I'm simplifying and reducing it to the language of the street, but the situation requires such precision. In a social sense, there are three Croatias. Partisan, Ustasha and Home Guard. It can be the other way around, and that other way around is the real state of affairs in recent decades.
Under normal circumstances, no matter how normal it may seem to us today, these three Croatias coexist, in such a way that the rhythm is set by the home-defense civic and centrist Croatia, while the Ustasha Croatia lives through church and fan gatherings and on the margins of public space, aware of its large numbers, but also frustrated by the fact of its real social irrelevance, while the partisan Croatia is constantly on the defensive in a political sense, but in a social sense it gathers the only relevant cultural figures, creative people, artists, journalists and intellectuals. This last fact terribly frustrates the Ustasha Croatia, which thinks that this is because of some conspiracy of the elites, and not because of its own undercapacity at all levels.
Now, when circumstances are not normal, and this happened after the country was attacked in 1991, these three Croatias did make a temporary pact for the defense of the country, which Tuđman, following the idea of the criminal Luburić, tried to smuggle into the story of reconciliation. With the important moment that this reconciliation actually implied the dominance of Home Guard Croatia, with a symbolic victory of the Ustasha and the complete expulsion from the public space of Partisan Croatia, which in that scenario would have to be grateful for the fact that they decided to spare its lives, but with the obligation of re-education. Essentially, the HDZ never gave up on such a vision of Croatia and in that sense, Andrej Plenković, unlike Ivo Sanader, is the authentic successor of Franjo Tuđman. Much more authentic than his predecessor at the head of the HDZ, Tomislav Karamarko, who did not have enough cunning of mind and intellectual capacity to understand that this scenario could only be achieved with petty-bourgeois mimicry and centrist phrases and declarative anti-fascism.
What is new now is that third element, when normal or extraordinary circumstances are not mentioned. This is a moment that we saw already during the Second World War, when this division was permanently sealed, and it happens when fascism wins on the international level, which then finds allies in Ustasha Croatia. In such circumstances, clearly, that Croatia comes to power, after which it would prefer to physically eliminate, as always, the Serbs first, but at the same time Partisan Croatia. While in such circumstances, that Home Guard Croatia is forced to make a choice, because in such extreme situations there is no longer any room for a middle way, but any indecision is actually support for violent and Ustasha Croatia. And then it splits into a liberal part that mostly supports Partisan Croatia, and a minority that still has no problem with the violent. And into a conservative part that mostly sides with Ustasha Croatia, but again not entirely, because moral people who belong to that part of society, like the Bishop of Rijeka, Mate Uzinić, do not allow the context and ideology to take away their morality and intellect.
This is exactly the situation we have today. Europe and the world sliding into fascism, Ustasha Croatia that feels that its time has come, a political leader who is aware that he does not have majority support in the public, so with the help of the violent he plans to stay in power, and Home Guard Croatia that is now reluctantly faced with the decision of what to do. The only thing that may seem paradoxical, but in the context of contemporary Croatia it is not at all, is that the newly proclaimed leader of the Ustasha revolution does not come from that milieu, but from the partisan milieu, and here I am talking about Andrej Plenković. However, this very fact makes him the authentic successor of Franjo Tuđman, who also came from the partisan milieu.
It didn't seem that way at the very beginning of his rule, but the excessive concentration of power created a sense of omnipotence in Plenković, quite detached him from reality, and put him in a situation where losing power seemed unthinkable to him and something that must definitely be prevented.
In other words, he is essentially trying, with what he did around the reception of the bronze medal-winning handball team in Zagreb and what he has been persistently doing ever since Marko Perković Thompson called for a right-wing revolution and takeover of power, to prevent the likely loss of power in the next parliamentary elections, but also to violently overthrow the government in Zagreb, which he cannot win in any way.
Or, as Tuđman himself once said, when HDZ de facto permanently lost Zagreb, that he could not tolerate the opposition situation in the capital.
For a long time, this did not seem possible and it seemed that Croatian society had progressed far enough that a new fall into the Ustasha abyss and the dictatorship of one man and his party could not happen to it, but with yesterday's open violation of the law and the removal of powers from local self-government, Andrej Plenković embarked on the path of Aleksandar Vučić's model of government.
And this is precisely the only turning point in which it is still possible to stop him in his plans. But only a new coalition of Partisans and a large part of Home Guard Croatia will be able to do this, or in an operational sense, a coalition of all those who do not want to live in a country of pro-Ustasha-minded thugs, a public television that looks like the ruling party's bulletin, a complete fusion of church and state, and a country where laws exist only for those who are not in the ruling party.
Zagreb Mayor Tomislav Tomašević, who in his previous political activities had shied away from these topics and sincerely believed that communal politics could make the discussion about the country's civilizational development irrelevant, definitely understood this. It became clear to him that we are facing a dictatorship of bullies and the party that sponsors them, and he decided to clearly resist it. With integrity and laws. The rest is up to the courage, reason, intelligence and consistency of those who do not want to live in Tuđman's Croatia 2.0.
Bonus video:
