No. 1

ON JULY 26, 1941, THE FIELD COMMAND ZAGREB REPORTS TO THE GERMAN GENERAL IN ZAGREB ON CRIMES AGAINST THE SERBS, THE REACTION OF THE CROATIAN POPULATION THERETO, THE ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE WEHRMACHT OF THEIR TOLERATING PERSECUTIONS, AND ABOUT SABOTAGE ACTS, PERSECUTIONS OF JEWS AND THE REACTION OF ITALIANS.^[1]

Attachment 1^[2]

Transcript!

Confidential!

Field Command Zagreb Zagreb, July 26, 1941

Major at the headquarters

I c^[3]

For

THE GERMAN GENERAL^[4]

Zagreb.

The mood among the population is still very restless. The facts, especially those from the province, are becoming known in wider circles, which greatly increases the feeling of insecurity.

The Croatian officers of the Orthodox faith who were released by the German Wehrmacht as Croats returned to their homeland to be arrested there by Croats (Ustashas) and threatened with death. The threats come in many ways from those people who were fired in the past because of communist activities, and now want to take revenge on company managers or executives. The Croatian army will probably not allow such actions.

When the families of Germans from the Reich were looking for their Orthodox relatives, it was determined that on the night between May 11 and 12, 1941, 380 inhabitants of the town of Glina were taken away, and so far it has not been possible to find out if they are alive, even with the help of the Field Command.^[5] The new head of the hospital knows nothing, the new judge knows nothing, the commander of the local Ustashas knows nothing, and in addition to that, another doctor and a female physician, a shop owner, etc. have disappeared. During the personal visit of the undersigned, it could be seen that the entire business life of this small town is stagnant and that most shops are closed. Undoubtedly, the consequences will be a big drop in tax revenues. Similar phenomena were found in Sisak, although the scope was not so great. In one night, 36 inhabitants disappeared, and the owner of a large factory there was also killed.^[6]

It is self-evident that these events are not approved by the majority of the Croatian population either. On the contrary, the Croatian population is even trying to help the mentioned circles, because these are families that have been living in Croatia for generations and which are related to both Volksdeutscher^[7] and Croatian circles.

The population is of the opinion that leading figures such as Marshal Kvaternik,^[8] who was brought up in the glorious tradition of the Austrian army, know nothing about these events, because they are purely Ustasha actions; numerous communists have taken the opportunity to settle inside their circles and are using this time to become successful in their own way.

And when under these circumstances the peasants flee to the forests to defend themselves there, it cannot be considered an action against the Croatian state or the German Wehrmacht, but only as an act of despair. Observed from the aspect of the German Wehrmacht, the most unpleasant accompanying phenomenon of all these events is the fact that the population of the Independent State of Croatia considers, which is expressed as well, how all this is happening with the knowledge and tacit tolerance of the German Wehrmacht. The population cannot understand that the German Wehrmacht, which has conquered this country, calmly observes how people who did not contribute anything to the founding of this state and just want to profit, behave in such a way, because it is clear to ordinary people that the Croatian state was founded by the German Reich, when no Ustasha movement existed.

The population is undoubtedly in possession of a large amount of weapons, which partly come from the stocks of the former Yugoslav army and are sold to the upset parts of the population.

The collection of weapons by the German Wehrmacht was interrupted in a certain way by the establishment of the Independent State of Croatia. A clear position on whether the order of the German Wehrmacht has been revoked has not yet been given. It would be desirable for the state if only the army, gendarmerie and police were considered to be the bearers of weapons, and the Ustashas only during service.

It should also be noted that in many cases, it has been determined that the local Ustasha authorities do not care about the orders of higher government services, but ignore them.

This whole development should be considered extremely worrying from the point of view of the security of the troops in Croatia. Numerous acts of sabotage on railway installations should be viewed as indications in this direction as well, regardless of the fact that so far the damage has not been of any great extent.

The economy will probably be the first to suffer grave consequences, because in many cases, companies are run by unprofessional and incompetent commissioners, who will spend the existing property, and then shut down the companies. The large drop in taxes from these companies, which can be expected, will confirm this opinion, regardless of the fact that the state has issued other tax decisions in the amount of twice as much as before, as reported here from business circles.

The deportation of the Jewish population to Italy has been stopped, because the Jews there are allegedly treated very well, and they are given the opportunity to be involved in business. These elements, due to their good knowledge of the country of Italy, will hold up on the basis of their strong economic influence and despite the local order for deportation from Italy. Also, it is reported that the local Italian business circles declare themselves accordingly, that they have no understanding for the action against the Jews taken at the request of Germany. The Italian economy is likely to profit from these ties.

Confirming the accuracy of the transcript Field Commander represents

Kalmar^[9] personal signature I.V.

Captain. signed by Knehe^[10]

Major.

^[1] Archives of Vojvodina (hereinafter AV), Ф. 562, Personal Fonds of Slavko Odić (1915-2006), 1909-1983. (hereinafter Ф. 562), Dossier of the Commander of the Security Police and the Security Service in Belgrade on Ustasha crimes (1941-1942) – archive unit 3.1.1.2. (134-135); hereinafter in Cyrillic letters АВ, Ф. 562, 3.1.1.2, 134-135.

^[2] Handwritten note.

^[3] Intelligence Department [at a military command or staff].

^[4] Edmund Glaise von Horstenau, with the rank of German General in Zagreb, representative of the German Army (Wehrmacht) in the Independent State of Croatia; B. Krizman, Ustaše i Treći Reich, Vols. I-II, Globus: Zagreb 1983; G. fon Horstenau, Između Hitlera i Pavelića (Memoari kontroverznog generala), Translated from German [into Serbian] by N. Živković, Beograd: Nolit, 2007; Removed from office in September 1944, he committed suicide in the Allies-held prison in Nuremberg in 1945.

^[5] It is most likely Field Command (Feldkommandantur) Zagreb. This field command was one of the military-administrative commands of the German army on the territory of the Independent State of Croatia, which were subordinated to the German general in Zagreb. Other field commands were stationed in: Karlovac, Bjelovar, Slavonski Brod (Brod na Savi), Osijek, Sarajevo, Bihać (Knin), Mostar, Zadar, Split and Dubrovnik (the last four after the capitulation of Italy). The local commands (Ortskommandanturen) were subordinated to them. These commands had exclusively military and garrison tasks within the Wehrmacht, and did not have military tasks toward the population as in occupied Serbia.

^[6] The brutally murdered industrialist Miloš Teslić, as evidenced by the photos in this book (photographs 15 and 16).

^[7] The term Volksdeutsche was used for members of the German national/ethnic minority. For Germans from Germany (German Reich), the name Germans from the Reich was used (Reichsdeutsche).

^[8] Commander of the Armed Forces of the Independent State of Croatia (Home Guard/domobranstvo) and Deputy of the Supreme Leader (poglavnik) Ante Pavelić until October 1942 Slavko Kvaternik. In German documents, his military title was marshal; he was removed in October 1942. At the 1947 trial, he was sentenced to death; D. Stuparić (Ed.), Tko je tko u NDH. Hrvatska 1941.-1945, Zagreb: Minerva, 1997, 226-227 (S. Ravlić).

^[9] Intelligence (I c) officer with the Military Commander in Serbia.

^[10] Wilhelm Knehe, intelligence (I c) officer of the Field Command Zagreb. On the role of Major Knehe in the action of rescuing Serbian children from the camp, see: Dnevnik Diane Budisavljević 1941-1945, S. Szabo (Ed.), Zagreb: Hrvatski državni arhiv, Jasenovac: Javna ustanova Spomen-područje, 2003.

Subeditor’s Note

This – English – edition of the book is a translation of the one in the Serbian language, published in 2022 under the title Ustaška zverstva: Zbornik dokumenata (1941–1942). As far as the corpus of the Dossier from the personal fonds of Slavko Odić is concerned – and it makes the essential body of this book – the translation team worked from its Serbian version given in the said book and not from the German original.

The Serbian edition, with the documents translated from German, was printed in the Cyrillic alphabet, which necessitated some explanations provided by the Editor, Dr. Milan Koljanin, with regard to the linguistic traits, orthography and punctuation resorted to by the translators from German into Serbian (Tatjana Janićijević, Akademija Oxford) and the Editor. Naturally enough, numerous clarifications referring to the Serbian edition do not apply on the English one in most of the aspects of translation work. Hence the need to write this Note.

To begin with, the translators basically opted for the varieties of the American English rather than British English.

Personal names in the officially processed documents are most often written in what is today considered inverse order: family name/surname first, followed by one’s first/Christian name, without a comma in between.

Originally, the documents (letters, reports, statements etc.) were written (typed) in bureaucratic style and with a page layout practised by German offices, so these traits have been retained herein, and so have the obvious spelling and/or typing errors (personal names, toponyms); the latter have been corrected in the footnotes. The parts of text/sentences which are underlined or written with spaces between letters as means of emphasis correspond to the German original and its Serbian/Croat counterpart. The same applies to whole words or lines written in capital letters.

Punctuation has been kept almost completely, except when the meaning demanded comma (usually related to the rules of word order in an English sentence). Some marks, such as hyphens, dashes or slashes may impress the Reader as outdated or misplaced. Earlier typewriters did not have buttons with parentheses, and the slash was used instead of them.

Dates are written with differing uses or omissions of period (full stop), whereby month is written in three ways: fully in letters (20 January), in Arabic numerals (e.g. 20.1.) or Roman numerals (e.g. 20.I.). In rare cases, the slash can be found in dates (e.g. 12./X. 1941), but not as a regular separator between their constituents. Years are occasionaly written without the first digit, e.g. 942 instead of 1942, which is a frequent occurrence in oral communication.

Abbreviations, other than official identification means for offices, titles or codenames (VB, MA, RSHA etc.), have been translated (e.g. ’etc.’). The translators chose to retain the Croat/Serbian abbreviation for the name of the wartime ’state’, that is, ’NDH’ is standing for Nezavisna Država Hrvatska (Independent State of Croatia) instead of the less known English name (ISC). Some words were written in a shortened form for the reason of economy of expression, and the habit has been transferred to the translation, including the Editor’s intervention in the Serbian edition: Reg.[ister], Gend.[armerie], Gor[nja] Tuzla.

Footnotes in the English edition partially differ from those in the Serbian version. Some proved to be unnecessary (those that provided original names which were transliterated into the phonetical Cyrillic alphabet). New footnotes have been added by the Subeditor in order to explain/clarify the specific, locally used, words or phrases with which the Reader may not be familiar (such as slava, din, sokolski dom), or to indicate some nuances in the meaning (student, profesor). Here and there, the Reader will find notes in brackets inserted into the main body of the text by translators or the Editor where immediate understanding was needed.

Finally, it is noteworthy that the above-mentioned bureaucratic style of the presented documents mirrors the established conventions of communication in Central Europe and the Balkans of the first half of the 20th century, particularly in state and military affairs, yet also illustrates the specific ’hierarchy’ of various authorities on the occupied territories during World War Two, accentuating the relations between the German organs/institutions in power and the various offices subordinated to the administrative and military system of the Third Reich. As to the information, facts and accounts of events recorded in these documents, they are the subject of the history science and studies related thereto.

A. Č. P.