@Jacob Harrison
Ok the Chetniks did commit atrocities, however this is what Wikipedia says about it’s leader Draa Mihailovic
“The nature and extent of his responsibility for collaboration and ethnic massacres remains controversial. On 14 May 2015, Mihailovic was rehabilitated after a ruling by the Supreme Court of Cassation, the highest appellate court in Serbia.”
And that is an example of why Wikipedia is an insufficient source. I could give you some articles by Serbian authors (alas, they're in Serbian) detailing everything that was problematic about the Draa Mihailovic rehabilitation. Here's but one. I'll just translate part of her conclusion, which I btw. agree with:
@Vesna Rakic-Vodinelic, translated by Vman
I won't hide that I am against the rehabilitation of Draa Mihailovic for the basic reason I gave at the beginning of this text: even though it is not established as such in in law, here [in Serbia] the rehabilitation is understood as an ideological and political tool for historical revisionism, rather than being a judicial measure. I also oppose the rehabilitation of D. Mihailovic on account of "political" reasons I believe that even the communist court provided enough evidence that he committed grave criminal acts. I oppose the rehabilitation of D. Mihailovic because it would legitimize impunity and allow for the spread of the idea of impunity for war crimes done in the 1990s.
This is true not just for Serbia, but for ex-Yugoslavia in general: the judicial system is often at the service of (nationalist) politics, especially in case of war crimes trials even when it comes to old crimes from World War 2. The case of Draa Mihailovic's rehabilitation was no different facts did not matter, only Mihailovic's "patriotic" credentials did, as well as his usefulness for the purposes of the current nationalist offensive within Serbia an effort spearheaded by their current government.
Do not make the mistake of blindly trusting the objectivity of Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Kosovo courts, especially in matters that closely touch upon the legitimacy of nationalist narratives.
Oh, by the way, that long list of articles at the bottom of the one I just gave you are all related articles dealing with that trial and those similar to it. All give a wealth of reasons for why this rehabilitation of the Chetnik movement is legally unjustified and a bad idea. And that's exactly what it is not a matter of addressing an injustice against a particular defendant, but a blanket rehabilitation of an entire movement and the official glossing over of its many, many crimes.
@Jacob Harrison
The Croats would have been guilt tripped by the atrocities by the NDH enough to not want to have independence from the Serbian ruled Kingdom of Yugoslavia for a while.
What sort of insane troll logic is that?
You think that when the Chetniks came guns blazing into their towns and villages, the local Croats would just say "Well, we kinda deserve it"? And that survivors wouldn't want revenge at the first opportunity? The Chetniks wouldn't have been merciful, as they kept demonstrating during the war.
It would have been a bloodbath.
@Jacob Harrison
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia kept the Serbs, Croats, and Bosnians seperate to practice their own culture and religion, knowing that if they were forced to be together, then major tensions would occur.
Jacob Harrison, you moron, how about you actually read the whole Wikipedia articles (since I have no illusion you'll go into more serious literature) before you go spouting off something as plainly ridiculous as this?
The Kingdom DID NOT keep them separate. Emphatically so. Ever heard of "integral Yugoslavism"? Unitarism?
See, with the very partial exception of the last few years of its existence, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes's (after 1929 renamed to Kingdom of Yugoslavia) official ideology integral Yugoslavism stated that Serbs, Croats and Slovenes were in fact one, single nation. Ethnic differences were only reluctantly acknowledged at first, then after 1929 even that was gone.
The Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), Montenegrins and Macedonians officially did not exist. The latter two were literally forced to identify as Serbs (while the Bosniaks could pick whether they preferred to be Croats or Serbs at least until the dictatorship of 1929-34 when ethnic differences were even legally abolished and integral Yugoslavism became essentially the only allowed option (officially, everyone was Yugoslav now).
I already told you that the Kingdom's policies were dumb, authoritarian and inconsiderate of possible ethnic tensions.
In conclusion, the truth is exactly the opposite of what you said.
@Jacob Harrison
Communist Yugoslavia forced them together and forced them to abandon their traditional cultures to live under Revolutionary Communist culture which caused Croatia and Slovenia to finally have enough and declare independence sparking the 1990s wars.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, with only a grain of truth.
I already told you that the communists immediately addressed the ethnic issues that the Kingdom only barely began to make an effort of fixing towards its end (and even then only in regards to the Croats). The communists right away created six constituent republics within the new Yugoslav federal republic (there was first an idea of there being five, but that quickly changed), each a 'home' for a major ethnic group, as well as two autonomous provinces. It is true that the republics and provinces had rather limited autonomy at first, but that increased over time.
Furthermore, the communists immediately recognized the Macedonians, Montenegrins and - not entirely at first, but later fully - (Bosnian) Muslims as individual and equal ethnicities, an achievement which was irreversible and never came into question during the second (socialist) Yugoslavia.
So, what you stated about the Kingdom and about the socialist Yugoslavia regarding their treatment of the ethnic issues should be precisely inverted then you get the real picture.
Croatian and Slovenian independence had much more to do with Serb nationalism than with communism. See, in the 80s, the ideological influence and control by the ruling League of Communists of Yugoslavia hit an all-time low and was further declining. In Serbia communist ideology was rapidly being fully replaced with Serb nationalism, which resulted in a great deal of alarm in the other republics (which had their own nationalist tendencies, just not so aggressive and often not as far developed). When Serbia's leadership, using masses of its own supporters, started literally taking down other republic and province leaderships by coup, that's when the shit really hit the fan. After they toppled the local governments of Montenegro, Vojvodina and Kosovo, the inter-republic and inter-ethnic tensions were becoming such that a positive solution was basically impossible. Croatian and Slovenian nationalists used this situation to agitate for independence.
That's not to say that republics other than Serbia and its post-coup ally Montenegro did not have their share of responsibility. But the point is that the Serbs were not some sort of guardians who tried to save everything from the evil separatism of others. Serb nationalism had an absolutely crucial role in the violent breakup of the second Yugoslavia. Point number two is that Croatia and Slovenia weren't primarily pushed out due to issues with communism if that were the driving factor, socialist Yugoslavia wouldn't have lasted for 46 years.
The one little grain of truth is that revolutionary communist doctrine was instituted as the official ideology in 1945, and that communists did in some ways attack the traditional ways of life and suppress religious influence. Sometimes brutally.
But as I said, the totalitarian phase of Yugoslav communist rule ended roughly around 1950. Since then the general tendency was that of increasing liberalization (with some successful reversals and pushbacks every once in a while).
@Jacob Harrison
Therefore, it was Croatia and Slovenia were on the right side of the Yugoslav wars.
That is... only sort of true. Generally I'd say: yes, kind of, but with strong caveats.
1) The Slovenian war only lasted for ten days. With all due respect to the Slovenians, it was a rather minor episode in the grand scheme of things and Slovenia did not play a major role in what happened after those initial 10 days.
2) The Croatian war of independence included some serious war crimes by the Croatian side. This, coupled with the lack of will or significant progress in prosecuting these war crimes, puts a dark shade over the whole thing.
3) The treatment of Croatian Serbs was far from perfect in general, too. The Croatia of the 1990s was largely virulently nationalist, and we feel the reverberations of that to this day. This nationalist revival was both spurred by and itself encouraged the beginning of the Serb rebellion.
4) We gladly greeted the evacuation of 250,000 Serbs from the Krajina (occupied part of Croatia) in 1995. At first, Croatia even used various means to make sure they don't return. They fled not only due to the decision of their own authorities, but also on account of their fear of what would happen when the Croatian authorities took over. A fear that unfortunately turned out to be justified.
5) You don't mention the war in Bosnia, which is another can of worms.
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