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Croatia, ‘Greater Serbianism’, and the Conflict Between East and West

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Croatia, ‘Greater Serbianism’, and the Conflict Between East and West 2441Chapter4 16/10/02 8:04 am Page 98 4 Croatia, ‘Greater Serbianism’, and the conflict between East and West Christ’s remarkable principle: ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that use and persecute you.’ That selfless sentiment has remained throughout history a cry of the weak, or an expression of those who have accepted their doom . No matter how many exam- ples can be found in life and history to support such renunciation, it has never overcome the passions of hatred and the desire to dominate or to take revenge. (Franjo Tudjman, Horrors of War) ERBIA WAS CERTAINLY not alone in its revision of history, nor in its use of national mythology. The Croatian government also saw the merits of Sreinterpreting history to buttress their own political objectives. Many of Croatia’s most interesting national myths were created well before the collapse of Yugoslavia. Franjo Tudjman’s rise to power in 1990, and the even- tual independence of Croatia, after almost five decades of Communist federalism, engendered a fertile climate for national myth creation. Croatia’s national propaganda evolved within an authoritarian context, and many of the central themes favoured by Croatian writers were similar to those advanced by their Serbian counterparts. The spectre of ‘Greater Serbia’ – which became likened to an anti-Semitism for Croats – was remarkably similar to Serbophobia. Many other myths appeared to be a reaction to a fear and strong distrust of the Serbs. Several, like the ‘state right’ tradition, the Antemurale Christianitatis, and Medjugorje, proved the existence of a civilised, peace-loving and enlightened Croatia. Other myths advanced the claim that the Serbs were religiously, culturally, and racially part of an Eastern and therefore inferior civilisation, while the Croats were more Western, more enlightened, better educated, and more democratic. 98 David Bruce MacDonald - 9781526137258 Downloaded from manchesterhive.com at 10/02/2021 01:09:33PM via free access 2441Chapter4 16/10/02 8:04 am Page 99 Croatia, ‘Greater Serbianism’, and the East–West conflict The beginnings of Croatian nationalism In contrast to the rise of nationalism in Serbia, Croatian nationalism was not a reactive phenomenon to internal events. There were no Albanians harass- ing Croats in the ‘provinces’, and no minority within Croatia agitating for statehood before the 1990s. Nevertheless, Croatian nationalism, like its Serbian counterpart, was born of a sense of cultural submergence and politi- cal domination within Yugoslavia, and a perceived threat to Croatian language, culture, and religion. Nationalism came to the forefront in Yugoslavia during a period of decentralisation and liberalisation in the 1960s, when Tito was forced to tone down his hard-line policies on nationalism in return for Western loans. This opened a window of opportunity for a new generation of Croatian Communists, who began pushing for increased auton- omy from the federal centre. In what became known as Maspok, activists demanded increased national rights within the federation. They cited the fact that Croats were under-represented in their own republic, since Serbs, who constituted roughly 13 per cent of the population, held 40 per cent of the Party posts, and a higher percentage of posts in the police, the secret police, and the JNA. Other contentious issues included the official figures for the number of Serbian war dead during the Second World War, the alleged economic exploitation of Croatia, and the status of Croatians in Bosnia- Hercegovina. The main focus of Croatian grievances, however, was the subordinate status of the Croatian language. A 1967 petition by the Croatian Writer’s Club called for the designation of Croatian as a distinct language – both for educational and publishing purposes.1 Afraid of having ‘1941 all over again’, Tito purged nationalist-oriented Communists, removing reformers from the ranks between 1971 and 1972. Some 1,600 Croatian Communists were subject to ‘political measures’, including ejection from the party – even arrest.2 While these purges momen- tarily suppressed domestic nationalism, nationalism continued in the Diaspora, among Croatian expatriate groups in South America, Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, and Europe. Often well-financed and closely co-ordinated, these groups were solidly anti-Communist, since they had left Yugoslavia as a result of their dislike or fear of the Titoist regime. Most of these people dreamed of one day returning home, and recreating an inde- pendent Croatia, freed of Communist control. With Tito’s death in 1980, new opportunities opened up for such people, and their contacts with Croatia grew stronger. The Croatian nationalist movement was eventually led by the former Communist general and historian Franjo Tudjman. Tudjman, born in 1922, was the youngest general in Yugoslav history, and also served as Tito’s Head Political