Fascists – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Croatia: Antifascists Vilify Veterans To The Disgrace Of The Nation

July 6, 2014 by inavukic 56 Comments

Monument to the HOS
9th Battalion Rafael Vitez Boban
raised in Split, Croatia – 9 May 2014

On 9 May of this year the mayor of the city of Split, Ivo Baldasar (a Social Democrat) presided over the unveiling of the monument to the 9th HOS Battalion Rafael Vitez Boban. Croatia’s communist lot, who boldly call themselves antifascists even though no antifascist organisation in the world protect from condemnation and processing of WWII and post-WWII communist crimes like they do, formed a so-called “Antifascist league”. These two events in Croatia on the same day did not occur by accident.

No Siree!

The communism lovers from various NGO’s are all about calling and labelling members of Croatian defence forces from the 1990’s Homeland War as fascists, maliciously and without any truth, except for communist political agenda, linking them to WWII Independent State of Croatia Ustashe! Some have even gone so far as to say that the monument in Split for a 1990’s Battalion carrying the name of WWII Ustashi Rafael Vitez Boban who formed the WWII Black Legion alongside Jure Francetic is designed to equate WWII fascists (Ustashe) and WWII communists/antifascists and this to them is not acceptable! The WWII Black Legion consisted mainly of Croatian and Muslim refugees from eastern Bosnia where large massacres and atrocities were committed against the population by Serb Chetniks and Yugoslav/communist Partisans. Communists or antifascists of Croatia still sweep under the carpet the communist crimes committed against innocent Croats, the scale of which far surpasses the crimes committed by the so-called WWII Ustashe regime.

There are it seems no limits to where Croatia’s antifascists will venture in order to protect their predecessors from being prosecuted and condemned for communist crimes. While many rejected to take part in creating the independent and democratic Croatia in the 1990’s – as they wanted communist Yugoslavia – they now enjoy and abuse the independence, democracy and freedom which they use to label Croatian veterans and indeed anyone who loves an independent Croatia – a fascist!
On 25 June of this year the televised program “Calender” by editor Vladimir Brnardic sparked Croatia’s antifascists into a new frenzy in which they labelled Homeland veterans as fascists!

Above Video: Croatian TV Kalendar program 25 June 2014, editor Vladimir Brnardic – transcript translated into English:
“Upon the embarkation of the Greater Serbia aggression against Croatia, Croatian Defence Forces (HOS) were founded 25 June 1991 as a military wing of the Croatian Party of Rights (HSP). HSP leader Dobroslav Paraga became its commander in chief, and Ante Paradzik undertook the duty of headquarters chief. Volunteering was exclusively the only criteria to enlist into HOS. Regardless of the label of radicalism that followed them at all times political party membership and nationality were not important. On the contrary, members of other nationalities and émigré Croats and a large number of foreign volunteers fought with HOS. Conscious of the fact that war was inevitable HOS leaders were preparing for the defence much before the eruption of the conflict.

In collaboration with the Slovenian police one of the first military training camps was organised in Zumberak (area between Croatia and Slovenia). From the very beginning members of HOS were active on all crisis battlefields. They were especially prominent in the defence of Vukovar, but also of all Slavonia, Dubrovnik, Banovina (central Croatia) and later in Livno and Bosnian Posavina then Mostar and other parts of Herzegovina.

The murder of HOS chief Ante Paradzik, in September 1991, sharpened the already high tensions between leaders of HSP and leaders of HDZ (Croatian Democratic Union), the party in government. In an atmosphere of distrust pressure mounted to abolish HOS, whose members either joined units of the Croatian Army or went to voluntarily defend Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Despite the allegations of extremism it’s essential to emphasise that they fought honourably and not a single one of the several thousand members of HOS has been convicted of war crimes.

