Dr. Jože Pirjevec: "Tito and comrades"
In 2013, the publishing house Laguna from Belgrade translated and published in Serbian the book by Jože dr. Pirjeveca Tito in tovariši (Cankarijeva založba-Založništvo doo, Ljubljana, Slovenia 2011). The book has two volumes, of which only the first volume of Laguna's edition has 564 pages. And when we state that it is a very extensive book written by an academician, the reader can easily fall into the trap that it is a highly sophisticated scientific research. In addition, if the book is recommended by a famous historian from Belgrade, then the trap for the reader can be complete and perfect. (It is only necessary to organize some kind of symposium on the significance of the book, so that the trap the readers fall into is complete.) Let's deal with the facts and the analysis of part of the first page of the book by Tito's close "comrade" Milovan Đilas. (The unit on Milovan Đilas in the book has 78 pages.)
I
Naturally, Pirjevec paid considerable attention to Đilas. Especially since "comrades" Tito - Đilas collaborated directly for 17 years and shaped YU-history but also the history of other areas. The author of the book collected and arranged chronologically a respectable number of more or less known party positions on Đilas, mainly Dedier's post-war imagination and innovation. We believe that they would not be far wrong if they asserted that Dedier's "Novi priloji..." is a guide to the book of Pirjevec. With this kind of methodological approach, Pirjevec legitimized himself as a popularizer of the evil party's views on Đilas. These views date back to 1954, which received a "scientific" acceleration in 1957 after the publication in the USA of Đilas' cult book "New Class".
What makes Pirjevec's book more original than almost all previous anti-Đilas slanderous publications, and even Vladimir Dedier himself, is the very research entry into the topic of "Comrade Đilas". But first of all, let us state that academician Pirjevec's dictionary about Đilas is full of hatred, aggressiveness, and banality. Let's list part of that vocabulary about Djilas: Wahhabi, dervish, maniac, sectarian, coward, slanderer, liquidator, madman, suicide, etc. This "academic" vocabulary of Pirjevec is astounding in any serious historiographical study. Let's briefly conclude, the culture of each individual is expressed, but also defeated, primarily through its vocabulary.
On the other hand, we wouldn't be wrong if they added that Pirjevč's "analytics" has a surprising methodology. Pirjevec begins his analysis of the character and works of Đilas in a strikingly banal way. The author presents Đilas to the readers as a genetic criminal because "my father's grandfather, my two grandfathers, my father and my uncle were killed" (M. Đilas). Pirjevec was shocked by this "bloody" family genealogy. But, the inside knowledge of more or less every Montenegrin family of that time knows very well that the extended family of Nikola Đilas (father of M. Đilas) was no exception. Many, if not all, Montenegrin families, especially those bordering Turkey such as the Đilas, lived on the edge of a knife and constant warfare. S. Šobajić, M. Pavićević and other Montenegrin historians present "bloody statistics" that they do not know an example of a Montenegrin dying of natural causes. Peace was an unnatural state.
Pirjevec builds a character and an ex-post work about Đilas on the "shocking" entry premise of a superficial knowledge of the history of tribes and families in Montenegro, the inner psychology and culture of the survival of a peculiar people of tribal consciousness and practices of "a fateless land".
II
Saving newspaper space, let's quote the beginning of the author's "unit" about Đilas "The harshest assessment of Milovan Đilas was made by Lado Kozak... 'I remembered Churchill's famous words about Stalin: He was a great man, but he was not a good man.' We could say something similar about Đilas. And another, in its own way, also characteristic assessment was given by a foreign journalist: 'You are standing somewhere on the side in all the photos - it cannot be by chance'... Milovan Đilas, whom his friends called Đido, was born on June 12, 1911. in the village of Polje near Kolašin in Montenegro, in the country 'without justice', as he later called it in one of his books because of its tragic history marked by centuries of fighting against the Turks and conflicts between enemy clans... While Montenegro was still independent kingdom, Đido's father Nikola served in the gendarmerie as a major, and after the war in the ranks of the Serbian police, with whom he participated in the massacres organized against the Sandžak and Albanian Muslims."
Pirjevec introduces the reader to the "letter about Đilas" with the assessment of the Slovenian communist Lado Kozak that Đilas was not a man to his liking, which is an anti-reflective approach. It is easy to see that Kozak's impression of Đilas is of a psychological nature. Admittedly, that is Kozak's right to a personal experience of Đilas. But this is not about science, facts, analysis and the like. Historical figures are not evaluated, whether it is Churchill, Stalin, Tito or Đilas, impressionistically. Historical figures are neither good nor bad. They are beyond descriptive, mundane, psychological impressions. The senselessness of "Kozak's" or anyone else's impressionism could be supported by the opposing view of the distinguished communist from Montenegro, Miloš Milikić, who says of Đilas that he was an "excellent man". Edvard Kotsbek, the biggest Slovenian dissident, a man of thorough education and a very broad culture, gave very flattering evaluations of Đilas. Kardelj also spoke flatteringly of Đilas until 1954. Not to mention Boris Kidric. But personal impression is not an a priori science as Pirjevec tries to promote.
