Pater Ike Manduric – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Croatian Communists Of Today: Hypocrites, Vultures and Yo-Yos

Military Police Operation Flash – Croatia 1995

Yesterday, 1^st May 2021 marked the 26^th Anniversary of Military-Police Operation Flash! Croatia marked the 26th anniversary of Operation Flash in the town of Okucani today, honouring the Croatian police and army that liberated about 500 square kilometres of territory occupied by Serb aggressors in Western Slavonia. The operation was launched on May 1 and ended on May 3, 1995. In that short time the Croatian troops and police regained control of 500 square kilometres of land, including the main west-east motorway and the railway line leading to Eastern Slavonia. 42 Croatians were killed and 162 wounded.

During the war, Okucani was the centre of the Serb rebellion and a staging area for their terrorist attacks in Western Slavonia. As their defeat progressed, the Serb aggressors organised and ordered the missiles attacks on Zagreb, Karlovac and Jastrebarsko. During the attacks against Zagreb on 2 May 1995, seven civilians were killed and 218 wounded. Serb rebel leader Milan Martic was sentenced by the UN tribunal ICTY to 35 years for war crimes committed during those missile attacks.

All the while, during the entire Croatian Homeland War today’s President Zoran Milanovic and Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic hid, away from battle zones, from Croatian lines of defence and liberation, hid outside Croatia, wishing that Croatia never succeeds in its independence plight, in its defence from brutal aggression.

“We do this (passing unique law on veterans’ rights) because we are convinced that the Homeland War is the foundation of the Croatian state, that the freedom given to Croats by Croatian defenders is the most important value that we must nurture and protect and respect their sacrifice. Therefore, in the future we will do everything for the dignity of the Homeland War, for the respect of Croatian veterans and their families,” said Prime Minister Plenkovic in Okucani yesterday.

“On this day, now many years ago, Croatian heroes liberated this part of Croatia with determination, knowledge, patience and courage, and after the ‘Maslenica’ ’93 action they enabled a few months later in August ’95 that Croatia be finally merged into a whole and liberated. Those were a few good and a few brave people. It was about hundreds, maybe thousands of people. The rest of us were in Zrinjevac, Geneva, personnel services, and here, and on other battlefields in Croatia, a small number of people fought and to them eternally thank and glory to Croatian heroes,” President Milanovic said in Okucani yesterday.

What a bunch of hypocrites! They could not care less about these Croatian heroes of the 1990’s who sacrificed their lives and many of whom lost their life or limb for democracy, for freedom from communist Yugoslavia. The legislation regarding war-veterans’ rights Plenkovic boasts about is a sham and is still leaving thousands of Croatia’s defenders without a veteran status and access to health and pension services.

The hypocrisy of both the Prime Minister and the President of Croatia lies in many purposeful “omissions” and the most important one is that they have done absolutely nothing in removing from the Historical Foundations (of independent Croatia) of the Constitution of the Republic Croatia this paragraph:

“- the establishment of the foundations of state sovereignty during the course of the Second World War, as expressed in the decision of the Territorial Antifascist Council of the National Liberation of Croatia (1943) in opposition to the proclamation of the Independent State of Croatia (1941), and then in the Constitution of the People’s Republic of Croatia (1947) and in all subsequent constitutions of the Socialist Republic of Croatia (1963-1990) …”

In essence the above paragraph that keeps or validates the communist regime and its mindset that prevents responsive legislation. Yugoslav communist regime did not, as they purport, liberate Croatia from Yugoslavia but kept it enslaved and oppressed within it. It murdered hundreds of thousands innocent Croats who actually fought for independence during WWII. It filled over a thousand of mass graves with Croatian patriot bodies. It falsified Croatia’s WWII history in order to promulgate hatred against freedom-loving Croats. Both Plenkovic and Milanovic promulgate the same lies about WWII independence fight in Croatia; they fail to even offer small amounts of funding for new research that is shedding light on the colossal lies their communist predecessors have heaped up against patriot Croats. They do, however, find funds to fund various NGO’s that continue justifying communist crimes and communist Yugoslavia!

In May 1991 almost 94% of Croatian voters voted to secede from communist Yugoslavia, which led to the declaration of independence. This also led to the bloodiest and most brutal escalation of Serb-led Yugoslav onslaught against Croatia. It was only a few years after the Homeland War ended that this war of defence was inserted into the Historical Foundations of independent Croatia of today. But the paragraph relating to Antifascists (communists) was not deleted! And therein lies the main reason why lustration did not occur!

Former communists in high positions, communist Yugoslavia operatives, retained positions to work against the very concept of an independent Croatia during peace time.

Prime Minister Plenkovic keeps rubbing salt on the Croatian independence fight wound, keeps insulting the very sacrifice Croatian defenders and people made for Croatian independence during 1990’s by embracing the 1990’s rebel Serb minority representatives in the Croatian Parliament as coalition partners in his government. “Thanks to Plenkovic” these Serbs, whose brothers, sisters, parents etc slaughtered Croatians during 1990’s, ethnically cleansed them from their homes, devastated and destroyed their properties, raped their women and girls…now dictated the political scene and government rudder that still tries to equate the aggressor with the victim!

President Milanovic continues to mimic a yoyo, just as he did when he was the Prime Minister some years ago. He cannot maintain stability of his political views nor his respect for the Homeland War and its true meaning. His statements confuse even the most prominent of political analysts, let alone ordinary citizens. One day he is full of praise of the communist regime and the next day he is full of praise for Croatian Homeland War heroes.

These vultures feed on the corpses of Croatian victims of Serb aggression while dining with the Serb aggressor and all the while their mind is communist red. With this political impasse and mindset, they seemingly retain some 26 to 30 % of voter body. They are the voters who most likely live in apartments and houses stolen by the Yugoslav communist regime from Croatian Jews and from Croatians who in WWII fought for Croatian independence. They are the voters whose families benefitted from the Yugoslav false economy that relied on foreign loans, rather than productivity at work. They are the voters who lift no fingers against widespread corruption and theft. They are the voters who look up to such a government and President for their continued sucking at a foreign purse – this time the EU purse – rather than develop new jobs within Croatia, to sustain independence.

It would be understatement to say that Croatia is now in a political crisis much more than ever in the past twenty years. The roots of this crisis are embedded in the fact that the meaning and values of the Croatia’s Homeland War and secession from communist Yugoslavia are simply not receiving due respect nor the deserved place in this nation of developing democracy. To illustrate this here is a translation of a poem published yesterday by Pater Ike Manduric, a leading Jesuit priest in Croatia in spiritual well-being of the community, a war veteran:

“The enemy thought that Croatia was weak,

That there is no strength.

But it didn’t know that there waa love.

And love is strong.

Like death.

The enemy believed it had greater rights than others.

And that the Croatian home is not holy

That it is not important to God

That communism is God.

But it was all a lie.

Then the Flash exposed the lie

The occupier was struck by the truth:

Communism is a fraud and a lie

Croatia is as strong as life

The Croatian home is sacred.

Congratulations on the Flash!

And I want and invoke a new Flash

Which will shed light on the lies again

Because they started going crazy again

Again, some rely on lies.

And there will be a Flash, some new one, for this time, with new weapons, and by all the signs of the times it can be read yes, to the one who loves the Homeland.

I know that!

Congratulations on the FLASH!”

Ina Vukic

Croatia: For Eternal Glory

Simultaneous worldwide prayers by Croats 11 April 2020
Top left: Father Ike Manduric
Photo: Screenshot

The Easter story is the story of hope. Easter Sunday is one of the most festive events among Christians worldwide. It commemorates Jesus Christ’s resurrection. The knowledge and sight of Jesus’ crucifixion more than 2000 years ago initially brought a sudden halt to so much hope and promise in the lives of his living, ardent followers. And the resurrection of Jesus has instilled in his followers, to this day, a story of overcoming darkness and despair, and finding new life and hope.

Easter invites all of us to believe in the transforming power of love.

At a time in our world where fear is a natural response, the Easter season encourages us to look towards love and life. We look for the generous and life-giving response of our health care and community service workers who continue to care for others; who continue to place their own life at risk so that the destruction sowed worldwide by Covid-19 coronavirus may be eradicated. We look at ourselves, we look at our neighbours, we look at our community and we give and expect sacrifice by adhering to strict rules of social isolation and limited movements. We look to the generosity of neighbours, as people help one another with shopping, phone calls and staying in touch. We look to the willingness of our community leaders working together to realise better outcomes for us all. To nourish our souls, we look at our religious institutions and church leaders to provide us and join us in prayer and celebration and the joy of Easter, even if at a distance via video or audio technology.

It is at times of disaster and fear of losing our lives, our loved ones’ lives, that our needs to belong, which are constantly present in all of us as human beings, become highly acute. And while there are multitudes of examples how people have come together despite the Covid-19 restrictions, one that caught my attention, naturally, are the events of simultaneous coming together online in prayer of thousands of Croats living across the world and all the continents. On Saturday 4^th April 2020 Croats across the world gathered together in simultaneous rosary for healing, fighting the Covid-19 pandemic and restoring faith on the youtube channel “For Eternal Glory“, initiated by Father Ike Manduric from Croatia, one of the most prominent Jesuit priests in Croatia well known for his spiritual guidance and deeds of goodness for the people. The Rosary was led by Father Ike Manduric then and also on last Saturday 11 April 2020 and it is to be continued.

This is how Father Manduric announced on 2 April 2020 the worldwide simultaneous prayer of the Rosary:

“Dear emigrated Croatians! Dear Croats in the Homeland, My people – separated!

These days, when even those who live side by side cannot spend time together, all of us Croats yearn for one another. And then, how much is the longing of those who had to part from their homeland, and how much is the Homeland’s longing for those who had to leave it? This is a time of yearning to meet, so our thoughts fly to you.

Where are you, how are your hearts, do you think of us? How is your faith, hope, love, wisdom? Have the seductions and difficulties of the world pressed upon you? Do you think of the Homeland? Do you manage to raise your children, preserve the language and religion, instil in them humanity, the Croatian soul? Are you scared?

And we know that you equally touch in thoughts the land you left behind, or your fathers and grandparents. Separated, but together in the soul… Wherever we are, we are all burdened by same worries, and especially these days we see and feel how fragile we are. In particular, we, as a small nation, must today be comforted by one another, in prayer, with our God, and by the robes of the Virgin Mary, whom we have carried in our hearts across the oceans and continents, with the love and prayers we have learned in the homeland.

The big pandemic is ravaging the world, shaking all the world’s powerful, all systems are tottering, and every human fragility is showing. In addition to this anguish, our main city of all Croats was badly damaged (in earthquakes), churches were badly damaged, the Cathedral damaged, apartments destroyed. With all the anguish and pain that we feel as we remain attached to our Homeland, these present ones must hurl us together to gather around the Mother of Heaven, for, though we are separated, we are one people and we are one. Let’s be together with her, all of us Croats from every continent, priests and people of God. And let us pour out all the crying of our souls. Thanks to the power of grace that dear God has bestowed upon our people, we ask that our people be elevated and thoroughly renewed through this crisis:

for faith, to remain true to God and our Catholic Church
to end the pandemic and rebuild Zagreb
for our diaspora, to preserve its identity and its values
for the future of all Croatian people and their offspring
and for each of us with all our needs.

I invite you, dear Croats from all over the world, all those whom I have met across Canada, America, Australia and Europe, and all those whom I have not, and I equally love you all: Let’s gather together and perhaps for the first time all together and at the same time pray the rosary, all Croats of the world, for God’s grace and salvation, for all the world as well as for all the difficulties that have afflicted our Croatia – from earthquakes to coronavirus and all the current crosses of this generation.”

If you the reader of this post, your family or friends wish to join in this rosary it is organised via Youtube channel “Za vječnu slavu” (For Eternal Glory) every Saturday, 14.00 hrs Zagreb/Croatia time.