Montenegro, driven,
it seemed, by some irresistible instinct, by an exciting scent." “Not even
my mother refrained, although she always said that stolen goods are cursed and
that no one ever found happiness in looting. In truth, she never took part in
open theft. Her sights were set on wheat. The guerrillas were distributing
goods from an Austrian depot in Bijelo Polje, and our house, which had always
been hospitable to the guerrillas, received a good quantity, supplemented by a
Muslim driver. But the driver was snatched from my mother's hands and
murdered.”
All of this is merely a retelling of what happened
during the last century, when the Montenegrins conquered the city of Kolasin,
which had been under Turkish control. This is what pp. 37-39 and 144-45 refer
to.
"My father's brothers, who were already
married, built mud houses on the new land, the former estate of a beg, and began a new life. But in the village itself,
there wasn't enough land for my father. The village land had already been
distributed among the new settlers who, after the war of 1875-77, had descended
from the mountains toward the Muslim holdings like hungry wolves upon a flock
of sheep."
"Almost all the land in Kolasin had been
taken from the Muslims, whom the Montenegrins killed or expelled after their
victory. Even their cemeteries were leveled and plowed: The bloody enmity between
the two faiths had been so great that the Muslims themselves withdrew,
abandoning their homes and farms..."
"The Muslim houses and mosques had
already been demolished, and their cemeteries leveled as if they had never
lived or ruled there. Not a single Muslim remained in the town or the entire
region." In 1942, the victims were the villages of Pavino Polje and
Sekovici. The event that sparked the massacre of Muslims was the ambush and
murder of a Montenegrin, Bosko Boskovic, by fellow Montenegrins. But, as Djilas
(pp. 190-95) points out, the murder had taken place in Sandzak, on the other
side of the Tara River, long a bloody border between two faiths. Consequently,
it was not difficult to incite the masses to a punitive massacre of Muslims.
"Some politicians wished to weaken the strength and unity of the
Muslims, who were banding together after their setbacks during the war. And
they incited the uprising populace to organize a crusade against the
Muslims."
"Immediately after Bosko's burial, without any special
consultation, the Poljani brothers and others with them took their hidden
rifles and marched against the Muslims. Half of them were unarmed, but weapons
were unnecessary. The Muslim population against whom they marched was also
unarmed, and most of them were not warriors, except for those who lived along
the original border, the Tara; most of whom had moved inland in 1912 (or 1918).
The Montenegrins were not particularly organized. They spontaneously placed
themselves under the command of the former officers, now retired, with whom
they had marched and whom they involved in the raid."
"There was never a campaign like this, nor is it possible to
imagine that such a thing latent in what is called the national soul. The
pillaging of 1918 was child's play compared to this: Most of the crusaders were
ashamed afterward of what happened and what they did. But... they did it. My
father intervened, although he was not particularly given to cruelty, no more
so than any other Montenegrin. He never wanted to talk about it..."
"The police officers in the small town beyond the Tara, as well as
the civil authorities in the communities, were almost all Montenegrins, and
they were in the hands of the rioting mobs. In Sahovici, the authorities
informed the gendarmes that a group of Muslims, in custody under the pretext
that their lives were in danger, were being transferred to Bijelo Polje. The
Montenegrins waited for them at a convenient location and murdered them near
the cemetery in Sahovici. About fifty prominent Muslims were killed. A similar
attempt was made against the Muslims of Bijelo Polje, a working-class town and
peaceful. They too were taken to Sahovici with safe passage. But at the last
minute, a Serbian army officer prevented treachery and murder.
"The destruction of Muslim settlements and the killing of Muslims
reached such proportions that the army was sent to intervene; the police
authorities remained passive and insecure. The incident devolved into a
small-scale religious war, but one in which people died on both sides. If it is
true, as a rumor later claimed, that Belgrade wished to exert pressure on the
Muslim party, which is quite likely, the affair turned out to be much larger
than expected. Neither Belgrade nor the leaders of the mob could control it."
"Despite all this, some did not lose their lives. Following the
tradition of their ancestors, the mob killed only males over the age of ten, or
fifteen, or eighteen, depending on the mercy of the murderers. Amid the
pillaging and looting, there were also rapes, unheard of among the ancient
Montenegrins." "No sooner had the army appeared than the crowd
realized the situation was serious and immediately withdrew. After that, the
Muslim villages slowly declined; the Muslims of that region began to emigrate to Turkey, selling their lands for next to nothing.
The Sahovici district and part of Bijelo Polje were emptied, partly as a result
of the massacre and partly out of fear. The Muslims were replaced by
Montenegrins."
