Blanka Matković | University of Warwick (original) (raw)

Books by Blanka Matković

This book focuses on the events that took place in late 1944 and 1945 in Croatia and Slovenia whe... more This book focuses on the events that took place in late 1944 and 1945 in Croatia and Slovenia when the intensity of violence was strongest. At that time, the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (KPJ), assisted by the People’s Liberation Army of Yugoslavia, the Yugoslav Army, the Department for the Protection of the People (OZNA) and the Corps of People’s Defence of Yugoslavia (KNOJ) conducted organized terror not only by intimidation, persecution, torture and imprisonment, but also by the execution of a large number of citizens perceived by the KPJ as disloyal, passive, ideological enemies or class enemies. However, investigating war and post-war crimes committed by communist regime was not possible until 1990, after the democratic changes in Yugoslavia. This book is based on documents kept in the archives of Croatia, Slovenia, the UK, and Serbia. Many of them, especially those in Croatia, recently became available to the public, which makes them extremely valuable source of data to the academics and students in this field and which shed new light on these historical events.

The Communist Party in the former Yugoslavia was an organization which used all available means to seize and keep power, including terror and mass murder, especially between autumn 1944 and summer 1945 when mass killings occurred across the country. However, in the Soviet sphere of influence, investigating war and post-war crimes committed by communist regimes was not possible until 1990. This project not only covers new ground in the research into communist war crimes at the end of and after the Second World War, but also contributes to coming to terms with the past in the successor states of Yugoslavia by studying one of the most controversial episodes in the contemporary history of the Balkans.

Since the October Revolution, when for the first time in history a Marxist party seized state power, communist regimes have influenced the lives of more than a billion people, caused millions of deaths and violated the human rights of countless people. However, in the Soviet sphere of influence and in Yugoslavia, investigating war and post-war crimes committed by communist regimes was not possible until 1990, after the democratic changes in Eastern Europe. Resolution 1481/2006 of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly strongly condemned human rights violations committed by totalitarian communist regimes and the 2008 Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism stated that these crimes were comparable with Nazi crimes but, very few people have been tried for committing such crimes. Nevertheless, 25 years later, in former Yugoslav republics this topic is still a matter of political and scientific debates.

Co-author Josip Dukić. Due to be published

Thesis by Blanka Matković

PhD thesis at the University of Warwick (Politics and International Studies department)

Since the October revolution, when for the first time in history a Marxist party seized state pow... more Since the October revolution, when for the first time in history a Marxist party seized state power, communist regimes have influenced the lives of more than a billion people, caused millions of deaths and violated the human rights of countless people. However, in the Soviet sphere of influence and in Yugoslavia, investigating war and post-war crimes committed by communist regimes was not possible until 1990, after the democratic changes in Eastern Europe. Resolution 1481/2006 of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly strongly condemned human rights violations committed by totalitarian communist regimes and the 2008 Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism stated that these crimes were comparable with Nazi crimes but, very few people have been tried for committing such crimes. Nevertheless, 22 years later, this topic is still a matter of political and scientific debates.

The communist regime in Yugoslavia was involved in the most brutal violations of human rights, particularly in the last months of World War II and the first months after the war. The terror was part of the process of imposing communist rule and establishing the new Yugoslav state and led to the deaths of a still unknown number of Croatians killed as 'ideological' or 'class enemies'. This project focuses on the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia (NOV), the Yugoslav Army (JA), the Yugoslav Agency for the Protection of Peoples (OZN-a) and the Corpus of People's Defence of Yugoslavia (KNOJ) and analyses their atrocities against Croatian citizens in Croatia and Slovenia. The project will investigate the role and the movement of particular military units which acted as death squads. Through a comparative analysis of documents from state and regional archives in former Yugoslavia, published sources and testimonials, the project will for the first time offer a reliable calculation of victim numbers during the communist takeover of power. The numbers were manipulated by the communist authorities, and in today's Croatia they are the subject of heated political debates. Since 1945 the focus has been on war crimes committed by German, Italian, Croatian and Serbian armed forces. In Croatia research into communist war crimes only began a few years ago.

This research project focuses on the politics of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia toward Croatian nationalism as well as the organization and operations of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia (NOV), the Yugoslav Army (JA), the Yugoslav Agency for Protection of Peoples (OZN-a) and the Corpus of People's Defence of Yugoslavia (KNOJ) and their role in the mass war and post-war crimes against Croatian citizens in Croatia and Slovenia which is one of the most complex research topics of the contemporary history of Balkan. In the last months of war and the first months after the war, the Communist Party of Yugoslavia conducted organized terror which included mass executions. Among the executed citizens in Yugoslavia, the majority was of Croatian origin since they were perceived as the major threat to the Yugoslav communist regime. The Communist party also employed „divide et impera“ politics which truly divided the Croatian nation and caused the on-going disputes in the Croatian society.

Drawing on studies of Nazi perpetrators my hypothesis is that the atrocities were the result of a combination of factors: political and ideological motives mattered but equally important were the brutalisation during the war, the wish to be revenged on perceived enemies, and peer pressure within the units. I will therefore be analysing the social and ethnic composition of some of the death squads. I will also be looking into the economic aspects of the mass killings and expropriations and ask to what extent this violence represented an attempt to restore a ‘moral economy’ (E. P. Thompson). To answer this question I will also be analysing the social, generational, ethnic, and gender composition and regional distribution of the victims.

This research is based on documents kept in the archives of Croatia, Slovenia, the UK, and Serbia. Other sources are published collections of documents and testimonials. Documents of the OZN-a, KNOJ, the Communist party and the Yugoslav Army kept in the Croatian State Archives, the State Archives in Split, the State Archives in Zagreb and the Military Archive in Belgrade will be the backbone of this research. They provide information on the units which participated in war crimes and the geographical scope of their military operations. The archival documents will be correlated with testimonials of both survivors and Yugoslav soldiers.

The project will not only cover new ground in the research into communist war crimes at the end and after World War II but will also contribute to Vergangenheitsbewältigung (coming to terms with the past) in the successor states of Yugoslavia by studying one of the most controversial episodes in the contemporary history of the Balkans.

Thesis Chapters by Blanka Matković

Published Papers by Blanka Matković

Tusculum: časopis za solinske teme, 2017

Polemos

Despite on-going peace process efforts, which have achieved some progress towards normalization o... more Despite on-going peace process efforts, which have achieved some progress towards normalization of the situation in Northern Ireland, and disarming of the Provisional IRA conducted in 2005, this region still lives in constant danger of terrorist attacks. Operations of the IRA’s breakaway wings have been intensified after 2007, and despite the Irish National Liberation Army’s termination of the armed struggle in October 2009, the Real IRA (RIRA) and Continuity IRA (CIRA) do not yet show an intention to lay down their arms. Moreover, there are indications that the Real IRA established contacts with al-Qaeda cells in the UK, and that former members of the Provisional IRA joined the dissidents. Particular concern is the public opinion polls which suggest that dissidents enjoy greater support within the Catholic community than previously assumed. Moreover, in July 2012 the dissidents announced unification into a new organization called the “New IRA”. In early 2015 a representative of Northern Ireland Police Bill Kerr announced that dissident groups are planning new attacks on the territory of the United Kingdom on the eve of
elections and the centennial celebration of the Easter Uprising. The available data on
dissident activities between 2012 and 2015 can not give a definitive answer about the future of a dissident movement. The fact is that the dissidents are “here”, but if they will still be here after 2016 remains to be seen.

Marulić. Hrvatska književna revija. Časopis za književnost i kulturu. 48./2015., br. 2 (263), ožujka-travanj 2015., str. 44-58

Co-author Josip Dukić. Due to be published

PhD thesis at the University of Warwick (Politics and International Studies department)

Tusculum: časopis za solinske teme, 2017

Polemos

Marulić. Hrvatska književna revija. Časopis za književnost i kulturu. 48./2015., br. 2 (263), ožujka-travanj 2015., str. 44-58

Marulić, Hrvatska književna revija, 48./2015., No. 1 (262), January-February 2015., pp. 108-122.

U članku se predstavljaju slabije poznati detalji o ubojstvu istaknutog splitskog HSS-ovca Vojka ... more U članku se predstavljaju slabije poznati detalji o ubojstvu istaknutog splitskog HSS-ovca Vojka Krstulovića, reakciji tadašnjih medija i redarstvenoj istrazi koja je uslijedila, a koje je moguće rekonstrurati na temelju dokumenata pohranjenih u Državnom arhivu u Splitu.
U prijeratnim godinama Krstulović se istaknuo kao novinar te član Omladinske organizacije HSS na području Dalmacije. Nakon talijanskog zauzimanja Dalmacije 1941. Krstulović se seli u Omiš, a u listopadu 1943. vraća se u Split gdje nastavlja s političkim radom, zapaženim i od strane Komunističke partije. Likvidiran je 22. lipnja 1944. metkom u sljepoočnicu, a u izvješću Župske redarstvene oblasti istaknuto je da je „na temelju dobivenih obavieštenja ubojstvo izvršeno na pok. Krstulovića iz političkih razloga i sa sigurnošću se može reći da je to izvršeno od strane komunističke partije u Splitu“. U dokumentima SUP-a iz 1960-ih godina ostalo je zabilježeno da je Krstulović likividiran„od članova otpora zato što je aktivno saradjivao sa ustašama i okupatorom“.

Na smrt Vojka Krstulovića osvrnuli su se glasilo Hrvatske radićevske omladine „Republika“ i splitski dnevni tisak, ali i partizansko glasilo „Glas Splita“ koje je objavilo da je „osvetnička narodna ruka satrla još jednog neprijatelja naroda i njegove svete oslobodilačke borbe“.

Župska redarstvena oblast u Splitu odmah je po ubojstvu Vojka Krstulovića saslušala niz svjedoka koji su se te večeri našli u neposrednoj blizini događaja. Saslušano je nekoliko svjedoka, no u rujnu 1944. zaključeno je da se istragom ništa novo nije moglo doznati o likvidaciji Vojka Krstulovića. Identitet atentatora razotkrilo je izvješće Okružnog komiteta KPH Split od 25. lipnja 1944. u kojemu se navodi da su akciju izvršili pripadnik Komunističke partije Tito Kirigin i jedan skojevac.

Radovi, Institute for Historical Sciences of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zadar, Croatia, No.56, pp. 323-408, 2014

The ex-Yugoslav historiography has so far been mostly focused on Ciglana, from which on 22nd Apri... more The ex-Yugoslav historiography has so far been mostly focused on Ciglana, from which on 22nd April 1945, prisoners’ breakthrough took place, as the most ill famed
among the concentration camps in the Jasenovac area. On 2nd May 1945, Yugoslav Army units occupied this territory. Nevertheless, the camp was following this date mentioned only sporadically, fragmentary and non-systematically. The existing sources include mostly brief oral testimonies, which have so far not been confirmed in any original documents. During the previous almost seven decades, no serious or thorough attempts were made to study the post-war camp in Jasenovac.
The objective of this paper is to offer a survey of the previous research, testimonies and documents witnessing to the everyday reality at the post-war camp in Jasenovac,
and to complement them by the archival sources discovered so far. Among the documents found at the State Archives in Sisak, there was a document revealing the identity of the Jasenovac governor, which raised particular attention, consequently making the accuracy of certain statements given by Mirko Šimunjak, whose testimony the thesis
regarding the so-called Jasenovac Working Group relied on to the most extent, questionable.
On the basis thereof, it was possible to establish that in the area around Jasenovac, following World War Two, there was a complex of prisoner camps, and later even a penalty institute (Kazneni zavod). It is therefore beyond doubt possible that people were indeed liquidated there. Neither the number of victims nor any other details may be tackled without further research of the matter, which is not only welcome, but also essential.

Radovi, Institute for Historical Sciences of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zadar, Croatia, No.55, Dec 2013

Ličko-primorska operacija 4. Jugoslavenske armije (JA) protiv postrojbi Wehrmachta i Hrvatskih or... more Ličko-primorska operacija 4. Jugoslavenske armije (JA) protiv postrojbi Wehrmachta i Hrvatskih oružanih snaga (HOS) vođena je na području Like od 20. ožujka do 15. travnja 1945. godine, a dijeli se u dvije faze: zauzimanje istočne Like i Bihaća te zauzimanje Gospića, Perušića, Ličkog Osika i Otočca. Nakon 7. travnja 1945. postrojbe 4. JA nastavljaju kretanje na teritoriju Hrvatskog primorja, odnosno prema Rijeci.
Tijekom navedene akcije veći broj vojnih i civilnih osoba likvidiran je bez suđenja, a likvidacije su nastavljene i nakon travnja 1945. Dostupni dokumenti ukazuju na to da su zločine izvršile najvjerojatnije različite postrojbe 4. JA, Korpusa narodne obrane Jugoslavije (KNOJ), Odjeljenje za zaštitu naroda (OZN-a) i I. samostalna lička brigada. U ovom članku detaljnije se govori o likvidacijama počinjenima na području Gospića, Kaniže, Ličkog Osika, Otočca i Korenice te se na temelju dostupnih izvora pokušavaju identificirati počinitelji spomenutih zločina. Na području Gospića, Ličkog Osika, Kaniže, Korenice i Otočca evidentirano je 15 grobišta, a na lokacijama istih u trenutku počinjenja zločina djelovale su ponajviše postrojbe nekadašnjeg 8. (dalmatinskog) korpusa NOVH koje su sudjelovale i u ranijim zločinima u Dalmaciji i Hercegovini.

Vartal, Matica Hrvatska Trogir, Dec 20, 2013

War and Propaganda in the Twentieth Century, Nov 26, 2013

Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one ... more Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one of the most controversial topics in the modern history of the Balkans. The obstacles, that every historian necessarily has to face while researching this topic, were influenced by several reasons, including political ones.
In the first place, the number of victims has been manipulated since 1942 when the Communist propaganda exaggerated the number trying to motivate larger number of people to join their forces. The starting point was the existence of the labour camp Jasenovac in the Independent State of Croatia, founded in the summer of 1941, and where, according to the Communist brochure published in late 1942, 300,000 prisoners were murdered by the end of that year. Manipulating the number of Jasenovac victims continued immediately after the end of the Second World War when Josip Broz Tito suggested that „during the four years we have lost one million and seven hundred thousand of our citizens“, and it served as the most important part of exaggerating the number of the war victims in general.
However, Tito’s statement needed scientific confirmation, but the prominent demographer and Professor Dolfe Vogelnik and his assistant Alojz Debevec refused this assignment since there was no population census and instead, they decided to pass it on to Vladeta Vučković, at that time a math student who was working at the Bureau of Statistics in Belgrade. He was given two weeks to calculate the total figure of all victims with the instruction that the number „must be impressive, but scientifically-statistically based“.
Nevertheless, the number of 1,700,000, that Vučković provided, „either out of ignorance or in order to deceive, the people of the regime turned demographic losses into actual victims, which were according to all investigations scientifically funded something more than a million.“ What is more, that number of one million people was supposed to include also those killed by the Communist forces.
However, the number of over 1,700,000 alleged war victims was presented by the Yugoslav representative Edvard Kardelj at the Paris Peace Conference in 1946 and it remained the official one till the disintegration of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s.
Based on the number of Yugoslav war victims of one million, provided by the USA government in 1954, Germany refused to pay reparations for 1,700,000 alleged victims. Therefore, the Yugoslav authorities were forced to conduct a new research in order to provide more accurate data. The list of victims was finally completed in 1964, but the result was „disappointing“ since the total number was indeed approximately one million, including 597,323 victims of the so-called „fascist terror“. According to the same list, approximately 60,000 people died or were killed in the camps Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška, where, as the Yugoslav authorities claimed, at least 700,000 people were murdered.
Official forensic investigations, conducted in 1964 in Jasenovac, were supposed to prove a huge number of Jasenovac victims and the Yugoslav war victims in general, but were interrupted since, after investigating 130 locations, they found seven mass graves which held a total of 284 victim remains. However, it is important to emphasise that the report, signed by Dr Alojz Šercelj, stated that “a large amount of objects shows that the victims were brought directly to the bridge where the executions took place and they were not previously being held in the camp. On this particularly he indicates the presence of knives, rings, coins, etc.” Therefore, the remains found did not belong to the prisoners from Jasenovac at all, but probably refugees.
The research results in 1964 were shocking and the list was declared top secret. It remained unknown to the public until 1989 when it was mentioned for the first time in the magazine Danas.
Finally, an inaccurate number of the Yugoslav victims killed during the Second World War was used as one of the tools of Serbian propaganda during the Croatian War of Independence (1990-1995) when over 20,000 people were killed. Therefore, these manipulations and the flaws in previous research had a tremendous impact even on the generations born after the end of the Second World War.
Today, due to the reluctance to deal with communist war crimes and incomplete de-communisation of Croatian society, this topic in Croatia is still a matter not only of political and scholarly debates, but also of everyday life.

