"For home," a group of fans shouted loudly in the south stand of the City Stadium in Podgorica.
"Ready," the Croatian ultras answered enthusiastically to themselves.
Croatia had just played a qualifying match against Montenegro, and some of the Croats who had traveled to cheer on the Croatian national team decided to do what they regularly do in their homeland.
"Ready for Home" was accompanied by shouts of "Kill a Serb" and the intonation of Jelačić's march "Fear the beat, beat it", modified so that, instead of Croatian, the appropriate song is sung about the Ustasha flag.
Something happened that no one expected.
"Ustasha, Chetniks, you fled together," replied the Montenegrins from the western stands. The same ones who greeted the singing of "Our Beautiful Country" with applause at the start of the match in Podgorica. And on Zagreb's Maksimir in September, they hung a banner reading "From Lovćen the fairy cries, forgive us Dubrovnik", as a humble sign of apology for the politicians and soldiers of their country participating in the siege of Dubrovnik in 1991.
Rarely has anyone ever given such a history lesson to the blushing Croats. He shattered the myth of double connotations as precisely as Nikola Vlašić “torn” the net behind Igor Nikić’s goal. And in doing so, he reminded them of the harsh facts – that never in history have the Ustashas waged war against the Chetniks, with the exception of the battle at Lijevča Polje that took place at the very end of World War II. About which historiography still debates today whether it was a battle at all or just an armed clash with a small number of deaths, which was inflated to unrealistic proportions by first the Chetniks and then the Ustasha mythomania.
Everything before and after that was a more or less solid alliance in which the Ustashas and the Chetniks under German command actually fought on the same side. The Independent State of Croatia, in whose name they so proudly shout today, paid pensions to the families of the Chetniks who died in clashes with the partisans, and wounded members of the Serbian Homeland Army were treated in the hospitals of the NDH. Together, in Operation Weiss in 1943, they advanced against the Dalmatian Croats on the Neretva River. And two years later, Poglavnik Ante Pavelić, the historical greatness of the Croatian radicals, issued a special order guaranteeing unhindered passage through the territory of the NDH to the priest Momčilo Đujić and the remnants of the Chetnik units.
So at Bleiburg, not only the units of the Independent State of Croatia, the Home Guard and Ustashas, the Slovenian White Guard and the Russian Cossack cavalry surrendered to Broz's partisans, but also Pavelić's war allies - the Chetniks.
The Montenegrins reminded the Croatian fans in Podgorica of this on Monday. That part of them that sees nothing objectionable in the greeting "For the homeland, ready" and the cry "Kill a Serb." And who today justify it as a reaction to the throwing of stones at the fan bus by - according to unofficial and currently unconfirmed information - fans of Belgrade's Red Star. As if they ever needed a direct reason for the ZDS.
So, for lack of a better argument, they in turn asserted that for the evil they had done on the slopes of Dubrovnik, no matter how much they repented, they would not receive forgiveness from them.
It is a historical shame that there is no one in Croatia to teach such a lesson to the ardent admirers of the NDH. Prime Minister Andrej Plenković is balancing on the wave that Marko Perković Thompson started at the Hippodrome this summer, trying not to be the one swept away by it. Significantly, when it comes to this topic, the President of the Republic Zoran Milanović, a former Prime Minister and until recently the presidential candidate of a nominally left-wing party, is unusually silent. He should have a clear and unambiguous position on the controversial salute. But all his principledness, determination and political value – and Milanović likes to see himself as the only real statesman in Croatia, and beyond – in a collision with the extreme right-wing march were reduced to the cowardly thesis that “Ready for Homeland” is actually best – ignored.
Which the European Football Federation will almost certainly not do. The Croatian national team is facing a fine for the controversial chants, now it remains to be seen whether it will remain just a fine or whether it will lead to a decision to play in front of empty stands.
When we ourselves don't have the will or strength to deal with our own demons, there is always someone else who will do it. Even if they are those we least expect it from, as the Montenegrins did this time.
Bonus video:
