Chetniks: Difference between revisions

Serbian Chetnik Movement
Српски Четнички Покрет
Srpski Četnicki Pokret
Serbian Chetnik Movement; Српски Четнички Покрет; Srpski Četnicki Pokret
	Flag of the Chetnik movement
Active	· 1904 - 1929 ; · 1941 - 1944; · 1992 - 1998
Type	Guerrilla
Commanders
Deputy Commander-in-Chief	Jovan Babunski; Kosta Pećanac; Gligor Sokolović; Vasilije Trbić; Dragoljub Mihailović

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The Chetniks (Serbian: Четници, Četnici) were a Royalist paramilitary formations operating in the Balkans before and during World Wars. During World War II, the Chetniks were known officially as "Yugoslav Army in the Fatherland" (Југословенска војска у отаџбини, Jugoslovenska vojska u otadžbini, or ЈВУО, JVUO), and consisted mostly of Serbs loyal to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia's government in exile. The name "Chetnik" was also used by some guerilla squads active in the wars in the Balkans prior to World War I. The name chetnik is derived from the Serbian word četa (чета) which means "military company", itself derived from Turkish çete, gang or band (e.g., of brigands).

The role of Chetniks during the World War II remains a controversial issue in former Yugoslav countries. While in Socialist Yugoslavia they were condemned as quislings and war criminals—the characterization also supported by Croatian and Bosnia and Herzegovinan historians and public perception—in today's Serbia they are largely rehabilitated.

In modern times, especially during and after Yugoslav Wars, "chetnik" come to be used as an ethnic slur against Serbs. However, some Serb nationalist and paramilitary organizations self-identified with the term, .

1904-1929

The word chetnik was first used in early XX century Macedonia by the IMRO freedom fighters against the Ottoman Empire. Soon, most ethnic groups in the Balkans had their own chetnik detachments: Serbs, Bulgarians, Greek Andartes and Albanian Kacak. Part of the IMRO members that fought till 1903 as pro-Bulgarian Macedonians, in 1903 started fighting as pro-Serbian Macedonians. This was due the offers made by Serb officials vis-a-vis the new policy of the Serbian kingdom towards Macedonia. In Vranje in 1904 the organization "Serb Chetnik Movement" (Српски Четнички Покрет) was formed by the members of the St. Sava organization, by members of the army and representatives of the ministry of foreign affairs. Besides the autonomist IMRO chetniks that already existed in Macedonia, Serbia started equipping and sending pro-Serbian Macedonian chetniks which started attacking both the autonomist and the pro-Bulgarian chetniks. The Serb chetniks were fighting against the Macedonian liberation movement and were conducting Belgrade's plans of force Serbisation of the Slavic population of Macedonia. This started the begging of the so-called "Macedonian struggle".

The Macedonian pro-Serbian chetniks from 1904 till 1908 created strongholds in Skopje and Prilep (Porech) regions after several battles against the Turks and the IMRO, but could not extend their territory due to the IMRO presence in the other parts of Macedonia. The most prominent Serbian chetniks from Macedonia were Jovan Babunski and Gligor Sokolovic. After the proclamation of the Young Turk revolution in 1908 and the proclamation of the constitution, all of the brigands in Macedonia, including the pro-Serbian chetniks put down their weapons. This period lasted till 1912, when the Balkan countries once again started arming guerrilla bands in Macedonia in order to help them in operations against the ottoman army.

At the start of the Balkan wars there were 110 Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO), 108 Greek, 30 Serbian, and 5 Vlach detachments. They fought against the Turks in the First Balkan War, while in World War I they fought against Austria-Hungary^{[citation needed]}.

World War I

In WWI the Chetniks were fighting against the Bulgarian army and organized the Toplicko inssurection, which was quickly crushed by the Bulgarian army.

Kingdom of Yugoslavia

After the formation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and the arrival of peacetime, the Chetnik movement experienced a transition from merely a guerrila force. In 1921 the Organization of Chetniks for Freedom in Honour of the Fatherland (Udruženje četnika za slobodu u čast Otadžbine) was formed and in 1924 the Organization of Serbian Chetniks for King and Fatherland (Udruženje srpskih četnika za Kralja i Otadžbinu) and Organization of Serbian Chetniks Petar Mrkonjić (Udruženje srpskih četnika Petar Mrkonjić) followed. These last two merged together the following year as the Organization of Serbian Chetniks Petar Mrkonjić.

After King Alexander's dictatorship in 1929 Organization of Serbian Chetniks Petar Mrkonjić was banned while the Organization of Chetniks for Freedom in Honour of the Fatherland was allowed to continue operating. Kosta Pećanac was the organization's leader from 1932 to the end of the state in 1941.^[1].

1992-1998

In the late 1980s, as Slobodan Milošević came to power in Serbia, the Chetnik movement was unofficially rehabilitated and the suppression of their literature and iconography was lifted. New opposition parties openly supported the role of Chetniks in the Second World War, claiming that the official history had been falsified. ^{[citation needed]}

In 1992, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was replaced by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Savezna Republika Jugoslavija) in Serbia and Montenegro. From 1991, the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia into several nation states resulted in the Yugoslav wars. The Chetnik continued to fulfill their purpose by systematically "cleansing" the Yugoslav region of everyone but pure-bred Serbs. The heaviest casualties were suffered by Bosnia's ethnic Muslims. Chetniks were proudly responsible for over 250,000 deaths, 60,000 rapings, and countless injuries. The Chetnik propaganda during these wars was facilitaed by Slobodan Milosevic and governed by war-time radicals Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic. It comes to no surprise that all of the Chetniks in these wars were radicals, and continue to be so in modern times.

Politicians like Vojislav Šešelj organized para-military units and demanded that Serbs use force to solve the nationalistic tensions in Yugoslavia and ensure that the territories populated by Serbs in other Yugoslav republics which planned to secede remain united with Serbia. During the Yugoslav wars which followed, many Serb paramilitary units called themselves Chetniks, and Croats and Bosniaks commonly used the word to describe any armed Serb unit, regular or paramilitary.

Several paramilitary formations, including those by Željko Ražnatović "Arkan", boasted Chetnik insignia and many of them committed war crimes. The White Eagles paramilitary also identified as Chetniks.^[2] This has contributed to the negative image of Chetniks in Croatia and Bosnia.

Contemporary period

Rehabilitation in Serbia

In late 2004, the National Assembly of Serbia passed a new law that equalized the rights of the former Chetnik members with those of the former Partisans, including the right to war pensions. Rights were granted on the basis that both were anti-fascist movements that fought occupiers, and this formulation has entered the law. The vote was 176 for, 24 against and 4 abstained. The socialist party (SPS) of Slobodan Milošević was the one voting against the decision.

File:LegionMeritDraza.gif

Dragoljub Mihailović was posthumously awarded with the Legion of Merit by U.S. President Harry S. Truman, 1948

There have been varying reactions to the law in Serbian public opinion. Many have praised it as just and long overdue, including the Prince Alexander Karađorđević of Yugoslavia (son of the last Yugoslav king), as well as most political parties (with the most notable exception of SPS). Others protested the decision, including the Serbian Association of Former Partisans, the Serbian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, the Croatian Anti-Fascist Movement, and the President and Prime Minister of Croatia.

Some Serbians allegedly support the Chetniks due to the Yugoslav wars ^{[citation needed]} and a failure of the Communist idea of "brotherhood and unity of southern Slavs" ^{[citation needed]}. On the other hand, most Croats and Bosniaks see Chetniks as a fascist movement, no better than the Croatian Ustaše or the SS Handžar Division ^{[citation needed]}.

Modern movement

Vojislav Šešelj, leader of the Serbian Radical Party, holds the rank of voivoda of the Chetniks, given to him in 1989 by Momčilo Đujić, a surviving leader of the World War II Chetniks who fled to the USA. ^{[citation needed]} The Serbian basketball player Milan Gurović has a tattoo of World War II Chetnik Draža Mihailović on his left arm which has resulted in a ban since 2004 in playing in Croatia under its anti-fascist laws.^[3] Turkey has also threatened to enact such a ban.^[4] Former Serbian rocker Bora Đorđević is also a declared Chetnik.^[5]

Today Chetnik activity is seriously restricted or banned in all neighbouring countries other than Serbia and Republika Srpska in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Milorad Pupovac of the Independent Democratic Serbian Party in Croatia, has called the organization "fascist collaborators".^[6] In 2003, the Montenegrin government forbade the building of a statue of Pavle Đurišić near Berane.^[7]

Since 1992, the Serbian Renewal Movement has annually organized the Ravna Gora Parliament.^[8] In 2005, Croatian president Stipe Mesić cancelled a planned visit to Serbia as it coincided with the gathering, officially supported by the Serbian government, and attended by Vuk Drašković.^[9] People who attend the Parliament wear Chetnik-World War II insignia.^[10]

Modern Chetnik movements include:

Ravna Gora Chetnik Movement of Republika Srpska, based in Brčko.^[11]
Serbian Movement of Ravna Gora, with branches in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia.^[12]

Bibliography

Tomasevich, Jozo, War and Revolution in Yugoslavia: The Chetniks. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1975
Milazzo, Matteo J., The Chetnik Movement and the Yugoslav Resistance. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975
Hoare, Marko A., Genocide and Resistance in Hitler's Bosnia: The Partisans and the Chetniks, 1941-1943. London: Oxford University Press, 2006
Karchmar, Lucien. Draža Mihailović and the Rise of the Četnik Movement, 1941-1942. New York: Garland Pub., 1987.
Lees, Michael. The Rape of Serbia: The British Role in Tito's Grab for Power, 1943-1944. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1991.
Martin, David. Ally Betrayed: The Uncensored Story of Tito and Mihailović. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1946.
Sipcic, Radoje. Vladimir "Vlado" Sipcic, The Last King's Soldier of the Kingdom Paris, FR: Integra; Beograd: Paris, 2004.
Martin, David. Patriot or Traitor: The Case of General Mihailović: Proceedings and Report of the Commission of Inquiry of the Committee for a Fair Trial for Draža Mihailović. Hoover Archival Documentaries. Hoover Institution Publication, Volume 191. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University, 1978.
Martin, David. The Web of Disinformation: Churchill’s Yugoslav Blunder. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990.
Pavasovic, Mike "Cetniks, Heroes or Villains?" History Today, April, 1992
Roberts, Walter R. Tito, Mihailović, and the Allies, 1941–1945. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1973.
Trew, Simon. Britain, Mihailović, and the Chetniks, 1941–42. Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin’s Press in association with King’s College, London, 1998.
Freeman, Gregory A. "The Forgotten 500: The Untold Story of the Men Who Risked All For the Greatest Rescue Mission of World War II" NAL Hardcover 2007, ISBN-10: 0451222121

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 *''Serbian Movement of Ravna Gora'', with branches in the [[United States]], [[Canada]], the  [[United Kingdom]], and [[Australia]].<ref>[http://www.ravnagorachetniks.org/board_e.html The Movement of Serbian Chetniks Ravne Gore Chapters]</ref>
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