Although many HOS members were wounded and became profound war invalids and laid their lives for Croatian freedom their status due to political disagreements, especially with the head of Croatian secret services Josip Manolic, has been devastating, even after the war. It was only in 1996 that HOS was officially recognised and only in 2004, in line with Croatian Homeland War Veterans’ Act, HOS members were recognised as true defenders and a part of Croatian armed forces. It’s interesting that the only formation that retained the HOS name and symbols was the 9th Battalion Rafael Vitez Boban, which is included in the 114th Brigade of the Croatian Army. Those killed from HOS formations still await their memorial symbols and only the city of Split had in 2014, with the erection of the monument to the 9th Battalion of HOS, in a dignified manner paid its respects to the formation that had 46 of its members lay their lives for the defence of the Homeland.”

On 1 July 2014 Damir Markus from the town of Kutina arm of the Association of HOS Volunteers (UDHOS) published a firm statement and plea on the Dragovoljac (Volunteer) website protesting the labelling of Croatian Homeland War veterans as fascists. Indeed, he states that Croatia in the only country in the world that calls its army fascist!

He says: “If we intend entering into history as the only nation which won’t process all war criminals, regardless from which war, in the name of all of us who have defended and created this country we ask you to please ensure that we don’t become a rare state in which its own army is labelled fascist.

The last of the many media outbursts in which formations from the Homeland War, especially HOS, are equated with fascism points to a clear tendency to generally criminalise the values of the Homeland War. For the first time since Croatia’s independence HOS is openly and unambiguously called a fascist organisation, i.e. an Ustashe formation, in the announced lawsuit ‘Antifascist league’ versus the author Vladimir Brnardic, who in his TV program Calendar examines the events from the war. How is it possible that the so-called ‘civil associations’ like that phantom one called ‘antifascist league’, which is well funded from the state budget, openly name-call and vilify as fascists the volunteers who defended the Homeland in 1991 – 1995? In which country of the world is it at all possible for an association or an individual to call their country’s victorious army formations criminal and treat them as fascists?!!

Let alone the fact that we have repeated many times that we have no connection with World War II but that we are a formation founded during our holy Homeland war and in reality are, as are all other Croatian army formations, the answer to the Greater Serbian fascism. It’s becoming more and more evident that our clear responses cannot bring results also due to the fact that the anonymous individuals who hide behind the phantom civil associations are still conducting calls to account from WWII. That is their right.

But, they do not have the right to draw us into their dirty games and it’s scandalous that the institutions of authority permit such things. In any other country the institutions would have long ago gone about sanctioning of subjects who vilify the values of the war for freedom of the Homeland and the formations that reined in that freedom. In our country, regretfully, the situation is reverse. Not only the WWII and post-WWII criminals are not sanctioned but also the terrible crimes committed by the Greater Serbia fascist hordes during the aggression against Croatia have not been investigated. In light of this, the paradox that the Croatian army formations are called, nothing more and nothing less than fascists is possible and that historians like Vladimir Brnardic, who objectively research the Homeland war, are threatened with lawsuits for promoting fascism!?!

Of course we also are contemplating lawsuits but it’s difficult to undertake anything under the law when we do not have the protection of the state and when the ghosts from the past vilify the Homeland War without signing their name to their deeds from within phantom associations. We invite all the state institutions to protect us in this, i.e., to respect the law of the country and to not succumb to the laws of phantom pressures of ghostly associations, who still live for retributions for events that occurred 70 years ago”.

Turning the clock back to 24 February 1990, Croatia’s first president Franjo Tudjman said: “The advocates of the hegemonic-unitarian or Yugoslav state attitudes see in the goals of HDZ (Croatian Democratic Union) nothing except a demand for a rehabilitation of the Ustashe NDH (WWII Independent State of Croatia). They forget, though, that NDH (The World War II Independent State Of Croatia) was not merely a ‘puppet’ creation and ‘fascist crime’ but that it was also an expression of both the political aspirations of the Croatian people for their independent state and of the perceptions of those Croatian aspirations and its geographic borders within the international factors, in this case the government of Hitler’s Germany, which tailored a ‘new European order’ on the ruins of Versailles. Accordingly, NDH was not a mere whim of the Axis forces but rather a consequence of the quite specific historical factors.”

Of course, as one would expect, the 1990’s anti-Croatian independence pro-Yugoslavia communist forces hurled around the world and in Croatia maliciously branding this speech by Tudjman as pro-fascist and “as a beginning of turning the Ustashe into good and patriotic boys”, reiterates Novi List journalist Ladislav Tomicic with a mean spirited slant.

Who benefits from labelling Croatia’s independence defenders of the1990’s as fascists? Certainly not Croatia! No one but communists or false antifascists benefit! Do Croatian authorities truly want such social rot to take hold? It would seem that the answer to the latter is yes and that yes is closely associated with sabotaging growth of democracy and freedom. Why else would authorities tolerate the situation where antifascist organisations and their individual spawns label the country’s honourable veterans as fascists?

Croatian veterans of the 1990’s had sacrificed everything to defend Croatia from Serb and communist Yugoslav People’s Army aggression and atrocities. They sacrificed their lives for democracy and freedom only to find themselves vilified and falsely accused as being fascists, as being an extension of WWII fascism! This is beyond insulting! This is a disgrace for the whole of the Croatian nation! This cannot be tolerated! Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: communist crimes, Croatia, Croatian Antifascist League, Croatian Defence Forces, Croatian Homeland War, Damir Markus, Fascists, Franjo Tudjman, HOS, Ivo Baldazar, Split, veterans, Vladimir Brnardic

Croatia: Stjepan Mesic – Liar, Liar, Pants On Fire! But, Not When Tito In Hell Is Concerned!

October 9, 2013 by inavukic 52 Comments

“Tito is in Hell” – Stjepan Mesic, 1992

When children know or think someone is telling lies they shout: “Liar, liar, pants on fire”. I’m not a child, I’m a well informed adult and, indeed, was present when in 1992 Croatia’s former president Stjepan Mesic visited Australia in his capacity as one of the leaders of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), and in his speeches he, in no uncertain terms praised the WWII pro-Nazi Independent State of Croatia as well as WWII pro-Communist Partisans, placing them on equal footing as victors for Croatian state. Now Mesic is denying this even though irrefutable evidence exists.

I shout: Liar, liar, pants on fire!

When one of these speeches appeared on Youtube some seven years ago, Mesic first said it was a political stunt by his opponents, that the film was doctored, that he never said those things … when truth struck and the authenticity of the speech video was confirmed, Mesic as president of Croatia actually appeared on a televised address to the nation saying that he had to talk like that because Croats in the diaspora were all fired-up on fascism (Ustashism)!

Furthermore he said that the 30-second video was taken out of context and that he could not remember if he made such a speech, or where, that he does not know if the video is authentic!

This history has repeated itself last Sunday, which suggests that the man is not to be trusted with what he says is the truth.

Mesic appeared on Croatian TV last Sunday 6 October on the On Sunday at Two program. The TV interview by Aleksandar Stankovic was particularly organised around the issue of bribes for armoured military vehicles deal with Finland’s Patria about which I wrote in my previous post.

At 43.46 minute of this HRT TV interview Mesic was asked: “How could it have happened to you to praise the Independent State of Croatia (NDH)?

Mesic replied: “I never praised NDH”

Stankovic: “Well OK, you said that it was an expression of historical aspirations …”

Mesic: “I did not say …”

Stankovic: “Well OK, you said over there at the assembly in Australia…”

Mesic: “Never… no aspirations, you have falsified that a little but probably because you are not informed.”

Stankovic: “Well, I’m not uniformed … the speech from 1992 exists…”

Mesic: “Well, the speech exists and you find it and then we can…”

Stankovic: “We have spoken about that before, you do not need to deny it now, I remember you told me in the program that your theory was that Croatia was being created then and then one said what one didn’t mean …”

Mesic: “No, no, I said that what I thought but I would now perhaps reformulate but also say that what I thought, that is what did I say, I said that Croats won twice, the first time the Kingdom of Yugoslavia disappeared because we were all against the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, Ustashes did not topple Kingdom of Yugoslavia, it disappeared by the will of the occupying forces but it was of benefit to us because Yugoslavia disappeared, and the real victory we won was with the NOB (National Liberation Movement) victory in 1945 when we came on the side of victory and were on the side of victory … that is what I said”.

So, Mr Aleksandar Stankovic and the world’s public, since Mesic asked for the speech to be found I have made the effort in finding it – for truth’s sake!

Here is what Mesic actually said in 1992 (and I personally remember he said the same on a number of occasions and in the video below there’s a glimpse of me in the background at the end of the video, so it is authentic 100%): “Those who are older remember that in 1971 Tito, who created Yugoslavia, which was not Croatian but Croatian only in that Croats lived in it but did not rule in it, said that river Sava will flow upstream before Croatia will have its army, and now if he hears me from Hell I must tell him that as far as we are concerned Sava can flow even sideways but Croatia has its army and its state. We have created a state after 900 years, but during those 900 years Croats did not stand still, they were always determined for the Croatian thing and Croatian state. Even in the Second World War Croats were victorious twice and we must tell that to everyone, to our friends and to our enemies. Croats were victorious when in 1941 on 10th of April they declared the Croatian state. Because Croats did not declare that state because they were fascists, but because they had a natural and historical right to their state. But the results of WWII are known and it’s also known that Croats won for the second time in that war because they found themselves at the table together with the Allies and to those who consider that Croats were on the other side, who want to win over those Allies and muddy the Croatian deed, we must tell them that Croats were for a Croatian state, and Croats did not fight for the white or the red flag but for the red-white-blue flag”.

The point of this is not just what Mesic said but also how he attempts to discredit the truth and make up stories as he goes; even attack those who put out the truth if that truth goes against him! It transpires from all this that the man was never to be fully trusted and his stories and spins should be put aside and the Croatian office of state prosecutor must seriously investigate the allegations against Mesic that suggest he may have been involved in serious corruption in the Patria case of armoured military vehicle supply from Finland.

I, for one, am disgusted at the reality that Croatian taxpayers and deficient government budget keep funding Mesic’s office as former president, with all the trappings that cost millions every year and yet Mesic has the hide to lie like this to the very people out of whose taxes his office is funded! I guess corrupt practices and political underground that keep the so-called antifascists or communists like Mesic afloat in the public arena are strong in Croatia.

Mesic who places himself at the helm of antifascist movement in Croatia says that Josip Broz Tito went to Hell after he died.

Therefore, as I see it, he subscribes to the ideals of those he himself considers went to Hell after they died! Will he now may say that the above video from 1992 when he said Tito was in Hell is also a falsehood! What will his antifascist association say when they hear what he said about their celebrated Tito? Will he also now say that he had to speak like that in the diaspora because the diaspora did not like Tito? Well, let him try – he will not succeed because there were multitudes of persons in his audience then who came from the so-called “Yugoslav” (as opposed to Croatian) clubs in the diaspora. They were all there because Franjo Tudjman managed to reconcile both sides of Croatian WWII politics into one single aim: independent and democratic state of Croatia. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Aleksandar Stankovic, anti-fascist, corruption, Croatia, Dr Franjo Tudjman, Fascists, Independent State of Croatia, Josip Broz Tito, Stjepan Mesic, Tito, Tito in Hell, Ustashe

Fortunate are the countries spared from communism after WWII

July 29, 2012 by inavukic 9 Comments

Serb rebel leader Jovan Raskovic at Srb, Croatia, 25 July 1990

Had Milorad Pupovac, president of the Independent Democratic Serb Party in Croatia, demonstrated better care and respect for the multitudes of innocent Croatian and non-Serb victims from early 1990’s in his speech at the 71st anniversary of anti-fascist (communist) WWII uprising against fascism in Srb last Friday, then this celebration of antifascist uprising would represent a heartfelt tribute to victims of fascism. But no, Pupovac went on to say that 27^th July was the day when some people should hang their heads in shame, but that does not include those at the ceremony.

Wrong!

Vecernji List portal further reports that Pupovac said: “with sadness we must talk about the victims of Croatian villages in this area who fell as a result of beastly Chetnik occupation that acted in Srb. Those that had no ideas for togetherness, idea of common freedom like antifascists and partisans had”.

The reality is that there were present at Srb (last Friday) descendants, or relatives, or neighbours of the 1990’s Serbs who imposed horror in Croatia.

Pupovac could benefit from lessons in historical facts as well as in human compassion if he truly wants effective reconciliation between Croatia’s Serbs and Croatia’s non-Serbs.

The historical fact associated with Srb is that both sides murdered and slaughtered. While fascists slaughtered 300 Serbs around the place of Srb, the Serbs (Chetniks) – close to those celebrated on 27^th July went on to slaughter and destroy the whole Croatian village in the nearby Boricevac in the night between the 1^st and 2^nd of August 1941 (those Croatians from that village not murdered were banished from the village).

The so-called uprising in Srb on 27 July 19941 is considered by many to have been a criminal Chetnik action. Documents confirm that mainly Serb Chetniks took part in this uprising and that, beforehand, they made an agreement with Italian fascists, hence, this celebrated Srb uprising should be called a fascist-chetnik operation rather than antifascist.

The salt rubbed so brutally at last Friday’s Srb celebration into the Croatian victims’ wounds has little to do with the fact that the celebrated so-called antifascist uprising against the fascist or Nazi WWII occupation of Croatia in Srb on 27^th July 1941 or that the Serb-led antifascist conglomerate slaughtered many Croatians in the same week of 1941 in Boricevac, but has a great deal to do with the fact that it was the place of Srb that marked the beginnings of the planning of the horrible Serb aggression in Croatia in early 1990’s.

That is, some 100,000 Serbs assembled in Srb on 25 July 1990 and made a declaration establishing the Serbian Assembly in Croatia, with the seat in Srb, as political representation of Serbian nation in Croatia. This went on to embrace extreme Serbian nationalism in Croatia, barricading roads in Croatia from 17 August 1990, leading to the proclamation of the Republic of Serbian Krajina within Croatia’s territory, instigating the abhorrent and brutal war of Serb aggression in Croatia.

The fact that Croatia’s former president Stjepan Mesic took part in these celebrations in Srb on Friday 27^th July 2012 only evidences how cruel towards the plight of victims of Croatian Homeland War (early 1990’s) he is. Were he as antifascist as he claims, were he for freedom as he claims, he would, as honorary president of Croatian antifascist association, make an effort in contributing to the healing of the still fresh Croatian Homeland War victims’ wounds so that ethnic reconciliation in Croatia can make more positive headway.

But no, Mesic, I believe, has rarely – if at all – protected the legitimate interests of Croatian people as a nation. He often finds himself in such controversial situations that might throw a negative light upon Croatians where there is no negative light. And that cannot be by accident.

Several dozens of protesters against the antifascist celebrations at Srb, last Friday, sent a clear message of pain that still exists, unhealed in Croatia. But, Mesic twisted and poisoned that fact by accusing the protesters of trying to equate the WWII fascists with WWII antifascists.

“What can one say at the claims that the territory of Yugoslavia is strewn with mass graves of victims of communism while bypassing the graves of victims of fascism … we need to fight against that,” Mesic said.

The reality, which Mesic conveniently misrepresents, is that the graves of victims of fascism are not bypassed, indeed they’ve been well marked and many monuments raised to the victims. The reality is, also, that perpetrators of WWII fascist crimes have been brought to courts over the past decades. The reality is, also, that no monuments have been raised to the victims of WWII communist crimes in Croatia and the perpetrators of those crimes have not been brought to courts.

So, Mesic has certainly shown no compassion for any victims and used the Srb opportunity to throw a yet another spanner in the work of those who pursue justice for victims of all crimes – particularly victims of communist crimes. It’s heartwarming, though, to know that there are many in Croatia who see this and don’t shy away from making their points and claims known through the media.

Croatia’s antifascists attempt to use Srb of 1941 to demonstrate that there were some Serbs in history who fought for Croatian freedom (against fascism) could be construed as a measure of a reconciliation process between Croats and Serbs, but such an interpretation fails miserably in the knowledge that it was the very place of Srb where the roots of Serb carnage in Croatia of early 1990’s were planted.

The antifascists could be no crueler nor crasser than this. Absolutely abominable. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)