Sydney United 58 (originally Sydney Croatia soccer club) fans and revellers were publicly condemned in Australia’s, and wider, mainstream media for alleged “devastating and shameful” scenes during the Australia Cup final on October 1, 2022, and with them the entire Croatian community of Australia and the Croatian people. Television coverage captured Sydney United 58 revellers chanting “Ready for home” (Za dom spremni!) in unison, raising their arms in the air or waving an open hand or clenched fist in hearty jubilation. Australian mainstream media immediately labelled it Nazi salutes during the match. Immediately, some journalists rushed to declare that it was a Nazi salute like “Sieg Heil”, and with the news of this incident from the match, topics such as Ustashe, Jasenovac, from the Second World War immediately appeared in the mainstream media. News quickly emerged alleging that several Sydney United 58 fans were also booing during the Welcome to Country ceremony conducted at all public events in Australia by a representative of Australian First Nations and during the playing of the Australian national anthem (but footage from the crowd later showed that the latter was not true because the Sydney United 58 fans sang and clapped for the Australian national anthem). The leadership of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies immediately after the game called publicly for “strong action”, including lifetime bans. While Football Australia (football association of Australia) said that the actions of a “very small minority” were not in line with the “values ​​and expectations of the wider community”, and former Australian TV sports presenter and well-known public figure Lucy Zelic, of Croatian origin, promptly expressed her outrage on her Twitter at what happened, was deeply disappointed by the actions of the fans and called for a lifetime ban and a mandatory education course for those involved.

“I was born in the 80s and was never raised to be a fascist, racist or antisemitic – it wasn’t an option. We knew what being treated differently because of your ethnicity, and losing loved ones in senseless war felt like,” wrote Lucy Zelic 2 October 2022 on her Twitter and continued: “What happened at last night’s @AustraliaCup Final was shocking and simply devastating, and I didn’t want to believe it. It was the first time I felt embarrassed by the actions of my fellow countrymen, and I wasn’t alone… Their beliefs and behaviour aren’t a true representation of Croatians, just as the actions of fans aren’t ever representative of a football club. What’s worse, is that many of them appeared to be teenagers who simply don’t know how deeply the ramifications of their actions run…”

So, this soccer match and accompanying media writeups turned into fodder for merciless attacks on Croatian unity and on the pride and purity of Croatian freedom. The media coverage was almost entirely negative, one-sided or with a great lack of context and had the cumulative effect of branding the Croatian community as fascist, racist, discriminatory, or sympathetic to such views. This of course is no news for most Croatians, they suffer attacks regularly that are not based on World War Two facts but on fabrications and mean spirits.   Did this media attack have anything to do with the fact that the Supreme Court of NSW recently ordered a judicial review of the convictions passed in 1981 against the so-called Croatian six for attempted terrorism, which case is considered the greatest injustice in the history of Australian judiciary and justice because it is becoming clear that it was set up by the communist UDBA of Yugoslavia (in collaboration with individuals from Australian authorities at the time), is a feeling that many people in Australia these days carry uneasily.

It was particularly disappointing to watch prominent media figures of Croatian origin, such as Lucy Zelic, who did not use this situation to, in addition to her own outrage at the behaviour of some fans, also use her media platforms and influence to inform the Australian and world public about the history of the For Home Ready “Za dom spremni” greeting, which has its roots long before the Second World War and which had a key motivational chant and basis for the victory in the 1990s over the brutal Serb aggression against Croatia. True, Lucy pointed out in her statements that the “beliefs and behaviour” of those who chanted at the match “are not a true representation of Croats,” but she did not point out what the true virtues of Croats are.

On its Facebook page, the Croatian Embassy in Canberra was quick to condemn the events at the match regarding the Sydney United 58 fans. It was “a small group of individuals whose shocking and reprehensible behaviour does not, and should not, be an embarrassment to the entire hard-working and law-abiding Australians – of the Croatian community,” says a Facebook post on October 3 on the embassy’s Facebook page. But at the same time, and as many people from the Croatian community reported to me, the statement on that Facebook page – “We strongly reject all forms of anti-Semitism and firmly believe that there is no place in society for any glorification of totalitarian regimes, extremism or intolerance” – also had the effect that confirmed the allegations of the Australian media and some influential persons and associations of Australia that the greeting “Za dom spremni” is fascist and Nazi, and that there may be a significant and worrying number of sympathizers of those regimes in the Croatian community! The fact that the official website of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Republic of Croatia on behalf of the Croatian Embassy in Canberra did not publish any statement regarding this incident is also a source of sadness for most, because the website is the first window to the wider world, not Facebook.

It seems not much has changed on this front since November 2013 when Australian defender of Croatian origins, Joe Simunic, greeted the crowds with “For Home!” (and the revellers replied “Ready!” at the World Cup qualifying match against Iceland. As a result, FIFA banned him from remaining Cup matches.

Croatian youth born in Australia, brought up with a sense of patriotism and pride for Croatia and everything that is patriotic and are certainly neither Nazis nor fascists nor neo-Nazis, but pure Croats who love their parental homeland. In this case, the Croatian community in Australia was thrown under the bus from all sides and even by some of its own people, and now that community must fight for its reputation again, as it did in the 1980s after false accusations of terrorism by the Croatian Six.

Historioghraphically, it is completely undoubtable that the phrase «For home» belongs to the Croatian traditional heritage and, as such, it has been very prevalent in various types of Croatian social life for several centuries. Historical sources evidence that the phrase «For home» was used in ethnological, literary, music, political, military, cultural and other forms of Croatian social life during the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. It has been applied to very differing occasions and situations, official and everyday ones. Because of all of that the phrase «For home» has become naturalised among the various generations of the widest of classes of Croatian population. With that, the phrase «For home» has acquired very wide communication meanings. Cumulatively, it had represented the widest expression of value of social solidarity. i.e., devotion to home and homeland, but it was also used as a spontaneous and amiable everyday greeting.

The Ustashe movement, whose leadership collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II, especially after Nazi Germany occupied Croatia, just as Serbia did, and established the Independent State of Croatia – NDH (1941 – 1945), used a series of contents from the Croatian traditional heritage in their original or adapted forms. Among other things they adapted the traditional phrase “For home” into their salutation “For Leader and Home Ready!” (Za Poglavnika i Dom spremni). With the ending of World War II, NDH ceased to exist, and the newly established Yugoslav communist totalitarian regime, largely comprised of Serbs at the helms, mounted a cruel and thorough revenge with its representatives and its ideology because NDH fought for Croatian independence from any form of Yugoslavia and communist Partisans fought for Croatia to remain within Yugoslavia.

And hence, all the great and grand and virtuous Croatian history of the “For Home Ready” greeting and salute was suffocated, and it was maliciously turned into a Nazi and/or Fascist salute, which it was not. It is obviously in someone’s interest to keep saying that and those insisting upon it are more likely than not the ones who are still pursuing the big lies their predecessors or even they themselves wrote into the WWII history of Croatia and former Yugoslavia.  And so, we who cherish the truth above all shall keep fighting for it. Ina Vukic