The Croatian Revolutionary Brotherhood (CRB) (Croatian: Hrvatsko Revolucionarno Bratstvo or HRB), also known as Ustasha, was an Australian-based Croatian separatist terrorist organisation.[1][2][3][4]
The organisation was established by four Croatian emigres: Jure Maric, Ilija Tolic, Josip Oblak, and Geza Pasti. Geza Pasti was a former Ustashi officer.[5] The organisation carried out terrorist actions in Europe and Australia.[6] The organisation was active throughout the territory of Yugoslavia in the early and mid-1960s. Its aim was to start an uprising in Yugoslavia and to establish an independent Croatia. This mission failed due to the intervention of the State Security Administration, the Yugoslav secret police.[7]
In 1972 CRB was renamed to Croatian Illegal Revolutionary Organization.[5]
Actions edit
- Action Kangaroo (July 1963) The objective was to focus on the Croatian villages and provincial enterprises in northern Yugoslavia, spreading anti-Communist propaganda and promoting civil unrest.[5]
- Belgrade cinema bombing in 1968
- Belgrade train station bombing in 1968
- Uprising attempt in Bugojno, 1972[8][9]
- Action Kaktus; a sabotage attempt on the 1975 tourist season[10][11]
Notable members edit
Some notable CRB members were:
- Jure Maric
- Ilija Tolic
- Josip Oblak
- Adolf Andrić
- Ilija Glavas
- Blaž Kraljević
- Geza Pašti
- Josip Senić
These people were also members of Ante Pavelić's Croatian Liberation Movement (HOP) but they left that organisation because they decided they would not achieve their goals through the political route.[5]
UDBA, the Yugoslav secret police, attempted to curb the group's terrorist activities by engaging in covert assassinations of its members. Geza Pašti was killed in Nice in 1965, and Marijan Šimundić was killed in Stuttgart in 1967.[12]
The CRB/HRB's motto was: "Život za Hrvatsku" ["Life for Croatia"].[citation needed]
See also edit
References edit
- ^ Jaensch, Dean (1992). The Macmillan Dictionary of Australian politics. Melbourne: Macmillan. p. 215. ISBN 978-0-7329-1445-5.
- ^ Atkins, Stephen E. (1992). Terrorism: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara. Calif.: ABC-CLIO. p. 109. ISBN 978-0-87436-670-9.
- ^ Aarons, Mark (2001). War Criminals Welcome: Australia, A Sanctuary for Fugitive War Criminals Since 1945. Melbourne: Black Inc. p. 15.
- ^ Koschade 2009, p. 12, 296.
- ^ a b c d Brawley, Sean (2009). "Croatian Revolutionary Brotherhood". Doomed to Repeat? Terrorism and the Lessons of History. New Academia Publishing. ISBN 9781955835046.
- ^ Cain, Frank (1994). "ASIO in the 1960s and 1970s". The Australian Security Intelligence Organization: An Unofficial History. Abington; New York, NY: F. Cass. pp. 206–207. ISBN 978-1-136-29385-6. OCLC 819635772 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ Hockenos, Paul (2003). "Chapter 3: The Avengers of Bleiburg". Homeland Calling: Exile Patriotism and the Balkan Wars. pp. 60–61. doi:10.7591/9781501725654. ISBN 978-1-5017-2565-4. OCLC 606993935.
- ^ Adriano & Cingolani 2018, pp. 434–435.
- ^ Tokic, Mate Nikola (6 August 2012). "The End of 'Historical-Ideological Bedazzlement': Cold War Politics and Emigre Croatian Separatist Violence, 1950-1980". Social Science History. 36 (3). Duke University Press: 421–445. doi:10.1215/01455532-1595408. ISSN 0145-5532. JSTOR 23258106. S2CID 246273836.
- ^ Tokić, Mate Nikola (2011). "Party Politics, National Security, and Émigré Political Violence in Australia, 1949–1973". In Heitmeyer, Wilhelm; Haupt, Heinz-Gerhard; Malthaner, Stefan; Kirschner, Andrea (eds.). Control of Violence. New York, NY: Springer New York. pp. 395–396. doi:10.1007/978-1-4419-0383-9. ISBN 978-1-4419-0382-2. OCLC 695388665.
- ^ Brawley, Sean (2009). Doomed to Repeat? Terrorism and the Lessons of History. Washington, DC: New Academia Publishing, LLC. pp. 283–298. ISBN 978-1-955835-04-6. OCLC 1265464219.
- ^ Adriano & Cingolani 2018, p. 434.
Bibliography edit
- Adriano, Pino; Cingolani, Giorgio (2018). "Epilogue The Question of the Ustasha between Yugoslavia and the Vatican, 1952–72". Nationalism and Terror: Ante Pavelić and Ustasha Terrorism from Fascism to the Cold War. Budapest; New York: Central European University Press. pp. 409–436. ISBN 978-963-386-206-3. JSTOR 10.7829/j.ctv4cbhsr. OCLC 8182808968.
- Koschade, Stuart (2009). "The Croatian Revolutionary Brotherhood: Action Kangaroo". In Brawley, Sean (ed.). Doomed to Repeat: Terrorism and the Lessons of History. Washington DC: New Academic Publishing. pp. 227–303. ISBN 9780981865492.
- Koschade, Stuart (2007). The Internal Dynamics of Terrorist Cells: A Social Network Analysis of Terrorist Cells in an Australian Context (PhD thesis). Queensland University of Technology.
- Cottle, Drew; Keys, Angela (2022). "Fascism in Exile: Ustasha-Linked Organisations in Australia". In Smith, Evan; Persian, Jane; Fox, Vashti Jane (eds.). Histories of Fascism and Anti-Fascism in Australia. London: Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781003120964-7. ISBN 978-1-003-12096-4.
- Tokić, Mate Nikola (2020). Croatian Radical Separatism and Diaspora Terrorism During the Cold War. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press. ISBN 9781557538918.