ARMY / POLICE - CROTIA / SERBIA
Zoran Daskalovic of the Split weekly Feral Tribune analyzes in the June 16, 1997 issue of that magazine the effects of the politicization of the Croatian Army, in the light of the pre-election attack on the presidential candidate Vlado Gotovac, by an army officer.
With the attack of officer Tomislav Brzovic on Vlado Gotovac, Croatia started to reap what Franjo Tudjman, Gojko Susak and the top of the HDZ state regime sawed in the Croatian army during the last few years. Brzovics hits - combined with the shouts We are Ustashis! Long live Ante Pavelic!, and threats that he will kill all those that think and speak of a different Croatia - testify that the fear present for some time now of the possibility of misuse of party oriented army are well grounded. At the same time, this certifies that gone with the wind are the warnings about the dangers of of the Croatian Army and its subordination to interests of the ruling structure, spoken out in the last few years by the high army officials. In spite of the fact that they have contributed to the creation of the Croatian Army and defence of Croatia, all of them, as is the case with many others, have been purged in their or that manner, form the military ranks.
Although there are indications that Brzovic attack is an expression of the problems within the First Guard Corps /elite army unit/, it is, after all, a consequence of the process which developed in Croatia from Autumn 1991. If the information is correct that in recent days forty members of the First Guard Corps have been fired and sent to the employment office (because the drawn out security checkups showed that they are not devoted to the Leader, under whose direct command they are, and to whom they are personal guard, but to extreme political structures whose services Tudjman used during the war), and that Brzovic executed the attack under the instructions from the Corps, the attack on Gotovac can be interpreted even as a warning to Tudjman, that they are his children and that with creation of a chaos and threatening of the minimum of democratic standards, they will resist their potential suppression and removal from the army ranks.
Resisting supposed Tudjman intention to remove from the army ranks in the post war period, or at least push into the back row those that swear to Ante Pavelic and Ustashi movement, so that the Army can be organized in accordance with criteria of the Western alliances, which it wants to join, the self proclaimed Ustashis have started at the same time a fight to retain and strengthen their position, preparing themselves for the period after Tudjman.
Although Tudjman and HDZ started to organize party army even before the war, organizing security police units, even at that time, quite a wider number of volunteers joined in, among them 2500 officers and junior officers who have left the JNA and joined the National Guard Corps /ZNG/, as well as 18,000 reserve officers, members of the territorial defence of Croatia which gathered their military knowledge in the JNA. The number of the members of the ZNG rose with lightning speed up from a number of 20 thousand it had in September 1991, to 70,000 in October of the same year.
The main command of the ZNG was dominated by the former JNA officers, since, along with 20 former members of the Foreign legion, they were the only one who had any military background to be able to command the army.
There are numerous reasons for the exodus of the former JNA officers from the Croatian army, but two are the key ones: Tudjmans and HDZ passion to rule unhindered of all segments of the state and society, as well as distrust, and even hatred of the powerful group of returned emigres against all and everything which was connected with the structures of former Yugoslavia. The differences with Tudjman flamed up first of all because of the insistence that the Army be lead by the Main command and that the politics should not meddle in the military matters, particularly into orders during military activities, but also because of the estimates of the former JNA officers that the JNA barracks should have been blockaded in the early months of the war.
It is not without meaning that the members of the war Main command of the Croatian Army who came from the former JNA still insist today that the units under their command and control did not commit war crimes, since they respected war conventions. On the other side, they are convinced that the investigation about the crimes committed in certain areas have shown who and under what command committed them, and that investigation was never conducted.
The ongoing purge of the former JNA members and numerous others from the Croatian army who did not want to place themselves under party control and serve party interests, Franjo Tudjman was left with such officers corps in the Croatian Army, as he promoted himself. This means that Croatia will enter the post - Tudjman period with ideologically colored army, which is impregnated with politics and internal strife. They were announce by Brzovic, hitting with his army belt presidential candidate Vlado Gotovac across the head.
Source: Split weekly Feral Tribune, June 16, 1997
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