Here we briefly conclude, ie. let's deepen the thinking. It is not excluded that the impressionism of L. Kozak about Đilas is based on Đilas's war behavior during October 1943. Namely, Đilas spent a shorter part of the war in Slovenia on Tito's order, where he attended a three-day, i.e. at the three-night Assembly of Slovenian Communists in Kočevje in early October 1943. During his stay in Slovenia, Đilas noticed and later reported to Tito about the hidden, smoldering Slovenian nationalism and anti-Yugoslavism in the top of the communists there. That observation does not have to, but it can be the basis for Kozak-Pirjevč's hatred towards the guest, so that the evil is even greater - the Montenegrin guest - the southerner Đilas. It is not excluded, maybe I am wrong, that Kozak noticed Đilas as a "bad man" because he opposed Slovenian separatism.
Immediately after Kozak's impression of Đilas, Pirjevec cites another observation "of a foreign journalist: "You are standing somewhere on the side in all the photographs - that cannot be by chance". (We are talking about the French journalist Georges Scrigin.) This quote also shows the superficial and even evil intention of Pirjevac in his interpretation of Đilas. Namely, it can be concluded that Pirjevec uses the word "journalist" to impute a propaganda trick that Đilas stood out from the "big four" during the war as an evil character. Đilas' separation from the "big four" is of a completely different nature and photo content. Although part of the "big four" of the war, Đilas felt less and less a member of it over time. Already in the hell of Sutjeska, Đilas doubted his communist ideology and gradually separated himself from the dogma.
Unlike the top of the Slovenian communists and even the broader base, Đilas strongly opposed all forms of nationalism from the position of Yugoslav brotherhood-unity.
What is the "heart" of Pirjevč's "Unit on Milovan Đilas" are his propaganda conclusions in which the author states a priori that he is talking about a dangerous "Stalin's dervish". In order to make such harsh judgments about someone, it is necessary to keep in mind and thoroughly know from the inside not only the circumstances of the war but also the depth of the being of the local tradition of Montenegro (the context of the circumstances, narrower war psychology, the mentality of the people and their war passion and enthusiasm, the scale of individual and group war values and everything else that is the subject of the scientist's research.) There is none of that in the Pirjeveci. In the book, "the unit about Đilas" abounds in arbitrariness and a deficit of historical sensibility when it comes to Montenegro.
When Pirjevec speaks critically about the "destined country", i.e. Montenegro, he mistakenly interprets that Đilas meant a country "without justice". On the contrary. Here, too, Pirjevec has a shortened historical view and looks at Đilas through a crooked mirror. As a "judgeless country", Montenegro only looked like a country "without justice" with a narrow dioptre. When Đilas states that Montenegro is a "destined country", he means its historical atypicality until the XNUMXth century in relation to the direction of European (commercial, material) civilization. This does not mean its organizational internal lawlessness, "uselessness". When Pirjevec states Đilas' position that Đilas was born in a more or less wild country "without justice", he concludes in a modern, civil manner. Đilas's conclusion is the opposite, more ancient, more original and based on the long and strict Montenegrin "legal" virtue of individual self-formation. Anyone who does not know, understand and see "from the inside" the specifics of the history of Montenegro, the facts and its people in various times, does not understand Milovan Đilas either. Even less Njegoš. (Long story.)
After all that has been said about the "introduction" of Pirjevac's story about Đilas, the central theme is his "left mistakes" that happened in Montenegro at the beginning of the uprising and in the first half of 1942. (However, there were "left mistakes" throughout the war in all YU -spaces. And especially immediately after the war. They are a natural, integral part of every revolution.)
Đilas spent two terms in Montenegro as the unnamed leader of the Montenegrin communist insurgents. In the first term, he stayed in Montenegro from July 8 to November 4, 1941 and in the second term from March 15 to the beginning of June 1942. During the first term of Đilas in Montenegro, Pirjevec precisely cites the "bulletin statistics" that there were 26 "left errors ". (Though not all these murders were "leftist mistakes".) After Đilas' withdrawal from Montenegro, Pirjevec accurately states the fact that "leftist mistakes" "became massive among Montenegrins, and caused such resistance that the people increasingly went to the Chetniks". (The strengthening of the Chetnik movement in Montenegro was not caused only by "leftist mistakes". The strengthening of the Chetnik and other pro-fascist movements was strengthened much more by other reasons.) So, during the more massive "leftist mistakes", Đilas was not in Montenegro. That was the time of Ivan Milutinović's mandate. Milutinović's mandate lasted over 5 months. At that time, the largest number of so-called of "left errors" i.e. about a couple of hundred. (Although even those "mistakes" are not out of the usual war standards. On the contrary. Some historians call "left mistakes" "so-called" and ephemeral war topics.)
Aware of the collapse of the uprising in Montenegro and the harmful consequences of the "left" and other mistakes that occurred after Đilas' withdrawal from Montenegro, Josip Broz sends Đilas to Montenegro for the second time to save what can be saved. Pirjevec did not write a single letter about the second mandate of Đilas in Montenegro. In the second term, Đilas did little to help. The entropy of the uprising was great. The Montenegrin insurgents moved to Bosnia and joined the group of communist insurgents under the leadership of Josip Broz.
I would not write about the rest of the "unit" in the book about Milovan Đilas.
Bonus video:
