The Anglo-Saxons say that "every cloud has a silver lining." Which is a much more subtle version of the local proverb - there is some good in every evil.
However, the latest "methodical" campaign of whitewashing recent and distant history by the leaders of the so-called "Serbian world" could be said to be evil and perverse rather than resembling a cloud after which the sun appears.
The leaders of the current parliamentary majority, Mandić, Mićović, Ostojić, have been falsifying historical facts and events in a tragicomic manner for months now, and they do not care much that they are receiving warnings from relevant domestic and regional sources, from recognized historians and established non-governmental organizations, that they are thereby spreading hate speech, deepening divisions among citizens, denying anti-fascism, and promoting collaborationists and quislings as the greatest patriots and knights.
We watched a new episode of that nationalist soap opera over the weekend at Zidan Most, in fraternal Slovenia, where the aforementioned "black trio" paid tribute to the "members of the king's army" who were killed in 1945 by the liberators and the new communist authorities.
Given that Slovenia is a democratic and European country, it has long investigated and marked the graves in places where, without trials and verdicts, thousands of people were liquidated. And now they have hosted the head of the Montenegrin parliament and his ministers and priests to visit these memorials and pay their respects. So that Mandić and his comrades would abuse the hospitality and, instead of showing respect to the victims, spread hate speech and ideological smearing and falsification of history. Everything resembled the end of the 80s, when similar "tours" were organized throughout the then homeland where the ideological fathers of Mandić, Mićović and Ostojić, in a similar way, spread intolerance, religious and national, preparing the ground for the bloody war and war crimes that later followed. And all this, as today, in the name of the people (Serbian) that they pushed into the greatest historical tragedy, far from EU membership, where their motherland, even today, 35 years later, wanders and waits.
Although it may sound cynical, in the latest speeches and speeches, progress is noticeable at least in one segment. There is something good in evil. Namely, it is visible that Mandić, Mićović and Ostojić avoid mentioning the Chetniks and their movement in their speeches! As if they are ashamed of them, or accept the historical fact that they were collaborators of the occupiers?! That is why, instead of the compromised Chetniks, they almost exclusively use the euphemism, "the king's army in the homeland". It sounds less problematic, because a king is mentioned, then a serious formation such as the army, and finally the homeland as probably the greatest value. Although you don't need to be a historian to know how that king, army and homeland disappeared in a few months in 1941 after the so-called April War. When the general of that army, Milan Nedić, was appointed prime minister by Hitler's Wehrmacht. And until the end of the war he was in collaboration with the Nazis. Nedic liked to use expressions like "communist-Jewish mob" or "communist-Masonic-Jewish-English mafia" in condemning the Partisan movement and Tito. Something, then, similar to Methodius' recent attack on the "Titoist-Ustasha regime".
Apart from trying to embellish or even hide the Chetnik movement behind the euphemism "Yugoslav army in the homeland", the aforementioned trio massively manipulates numbers in their so-called speeches. We have already seen this, when it comes to nationalists and populists. Dozens of those killed become thousands, and thousands then hundreds of thousands. Mandić claims, in honor of the Chetniks buried near Kamnik, that "10 thousand of them set out from Montenegro"! So, if they were all shot, it cannot be more than 10 thousand. Then Joanikije takes the floor and, in just an hour, the number doubles for him - to over 20 thousand. The famous Belgrade historian, Dr. Bojan Dimitrijević, a sympathizer of the "king and the homeland" (and not the communists and Tito), writes an essay in Politika 2005 in which, referring to dispatches from the scene, he states that the number of Chetniks killed is around 6 thousand, along with, as he states, a few hundred civilians. The most famous Croatian historians and demographers, from Vladimir Žerjavić to (Jew) Ivo Goldštajn, came up with a figure of 40-50 thousand! Where, as they claim, were 2 thousand killed Chetniks and their sympathizers! What would it mean if Mandić increased the number of killed five times, and Joanikije ten times?! Which clearly illuminates their intention, which has nothing to do with commemorating the victims of the Built Bridge, but is for internal use, in the service of whitewashing history and stirring up nationalist passions here.
In support of this, here is the following observation - if no one questions the fact that tens of thousands of people were killed between Zidani most and Bleiburg, of which the Chetniks made up 2 to 6 thousand, a logical question arises - who were the other victims?! And where is the mention of these victims, if they were also killed, like the Chetniks, without trial and verdict. Renowned Yugoslav historians and demographers have determined that there were 36 thousand killed Croats (mostly Ustashas and Home Guard), 5-8 thousand Slovenes (mostly Home Guard), 5 thousand Muslims (mostly in the service of Pavelić), and the aforementioned 2 thousand Chetniks. In the quoted text from Politika, Serbian historian Dimitrijević cites a report by one of the survivors from Zidani most: "On the right are the Ustashas with the Croatian flag, on the left the Chetniks with the Serbian one. The Chetnik flag was unfurled by the commander of the Pljevlja brigade Jelovac".
When ordinary people falsify historical facts, that is not commendable either. But they are blamed for their ignorance and misguidance. When the speaker of the parliament and the head of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro do it so obviously and brutally, then it is hate speech, the aim of which is to divide, divide and humiliate, primarily the citizens of this country for whom it is intended. First, the numbers are manipulated, and then tens of thousands of victims are ignored, just because they are of different religions and nations?! Or is the much more important reason that it is politically inconvenient for the "methodical" narrators from Montenegro to emphasize the fact that along with the Chetniks, in the Slovenian hills, the Ustashi were also killed because that would acknowledge the historical fact - that the Chetniks and the Ustashi are the same scum. And that, in World War II, they were on the same side of history!
Nothing like Zidani most and Bleiburg makes fun of Metodije Ostojić's recent verbal shenanigans, in which he scared his Uskoks and Pivljana with a conspiracy theory about the "Titoist-Ustasha" regime after the war, which allegedly persecuted and even killed Serbs! And then, in a wide field along the border of Slovenia and Austria, the same Metodije visits the place where Tito and the communists shot 15 times more Ustashas than Chetniks! If numbers are even important in crimes. Not to mention a part of Tito's speech from 1961, when on the 20th anniversary of the uprising he speaks about "Pavelić's butchers" and "Ustasha executioners who killed hundreds of thousands of Serbs and Croatian patriots".
The intention of the aforementioned trio is obvious, and no means are chosen for this purpose. The past and history are being falsified in order to equate Croats with the Ustashas, Montenegrins with the "red Croats", and Serbs with the king and the "army in the homeland", who were against Hitler. So, how poetically and obviously in an emotional trance, said the announcer Mandić, they were liquidated by Stalinism on the way they rushed to the embrace of the Western allies! To save themselves from Tito and communism. What a morbid joke.
It all comes down to the well-known anti-war metaphor - priests and then cannons. What is different, however, in the latest evil is the fact that today the cannons are under the control of NATO and not official Belgrade... Vučić has a couple of them, but they are more for some school exercise or comic parade than for serious campaigns. So don't be afraid - there will be no new war. No matter how hard Mandić, Mićović and Ostojić try.
Finally, another important question: the latest nationalist feast, the AM announcer organized on the soil of Slovenia, which is based to the core on anti-fascism and the partisan movement. Wherever you go in Slovenian towns, villages, hills and valleys, you will meet some partisan monument or memorial plaque. There is no trace of the Home Guard. Although in terms of their performance, that is, crimes, they were a scouting platoon or a holiday party, compared to the infamous Ustasha and Chetnik brigades. Since it is obvious that the Montenegrin delegation abused the hospitality of the state of Slovenia, it remains to be seen whether the competent authorities will prosecute the high-ranking guests?! Will Mandić, after Croatia, also end up on the Slovenian list of "undesirable persons"?! Spreading hate speech, manipulating the victims of World War II, glorifying the defeated Chetnik movement, all these are serious violations of the legal solutions that are nurtured and on which a reputable member of the European Union, such as Slovenia, rests. A wonderful country, as the voivode himself noted.
Bonus video:
