"Not every man who wears the uniform of the Croatian Army is a member of the Croatian Army." With these words, Nataša Rajaković, spokeswoman for President Franjo Tuđman, tried to respond to the first shameful news from the field at the press conference in October 1995, according to which persons in the uniforms of the Croatian Army allegedly killed Serbian old men and burned houses after the military police operation "Storm". . An unusual phenomenon is simply in its glory greatest shit from February 1996, I explained to the Minister of Defense Gojko Šušak: "The uniform is easy to put on. Many received it back in 1990, and since it was not a practice to return the uniforms, many took them home. They dug gardens in them, planted tobacco, and and went to set the house on fire."
This is how the official Republic of Croatia fought against the criminalization of the Croatian Army in those glorious days. For the next thirty years, Croatia will be alive and well, defending itself with the holy principle of individualizing crimes. The principle was relatively simple: if some war crime might have been committed in the Homeland War, if some grandmother was killed in "The Storm" or immediately after it or some house was set on fire, Croatia had nothing to do with it, because that crime - if the crime at all, and if there was one at all - was not committed in her name, but in the unknown name and surname of the famous individual Unknown Perpetrator. And if the Unknown Perpetrator was in the uniform of the Croatian Army, the famous Šuškov axiom about war crimes as folklore heritage and the uniforms of the Croatian Army as national costume was valid: "Many of them dug gardens, planted tobacco, and even went to set fire to houses."
If, however, the Known Perpetrator with first and last name was indeed a member of the Croatian Army with first and last name, the problem was solved by nationalizing the crime, the so-called Norč precedent, so named after the Croats took responsibility for the war crime of Mirko Norc in Gospić in 1991. , with the famous slogan "We are all Mirko Norac!"
And the Croatian people - whose full name is Mirko Norac - could, as we see, be criminal, but not the State. Even if it was committed in a Croatian uniform, by a soldier in the pay of the Croatian state, with the knowledge or even on the orders of a Croatian officer, in a Croatian military operation on Croatian soil, that is, during the "working hours" of the Croatian army, a war crime - if to repeat, was a crime at all, and if there was one at all - it could not and should not have anything to do with the Croatian state.
A small problem arose when it was discovered that war crimes committed by soldiers in Croatian uniforms and on the pay of the Croatian state - that is, during the "working hours" of the Croatian army - did take place at all. Norac's precedent had a magnificent historical and symbolic force, but it fared poorly in court: the crime in Gospić was committed and confessed by the Mirkonors, a people formerly known as Croats, but only the one who went to prison, Mirko Norac, was not a nationality, but a name and last name.
This, of course, was not a problem in itself - Mirko Norac was in prison only as a redeemer of Croatian sins - but the problem was when, after the final war crimes trials, the victims' families began to demand financial compensation from the Croatian state. The matter became a bit awkward: at the time when it paid the first compensation for crimes committed during the working hours of the Croatian Army, the Republic quite literally paid for individual crimes, thus formally taking responsibility for them.
Since the Croatian state cannot under any circumstances be criminal, an ingenious solution was found: the Law on the Responsibility of the Republic of Croatia for the Damage Caused by Members of the Croatian Armed and Police Forces during the Homeland War was passed, according to which the State, after financially compensating the victims crime, sued the Known Perpetrators, demanding their money back. In short, you understand, the Law on the Responsibility of the Republic of Croatia for Damage Caused by Members of the Croatian Armed and Police Forces during the Homeland War reads: 1. There is and cannot be any responsibility of the Republic of Croatia for damage caused by members of the Croatian Armed and Police Forces during the Homeland War. .
You understand, it was not about the money - the Croatian state has that money to throw away - but about the principle. And the principle was called the individualization of the crime and it was relatively simple: if a war crime might have been committed, Croatia had nothing to do with it.
Thus, the Republic of Croatia has been preserved virginally clean for history. Or at least that's how it used to be.
The news came as a New Year's greeting to legally convicted war criminals: while they were counting down the last hours of 2023 in the provincially decorated studios of Croatian television, Plenković's Ministry of Justice suddenly proposed to write off all claims for damages based on the Law on Liability for Damage Caused by Terrorist Acts and public demonstrations, and the famous Law on the Responsibility of the Republic of Croatia for Damage Caused by Members of the Croatian Armed and Police Forces during the Homeland War. Which means, to translate, how all claims collection procedures against legally convicted Croatian war criminals for the compensation of damages that the State has paid to their victims over the years will be suspended: moreover, the State will return the money to those from whom it was successful.
Or, in short: The state finally took responsibility for the crimes. The hitherto Unknown Perpetrator has revealed his identity and his name is the Republic of Croatia. Mirko Norac, that is the Croatian state.
You understand, it was not about the money - as I said, the Croatian state has that money to throw away - but about the principle. And the principle was relatively simple: if something looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it is a duck. If, therefore, it was committed in a Croatian uniform, by a soldier in the pay of the Croatian state, with the knowledge or even on the orders of a Croatian officer, in a Croatian military operation on Croatian soil, that is, during the "working hours" of the Croatian army, the war crime cannot be an individual one, but national, state, Croatian. After all, "it was a war, and war kills people: so we didn't pick strawberries!", explained the famous general of the Croatian army, Ljubo Ćesić Rojs, a long time ago.
In this way, Andrej Plenković and his government preserved the Republic of Croatia for history as a criminal one. I know, it is a difficult word, but I did not pass the law according to which Croatia pays the victims of crimes committed by individual Known Perpetrators.
To make things better and historically more legitimate, this matter - the Republic of Croatia as the direct culprit of war crimes - is the only item on the agenda on which the eternally opposed holders of executive power, Prime Minister Plenković and President Zoran Milanović, have ever agreed.
"Is it normal for a state that punishes - and should punish - those who committed war crimes, twenty-five years after the war, as if for auto insurance liability, to charge those same people financially?" asked the President of the Republic back in July 2021. "I know that what I am saying will not go down well with everyone, so I will be very clear and repeat that they do not take me at my word. So, it is a situation that requires coordinated and high-level political action, with a completely clear conscience: if you are guilty, you are punished, but the punishment has its limit and as I said, it must not turn into abuse. What are people who have already answered for their sins to do, to rob a bank? That cannot be solved by any minister alone, that cannot be solved by the state attorney's office because they come to the situation that they have to break the law. Therefore, the representative body and the Croatian government can resolve this cautiously, sympathetically, intelligently. If they want to, and I'm sure they will. We must not allow ourselves to behave like the last naive people. Mistakes and crimes happen."
The situation, as it were, "asked for coordinated and high-level political action", and it got coordinated and high-level political action: two and a half years later, Plenković's government really handled the matter cautiously, compassionately and intelligently.
"Mistakes and crimes happen."
In other words, we understood, the veterans in "Croatian Army uniforms burned houses, and even went to dig gardens and plant tobacco."
Okay, let's go and pick strawberries.
Bonus video:
