Nationalism and mythology
including the use of the slogan ‘Za dom spremni’ – ready for the homeland – and other Ustasha paraphernalia, highlights the consequences of fusing potent nationalistic mythologies to legitimize and justify political ends. 34
When discussing nationalism in the context of the dissolution of Yugoslavia, then, it is clear that the role of popular history and mythology should not be underestimated. To the extent that nationalism can be said to have caused the conflict, so too can such mythologizing, whether on the part of politicians, media organizations, or religious institutions. It was through the adoption and embracing of popular history that nationalist politicians like Slobodan Milosevic and Franjo Tudjman were able to gain power in the first place, as they placed the rebirth and revival of the past at the fore of their appeal. Having done so, they were then able to use that same history to secure their political ends, whether that be the reassertion of Serbian dominance within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the case of Milosevic, or the affirmation of Croatia as an independent state in the case of Tudjman. More than that though, it was through that same weaponizing of history that the case for conflict and violence could be made; in Serbia, the memory of genocide and oppression at the hands of fascism served as reminder of what unchecked Croatian power would mean for their safety, while across the border the sanctity of Croatia’s status as the farthest reaching Christian kingdom gave their defeat of Orthodoxy and Islam all the more relevance. And, perhaps most worryingly of all, when it came to the violence itself, historical memories had a role to play. They facilitated and excused the worst excesses of Serbian militarism, while incentivizing a renaissance of fascist ideology and Islamophobia amongst Croatian paramilitary organizations. While it may be true, in some cases at least, that George Santayana was correct in suggesting that ‘ those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it ’ , when examining the conflict in Yugoslavia, it seems it was exactly the remembrance and resurrection of the past that enabled it to be repeated in its worst excesses. 35
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b00tdptg [Accessed 20 July 2020] Berghaus, G. (1996) Fascism and Theatre: Comparative Studies on the Aesthetics and Politics of Performance in Europe, 1925-1945 . Berghahn Books, p. 17. [Online] Available At: www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1c0gm3z [Accessed 27th June 2020] Denich, B. (1994). ‘ Dismembering Yugoslavia: Nationalist Ideologies and the Symbolic Revival of Genocide ’, [online] available at: www.jstor.org/stable/645894 [Accessed 19 th July 2020] Engelberg, S. (1991) The New York Times. [online] Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/09/01/magazine/carving-out-a-greater- serbia.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm [Accessed 18th July 2020] Glenny, M. (1996) The Fall of Yugoslavia. London ICTY Trial of Pavle Strugar. (2005) [online] Available at: https://www.icty.org/x/cases/strugar/tjug/en/str-tj050131e.pdf [Accessed 19 th July 2020] Judah, T. (2009) The Serbs . New Haven Kinzer, S. (1993) The New York Times. [Online] Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1993/10/31/world/pro-nazi-rulers-legacy-still-lingers-for- croatia.html [Accessed 18 th July 2020]
34 Milekic, S. (2020). 35 Macmillan, M. (2010): 147.
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