Commissar. Tudjman was an extremely successful, high-ranking 99 David Bruce MacDonald - 9781526137258 Downloaded from manchesterhive.com at 10/02/2021 01:09:33PM via free access 2441Chapter4 16/10/02 8:04 am Page 100 Balkan holocausts? Communist, and a true believer, before his conversion to nationalism in the 1960s. It was only in 1967 when he began to challenge the official accounts of Croatian history during the Second World War that Tudjman was sacked for his nationalist writings. He was jailed after the Croatian Spring in 1971 and later in the 1980s. Tudjman exploited his prison time, casting himself as a martyr for the Croatian cause, and wrote extensively on his experiences and his vision for Croatia. His most important works included An Endless Multitude of Historical Truth (1977), Croatia on Trial (1981), and his most famous work, Wastelands of Historical Reality (1987), which was substantially re-edited for the 1996 English edition, Horrors of War. Tudjman’s writings laid the basis for a movement to discover the truth about Croatia’s history. With his typical egocentricity, which at times could assume messianic proportions,3 he even conferred his own name on the movement that he claimed to have founded. ‘Tudjmanism’, as he defined it, was to be both a non-Communist nationalism and a ‘re-examination of Croatian history’.4 Tudjman’s revisions dealt prima- rily with the Second World War, and will be extensively discussed in the next two chapters dealing with that period of history. On a practical level, Tudjman’s denunciation of Communism and his embrace of Croatian nationalism made him highly popular among Diaspora communities, and allowed him to raise millions of dollars for the re-emergence of nationalism. This impressive war chest would be essential during his rise to power in 1990. So too was the support of the émigrés themselves, such as the former Canadian business-owner Gojko Sˇusˇak, who later became Defence Minister in the HDZ government. On 28 February 1989, the HDZ held its first public meeting, bringing together Maspok intellectuals and nationalists, both of whom advocated the increasing autonomy and liberalisation of Croatia.5 By 1990, large numbers of émigrés had been brought in for the February HDZ Congress, mixing with Croatian and Hercegovenian nationalists.6 Tudjman’s party, with its American-designed posters and slogans, appeared Western and progressive. He alluded to a referendum on Croatian independence, and promised to recreate the Croatian state in all its former glory. While the re-annexation of Kosovo and Vojvodina formed a central part of Milosˇevic´’s election strategy it, Tudjman focused on the annexation of Bosnia-Hercegovina, referring to the unnatural shape of Croatia as ‘an apple with a bite taken out of it’. All this would change – he promised – once the HDZ was in power.7 While viewed with suspicion outside Croatia, within it, Tudjman enjoyed the same initial support as did Milosˇevic´ in Serbia. His party gained victory in April 1990, ousting the weak reformed Communists, who were largely taken by surprise.8 Tudjman’s electoral triumph was typical of what Tom Nairn has termed an elite-manufactured ‘popular revolution’ or ‘national liberation struggle’.9 Whether it was Tudjman’s ‘Tudjmanism’ or Milosˇevic´’s ‘Antibureaucratic Revolution’, the myth of popular mobilisation 100 David Bruce MacDonald - 9781526137258 Downloaded from manchesterhive.com at 10/02/2021 01:09:33PM via free access 2441Chapter4 16/10/02 8:04 am Page 101 Croatia, ‘Greater Serbianism’, and the East–West conflict against colonial (or in this case Communist) oppression was integral to the success of nationalism. Nairn also rightly identified the issue of underdevelop- ment as a key argument in many nationalisms. Tudjman echoed the widely held belief that, since the 1970s, most of Croatia’s tourist earnings were being siphoned off by Belgrade. A vote for the HDZ was seemingly a vote for the end of Communist mismanagement and economic plundering.10 Unlike Milosˇevic´, who was very much an opportunist, Tudjman was a true believer in nationalism, and contributed to many of the nationalist myths used before and during the wars. As a result, control over the spread of nation- alist propaganda was centralised within the HDZ apparatus. While there were several nationalist opposition groups, these were not co-opted into govern- ment, and remained marginal players. The Communists had been largely discredited by Vladimir Bakaric´’s slavish adherence to Tito during and after the Maspok period, when nationalistic Croatian Communist Party officials, journalists, and academics, were purged, arrested, and sometimes impris- oned. With Communist leaders discredited by Bakaric´’s legacy, many Croats felt that they had little choice but to seek independence through Tudjman’s party. Other nationalist, non-Communist parties simply did not have the HDZ’s level of funding, or its long-cultivated level of diaspora support. Tudjman shared much with Milosˇevic´ in terms of his hunger for power and his desire to create a national state that he alone could effectively control.
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