Bosna Franciscana, Franciscan theology, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, No.38, pp. 107-145

Annals of the Institute of Historical Research of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Dubrovnik, Dubrovnik, No. 51, May 2013

Hum, Faculty of Philosophy, the University of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, No. 9, Dec 2012

Bosna Franciscana, Franciscan theology, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, No.37, pages 109-138, Dec 2012

The article analyzes the military operations in the area of Podvucjak (Bosnia and Herzegovina), a... more The article analyzes the military operations in the area of Podvucjak (Bosnia and Herzegovina), and the Battle for Odzak at the end of May 1945 which represents the end of World War II in Europe. The first section presents the geographic and demographic characteristics of the area, while the second one describes military operations carried out between 1941 and 1944 with the emphasis on the organization of defense, but also relations between partisans and Chetniks. The third part analyzes the situation in Podvucjak in 1945, and the fourth one battle for Odžak which ended with the fall of that town on 27th or 28th May. In the last section the authors tried to identify locations of
the POW camps and grave sites, but also the identities of those who committed war and post-war crimes against Croatian population in this area in May 1945.

Radovi, Institute for Historical Sciences of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zadar, Croatia, No.54, pages 273-303, Dec 2012

During the Spanish Civil War, the republicans were supported by numerous international brigades c... more During the Spanish Civil War, the republicans were supported by numerous international brigades consisting of volunteers from 54 countries, among them approximately 1500 volunteers from the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Out of this figure, approximately 150 Dalmatians, mostly from Imotski, Zadar, Sibenik and Split, fought in the war as well. The majority of them arrived to Spain from France and Belgium, where the most of them worked in the mines. The attempt to transfer from the Split surroundings around two hundred Dalmatians, inhabitants of Zagreb and Slovenes at the beginning of 1937 failed. Volunteers from Yugoslavia fought on the Madrid, Aragon, Levanto and Catalonian battlefields. After the retreat from Spain, the majority of the volunteers were captured at the camps St. Cypriene, Argeles, Gurss and Vernet, where around thirty of them are believed to have died due to severe life conditions. Several valuable testimonies of the Dalmatian “Spaniards”, in safekeeping at the State Archives in Split, witness to this fact.

Sources and contributions for the History of Dalmatia, State Archive in Split and Faculty of Philosophy studies (University of Split), Split,, No.24, pages 245-293, Nov 2012

The article describes the development of Knin operation, the largest military operation led on th... more The article describes the development of Knin operation, the largest military operation led on the territory of Dalmatia during World War II, in which during November and December 1944 most units of the 8th corps took part. Military operations in the territory of Sibenik, Zadar and Drnis conducted at the beginning of November 1944 represent the early stage of Knin operation. During these actions greater number of soldiers and civilians were liquidated without standing a trial, but POWs were partially mobilized into partisan forces. With no further research, it is not possible to determine with certainty the number of victims in the stated territory, but the available figures indicate that it might be the case of a few hundred, maybe a thousand Croatian Military Forces and Wehrmacht members.

Hum, Faculty of Philosophy, the University of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, No. 7, pages 288-331., Dec 1, 2011

Formations of the 9th, 19th and 26th Dalmatian division of the 8th corpus made many war crimes on... more Formations of the 9th, 19th and 26th Dalmatian division of the 8th corpus made many war crimes on Herzegovinian Croats before, during and after Mostar operation, i.e. joint activities of formations of the 8th Dalmatian corpus and 29th Herzegovinian division of the 2nd NOVJ corpus. Those victims were soldiers, civilians and priests most of whom were killed and buried in Herzegovina, but part of them was taken to Croatia and killed at the Dalmatian battlefields near Vrgorac and Zagvozd. The article analyzes familiar data about these events and updates them with unpublished documents from archive funds which are today kept in the National Archives in London, Croatian state archive in Zagreb and State archive in Split because of identifying formations responsible for certain crimes.

Bosna Franciscana, Franciscan theology, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, No.35, 2011 (co-author), pages 133-172, Dec 1, 2011

This paper analyzes the struggle for the town Travnik (Bosnia and Herzegovina) and its occupancy ... more This paper analyzes the struggle for the town Travnik (Bosnia and Herzegovina) and its occupancy on 22nd October 1944, including the victims who were killed thereby, and whose names were so far largely unknown.
The first part indicates the importance and significance of Travnik, and the battles being led for this town during the World War II. The second part presents the documents with the lists of missing and killed during the battle in Travnik from 20th to 24th October 1944. These sources reveal the names of 39 missing and 33 killed active members of the Croatian military unit known as "V. stajaća djelatna bojna I. ustaškog stajaćeg djelatnog zdruga", of which there is almost nothing known in the Croatian historiography.
The third and final part is trying to reveal the mass graves which should be marked with dignity, and to identify the perpetrators of these war crimes.

Arhivski vjesnik (Bulletin d'Archives), No.54/2011, pages 179-214, Nov 1, 2011

Based on documents from the two hospitals in Zagreb, Croatia ( „Zakladna“ and „Sisters of Mercy“)... more Based on documents from the two hospitals in Zagreb, Croatia ( „Zakladna“ and „Sisters of Mercy“), it is possible, at least to some degree, to reconstruct what happened to the hospitalized members of the Croatian Armed Forces (HOS) most of whom were suferring from heavy injuries and were imobile, when the Yugoslav Army entered Zagreb on May 8, 1945 and found them in the hospitals in Zagreb.

Even though contemprary historians do not have access to documents from other Croatian hospitals (because they are not available and/or not preserved) where the members of the Croatian Armed Forces were hospitalized together with soldiers from Germany, Poland, the Check Republic, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Slovenia, Italy and the New Siberia region, the documents from the Sisters of Mercy hospital, currently deposited in the State Archives in Zagreb, defintely confirm previous eye witnesses accounts on how the Agency for Protection of Peoples (OZN-a) conducted massive arrests and transportated these patients into the concentration camp „Precko“ in Zagreb, Croatia.

Even though there are no documents regarding the ultimate destiny of these hospitalized Croatian soldiers, the results from excavations and the reports from patologists from 1999, that is the evidence recovered from the mass grave Jazovka, in Zumberak, Croatia, proves that these wounded Croatian soldiers were mass murdered at this location, together with the hosptial staff and other victims.

The registration and the realease documents from these two hospitals („Zakladna“ and „Sisters of Mercy“) provide necessary information that could eventually, with the help of additional research and excavation of other mass graves, lead to at least a partial list of hospitalized members of the Croatian Armed Forces that were mass murdered by the members of the Yugoslav Army, the Yugoslav Agency for Protection of Peoples (OZN-a) and the Corpus of People's Defense of Yugoslavia (KNOJ) and thrown into the Jazovka and other mass graves.

Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one ... more Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one of the most controversial topics in the modern history of the Balkans. The obstacles, that every historian necessarily has to face while researching this topic, were influenced by several reasons, including political ones.
In the first place, the number of victims has been manipulated since 1942 when the Communist propaganda exaggerated the number trying to motivate larger number of people to join their forces. The starting point was the existence of the labour camp Jasenovac in the Independent State of Croatia, founded in the summer of 1941, and where, according to the Communist brochure published in late 1942, 300,000 prisoners were murdered by the end of that year. Manipulating the number of Jasenovac victims continued immediately after the end of the Second World War when Josip Broz Tito suggested that "during the four years we have lost one million and seven hundred thousand of our citizens", and it served as the most important part of exaggerating the number of the war victims in general.
However, Tito’s statement needed scientific confirmation, but the prominent demographer and Professor Dolfe Vogelnik and his assistant Alojz Debevec refused this assignment since there was no population census and instead, they decided to pass it on to Vladeta Vučković, at that time a math student who was working at the Bureau of Statistics in Belgrade. He was given two weeks to calculate the total figure of all victims with the instruction that the number "must be impressive, but scientifically-statistically based".
Nevertheless, the number of 1,700,000, that Vučković provided, "either out of ignorance or in order to deceive, the people of the regime turned demographic losses into actual victims, which were according to all investigations scientifically funded something more than a million." What is more, that number of one million people was supposed to include also those killed by the Communist forces.
However, the number of over 1,700,000 alleged war victims was presented by the Yugoslav representative Edvard Kardelj at the Paris Peace Conference in 1946 and it remained the official one till the disintegration of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s.
Based on the number of Yugoslav war victims of one million, provided by the USA government in 1954, Germany refused to pay reparations for 1,700,000 alleged victims. Therefore, the Yugoslav authorities were forced to conduct a new research in order to provide more accurate data. The list of victims was finally completed in 1964, but the result was "disappointing" since the total number was indeed approximately one million, including 597,323 victims of the so-called "fascist terror". According to the same list, approximately 60,000 people died or were killed in the camps Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška, where, as the Yugoslav authorities claimed, at least 700,000 people were murdered.
Official forensic investigations, conducted in 1964 in Jasenovac, were supposed to prove a huge number of Jasenovac victims and the Yugoslav war victims in general, but were interrupted since, after investigating 130 locations, they found seven mass graves which held a total of 284 victim remains. However, it is important to emphasise that the report, signed by Dr Alojz Šercelj, stated that "a large amount of objects shows that the victims were brought directly to the bridge where the executions took place and they were not previously being held in the camp. On this particularly he indicates the presence of knives, rings, coins, etc." Therefore, the remains found did not belong to the prisoners from Jasenovac at all, but probably refugees.
The research results in 1964 were shocking and the list was declared top secret. It remained unknown to the public until 1989 when it was mentioned for the first time in the magazine Danas.
Finally, an inaccurate number of the Yugoslav victims killed during the Second World War was used as one of the tools of Serbian propaganda during the Croatian War of Independence (1990-1995) when over 20,000 people were killed. Therefore, these manipulations and the flaws in previous research had a tremendous impact even on the generations born after the end of the Second World War.
Today, due to the reluctance to deal with communist war crimes and incomplete de-communisation of Croatian society, this topic in Croatia is still a matter not only of political and scholarly debates, but also of everyday life.

Researching demographic losses in the Second World War in former Yugoslavia has been facing many ... more Researching demographic losses in the Second World War in former Yugoslavia has been facing many difficulties since 1945 when the number of victims was presented for the first time. Even though Yugoslav authorities and organisations did research and prepared the victims list in 1946, 1950 and 1964, the data were mostly based on testimonials instead of documents. Moreover, these research proved that total number of victims was actually quite smaller than the Yugoslav authorities claimed and therefore, the results were kept secret until 1989. The fact there was no population census between 1931 and 1948 complicates this kind of research even more.
The research in the Croatian archives has shown that the Yugoslav authorities also prepared lists of the missing, dead and living 'enemies' for every village and town. Although the lists are incomplete, they demonstrate without a doubt that the Yugoslav government knew the approximate number of all WWII victims in Yugoslavia, including those killed by the communists. Moreover, the sources indicate that occasionally victims of communist repressions were presented to the public as victims killed by the German, Italian or Croatian Army.
The numbers have been manipulated in former Yugoslavia, and even in today's Croatia they are still the subject of politically motivated debates. The manipulation of the victim numbers also had an international dimension as these numbers were used in the 1960s in the negotiations with Germany about compensation payments. Therefore, researching demographic losses in former Yugoslavia has remained one of the most controversial topics in the modern history of Balkans.

Smaller Croatian communities have been present in Latin America since 18 century. However, after ... more Smaller Croatian communities have been present in Latin America since 18 century. However, after the late 19th century larger Croatian communities settled in Argentina, Brazil and Chile where between 650,000 and 700,000 people of Croatian origin live today.

During the first half of the 20th century, these economic immigrants maintained strong links with their home country despite limited means of communication and they managed to preserve their own identity. Moreover, they founded schools, built churches and entire settlements, organised cultural, sport and charity societies, and published papers. At the same time, they fully integrated into new society contributing in many areas of life, such as culture, and, influencing economic growth of Latin American countries. Till 1945, Croatian immigrants also cooperated with other Yugoslav immigrants providing their support to the idea of the united Yugoslav state, especially during the First and Second World War.

However, political orientation of the Croatian communities in Latin America, especially those in Argentina, dramatically changed after the Second World War when the country provided the refuge to thousands of Croatian immigrants who fled Yugoslavia where the communist regime was established. During the next 45 years these communities remained one of the most influential strongholds of the idea of a free and independent Croatia, and provided significant help to the Republic of Croatia during the recent war.

Therefore, Croatian communities kept their influence in economic and cultural life of their new countries, while at the same time they encouraged political changes in their home country.

Based on documents from the two hospitals in Zagreb, Croatia (‘Zakladna’ and ‘Sisters of Mercy’),... more Based on documents from the two hospitals in Zagreb, Croatia (‘Zakladna’ and ‘Sisters of Mercy’), it is possible, at least to some degree, to reconstruct what happened to the hospitalized members of the Croatian Armed Forces (HOS), most of whom were suffering from heavy injuries and were bedridden when the Yugoslav Army entered Zagreb on May 8, 1945 and found them in the hospitals. Even though contemporary historians do not have access to documents from other Croatian hospitals (because they are not available and/or not preserved) where the members of the Croatian Armed Forces were hospitalized together with soldiers from Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Slovenia, Italy and the New Siberia region, the documents from the ‘Sisters of Mercy’ hospital, currently deposited in theState Archives in Zagreb, definitely confirm previous eyewitnesses’ accounts on how the Department for the Protection of People (OZN-a) conducted massive arrests and transported these patients to the concentration camp „Precko“ in Zagreb, Croatia. Even though there are nodocuments regarding the ultimate destiny of these hospitalized Croatian soldiers, the results from excavations and the reprts from pathologists made in 1999 i.e. the evidence recovered from the mass grave Jazovka, in Zumberak, Croatia, proves that these wounded Croatian soldierswere mass murdered at this location, together with the hospital staff and other victims. The registration and the release documents from these two hospitals provide necessary information that could eventually, with the help of additional research and excavation of other mass graves, lead to at least a partial list of hospitalized members of the Croatian Armed Forces that were mass murdered by the members of the Yugoslav Army, the Department for the Protectionof People (OZN-a) and the Corpus of People's Defense of Yugoslavia (KNOJ) and thrown into Jazovka and other mass graves.

Objavljeno na moj rođendan u mom rodnom gradu :) Nažalost intervju je zbog prostora u novini mora... more Objavljeno na moj rođendan u mom rodnom gradu :)
Nažalost intervju je zbog prostora u novini morao biti drastično skraćen pa je ovo otprilike 20 % od onoga što sam rekla

ODGOVOR SLAVKU GOLDSTEIN NA NEISTINE IZNESENE U NJEGOVOM POSLJEDNJEM PAMFLETU

Ovo je email koji je zajedno s ovim prilogom poslan na email adrese 35 medija u Hrvatskoj (od koj... more Ovo je email koji je zajedno s ovim prilogom poslan na email adrese 35 medija u Hrvatskoj (od kojih je samo 4 objavilo prethodno reagiranje objavljeno 9.4.2016.):

Poštovani,
U privitku vam šaljem naš odgovor povjesničaru Hrvoju Klasiću i saborskom zastupniku Darinku Kosoru koji su se u svojim medijskim istupima pogrdnim riječima osvrnuli na naš rad i time narušili naš ugled i čast. Stoga od onih medija koji su prenijeli spomenute izjave očekujemo objavljivanje našeg priopćenja.
Ovim putem također još jednom molimo sve medije koji su ranije prenijeli klevete Slavka Goldsteina i Ivice Đikića (iznesene također na naš račun i koje nisu bile potkrijepljene nikakvim materijalnim dokazima) da u skladu s čl. 6 i čl. 12 Kodeksa časti hrvatskih novinara objave naše jučerašnje priopćenje s dokumentima koje smo poslali. Ukoliko to ne bude učinjeno, medije, urednike i novinare ćemo prijaviti Hrvatskom novinarskom društvu i poduzeti druge zakonske mjere.
Onima koji su objavili naše jučerašnje reagiranje ovim putem zahvaljujemo na kulturnom ponašanju i objektivnom izvještavanju.

mr.sc. Blanka Matković, Mphil
PhD Candidate
Politics and International Studies
University of Warwick
United Kingdom

Stipo Pilić, prof. povijesti
O.Š. Kralja Tomislava
Zagreb

KODEKS ČASTI HRVATSKIH NOVINARA
6. U svim novinarskim prilozima, pa tako i u komentarima i polemikama, novinar je dužan poštovati etiku javne riječi i kulturu dijaloga te uvažavati čast, ugled i dostojanstvo osoba ili skupina s kojima polemizira. Kada izvještava o temama o kojima postoje različita relevantna stajališta, a posebice kada se iznose optužujući navodi, novinar nastoji sva ta stajališta predstaviti javnosti.
12. Ako je novinar objavio netočnu informaciju, dužan ju je u najkraćem mogućem roku ispraviti. Ispravak treba nastojati objaviti na istom ili jednakovrijednom mjestu medijskog prostora i na isti ili jednakovrijedan način na koji je bila objavljena informacija na koju se ispravak odnosi. Isto vrijedi i za sve druge postupke kojima su prekršena načela ovog Kodeksa.

Ovo priopćenje poslano je većem broju medija u Hrvatskoj, a od Hrvatskog novinarskog društva zatr... more Ovo priopćenje poslano je većem broju medija u Hrvatskoj, a od Hrvatskog novinarskog društva zatraženo je očitovanje o zlouporabi javnog prostora koje sustavno provodi Ivica Đikić, urednik portala Novosti

Conducting an objective research in a former communist country is NEARLY impossible, but expectin... more Conducting an objective research in a former communist country is NEARLY impossible, but expecting from the journalists to actually understand a meaning of ethics is a mission impossible... T portal prijavljen je Agenciji za elektroničke medije!

Potaknuta promjenom na čelu Hrvatskog povijesnog muzeja, odlučila sam se konačno osvrnuti na doti... more Potaknuta promjenom na čelu Hrvatskog povijesnog muzeja, odlučila sam se konačno osvrnuti na dotičnu "antifašistkinju" Nataše Mataušić koja je ostala bez fotelje. Neobična podudarnost je u tome što je upravo u njenoj knjizi "Logor smrti i radni logor Jasenovac 1941.-1945." iz 2003. objavljen Dodatak Slavka Goldsteina pod naslovom "Radna grupa Jasenovac - 1945.-1947.". U knjizi ove, nažalost, povjesničarke, Goldstein je iznio čitav niz lažnih informacija o poslijeratnom logoru Jasenovac, a ti navodi još uvijek "krase" web stranicu SP Jasenovac iako su Goldsteinove fantazije razmontirane još u prosincu 2014. u radu kojeg smo objavili kolega Stipo Pilić i ja.
15. siječnja 2015. uputila sam Nataši Jovičić i Ministarstvu kulture email sa zahtjevom da se ti navodi isprave u skladu s novootkrivenim arhivskim dokumentima objavljenima u našem radu. Odgovor nikad nije stigao. Dotična je u međuvremenu postala savjetnica predsjednice RH, pa je stoga 19.5.2015. upućen i email Uredu predsjednice. Odgovor nikad nije stigao. 16.10.2015. upućen je iznova email i to Nataši Jovičić, Ministarstvu kulture i Uredu predsjednice. Odgovora i dalje nema.
S obzirom da sve institucije odgovaraju šutnjom i to unatoč činjenici da se Spomen područje Jasenovac financira iz državnog proračuna RH dok u isto vrijeme objavljuje lažne informacija čime se nanosi šteta ugledu RH i njenih građana, prije desetak dana upućen je novi dopis Ministarstvu kulture, ali i email dr. Zlatku Hasanbegoviću.
Zanimljivo će biti vidjeti u kakvoj zemlji mi ustvari živimo. Smjenjuju li se Povjerenstva samo zbog angažmana nekakvih udruga (U ime obitelji i sličnih), ili se u 21. stoljeću određene stvari mogu promjeniti jednostavno zato jer je znanstveno dokazano da Zemlja ipak nije ravna ploča?

Update 4.5.2016:
Odgovora ministra ili njegova tajnice i dalje nema. Odgovor vladajućih jednak je odgovoru prethodno vladajućih: ŠUTNJA. Znaju li oni uopće odgovoriti argumentom na argument? Runjaninova 2 posljednja je linija obrane jasenovačkog mita.

Sources and contributions for the History of Dalmatia, State Archive in Split and Faculty of Philosophy studies (University of Split), Split,, No.24, pages 245-293, Nov 1, 2012

Koristeci se objavljenim izvorima te arhivskim gradivom iz Državnog arhiva u Splitu i Hrvatskoga ... more Koristeci se objavljenim izvorima te arhivskim gradivom iz Državnog arhiva u Splitu i Hrvatskoga državnog arhiva, autorica analizira tijek Kninske operacije kojom su zavrsena vojna djelovanja na podrucju Dalmacije u Drugome svjetskom ratu, te ratne zlocine pocinjene u studenome i prosincu 1944. od postrojbi 8. dalmatinskog korpusa i OZNE. Iako je od Komisije za utvrđivanje ratnih i poratnih žrtava ustanovljen određeni broj grobista na sirem podrucju Drnisa i Knina, brojni izvori upucuju na mogucnost postojanja dosad neotkrivenih masovnih grobnica, narocito na kninskome podrucju gdje su vođene najteže borbe. ----- The article describes the development of Knin operation, the largest military operation lead on the territory of Dalmatia during World War II, in which during November and December 1944 most units of the 8th corps took part. Military operations in the territory of Sibenik, Zadar and Drnis at the beginning of November 1944 represent the early stage of Knin operation. During these actions greater number of military and civil persons were liquidated without trial, and part of them were mobilized into partisan forces. With no further research and digging it is not possible to tell with certainty the number of victims in the stated territory, but the available figures indicate that it might be the case of a few hundred, maybe a thousand of Croatian military forces and Wehrmacht members.

Dokumenti o partizanskoj i komunistickoj represiji i zlocinima u Dalmaciji krajem i nakon Drugoga... more Dokumenti o partizanskoj i komunistickoj represiji i zlocinima u Dalmaciji krajem i nakon Drugoga svjetskog rata opisani u ovoj zbirci nalaze se Hrvatskome državnom arhivu u Zagrebu te u državnim arhivima u Zagrebu, Zadru, Sibeniku, Splitu i Dubrovniku. Uvrsteni su i dokumenti iz stranih arhiva, ponajprije iz Vojnoga arhiva Vojnoistorijskog instituta u Beogradu, te dokumenti koji se nalaze u muzejskim zbirkama i privatnom vlasnistvu. Od ukupno 318 dokumenata (26 u preslici) prikupljenih u ovoj zbirci, do sada ih je objavljen samo manji broj. Dokumenti prikupljeni u ovoj zbirci, koja je rezultat istraživanja, u okviru znanstveno- istraživackoga projekta Hrvatskoga instituta za povijest "Ljudski gubici Hrvatske u Drugom svjetskom ratu i poracu", zapocetog zbirkama Partizanska i komunisticka represija j zlocini u Hrvatskoj 1944.-1946. Dokumenti, Partizanska i komunisticka represija i zlocini u Hrvatskoj 1944.-1946. Dokumenti. Slavonija, Srijem i Baranja, Partizanska i komunis...

Radovi Zavoda Za Povijesne Znanosti Hazu U Zadru, 2013

Radovi Zavoda Za Povijesne Znanosti Hazu U Zadru, 2014

Građa I Prilozi Za Povijest Dalmacije, Oct 1, 2012

Radovi Zavoda Za Povijesne Znanosti Hazu U Zadru, Dec 29, 2012

Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one ... more Researching demographic losses of the former Yugoslavia in the Second World War has remained one of the most controversial topics in the modern history of the Balkans. The obstacles, that every historian necessarily has to face while researching this topic, were influenced by several reasons, including political ones. In the first place, the number of victims has been manipulated since 1942 when the Communist propaganda exaggerated the number trying to motivate larger number of people to join their forces. The starting point was the existence of the labour camp Jasenovac in the Independent State of Croatia, founded in the summer of 1941, and where, according to the Communist brochure published in late 1942, 300,000 prisoners were murdered by the end of that year. Manipulating the number of Jasenovac victims continued immediately after the end of the Second World War when Josip Broz Tito suggested that „during the four years we have lost one million and seven hundred thousand of our citizens“, and it served as the most important part of exaggerating the number of the war victims in general. However, Tito’s statement needed scientific confirmation, but the prominent demographer and Professor Dolfe Vogelnik and his assistant Alojz Debevec refused this assignment since there was no population census and instead, they decided to pass it on to Vladeta Vučković, at that time a math student who was working at the Bureau of Statistics in Belgrade. He was given two weeks to calculate the total figure of all victims with the instruction that the number „must be impressive, but scientifically-statistically based“. Nevertheless, the number of 1,700,000, that Vučković provided, „either out of ignorance or in order to deceive, the people of the regime turned demographic losses into actual victims, which were according to all investigations scientifically funded something more than a million.“ What is more, that number of one million people was supposed to include also those killed by the Communist forces. However, the number of over 1,700,000 alleged war victims was presented by the Yugoslav representative Edvard Kardelj at the Paris Peace Conference in 1946 and it remained the official one till the disintegration of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. Based on the number of Yugoslav war victims of one million, provided by the USA government in 1954, Germany refused to pay reparations for 1,700,000 alleged victims. Therefore, the Yugoslav authorities were forced to conduct a new research in order to provide more accurate data. The list of victims was finally completed in 1964, but the result was „disappointing“ since the total number was indeed approximately one million, including 597,323 victims of the so-called „fascist terror“. According to the same list, approximately 60,000 people died or were killed in the camps Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška, where, as the Yugoslav authorities claimed, at least 700,000 people were murdered. Official forensic investigations, conducted in 1964 in Jasenovac, were supposed to prove a huge number of Jasenovac victims and the Yugoslav war victims in general, but were interrupted since, after investigating 130 locations, they found seven mass graves which held a total of 284 victim remains. However, it is important to emphasise that the report, signed by Dr Alojz Šercelj, stated that “a large amount of objects shows that the victims were brought directly to the bridge where the executions took place and they were not previously being held in the camp. On this particularly he indicates the presence of knives, rings, coins, etc.” Therefore, the remains found did not belong to the prisoners from Jasenovac at all, but probably refugees. The research results in 1964 were shocking and the list was declared top secret. It remained unknown to the public until 1989 when it was mentioned for the first time in the magazine Danas. Finally, an inaccurate number of the Yugoslav victims killed during the Second World War was used as one of the tools of Serbian propaganda during the Croatian War of Independence (1990-1995) when over 20,000 people were killed. Therefore, these manipulations and the flaws in previous research had a tremendous impact even on the generations born after the end of the Second World War. Today, due to the reluctance to deal with communist war crimes and incomplete de-communisation of Croatian society, this topic in Croatia is still a matter not only of political and scholarly debates, but also of everyday life.

U članku se analiziraju vojne operacije na području Podvučjaka i bitka za Odžak kojom krajem svib... more U članku se analiziraju vojne operacije na području Podvučjaka i bitka za Odžak kojom krajem svibnja 1945. završava Drugi svjetski rat na europskom tlu. U prvom dijelu prezentiraju se geografska i demografska obilježja ovog prostora, a u drugom borbe koje su se ondje vodile između 1941. i 1944. s posebnim osvrtom na organizaciju obrane, ali i međusobne odnose partizana i četnika. U trećem dijelu analizira se položaj Podvučjaka u završnim borbama 1945., a u četvrtom bitka za Odžak koja je okončana padom grada 27. ili 28. svibnja iste godine. U posljednjem dijelu pokušavaju se identificirati lokacije logora i grobišta, ali i počinitelja ratnih i poratnih zločina nad hrvatskim stanovništvom zatečenim na tom području potkraj svibnja 1945. Ključne riječi: Drugi svjetski rat, Bosna, Odžak, završne operacije, poginuli, nestali, ratni zločini Uvod Proljeće 1945. na našim prostorima obilježile su tzv. završne operacije za oslobođenje Jugoslavije okončane predajom Hrvatskih oružanih snaga (HOS) u Austriji sredinom svibnja. Rat je završio sedam dana kasnije, pisao je nakon rata Milan Basta, tadašnji politički komesar 51. vojvođanske divizije u sastavu Treće armije, koji je aktivno sudjelovao u navedenim događajima. 1 Jugoslavenski primjer nije bio izolirani slučaj. Iako je većina zapovjednika postrojbi Wehrmachta položila oružje u skladu s naredbama generala Jodla i generala Keitela o bezuvjetnoj predaji od 7. i 8. svibnja 1945., dio postrojbi pod zapovjedništvom feldmaršala Ferdinanda Schörnea nastavio se boriti sve do 11. i 12. svibnja. Slijedećeg dana predale su se i preostale njemačke postrojbe u Čehoslovačkoj. Garnizon na otoku Alderney u kanalu La Manche predao se 16. svibnja, a manja skupina njemačkih vojnika izgubila je radio vezu te ostala izolirana na norveškom otoku Svalbard sve do rujna 1945. Uvriježeno je mišljenje da je 1 " Rat je završen sedam dana kasnije " naslov je knjige Milana Baste, objavljene prvi put 1976. godine u Zagrebu u nakladi Globusa.

Radovi Zavoda Za Povijesne Znanosti Hazu U Zadru, Dec 17, 2013