Communism To Yugoslavia example essay topic

In this paper I will be discussing the reason for the rise of Communism and its Power and Authority and the fall. The first time around when Communism was introduced was at the end of world war one, when Yugoslavia got it's communist party. It was very strong but couldn't effectively create a communist regime. Then during World War two, Germany, Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria broke up Yugoslavia and annexed the parts to them selves. Germany created the "Independent State of Croatia" (NDH), which consisted pretty much the entire northern parts of Yugoslavia, Which were Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and small parts of Serbia. Germany and Italy supported the NDH and began diverting natural resources to the Nazi regimented areas.

The Nazis made Ante Pavel ic head of the NDH. His Ustase storm troopers began eliminating the two million Serbs, Jews, and Gypsies living within the borders of NDH, through forced religious conversion, deportation, and extreme violence. Beyond this, the Serbs were massacred and humiliated in other parts of Yugoslavia by Albania (which was then in collaboration with Italy), Bulgaria and Hungary. Understandably the Serbs rose up to defend their nation and their lives. Initially Resistance in Yugoslavia developed mainly in isolated units of the Yugoslav army, and among Serbs fleeing genocide from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

This is where Communism comes into play. A group of partisans, devoted to the liberation and recreation of Yugoslavia backed by the Communist regime of the U.S.S. R push for the liberation of the German controlled regions as well as other regions controlled by foreign governments. The communist-led Partisans eventually grew into Yugoslavia's largest, most active resistance group. The Partisan leader was Josip Broz Tito, son of a Croatian-Slovenian peasant family. The Partisan slogan "Death to Fascism, Freedom to the People", combined with a pan-Yugoslav appeal, won recruits for Tito across the country -- despite the fact that before the war the communists had worked for the breakup of Yugoslavia. Despite the setbacks such as loss of western Serbia and Montenegro, Bosnian Serbs and other Yugoslavs flocked to the Partisans.

This gives enough proof that Tito was playing on the despair of the Yugoslavian people to bring in communism to Yugoslavia. In November 1942, the Partisan leaders, anxious to gain political legitimacy, convened the first meeting of the Anti- Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia (AVNOJ). Stalin forbade Tito from declaring AVNOJ a provisional government because the Russians feared that they were not going to be able to gain full control of Yugoslavia. Hence Tito did not notify Russia of this meeting of the AVNOJ, which enraged Stalin. With Britain's support for the partisans they were able to fight the Germans, but Tito was worried that Britain might force Yugoslavia into a democracy, which he did not want, so he sets up a secret meeting with Stalin to arrange for the Russians to enter Yugoslavia, and to secure Stalin's word that the Red Army would leave the country once it was secure, without interfering with the local politics. At this point it gets clear to me that Tito had everything worked out and was playing all sides to bring in communism and at the same time be an independent state -without Russia's involvement.

The Red army, crossed the border on October 1st, and a joint Partisan-Soviet force freed Belgrade on October 20th. The majority of the Red Army then continued into Hungary, leaving the Partisans and the Western Allies to crush the remaining Germans and Ustase. When the Partisans advanced into Croatia, Ustase leaders and collaborators fled to Austria with regular Croatian and Slovenian troops. The Partisans finally occupied Trieste, Istria, (part taken over by Italy during the war) and some Slovenian enclaves in Austria, but they withdrew from some of these areas after the Allies persuaded Tito to let the postwar peace conferences to create new borders. And finally the Partisans crushed a small Albanian nationalist revolt in Kosovo after Tito and Albanian Communist leader Enter Hoxha announced that they would return Kosovo to Yugoslavia. Thus Communism was brought into Yugoslavia by planning and collaboration of one man with many nations.

The communists under Tito emerged from the war as sole rulers of Yugoslavia, without major Soviet assistance. On March 7, 1945, a single provisional Yugoslav government took office with Tito as prime minister and war minister and Tito's supporters occupying almost all cabinet posts. New election laws barred alleged wartime collaborators from voting and all candidates had to be nominated by the communist-controlled People's Front, the descendant of the wartime People's Liberation Front that encompassed all non-collaborationist political parties and organizations. The newly elected Constituent Assembly dissolved the monarchy and established the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia on November 29, 1945. Two months later, it adopted a Soviet-style constitution that provided for a federation of six republics under a strong central government. In an effort to prevent Serbian domination of the new state, the regime made separate republics of Montenegro and Macedonia and created within Serbia itself an ethnically mixed Autonomous Province of Vojvodina and a mostly Albanian Autonomous Region of Kosovo.

Furthermore, the regime divided Serbian land into three "nations", the Serbs, Croats, and Muslims, taking a shot to overcome competing Serbian and Croatian claims to that republic. It also included restricted wording on the inviolability of the home, the right to work, freedom of speech, association, and religion, and other rights. Tito headed the party, government, and armed forces; his party functionaries oversaw the industries and supervised republican and local officials. Thus we see the efficient and orderly application of Communism in Yugoslavia without any out side help or interference.

But the entire ideology was very identical to Russian Communism custom made to fit Yugoslavia and its people and six republics. Tito, put into operation the Stalinist style of communism for rapid industrial development. He nationalized virtually all the country's wealth except privately held land. State planners set wages and prices and compiled a pompous five-year plan that emphasized on exploiting of domestic raw materials, developing heavy industry, and economic growth in underdeveloped regions. They relied on tax and price policies and export of foodstuffs, timber, mineral, and metal exports to generate capital. They redirected the bulk of their trade toward the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

Another aspect where Communism completely destroyed old world order was religion influence in society. They joint forces with communists of the neighboring nations to choke off religious or political opposition (Not only with Russia and being pluralistic thus making sure that Russia was no way able to single handedly influence any of Yugoslavian local politics). The fall of Communism is very diverse depending on the republic. Unlike Russia where the fall of communism started with Gorbachev implementing changes to facilitate development, in Yugoslavia the fall was directly linked with the chain of events with the fall of communism within the U.S.S.R. Yugoslavia is a group of different ethnic people all with different aims in their societies as whole. Centuries Montenegrin society was composed of families organized into clans. Hence, Loyalty to their people and protection of family their honor was the principal values.

Civic responsibility was a foreign idea. They were not in any hurry to catch up with the fast paced world or be brought up to date in technology. But they were deeply depended on Serbian economy as was kosovo and hence those two had no choice other than to stick it out with Serbia. Croats and Slovenes identified themselves more with their western counterparts, the developed part of Europe, and they were also homogenous to the land they occupied. They saw democracy and market economy as the way for them to reach their goals of economic prosperity and technological development. That created a desire within Slovenes and the Croats to want out of the Communist Yugoslavia.

Macedonians had a different agenda for wanting out of the communist Yugoslavia. To put it briefly without any historical perspective, Macedonia was split three ways and partitioned among Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Greece and hence Macedonians as an ethnic group were fast loosing their heritage, culture and even land to majority ethnic groups in the three respective nations. This was the main driving force for a separatist movement within Macedonia. Beyond that there were more minority groups such as Albanians who had come into Yugoslavia during the occupation during the Second World War, and Croatian Muslims to the north who felt that they faced severe religious persecution from the Communist state. Finally the gypsies living within the borders of Yugoslavia too wanted a free Yugoslavia detached from the bondage they were in within the communist state. The major blow to the Communist Yugoslavia was the instable economy.

It was clear that Yugoslavia did all of its trade with the Soviet bloc and the nations behind the iron curtain. Due to this, Yugoslavia was not able to keep up with the developments going on in the rest of the world or was it able to compete with them. Their industries, which were mainly chemical, shipbuilding and Automotives were not doing so well. The chemical industry was stagnant and so was Shipbuilding.

Beyond that both, the ships and the cars they made were not able to compete in the international market and were mainly marketed in Communist nations, where they had to compete with Russian made vehicles. And thus the outcome was that, between 1991 and 1992, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina forcibly seceded from Yugoslavia, while Macedonia did so peacefully. The break-up of Yugoslavia was legitimized by the international powers that recognized the right of self-determination to all nations except the Serbs who generally wanted to continue living in Yugoslavia. The secessionist republics were quickly granted recognition by the international community.

Serbia and Montenegro opted to stay on in the federation. Hence we can safely assume that the fall of Communism was brought about with the Break up of Yugoslavia. But the break up Yugoslavia was brought about by the fall of communism and the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Communism has left Yugoslavia in delayed state of economic and scientific development.

Add to that, the destruction and mayhem cause by the bloody separatist wars, Yugoslavia is in a state of degeneration. Hence Communism is pretty much the cause of the dilapidated state Yugoslavia is in right now. Directly it help back Yugoslavia form developing along with its western European neighbors, and indirectly through communist ideology of one nation and one society of one kind of people it created conflicts among the Yugoslavian people.

Bibliography

Dusan T. Batakovic, nationalism and communism: the yugoslav case", web " Government of the republic of Yugoslavia, 2002, web Ivo Bana c, With Stalin against Tito: Cominform ist Splits in Yugoslav Communism, Cornell University Press, 1998 M.
Hargrove, History Dept of the UNC at Chapel Hill. web Misha Glenn. The Balkans: Nationalism, War, and the Great Powers, 1804-1999, Penguin USA, 2001 Richard West, Tito and the Rise and Fall of Yugoslavia, Carroll & Graf publishers and incorporated, 1996 Svetozar Stojakovic, The Fall of Yugoslavia: Why Communism Failed, Prometheus Books, 1997.