"The affair produced general horror, even among those who had
devised it. My older brother and I felt genuine dread. We blamed our father for
being one of the leaders of the riot. He himself used to say afterward that it
was good fortune. Besides, there were many unsettled scores from days gone by.
Carefully chosen assassins waited six days and six nights for Bosko in the same
place... But the leaders who organized the crime didn't lift a finger to
prevent the slaughter of the Muslims. They understood that the crime of Bosko's
murder was just a pretext, and they secretly rejoiced that Bosko and the
Muslims were eliminated in the same sweep."
"Sekula, the one who had severed the tendons of the Muslims, hated
the Turks more out of innate hatred than criminal tendencies. He, too, was
dissatisfied with the political situation and detested the existing forces, the
gendarmes. He felt that his sacrifices and exploits during the war went
unrewarded. He had previously robbed and killed Muslims in secret. He was not
alone in this; neither he nor the others felt the slightest remorse. However,
he stood out for his cold hatred, of which he was proud. He reveled in it...
Yet, there is no reason to suppose that he wished to tarnish his Serbian faith
and his Montenegrin name. He simply considered the Muslims, whom he called
Turks, as naturally responsible for all evil and felt it his inescapable duty
to avenge himself against this foreign creed and eradicate it. He considered
anyone who missed an opportunity to do so a traitor."
" What Djilas described has
little to do with religion and even less with the spirit of the Crusades, which
was completely foreign to dissenting Eastern Christians. Djilas himself
maintains that his Montenegrins "hardly know the Bible; Njegos's poem
served as their holy book" (p. 129). He is referring to the poem Gorski
vijenac ("The Garland of the Mountain"), by Prince-Bishop Peter II
Njegos, an apotheosis of the extermination of the Islamized Montenegrins on
Christmas Eve of 1708. "It was," says Djilas, "the Prince-Bishop...
who played with the many heads of his victims as if they were apples" (p.
27).
Djilas is right when he condemns fanaticism, the cause of genocides and
hatreds that spare not even the dead, but it should be noted that the events of
1918 and 1924, described by Djilas, were surpassed a hundred times over when,
at the end of the Second World War, the communists massacred hundreds of
thousands of their adversaries. The communist fanatics, when the war had
already ended and When the communist government was universally recognized as
the established power—Djilas was then the second most powerful Yugoslav
communist, Tito's most prominent collaborator—they killed over one hundred
thousand unarmed Croats. They spared neither the women nor the dead. In Zagreb,
the capital of Croatia, in 1945, the authorities, not the irresponsible,
leveled the Croatian army cemeteries. Montenegrin communists, disciples of
Djilas, played a particularly prominent role in the repression (see the study
by D. A. Tomasic, "New Class and Nationalism," Studia Croatica, Year
I, No. 1, pp. 68-69).
Some Serbian exiles attempted to deny the veracity of Djilas's
testimony, claiming that he was one of the pillars of the communist regime and,
therefore, his statements could not be trusted. This maneuver led to the publication
of the newsletter Bosnian Perspectives. (Bosanski Pogledi, No. 15, September
1960 London), to publish the text of the memorandum that the Muslim survivors
of said massacre had addressed to King Alexander I. Said text, which we
transcribe below, coincides entirely with Djilas's account:
"The abominable massacres committed in recent days against the
Muslims of the municipalities of Pavino Polje and Sahovici, within the
jurisdiction of the Bjelo Polje district, compel us to address Your Majesty and
explain the injustices that oppress us and which we can no longer endure, as
even far lesser injustices and atrocities exceed human strength.
"On November 7, 1924, Bosko Boskovic, former mayor of Kolasin, was
killed in the village of Cer, belonging to the municipality of Majkovac, where
there are no Muslims."
"Once the murder had been committed, the first duty of the
authorities was to investigate the crime, identify the perpetrators, and bring
them to justice to be tried according to the law. Instead, something horrific,
inconceivable, and utterly unbecoming of a state with an established legal
order occurred. The competent authorities, having been warned in time that the
Orthodox were preparing, under the pretext of avenging Boskovic's death, to
exterminate the Muslims, had allowed approximately 2,000 locals from Kolasin
and Polje, Montenegro, in collusion with the Orthodox population and
Montenegrins residing there, to arm themselves, organize, and march on the
remote Muslim villages to carry out a 'blood vengeance' (vendetta).
"Before addressing the merits of the case, allow us to highlight a
circumstance as important and significant as it is regrettable. The deceased,
Bosko Boskovic, was buried on November 9th in Polje, in what was then
Montenegro." During the funeral, which was attended by,
among other officials of Your Majesty, the heads of the Bijelo Polje district:
Nikodem Cenovic, Lazo Bogicevic, and Milan Teric, speeches were made to incite
the crowd against those present. Milan Teric, in particular, whose
father, while administering the Bijelo Polje district, had been responsible for
many crimes committed in 1920, delivered a violent speech against Muslims and
openly incited the massacre. Immediately after the funeral, on the night of
November 9-10, some 2,000 armed locals from Kolasin, Polje, and other areas
gathered and simultaneously attacked Muslim villages along a 19-kilometer
stretch.
Two days earlier, the authorities had confiscated all weapons in these
villages and distributed them to Orthodox Christians in neighboring areas. As
the armed assailants prepared to attack the Muslims, state authorities—perhaps
to facilitate the attackers' actions and thwart any potential resistance from
the Muslims—took the heads of families and the strongest men from the Muslim
villages hostage and brought them to the government house in Sahovici. There,
they were told they had been summoned by the mayor, but were then handed over
to the assailants under the pretext of escorting them to Bijelo Polje.
These criminals took charge of the handcuffed hostages, but it is
unknown whether they received orders to kill them. We only know that these
criminal escorts, at a distance of 250 meters from the district headquarters,
murdered 58 hostages; three were saved by paying a ransom. A man named Novak
Hasanin from Sahovici saved a 13-year-old boy, and for his noble act, he and
his family narrowly escaped the same fate as the murdered hostages. After
killing the hostages, the criminals launched an assault along a 19-kilometer front,
simultaneously setting fire to houses and killing the elderly, young, women,
and children. It is unknown how many died from stab wounds and gunshots, or how
many were burned alive in their homes. The number of victims is in the
hundreds, while the material damage from the fires and looting has not yet been
assessed. While these atrocities unfolded, the local authorities took no action
to prevent them; instead, they condoned these horrendous crimes with their
passive attitude. Only the head of the Plevlje district—that is, of another
district—came to the aid of those under attack, and it was thanks to the
intervention of this official, surnamed Kreckovic, that the survivors were
saved.
"We complain to you, convinced that there is no one else to whom we
can complain. According to the constitution, we Muslims should enjoy equal
state protection, freedom, and other civil rights. The constitution and the
laws do not deny us these rights, even if one of our own is guilty of the
murder of Bosko Boskovic. The competent court should, in that case, pass
sentence and punish the murderer and his accomplices. Unfortunately, the
authorities of the Bijelo Polje district allowed their duty to be carried out
by armed mobs, incited by the very organs of the state, who
remained impassive in the face of the looting of our property and the slaughter
of our children and women.
This is an abominable act that would discredit any state. It is
impossible to detail the enormous damage or express our suffering and the
constant fear for our lives and property; we are victims of atrocities
committed not in the course of armed conflict, but in times of peace, against a
population guilty of nothing except..." to profess the Islamic faith.
Having brought all this to Your Majesty's attention, we wish to draw your
attention to these horrific events and request Your Protection, as we trust no
one else. We cannot believe that official positions are distributed not based
on the employee's ability and integrity, but on their political affiliation.
Clearly, in such circumstances, the laws are broken and the innocent suffer,
thus undermining the authority of the State and Your Majesty.
"Great is the misfortune and calamity that has befallen us and
those who, fortunately, escaped certain death. We are left with nothing and no
one, without possessions and without protection. We do not expect protection
from the regular courts. We know that in similar cases special commissions were
sent, but we are unaware of the outcome of their investigations." We expect
nothing from these investigations, which in well-governed countries are
unnecessary and inconceivable, but we express only one hope: that Your Majesty
will understand our tragic situation and order that the damages suffered be
assessed and compensated, for we have been left with nothing, and immediate aid
would alleviate our misfortune.
As for our future, we humbly request that Your Majesty issue a decree
authorizing us to leave our ancestral home and settle in another region of our
kingdom, where we could live in peace and tranquility and prosper under Your protection. We request permission to relocate,
convinced that, remaining in our homes, genocide and terror will be repeated.
Your Majesty's unfortunate subjects: Municipal Delegates of Sahovici and
Pavino Polje (signatures follow).
Given in Belgrade, November 21, 1924
Djilas, at the beginning of his work, describes Montenegro as a country
where "...men of several generations died at the hands of Montenegrins,
men of the same faith and the same name. My father's grandfather; both my grandfathers, my father, and my uncle were murdered,
as if a terrible curse had befallen them. My father, his brother, and my
brothers were killed... generation after generation, and the chain of blood was
not broken... The fear and hatred inherited from rival clans was more powerful
than the fear and hatred of the enemy, the Turks. I believe I was born with
blood in my eyes: My first sight was of blood.
My first words were of blood..." This lawless country, with clans
"accustomed to all kinds of crimes and illegalities," was ruled by a
schismatic prince-bishop who "burned with hatred for the Turks" and
delighted in killing and then "ripping out the heart with a dagger."
In the fighting, he spared neither infants nor children in their cradles. The massacres, pillaging, and looting by the Muslims have been
considered a special merit. On several occasions, the Montenegrins
"had descended from the mountains into Muslim possessions like hungry
wolves upon a flock of sheep... Almost all the lands of Kolasin had been taken
from the Muslims, whom the Montenegrins killed or expelled after defeating
them. Even their cemeteries were leveled and plowed... although they were of
the same language and blood as the Montenegrins."
All of this, recounted with ruthless realism
and emphasizing the acts of the most savage barbarity, offers a chilling image
of an evolution whose product and direct legacy are those much-lauded
guerrillas of the last world war and high-ranking officials of Tito.
From a sociological point of view, the description of the incipient
urban development of the towns and inhabitants of Montenegro, a region lacking
cities and a differentiated social structure, deserves special attention.
There, the shepherd, half warrior and half bandit, descends to the valleys and
the sparse plains, seizes other people's lands, mainly those of the
exterminated and expelled Muslims, and transforms himself into a farmer, who
mostly abhors any systematic work other than herding, while heavy labor, in the
country where men boast of "heroism," is the domain of women.
Now this Montenegrin, half peasant, half illiterate civil servant, sends
his children to makeshift schools, organized by "foreigners"—that is
to say, by those who are not Montenegrins, victims of widespread xenophobia. For the most part, the teachers were Croats, practically exiled to
Montenegro by the Serbian rulers of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia to prevent them
from practicing their profession in their homeland. In these semi-rural
schools, the boys, still dressed in their regional clothing, looked poor and
rustic, living in utter misery and utter inequality. They dreamed of Russia,
once the protector of the Orthodox Slavs of the Balkans, and particularly of
the Montenegrins.
After the collapse of the Montenegrin state, most of the urban
population lived on pensions and subsidies, a heavy burden imposed by the
Serbian rulers on the Croats and Slovenes. The young Montenegrin generation,
aware of the impossibility of making a living with the insufficient resources from
the scarce and arid lands of their mountainous country, sought to secure their
future in makeshift schools, from which they emerged socially resentful and
without prospects of finding work. With the dissolution of the Kingdom of
Yugoslavia in 1941, these subsidies also ceased. It was then that both the
mountain dwellers and the urban population, along with members of Montenegro's
intellectual proletariat, embarked on the guerrilla adventure, moving into the
more prosperous regions to plunder them under the pretext of fighting the
invader.
These "liberators," as they called themselves, initially acted
in accordance with their supposed loyalty to the Karageorgevic monarchy, but
under strong pressure from the younger generation, they readily opted to enlist
in the ranks of the communist guerrillas, which were organized following the
outbreak of Russo-German hostilities. In a country lacking a true cultural
tradition, the young Montenegrin intelligentsia, for the most part, considered
their adherence to Soviet Marxism and Russia a natural path forward, which in
turn meant uniting traditions with revolutionary action. During the war, the Montenegrin communists proclaimed Montenegro an
integral part of the USSR.
Despite his critical stance toward "the new class," Djilas
demonstrates a number of facts that suggest he still belongs to that circle of
leaders. This is evident, first and foremost, in his position regarding the
national question of the multinational conglomerate of the Yugoslav state. This
state, the result of improvisation conditioned by the exceptional circumstances
prevailing at the end of the First World War in 1918, granted an unexpected
triumph to Serbian nationalist expansionism, the main instigator of that war.
Djilas fails to see, or perhaps considers it a positive fact, that the
unhealthy conditions arising from the pressure of the forced union, under the
leadership of small Balkan Serbia—incapable of playing a leading role in a
country with a predominantly Adriatic-Danubian character—thus created the
conditions for a tragic conflict between Serbia on one side and Croatia,
Slovenia, Montenegro, Macedonia, and numerous minorities (Albanian, Hungarian,
and German) on the other. Along these lines, Djilas adopts a completely unfair
position, even toward his own countrymen, supporters of Montenegrin
independence, and professes to be a supporter of Yugoslav unitarianism, despite
this conception lacking any material or moral basis.
One should not be deceived by appearances when, in some pages of this
book, sympathy is displayed for the opposition that fought against the
governments of a tyrannical monarchy in the period between the two world wars.
This is merely a purely communist tactic, in line with the conduct of the
Yugoslav Communist Party, which, faithful to Stalin's instructions, exploited
the discontent of the subjugated peoples and minorities without offering any
real solutions.
This fact became evident with the collapse of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
in 1941, when the Serbs, having lost their privileged position, found
themselves reduced to a region governed by the occupying military power, while
other areas, mainly the Croatian provinces, had a somewhat more bearable
situation. It was precisely then, after Germany invaded Russia, that the Yugoslav
communists, in whose ranks Serbian elements predominated, became the bearers of
the Serbian tendency toward revenge and the restoration of the destroyed
Serbian empire. At least, this is how the communist guerrilla presented itself
to the Serbian masses, while the communist leaders exploited the well-known
combativeness of the mountain population, accustomed during centuries of
Turkish rule to the life of the haikuds, and further educated in the cult of
rebellion and political terrorism.
The assassination of Croatian leader Esteban Radich in the Belgrade
parliament in 1928 was, according to Djilas and his contemporaries in the same
political group, a momentous event. The assassin, Punisa Racich, a deputy of
the Serbian Radical Party (the ruling party), was Montenegrin, from the
Vasoyevichi tribe, and Djilas had the opportunity to meet him. He considered
him a political assassin. Djilas lacked regard for his own country and, as
such, was unable to offer a fair assessment of the Croatian national resistance.
He simply downplayed the national conflicts in Yugoslavia and, according
to Marxist-Leninist conceptions, viewed them as power struggles between the
Serbian and Croatian bourgeoisies. Furthermore, Djilas, coming from the
Balkans, failed to recognize that the traditional form of government in Serbia
was autocratic and, as such, resembled Russia. It was precisely for this reason that the process of transformation from an
autocratic monarchy to communism was possible.
Djilas's allusion to "premature freedom" aligns with the
arguments of those who justify chronic dictatorships, and in the case of
Yugoslavia, it is the only form under which such a state can exist. From this
perspective, justifying the policies of an Alexander or a Tito is not
difficult, but from the standpoint of natural and moral law, the rationale for
the existence of such a state, created and maintained in this way, is highly
questionable.
To further complicate Djilas's "progressive" stance on the
national question in this book, the author of a lengthy and equally biased
introduction to the English edition, H. W. Jovanovic, of Serbian descent,
contributed his remarks. Unfortunately, in its polished edition, Editorial
Sudamericana translates the work in its entirety, disregarding the fact that
here in Argentina, thanks to prestigious publications like "La Revista
Croata" and "Studia Croatica," it has been easy to obtain
contributions from renowned experts on the political and cultural issues of the
Balkans, thus enabling the work to be presented appropriately to
Spanish-speaking audiences, in accordance with the standards of scholarly
accuracy.
The aforementioned introduction attempts to soften the impact that these
cruel events might have on a Western-educated reader. Furthermore, with utter disregard
for historical truth, the author had the misguided idea of
employing the mystifying interpretations of Serbian official
propaganda, both nationalist and communist, when referring to various events.
Regarding current events, he unequivocally maintains the existence of a
supposed Yugoslav nationality, even though Yugoslavia is a multinational state;
moreover, he believes that presenting Djilas as a Yugoslav Marxist without
national sentiment is advantageous. Inaccurate and nonsensical assertions also
accumulate in the explanatory notes. On page 213, he refers to the Croatian
opposition in the Serbian Parliament. This is the Yugoslav Parliament. The
Croats are described as having been both "separatists" and proponents
of autonomy within the Yugoslav state.
According to this particular stylization, it appears that King Alexander
proclaimed a dictatorship because the Croats withdrew from parliament, thus
transforming the tyrannical king into the defender of Parliament against the
Croatian opposition.
Readers of Djilas's book will gain a broader understanding of the new
class of Yugoslav communism by examining another facet of his personality. They
will also come to understand the fraudulent nature of the war propaganda that
so glorified Tito's "liberators." Furthermore, the desperate efforts
of Croatia, a nation faithfully committed to its Western and humanist
traditions—no less noble in its Muslim province of Bosnia—against the
"liberators," among whom Djilas was considered one of the most
ruthless, will become readily apparent. This assertion, without diminishing the
documentary value of both of Djilas's works, situates the reader within the
relevant context and facilitates their understanding.
Jovan Djordjevic:
Yugoslavia, Socialist Democracy
By B. Latkovic
(Edition Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1961, pp. 272. Translated from the French.)
Since Yugoslavia emancipated itself, to some
extent, from Soviet tutelage in 1948, much has been written and said about it
in the West. It is well known how many hopes were placed in the supposed breach
opened in the monolithic communist bloc. Yugoslavia, on the other hand, has
consistently insisted that the principles of its social and political
organization are the basis of the independent path it has taken within the
family of communist nations.
The book by Jovan Djordjevic, a professor at
the Faculty of Law in Belgrade, is undoubtedly a considerable contribution to
the dissemination of the Yugoslav thesis on the correct application of
Marxism-Leninism, and useful for those interested in understanding the social,
economic, and political organization of communist Yugoslavia, as reflected in
its Constitution and current laws. However, the results of careful and
objective analyses of the achievements to date differ greatly from the picture
one might form based on the system described in the book. Therefore, and
despite the author's authority, this book should be read with caution if one
does not wish to close one's eyes to the reality as it is currently experienced
in Yugoslavia.
Furthermore, it should not be forgotten that
between the communist conception and the Western conception of the democratic
regime, which "we cannot abandon without opening ourselves to all kinds of
intellectual confusion," there exists a "fatal separation," as
Marcel Prélot aptly observes in his "Preface" to Djordjevic's book.
For in the "socialist democracy" implemented in Yugoslavia,
"notwithstanding certain freedoms granted for discussion regarding
economic experiences, no ideological opposition can be formed, and any
inclination in this direction is immediately repressed," as Professor
Marcel Prélot notes.
In the "Introduction," the author
reviews the political and constitutional evolution of present-day Yugoslavia.
According to him, "the struggle for liberation broadened and took on the
character of a revolutionary struggle against the representatives of the old
social classes and their political domination," a struggle led by the
Communist Party of Yugoslavia. This assertion is inaccurate. In reality, there
was no social struggle, but rather, on the one hand, national resistance
movements in the areas occupied by the Axis armies, and on the other, rebel
opposition from a segment of the Serbian minority within the Independent State
of Croatia, created after the collapse of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1941.
These resistance movements were infiltrated by
communists who then imposed themselves as their leaders. The communists
concealed their true aims for three years, and, as the author states,
"during this period no significant revolutionary decision was made to
change the economic and social foundations of the country, namely, the private
ownership of the means of production." Only when they firmly assumed
control of the resistance groups did they begin to act. The communists revealed
their true intentions, but it was too late to remove them from power, as Russia
was providing them with effective support and the Western powers failed to
grasp the full extent of the danger they posed.
Regarding the continuity of Yugoslavia
"from the standpoint of national will, clearly affirmed by four years of
struggle for independence," which the author discusses when chronicling
the evolution of relations between the Yugoslav government in London and the
National Committee in Belgrade, it should be clarified that such will did not
exist with respect to the Croats. Post-war Yugoslavia was imposed on the
Croats, who, during the four years of heroic struggle to assert their
independence, provided irrefutable proof of their national will to live in
their own independent state.
The book under discussion is divided into three chapters: "The
Foundations of the Social and Political System," "The Principles of
Political Organization," and "The Structure of Power." Selected
excerpts from the Constitution and some organic political laws are included as
an appendix.
For Djordjevic, the foundation of the social and political organization
of communist Yugoslavia is "the self-government of the producers,"
and it was precisely in Yugoslavia that such a system was implemented for the
first time in history. According to the author, this development arose from the
Yugoslav reaction "to the open attempt by the leaders of the USSR at the
time, with Stalin at the helm, to dominate the life, politics, and economy of
Yugoslavia," followed by "emancipation from the doctrinal and
political tutelage that the USSR had exercised over it."
It should be noted that the author insists on demonstrating that it is
in Yugoslavia where orthodox communism, or as it is called, socialism, has been
implemented, in contrast to the Stalinist conception of the preponderant role
of the State and its centralized apparatus in the construction of socialism. It
is evident, however, that despite such much-touted decentralization, it is the
State, through the Communist Party, that directs and controls all economic,
social, and cultural activity in Yugoslavia.
The Communist Party, renamed the "League of Yugoslav
Communists," is the sole political party; no others are permitted.
Djordjevic, defending the compatibility of the single-party system with
"true democracy," that is, socialist democracy, refers to a UNESCO
survey on "Democracy in a World of Tensions." Several Marxist
philosophers, Djordjevic says, believed that socialist society possesses almost
all "the conditions necessary to eliminate the need for multiple political
parties. These conditions generally include the following: the absence of
profound differences of opinion within society, or at least among those in
power, and the fact that the doctrine of the ruling party is determined by
scientific criteria and ceases to be a mere matter of public opinion. Under
these conditions, dissenting opinions, and consequently dissenting parties,
could only be manifestations of ignorance or an antisocial, antidemocratic, and
even criminal attitude."
In reviewing the role of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, Djordjevic
argues that political democracy failed in monarchical Yugoslavia due, among
other factors, to the weakness of the bourgeois parties, continuing: "In
the former Yugoslavia, the Communist Party already appeared to the masses as
the only political force capable of leading them in the struggle for national
independence and political freedom, against exploitation and subjugation to
foreign fascism." This is not true. Communism had no roots among the
peoples of Yugoslavia. In Croatia, it was an insignificant minority.
While it is true that in the former Yugoslavia, even before the
dictatorship established in 1929, there was no true political democracy, this
was due to the tradition of autocratic rule in Serbia, expressed in the
hegemonic tendency of most Serbian parties, which never abandoned the idea of
Serbian domination over the other peoples of Yugoslavia. In
Croatia, the Agrarian Party represented the vast majority of the Croatian
people. From this party and later from the nationalist movement
"Ustasa" the Croats expected the realization of their freedom and
national independence, and not from the communist party.
Speaking of federalism, the author states that there is a difference in
the definition of federalism according to the 1946 Constitution and the 1953
Constitution. In his opinion, the 1946 Constitution emphasized its legal
structure, and Yugoslavia was defined as a community of nation-states. The 1953
Constitution defines federalism "vigorously emphasizing the unity of the
Yugoslav peoples." This development closely resembles what we have seen
unfold in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes when the formal equality
of these peoples led to Serbian domination and the renaming of the Kingdom of
Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (Kraljevina Srba, Hrvata i Slovenaca) to the
Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
This is surely why the author is quick to clarify that "these
modifications to the character of Yugoslav federalism do not, in any way, mean
that a kind of new 'state unitarism' or centralism is currently being created, nor that it has been established." or proclaimed a kind
of new, unified Yugoslav Nation. This observation by the author is interesting
for anyone familiar with the true problem of Yugoslavia, as it reveals that
Serbian imperialism, even within the new socio-economic organization of
present-day Yugoslavia, remains a constant threat to the other peoples that
comprise it.
The author's words are not enough to reassure us regarding the
safeguarding of national identities in Yugoslavia, because, speaking of the
prospects for communal self-government, the basis of the social and political
system, the author notes that by expanding the powers of the communes and
districts, the functions of the people's republics are diminished. And further
on he concludes: "The Yugoslav federation acquires autonomous social and
economic foundations at the expense of state and national foundations. Local
self-government becomes an instrument for a more advanced integration of
Yugoslav society, for the creation of a new social, economic, and political
community of Yugoslav citizens."
This 'integration' is carried out, as is well known, through the
surveillance and pressure of the Communist Party, since—as we read elsewhere in
the book—"the productive forces and the consciousness of the masses have
not yet reached a level in Yugoslavia sufficient for social life to do without
a strong political organization or the support of the most conscious social
forces." Hence the aforementioned danger, since these "most conscious
socialist forces" are primarily composed of and led by Serbs.
Anton Knezevic: The Croats and Their History
By Angel Belic, Buenos Aires
(Düsseldorf 1961, pp. 144).
It is no easy task to give a foreign reader a
comprehensive idea of the cultural and political life of a people
over 1,300 years in just a few pages.
That is what Dr. Anton Knezevic set out to do
in his book in German, "The Croats and Their History." In ten short
chapters, subdivided into numbered paragraphs, the author concisely recounts
the events of Croatian history.
The first three chapters cover medieval
history up to 1102, when the princes and kings of the local dynasties reigned
in Croatia. Knezevic argues that the Croats arrived in the lands they inhabit
today in the 7th century, not as barbarian invaders, but as allies of the
Byzantine Emperor Heraclius. He clarifies that Croats today consider themselves
Slavic in terms of language, and regarding their origins, he highlights
theories about the Iranian and Gothic origins of the ethnic group that shaped
the Croats. In the West, Slavs are generally considered to be of Eastern
origin. However, the author demonstrates that Croats belong to the sphere of
Western culture due to their close ties with papal Rome and the empire of
Charlemagne.
Chapters IV through VII cover
Croatian-Hungarian and Croatian-Austro-Hungarian relations. These relations
were based on a fundamental constitutional principle: the common kings assumed
the obligation to respect Croatia as an associated sovereign kingdom. A wealth
of data and diplomatic records reveal the independent stances taken by Croatian
feudal lords in relation to the common kings and their ongoing struggle to
defend their sovereign rights. Foreign interference, particularly from Hungary,
intensified during the nationalist conflicts of the last century. The author
highlights the behavior of the Serbian ethnic minority in Croatia, which,
instead of siding with the Croats, tended to side with the Hungarians.
Chapter VIII refers to the First World War and
the secret Pact of London, signed in 1915, by which
the Allied powers agreed to compensate Italy with the largest portion of the
Croatian Adriatic coast. Knezevic emphasizes the disinterest shown by the
Russian imperial government in this serious mutilation of the territory of a
Slavic people, since the Russians, Orthodox Slavs, distrusted the Croats, who
were Catholic and Western-oriented. The result was the formation of the Kingdom
of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes.
In the following chapter, the author traces
the history of this new state, summarized in the struggle of the Croats against
Serbian centralism and dictatorship, waged within the country under the aegis
of the Croatian Peasant Party and abroad through the revolutionary movement
founded and led by Dr. Ante Pavelić. Just four days before the outbreak of
the Second World War, a limited agreement was reached between the Prince Regent
and Dr. Čaček, president of the Croatian Peasant Party. However, the
author states, neither the Serbian Orthodox Church, nor the military caste, nor
the Serbian political parties were satisfied with this arrangement, as they
opposed any political concessions to the Croats.
The final chapter covers the Second World War
and describes its consequences. Yugoslavia, without military resistance,
disintegrated days after the German attack, and its government fled. On April
10, 1941, the Croats proclaimed their national independence, an act through
which—according to the author's apt assertion—the age-old aspiration of the
Croatian people was realized. Due to the precarious circumstances of war, the
new state found itself in relative dependence on the Axis powers. In May 1945,
communist partisans, with the support of the Red Army, occupied Croatia,
incorporating it into the newly re-established Yugoslavia. The Croatian people,
without the opportunity to express their will in free elections—the author
concludes—have demonstrated, and continue to demonstrate daily through enormous
sacrifices in their tenacious struggle against the communist invaders, their
will to live in freedom and democracy.
The abundance of data, details, dates, and
names, presented succinctly, has its advantages and its disadvantages.
Disadvantages: On the one hand, it is advisable to cite all of this data even
if it is a book, written as a compendium, since it can serve as a point of
orientation for further, broader studies; on the other hand, this method
requires a greater effort from the reader to follow with understanding the
entire complex process of Croatian history.
Walter Letsch: Moskau, und die Politik des Kaiserhofes im XVII.
Jahrhundert, l. Part 1, 1604-1654
By Milan Blazekovic, Buenos Aires
(Moscow and the Politics of the Imperial Courts in the 17th Century, Part
I) Ed. Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für osteurpüische
Geschichte und Südostforschung der Universität Wien -Wiener Archiv für
Geschichte des Slawentums und Ostereuropas-. Verlag
Hermann Btihlaus Nachf. Graz - Köln 1960, pp. 296).
This
work, exclusively scholarly in nature and devoid of political allusions or
deductions applicable to current international relations, was originally (1954)
conceived and written as a dissertation for a degree from the Faculty of
Philosophy at the University of Vienna. For its publication in this form, the
work was considerably revised and supplemented with additional research. The
work, the first part of which we review, extends the studies of the Austrian
historian Hans Uebersberger, "Oesterreich und Russland seit dem Ende des
15. Jahrhunderts" (Austria and Russia from the End of
the 15th Century) (Vienna-Leipzig 1906), and attempts to demonstrate the
futility of the efforts and negotiations of both states to reach a common
ground under the political circumstances of the time. The author was
right to speak of the "emperor" instead of "Oesterreich"
(Austria) and of the "Muscovite State" instead of "Russia,"
since, on the one hand, in the 17th century the emperor was the sole link
between the countries that would later comprise Austria, and, on the other
hand, Russian historians used the term "Muscovite State" instead of
"Russia" around the same time.
In the
insightful introduction, the author succinctly clarifies the distinct processes
of formation of both states and their different reasons for existence:
"Concord meant liberation in Russia, and in Central and Eastern Europe, on
the other hand, defense against subjugation"—at the hands of the Turks and
the Tatars—from which arises the offensive character of one—Russia—and the
defensive character of the other—Austria. The work is particularly
distinguished by its use of numerous documents from the archives of Vienna and
Munich, previously unpublished.