Preliminary communication
Activities of the post Second World War anti-communist «reactionaries» in Solin in the UDB file of Živko Grubić (1950-1952)
Blanka Matković
Abstract
At the end of October 1944, partisan forces captured Solin, Split, and the entire central Dalmatian area. From that moment, the organization of anti-communist resistance began, which in the second half of the 1940s mainly manifested through the activities of crusader groups and illegal political organizations such as those gathered around Frane Bettini and Frane Tente. However, besides these groups, the «reactionaries» continued their activities through former supporters of the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS – Hrvatska seljačka stranka), like Jozo Bulj, who was discussed in one of the previous issues of Tusculum. This paper serves as a sort of continuation of the mentioned work on Jozo Bulj, specifically the post-war activities of the HSS supporters in Solin. The aim of the paper is to present the activities of a group of former HSS members from Solin in the early 1950s when the
activities of armed anti-communist groups ceased, but resistance continued in the shadow
of the Yugoslav conflict with the Western allies due to the situation about Trieste. This concerns the activities of the «Joskan's group», whose actions and organization are attempted to be reconstructed through the UDB (Uprava državne bezbednosti = State Security Administration) file of the group member Živko Grubić, which is kept and available in the State Archives in Split and contains preserved statements from other members of the mentioned group. Based on the preserved interrogation records, presented are conversations among group members, depicting the post-war daily life in Solin and revealing that at least until the mid-1950s, Solin's «mačekovci» (followers of the policies of Vladko Maček) lived in anticipation of a new world conflict that would lead to drastic political changes in the then Yugoslavia and sought to maintain the longing for a Croatian state that would not be governed from foreign centres of power. Thus, this paper aims to contribute to understanding of the post-war history of the Solin area, which has so far has remained on the margins of historiography.
Keywords
Dalmatia; Second World War; Croatian Peasant Party (Hrvatska seljačka stranka); Josip Gašpić; Jozo Bulj; post-war period; anti-communist resistance; Solin; UDB; Živko Grubić
Hrčak ID:
322583
URI
Publication date:
15.11.2024.
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