michael mills wrote:Dr Eisvogel, thank you for this information.
I have just finished reading the book by the late Jozo Tomasevich, "War and Revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: Occupation and Collaboration". Tomasevich says that the declaration of independence by Slavko Kvaternik was organised by the Germans, after Macek had refused the German offer to be the head of a separate Croatian state.
Tomasevich also says that the Croatian Peasant Party split into three factions, one that supported the Ustasha regime, one that supported the Communist partisans, and one led by Macek that remained neutral.
He also says that the great majority of Croatians opposed the Ustasha Party because it was regarded as a puppet of Italy, and after taking power allowed Italy to annex Rijeka and Zone A in Dalmatia. According to him, the majority of Croatians supported the Partisans because they feared the violent Greater-Serbian nationalism of Mihailovic's Chetniks.
I was surprised to read that in the parts of Croatia annexed or occupied by Italy, the Italian armed forces supported the Serbs against the Croats.
Dear Mr. Mills,
Ustasha movement was organized independently of Germans in the beginning of 1930-ies with the goal: independent state.
German emissary Edmund von Veesenmayer was present in Zagreb throughout the April War and he assisted Kvaternik, although in fact von Veesenmayer was supposed to convince Maček to take over.
Maček was pacifist, Anglophile and he didn't believe in German victory, so he refused. Maček was soon arrested by Ustashas and he spent the war in prison, concentration camps and house confinement.
Immediately before the arrival of the communist Yugoslav Army to Zagreb on May 8th 1945, Maček fled to the West. He knew that the Communists would kill him, because their propaganda was aimed against him especially in 1944/1945, because he was a powerful symbol, since he never collaborated with the Axis.
In Croatian historiography currently it is believed that Kvaternik first proclaimed independent State of Croatia in the seat of government (Banski dvori) and then he went to radio, where he informed the people about proclaiming independent Croatian state.
Note: he proclaimed
independent State of Croatia not
Independent State of Croatia. And over radio he informed about independent Croatian state. So, it was not official proclamation over radio, but just information.
Germans really started to support Ustashas after March 27th 1941, because until that time they were satisfied with Kingdom of Yugoslavia and since it was a bigger economic unit, it was in their interest not to fragment it.
Even, when Hitler issued directive to attack Yugoslavia, he didn't have a clear picture what to do with Croatia, so he has a reference to put Croatia under Hungarian rule in his instruction.
However, since Croatian state was declared already on 8th of April 1941 in Bjelovar by the mayor Julije Makanec who was supported by the soldiers of 108th Royal Yugoslav Regiment and after the proclamation on 10th of April in Zagreb, Croatian state authority was formed all over the country, in the areas where German and Italian troops didn't arrive yet, Hitler decided to play the Croatian card and allowed for Croatia to include all of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was not his original plan.
Tomasevich is correct about three factions of Croatian Peasant party.
The faction which merged into Ustashas was led by Janko Tortić.
The faction which joined Communists as their puppet Croatian Peasant Party was led by Božidar Magovac. He was eventually imprisoned in August of 1944 by the Communists.
When the vice-president and member of Maček faction, August Košutić fled to partisans in August of 1944, he was imprisoned by the Communists already in September.
There might have been distrust towards the Ustashas among the general population, because they had close relations with Italy, which was seen as archenemy of Croatia, because of the Adriatic Question, but in April of 1941 there was total euphoria in Croatia, once the state was proclaimed.
The euphoria went down in the beginning of May of 1941, because the Italians dissolved all Croatian civil and military authority along the coast from Crikvenica, Novi Vinodolski, Senj, in whole former Austrian Dalmatia and even in hinterland as far as Mostar in Herzegovina.
So, when the Treaties of Rome where signed on May 18th 1941, Croatia got half of Dalmatia as well as Mostar, Crikvenica, Novi Vinodolski and Senj. The Italians started to handover civil authority in these areas, but the Treaties of Rome was perceived as a betrayal, because Croatia handed over the craddle of its statehood, history and culture to the Italians and was not allowed to maintain its Navy on the Adriatic, which was a humiliation. And there were other humiliating clauses.
Also, among Croatian nationalists of the time, Dalmatian Croats were influential and now they were split, because many lost their homes.
Tomasevich is wrong about Rijeka. It was annexed by Italy in 1924, when Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and Kingdom of Italy partitioned the Free State of Fiume/Rijeka.
From April of 1941 the Italian Second Army had pretty bad relations with Croatian military and civil authorities and they saw opportunity to weaken Croatia by supporting the Serbs.
The reason for such Italian behaviour was the fact that they planned to control the entire Croatia through Ustashas, but since it was the Germans who occupied the northern two thirds of Croatia, the Italians were excluded from the economically richer part of the country and Ustashas in general, with maybe partial exception of Pavelić, were too happy to use Germans against the Italian to secure more independence for Croatia.
Anyway, in the annexed First Zone (there was no Zone A, but First Zone, Second Zone and Third Zone according to the Treaties of Rome) the Italians perceived two major threats:
1.) Croatian irredentism (Italian term for all sorts of Croatian nationalism including Ustasha)
2.) Communism
Initially, the Italians perceived Croatian irredentism as more dangerous than Communism.
Eventually, part of the Croatian nationalists in Dalmatia joined Communist partisans, but only in 1942/43, not in 1941.
In the German zone of Independent State of Croatia, Croats massively joined partisans even later.
By the end of the war Croats were roughly split 50:50 between those supporting Independent State of Croatia and those supporting Democratic Federative Yugoslavia (which included Federal State of Croatia proclaimed in May of 1944 in Topusko).
This Federal State of Croatia was not a sovereign state in reality, but a federal unit and after the war it was treated as a province by Belgrade.
Of course, Chetniks were not really an option for vast majority of Croats, because they were perceived as genocidal killers and they were influenced by Stevan Moljević ideas of total ethnic cleansing of large tracts of Croatia from ethnic Croats.
One last thing, in many areas of Croatia the insurgency in 1941 was a blend of Chetniks and Communists and only in late 1941 or even 1942 clear difference could be noted.
Best regards,
Eisvogel